A V I C E N N A

is: that all elements are equal in dominance and in being dominated, or are equal in the "fleeing being" and the "overcome being" This refers to the active and passive interactions of elemental qualities like heat and cold, which is false. For in that case, this body—namely, such a composite—would neither rest nor move. But every contained body is a body that is either resting or moving; therefore, this [premise] will also be false. And that which leads to a falsehood is itself false. Therefore, the discourse which says that it is possible for elements to be composed and mixed according to an equality of powers is a false discourse. Consequently, its contradictory—which is our own discourse, proving that such a thing is impossible—is true. The soul, therefore, does not arrive according to the path of the second division; thus it must arrive according to the third division. It therefore arrives from the outside; wherefore the soul arrives from the outside, and this is what we intended to declare.

Explanations on the third chapter.

A AND INDEED THE EXAMPLE of the first division, etc. Note that Avicenna, in providing examples from artificial things, first illustrates that the form of a natural composite tends toward one of the forms of the simple components making up that composite. For instance, if a medicine is made of honey and aloes mixed together, and the quantity of honey in it is small, while the quantity of aloes is very large, then the form of that composite food and its accidents In philosophy, "accidents" are non-essential qualities, like color or taste, that do not change the nature of the thing itself. tend toward the form of the aloe and toward its specific flavor.

B HOWEVER, THE EXAMPLE of the second division, etc. that is, the example of the second division, which was that the composite did not tend toward any of the forms of the simple elements. This is because, in such a composite, the component parts are equal and their qualities are equal. Thus, due to the resistance of parts equal in quantity and power, the mixture does not lean toward any of the forms of its components. It is like when the color white is mixed equally with black; then the color of that mixture leans neither toward white nor toward black because of the resistance of their equality, and it becomes like an ashy color original: "color cinericius"; gray. And although such a color, resulting from the different aforementioned parts, can be made artificially—where each part keeps its own form and color, and one does not act upon the other nor is acted upon by the other—nevertheless, it is not naturally possible for there to exist a complexioned mixture A "complexion" refers to the unique balance of the four qualities—hot, cold, wet, dry—within a living being. composed of elements of equal quantity refracted against each other, etc., whose form is a middle point, as was said regarding the color, as Avicenna will declare below.

C INDEED, THE EXAMPLE of the third division, etc. Here Avicenna places the example of the third division, or the third member of the division, which was: that the form of the composite does not lean toward any of the forms of the aforementioned simple elements, but the form arriving to it is a form added above that which the forms of the component simple elements require, etc., and it is a form added from the outside—