A, 3. 186ᵃ 9 — 186ᵇ 5.

This translation follows the standard Bekker numbering provided in the margins for scholarly reference.

This is crude and lacks any aporia impasse/logical puzzle, but once one absurd premise is granted, the rest follows. This, however, is not difficult. That Melissus argues fallaciously is clear. He thinks he has assumed that if everything that comes into being has a beginning, then that which does not come into being has no beginning. Furthermore, it is absurd to think that every thing has a beginning in terms of the object itself rather than in terms of time, and that this applies to genesis, not just in the simple sense, but also to alloiosis alteration/change in quality, as if change did not occur all at once. Next, why is it unmoved if it is one? For just as a part, such as this water, is one and moves within itself, why would the whole not do so as well? Furthermore, why could there not be alteration? Yet, it is not even possible for it to be one in species, except in the sense of that from which it originates.

Some natural philosophers speak of it as one in this way, but not in the way Melissus does; for a man is different in species from a horse, and they are contraries to one another. The same method of argument applies to Parmenides, and to any others if there are any specific to him. The solution is partly that the argument is false, and partly that it is not syllogistic. It is false insofar as he simply assumes that "being" is said in only one way, when it is said in many ways. It is non-syllogistic because, if one only took white things, even if "white" signifies one thing, the white things would be no less many and not one; for white will be one neither by continuity nor by definition. For the being of "white" will be one thing, and the being of "that which has received it" i.e., the subject will be another, and there will be nothing separate besides the white; for it is not separated, but the white and that to which it belongs are different in being. But Parmenides did not yet see this. It is necessary to accept that "being" signifies not only one thing, whatever it may be predicated of, but also that it is "what-is" and "what-is-one." For that which is accidental is said of some subject, so that the thing to which "being" is accidental will not be because it would be something else; it will be something non-existent. Therefore, "what-is" will not belong to anything else. For it will not be any existing thing, unless "being" signifies many things in such a way that each is something; but the premise is that "being" signifies one thing. If, therefore, "what-is" is not accidental to anything, but only to itself, why does "what-is" signify "being" any more than "non-being"? For if "what-is" is the same as "white," and the being of "white" is not "what-is" since it is impossible for "being" to be accidental to it, for nothing is a "being" that is not "what-is", then white is not a being not as something that is not, but as a total non-being. Therefore, "what-is" is not a being; for it is true to say that it is white, and this signified a non-being. So, if "white" also signifies "what-is," then "being" signifies more than one thing. Therefore, "being" will not even have magnitude, if it is "what-is"; for the being of each of the parts is different. That "what-is" is divided into another "what-is" is also clear by definition. For example, if "man" is "what-is," it is necessary that "animal" is "what-is" and "two-footed" is "what-is." For if it were not "what-is," it would be accidental, either to man or to some other subject. But this is impossible; for that is called accidental which can either belong or not belong, or that in whose definition the subject to which it is accidental is contained, or in which the definition of the subject is contained—for instance, "sitting" as something separable, whereas the definition of the nose is contained in "snub," to which we say "snubness" is accidental. Moreover, whatever is contained in the definitive formula, or those things from which it consists, the definition of the whole is not contained in their definition—for example, the definition of "man" is not in "two-footed," nor is the definition of "white man" in "white." If, therefore, these things are in this state and "two-footed" is accidental to man, it must be separable, so that it would be possible for man not to be two-footed, or the definition of "man" would be contained in the definition of "two-footed." But this is impossible; for the latter is contained in the definition of the former. But if "two-footed" and "animal" are accidental to something else, and neither is "what-is," then man would also be among those things accidental to another. But let "what-is" be accidental to nothing, and let that which is predicated of both, and that which is from these, be called what it is; therefore, the whole is from indivisible things.