ARISTOTLE

NOTES ON POSTERIOR ANALYTICS (I.1-10)

By Dr. Dave Yount
Mesa Community College
May 2013
Introduction
The following are detailed notes of Aristotles Posterior Analytics (Book I, chapters 1-14, and Book II, ch.
19), which were part of a Summer Project Grant, approved by the Maricopa County Community College
District. I would like to thank them for allowing me to spend time and effort on this research.
Please be aware that in what follows, these are actual sentences of Aristotles text in some cases, but this
is not the whole text. More importantly, I have deleted many unnecessary words, phrases, sentences, and/or
examples (when 3 would suffice), and added chapter headings (that should be very helpful), numbers, underlining,
italicizing, and so on, to make the text easier to understand. I have also added any notes or objections I may
have thought about along the way, which are underlined and highlighted in blue. I have also moved his
examples nearer to when he describes a principle (sometimes he says, e.g., X is Y and not-Y and then gives an
example of not-Y for several sentences, until finally getting to an example of Y; I moved the example to make it
more easily accessible).
In addition, these notes are in no way to be thought of as being a substitute for reading all of the Posterior
Analytics for oneself; these notes are merely what I thought was most important, and put into a form that I could
more easily understand.
Lastly, despite all these disclaimers, I do sincerely hope that these notes are of some value to the reader.
Posterior Analytics
BOOK I, Chs. 1-14
1 All Teaching/Learning Comes from Knowledge that Already Exists; Two Kinds of Awareness;
(71a-b). All teaching and all intellectual learning come about from already existing knowledge. Mathematical
sciences (and every other art) are acquired in this way. Arguments (deductive and inductive) proceed in this way;
both produce their teaching through what we are already aware of (deductive arguments get their premises as
from men who grasp them; inductive arguments prove the universal through the particular's being clear). [And
rhetorical arguments also persuade in the same way either through examples (induction) or through
enthymemes (deduction).]
It is necessary to be already aware of things in two ways: (1) of some things we must already believe that
they are (e.g. of the fact that everything is either affirmed or denied truly, one must believe that it is); and (2) of
some we must grasp what the thing said is (e.g. of the triangle, that it signifies this). Of others, we must be
already aware of both (1) and (2) (e.g. of the unit, both what it signifies and that it is).
You can become familiar by already being familiar with some things but gaining knowledge of the others
at the very same time (i.e. of whatever happens to be under the universal of which you have knowledge). E.g.,
that every triangle has angles equal to two right angles was already known; but one can discover that there is a
triangle in the semicircle here at the same time as the induction.
Before the induction or a deduction, in a way you know and in a way you do not. If you did not know if
a triangle is simpliciter [= in itself], how did you know that it has two right angles simpliciter? You know it
universally [DY: Does Aristotle meant that you know the kind of thing a triangle is (since that is what a universal
is, for him)? I am not sure what universally means here, exactly.] but not simpliciter. (Otherwise the puzzle in
the Meno will result; for you will learn either nothing or what you know.)
One should not attempt to solve it this way: Do you (or don't you) know of every pair that it is even?
When you say, Yes, they bring forward some pair that you didnt think was a pair or that it was even. They
solve it by denying that people know of every pair that it is even, but only of anything of which they know that it
is a pair. But they know what they have demonstration of and which they have their premises of; and they got
them not about everything of which they know that it is a triangle or that it is a number, but of every number


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and triangle simpliciter. For no proposition of such a type is assumed (that what you know to be a number or
what you know to be rectilinear), but they are assumed as holding of every case. [DY: Is holding of every case
the universal knowledge he mentioned above?]
Nothing prevents one from in a sense knowledge and in a sense being ignorant of what one is learning;
what is absurd is not that you should know in some sense what you are learning, but that you should know it in
the way and sense in which you are learning it.
2 Knowledge Simpliciter; Knowledge through Demonstration; Definitions of Proposition,
Dialectical, Contradiction, Posit, Axiom, Supposition, and Definition Itself; Must Be Aware of
the True Premises of a Demonstration and More Certain of Them Than the Conclusion (71b72b). We know a thing simpliciter whenever we think we are aware both that the explanation because of which the object
is is its explanation, and that it cannot be otherwise. (Those who do not know think they are themselves in such
a state, and those who do know actually are.)
We do know through demonstration. By demonstration I mean a scientific deduction; and by
scientific I mean one in virtue of which, by having it, we know something.
If knowledge is as we posited, demonstrative knowledge necessarily depends on things [starting
points/premises] that are true, primitive, immediate, more familiar than, prior to, and explanatory of the
conclusion (in this way the principles will also be appropriate to what is being proved). There will be deduction
even without these conditions, but there will not be demonstration; for it will not produce knowledge.
The premises must be true because one cannot know what is not the case (e.g. that the diagonal is
commensurate). They must depend on what is primitive and non-demonstrable because otherwise you will not
know if you do not have a demonstration of them; to know that of which there is a demonstration nonaccidentally is to have a demonstration. They must be (a) explanatory (we only know when we know the
explanation), (b) more familiar, and (c) prior (if they are explanatory, and we are already aware of them not only
grasping but also knowing that they are).
Things are prior in two ways (by nature and in relation to us) and more familiar in two ways (more
familiar and more familiar to us). Prior and more familiar in relation to us is what is nearer to perception; prior
and more familiar simpliciter is what is further away. What is most universal is furthest away, and the particulars
are nearest; and these are opposite to each other.
Depending on things that are primitive is depending on appropriate principles; the same thing is
primitive and a principle. A principle of a demonstration is an immediate proposition (one to which there
is no other prior). A proposition is the one part of a contradiction (one thing said of one); it is dialectical if it
assumes indifferently either part, and demonstrative if it determinately assumes the one that is true. (A
statement is either part of a contradiction.) A contradiction is an opposition that excludes any intermediate of
itself; and a contradiction contains (i) an affirmation (saying something of something), and (ii) a denial (saying
something from something).
A posit is an immediate deductive principle if one cannot prove it but it is not necessary for anyone who
is to learn anything to grasp it; an axiom is an immediate deductive principle that is necessary for anyone who
is going to learn anything whatever to grasp. A supposition is a posit that assumes either of the parts of a
contradiction (that something is or that something is not). A definition is a posit that assumes neither part of a
contradiction. [A definition is a posit (for the arithmetician posits that a unit is what is quantitatively indivisible)
but not a supposition (for what a unit is and that a unit is are not the same).]
Since one should both be convinced of and know the object by having a deductive demonstration, and
since this is the case when the premises of the deduction are true, one must already be aware of the primitives
(either all or some of them) and be better aware of them. If we know and are convinced because of the
primitives, we both know and are convinced of them better, since it is because of them that we know and are
convinced of what is posterior.
It is not possible to be better convinced than one is of what one knows, of what one in fact neither knows
nor is more happily disposed toward than if one in fact knew. But this will result if someone who is convinced
because of a demonstration is not already aware of the primitives, because it is necessary to be better convinced
of the principles (either all or some of them) than of the conclusion.

Moreover, there must be no other thing more convincing to him or more familiar among the opposites
of the principles on which a deduction of the contrary error may depend (if anyone who knows simpliciter must be
unpersuadable).
3 All Knowledge is Not Demonstrative; Knowledge Immediates is Non-Demonstrable; It is
Impossible to Demonstrate Simpliciter Circularly and so Demonstrate Everything (72b-73a).
Neither of the following views is either true or necessary: (1) Because one must know the primitives, there is no
knowledge at all; (2) There is knowledge, but there are demonstrations of everything.
Those holding (1) claim that we are led back ad infinitum on the grounds that we would not know what is
posterior because of what is prior if there are no primitives (they are correct, since it is impossible to go through
infinitely many things). If it comes to a stop and there are principles, they say that these are unknowable since
there is no demonstration of them, which knowledge requires; but if one cannot know the primitives, neither can
the inferences or conclusions be understood simpliciter or properly (except on the supposition that they are the
case).
The other party (2) agrees that knowledge occurs only through demonstration and exists. But they argue
that nothing prevents there being demonstration of everything, since demonstration can come about in a circle
and reciprocally.
But we say that all knowledge is not demonstrative; knowledge the immediates/priors is nondemonstrable, and necessarily so, because if it is necessary to know the things which are prior and on which the
demonstration depends, and it comes to a stop at some time, it is necessary for these immediates to be nondemonstrable. (There is not only knowledge but also some principle of knowledge by which we become familiar
with the definitions.)
Against (2), it is impossible to demonstrate simpliciter in a circle, if demonstration must depend on what is
prior and more familiar; it is impossible for the same things at the same time to be prior and posterior to the
same things, unless one is so in another way (i.e. one in relation to us, the other simpliciter), which induction
makes familiar. But if so, knowing simpliciter will not have been properly defined, but will be twofold. Or is the
other demonstration not demonstration simpliciter in that it comes from what is more familiar to us?
Against (2) too, they only say that A is the case if A is the case; it is easy to prove everything in this way.
It is clear that this results if we posit three terms: whenever if A is the case, of necessity B is, and if this then C,
then if A is the case C will be the case. Thus given that if A is the case it is necessary that B is, and if this is that
A is (that is what being circular is), let A be C: so to say that if B is the case A is, is to say that C is, and this
implies that if A is the case C is. But C is the same as A. So those who assert that demonstration is circular say
nothing but that if A is the case A is the case.
Moreover, even this is impossible except in the case of things that follow one another, as properties do.
Now if a single thing (= no term or posit is posited) is laid down, it is never necessary that anything else should
be the case. Now if A follows B and C, and these follow one another and A, in this way it is possible to prove all
the postulates reciprocally in the first figure, as was proved in the account of deduction. But one cannot prove
circularly things that are not counter-predicated; so, since there are few such things in demonstrations, it is both
empty and impossible to say that demonstration is reciprocal and that because of this there can be
demonstration of everything.
4 Demonstration is Deduction from What is Necessary; Definitions of Holding in Every Case,
In Itself, and Universally (73a-74a). Since it is impossible for the object of knowledge simpliciter to be
otherwise, the object of demonstrative knowledge will be necessary. So demonstration is deduction from what is
necessary. So we must grasp on what (sort of) things demonstrations depend. Let us define what we mean by (1)
holding of every case, (2) in itself, and (3) universally.
(1) Something holds of every case if it holds in all cases and at all times (e.g. if animal holds of every man,
then if it is true to call this a man, it is true to call him an animal too; and if he is now the one, he is the other
too; and the same goes if there is a point in every line). Evidence: when asked if something holds of every case,
we try to find objections with exceptional cases or times.

(2) One thing belongs to another in itself only if (a) it belongs to it in what it is [e.g. line to triangle and
point to line (their substance depends on these and they belong in the account which says what they are)] and (b)
the things it belongs to themselves belong in the account which makes clear what it is (e.g. straight belongs to line
and so does curved; odd and even to number; prime and composite; equilateral and oblong; and for all these
there belongs in the definition line (in the first case), and number (in the others). [Things that dont satisfy
conditions (a) and (b) are accidental (e.g. musical or white to animal).]
What is not said of some other underlying subject (i.e., a substance or whatever signifies some this) is
just what it is without being something else, and are things in themselves; accidentals are those that are said of
an underlying subject.
In another way what belongs to something because of itself belongs to it in itself, and what does not
belong because of itself is accidental (e.g. if it got lighter out when he was walking, that was accidental; for it was
not because of his walking that it got lighter out). But if something belongs to something else because of itself,
then it belongs to it in itself (e.g. if something died while being sacrificed, it died in the sacrifice since it died
because of being sacrificed, and it was not accidental that it died while being sacrificed).
So regarding what is understandable simpliciter, whatever is said to belong to things in themselves in the
sense of inhering in the predicates or of being inhered in, holds both because of themselves and from necessity. It
is impossible for them not to belong, either simpliciter or as regards the opposites (e.g. straight or crooked to line,
and odd or even to number). For the contrary is either a privation or a contradiction in the same genus (e.g.
even is what is not odd among numbers, in so far as it follows). So if it is necessary to affirm or deny, it is
necessary too for what belongs in itself to belong.
(3) Universal is whatever belongs to something both of every case, in itself, and as such. So whatever is
universal belongs from necessity to its objects. [To belong in itself and as such are the same thing e.g. point
and straight belong to line in itself (for they belong to it as line), and two right angles belong to triangle as
triangle (for the triangle is in itself equal to two right angles).]
Something holds universally whenever it is proved of a chance case and primitively [e.g. having two right
angles neither holds universally of figure (e.g. the quadrangle is a figure but it does not have angles equal to two
right angles), and a chance isosceles does have angles equal to two right angles, but not primitively the triangle
is prior.
5 Mistakes in Proving Which does Not Belong Primitively and Universally; Knowledge
Simpliciter (74a-b). We often make mistakes when what is being proved does not belong primitively and
universally in the way in which it seems to be being proved (universally and primitively). We make this error
when either (1) we cannot grasp anything higher apart from the particular, or (2) we can but it is nameless for
objects different in sort, or (3) the thing proved is in fact a whole that is a part of something else.
If someone were to prove that right angles do not meet, the demonstration would seem to hold of this
because of its holding of all right angles. But this demonstration would not hold, if it comes about because they
are equal in any way at all.
If there were no triangles other than the isosceles, having two right angles would seem to belong to it as
isosceles.
Perhaps proportion alternates for things as numbers, as lines, as solids, and as times (proportion used to
be proved separately but is now proved in all cases at once by a single demonstration). Because all these things
(numbers, lengths, times, solids) do not constitute a single named item and differ in sort from one another,
proportion used to be taken separately. But now it is proved universally; for it did not belong to things as lines or
as numbers, but as this that they suppose to belong universally.
Thus, even if you prove of each triangle either by one or more demonstrations that each (equilateral,
scalene, and isosceles) has two right angles, you do not yet know of the triangle that it has two right angles, or
the same of triangle universally (not even if there is no other triangle apart from these). For you do not know it
of the triangle as triangle, nor even of every triangle.
So when do you not know universally, and when do you know simpliciter? You would know simpliciter if it
were the same thing to be a triangle and to be equilateral (either for each or for all). But if it is not the same but
different, and it belongs as triangle, you do not know. Does it belong as triangle or as isosceles? When does it


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belong in virtue of this as primitive? Of what does the demonstration hold universally? Whenever after
abstraction it belongs primitively (e.g. two right angles will belong to bronze isosceles triangle, but also when
being bronze and being isosceles have been abstracted but not when figure or limit have been abstracted). If
triangle (e.g.), it is in virtue of this that it also belongs to the others, and it is of this that the demonstration holds
universally.
6 Demonstrative Knowledge Depends on Necessary Principles; The Middle Term of a
Demonstration Must be Necessary; No Demonstrative Knowledge of Accidentals (74b-75a). If
demonstrative knowledge depends on necessary principles (what one knows cannot be otherwise), and what
belongs to the objects in themselves is necessary, demonstrative deduction will depend on necessary principles;
everything belongs either in this way or accidentally, and what is accidental is not necessary.
Given the above, and positing as a principle that demonstration is necessary and that if something has
been demonstrated it cannot be otherwise, the deduction must depend on necessities. From truths one can
deduce without demonstrating, but from necessities one cannot deduce without demonstrating; this is precisely
the mark of demonstration.
Evidence: we bring our objections against those who think they are demonstrating by saying that it is not
necessary (because it is absolutely possible for it to be otherwise, or at least for the sake of argument).
Those people who think they get their principles correctly if the proposition is reputable and true (e.g.
sophists who assume that to know is to have knowledge) are silly. [DY OBJ: It is silly for someone to think that
to know is to have knowledge? We need an explanation of that example from Aristotle or an Aristotelian.] It is
not what is reputable or not that is a principle, but what is primitive in the genus about which the proof is; and not every
truth is appropriate.
More evidence that the deduction must depend on necessities: if, when there is a demonstration, a man
who has not got an account of the reason why does not have knowledge, and if it might be that A belongs to C
from necessity but that B (the middle term through which it was demonstrated) does not hold from necessity,
then he does not know the reason why. For it is possible for B not to be the case, whereas the conclusion is
necessary.
If someone does not know now, though he has got the account and is preserved, and the object is
preserved, and he has not forgotten, then he did not know earlier either: the middle term might perish if it is not
necessary; so that though, by himself and the object being preserved, he will have the account, yet he does not
know. So he did not know earlier either. If it has not perished but it is possible for it to perish, the result would
be capable of occurring and possible; but it is impossible to know when in such a state. [DY: FYI, this is not like
Schrodingers Cat (click here or here), because in the SC case, the cat at one point both is and is not dead, which
Aristotle would deny.]
When the conclusion is from necessity, nothing prevents the middle term through which it was proved
from being non-necessary; one can deduce a necessity from a non-necessity, just as one can deduce a truth from
non-truths. But when the middle term is from necessity, the conclusion too is from necessity, just as from truths
it is always true (e.g. let A be said of B from necessity, and this of C; then A belongs to C from necessity). But
when the conclusion is not necessary, the middle term cannot be necessary either (e.g. A belong to C not from
necessity, but to B and B to C from necessity, then A will belong to C from necessity too; but it was not
supposed to).
Since if a man knows demonstratively, it must belong from necessity, he must have his demonstration
through a middle term that is necessary too; or else he will not know either why or that it is necessary for that to
be the case, but either he will think but not know it (if he believes to be necessary what is not necessary) or he
will not even think it (equally whether he knows the fact through middle terms or the reason why actually
through immediates).
There is no demonstrative knowledge of accidentals.
Since in each kind what belongs to something in itself and as such belongs to it from necessity, scientific
demonstrations are about what belongs to (and depends on) things in themselves. What is accidental is not
necessary, so you do not necessarily know why the conclusion holds not even if it should always be the case but
not in itself (e.g. deductions through signs). You will not know in itself something that holds in itself; nor will you


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know why it holds, because to know why is to know through the explanation. So the middle term must belong
to the third, and the first to the middle, because of itself.
7 One cannot Prove Something by Crossing from Another Genus; Conclusions, Axioms, and
Genera in Demonstrations; Demonstrations Always Include the Genus of the Conclusion; What
Different Sciences Cannot Prove about Other Sciences (75a-b). One cannot prove anything by
crossing from another genus (e.g. something geometrical by arithmetic). [DY OBJ: Why not? I cant prove
geometrically of a triangle that a2 +b2 = c2, by squaring and adding the numbers using arithmetic?] There are
three things in demonstrations: (1) conclusion (what is being demonstrated, or what belongs to some genus in
itself); (2) axioms (the things on which the demonstration depends); and (3) the underlying genus of which the
demonstration makes clear the attributes and what is accidental to it in itself.
The axioms may be the same; but of things whose genus is different (e.g. arithmetic and geometry), one
cannot apply arithmetical demonstrations to the accidentals of magnitudes (unless they are numbers).
Arithmetical (and other) demonstrations always include the genus of the conclusion; so the genus must
be the same, either simpliciter or in some respect, if the demonstration is going to cross. [DY: Crossing is not
clear, given the first sentence of this chapter.] Otherwise, it is impossible: it is necessary for the extreme and the
middle terms to come from the same genus (if they do not belong in themselves, they will be accidentals).
One cannot prove by geometry that there is a single science of opposites, nor even that two cubes make
a cube; nor can one prove by any other science the theorems of a different one, except when they are related
such that the one is under the other (e.g. optics to geometry, and harmonics to arithmetic). Nor can one prove
by geometry anything that belongs to lines not as lines and as from their proper principles (e.g. whether the
straight line is the most beautiful of lines or whether it is contrarily related to the circumference); that belongs to
them not as their proper genus but as something common.
8 A Demonstration Must Have an Eternal Conclusion; No Demonstration of Perishable Things
(e.g. Eclipses) (75b). If a demonstrative deduction (or simpliciter) depends on universal propositions, it is
necessary for its conclusion to be eternal too. There is no demonstration or knowledge simpliciter of perishable
things, but only accidentally, because it does not hold of them universally, but at some time and in some way.
In such a demonstration, it is necessary for the one proposition to be non-universal (because its subjects
will sometimes be and sometimes not be) and perishable (because when it is, the conclusion will be too), so one
cannot deduce universally, but only that it holds now.
The same goes for definitions, since a definition is either a principle of demonstration or a demonstration
differing in position or a sort of conclusion of a demonstration.
Demonstrations and sciences of things that come about often (e.g. eclipses) clearly hold always in so far
as they are of such-and-such a thing, but are particular in so far as they do not hold always.
9 Demonstrations must Proceed from Principles that Belong to a Thing As That Thing;
Knowing (Non-)Accidentally; It is Difficult to be Aware when One Knows or Not (75b-76a). Since
one cannot demonstrate anything except from its own principles if what is being proved belongs to it as that thing,
knowledge is not this (if a thing is proved from what is true and non-demonstrable and immediate). [DY: I think,
but am not sure, that the phrase knowledge is not this = knowledge is not a demonstration of things that come
about often (without being absolutely true or holding always). Moreover, it is puzzling if he is saying that
knowledge is not of something essential of a substance, or that demonstrations are not proved from what is true,
non-demonstrable, and immediate he states that premises of a demonstration have precisely these
characteristics.] Such arguments prove in virtue of a common feature that will also belong to something else;
that is why the arguments also apply to other things not of the same kind. So you do not know it as that thing but
accidentally; otherwise the demonstration would not apply to another genus too.
We know a thing non-accidentally when we know it in virtue of that in virtue of which [DY: the genus, I
believe, or the principles] it belongs, from the principles of that thing as that thing (e.g. we know having angles
equal to two right angles when we know it in virtue of the principles of that thing). So if that too belongs in itself
to what it belongs to, it is necessary for the middle to be in the same genus.

If this is not so, then the theorems proved as harmonical theorems are proved through arithmetic. Such
things are proved in the same way, but they differ; the fact falls under a different science (for the underlying
genus is different), but the reason under the higher science under which fall the attributes that belong in
themselves [DY: is the same?]. So one cannot demonstrate anything simpliciter except from its own principles.
But the principles of these sciences have the common feature.
If this is true, one cannot demonstrate the proper principles of anything; those will be principles of
everything, and knowledge of them will be sovereign over everything. You know better if you know from the
higher explanations; you know from what is prior when you know from unexplainable explanations [DY: The
Tredennick/Forster translation has it when he knows it from causes which are themselves uncaused.
Maybe that helps. J]. So if you know better and best, that knowledge too will be better and best. But
demonstration does not apply to another genus (except, as has been said, geometrical demonstrations apply to
mechanical or optical demonstrations, and arithmetical to harmonical).
It is difficult to be aware of whether one knows or not: It is difficult to be aware of whether we know
from the principles of a thing or not (and that is what knowing is). We think we know if we have a deduction
from some true and primitive propositions. But that is not so, but it must be of the same genus as the primitives.
[DY OBJ: This really undercuts his view of knowledge, because according to Aristotle, we need to know the
principles are true; and we need to know that the conclusion is eternal; we cant just guess if the conclusion
cannot be otherwise. And hes already stated above that we know the premises by non-demonstrable knowledge,
so how can we know that?]
10 We must Assume Principles in Each Genus Exist; Things Proper to Each Science and Things
Common Used in Demonstrative Sciences; Three Things Demonstrative Sciences Deal With;
Suppositions v. Postulates; the Geometer Does Not Suppose Falsehoods (76a-77a). It is not
possible to prove that principles in each genus exist. Both what the primitives and what the things dependent on
them signify is assumed; but that they are must be assumed for the principles and proved for the rest (e.g. we
must assume what a unit or what straight and triangle signify, and that the unit and magnitude are; but we must
prove that the others are).
Some things they use in demonstrative sciences are proper to each science and others common (by analogy,
since things are useful insofar as they bear on the genus under the science): proper (e.g. that a line is such and
such, and straight so and so); and common (e.g. that if equals are taken from equals, the remainders are equal).
But each of these is sufficient insofar as it bears on the genus; it will produce the same result even if it is not
assumed as holding of everything but only for the case of magnitudes (or, for the arithmetician, for numbers).
Proper too are the things that are assumed to be, about which the science considers what belongs to
them in themselves (e.g. arithmetic is about units, and geometry is about points and lines). They assume these to
be and to be this. As to what are attributes of these in themselves, they assume what each signifies (e.g. arithmetic
assumes what odd or even or quadrangle or cube signifies, and geometry what irrational or inflection or verging
signifies and they prove that they are, through the common items and from what has been demonstrated;
astronomy proceeds in the same way).
Every demonstrative science deals with three things: (1) what it posits to be (these form the genus of what it
considers the attributes that belong to it in itself); (2) the common axioms, the primitives from which it demonstrates;
and (3) the attributes, of which it assumes what each signifies. Nothing prevents some sciences from overlooking
some of these, e.g. from not supposing that its genus is, if it is evident that it is it is not equally clear that
number is and that hot and cold are, and from not assuming what the attributes signify just as in the case of
the common items it does not assume what to take equals from equals signifies, because it is familiar. So there
are by nature these three things, that about which the science proves, what it proves, and the things from which
it proves.
What necessarily is the case because of itself and necessarily seems to be the case is not a supposition
or a postulate. Demonstration is not addressed to external argument (but to argument in the soul) since
deduction is not either. One can always object to external argument, but not always to internal argument.
Whatever a man assumes without proving it himself though it is provable (e.g. if he assumes something
that seems to be the case to the learner), he supposes it (and it is a supposition not simpliciter but only in


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relation to the learner); but if he assumes the same thing when there is either no opinion present in the learner
or actually a contrary one present, he postulates it. (A postulate is what is contrary to the opinion of the
learner, which though it is demonstrable is assumed and used without being proved).
Terms are not suppositions (they are not said to be or not be anything), but suppositions are among the
propositions, whereas one need only grasp the terms; and suppositions are propositions such that, if they are the
case, then by them the conclusion comes about.
The geometer does not suppose falsehoods (as some say); my opponents state that one should not use a
falsehood but that the geometer speaks falsely when he says that the line that is not a foot long is a foot long or
that the drawn line that is not straight is straight. But the geometer does not conclude anything from there being
this line that he himself has described, but from the conclusion that is made clear through them. [DY OBJ: And
is this not something separate and apart from this particular line? Then why can Aristotle not accept that Forms
exist, or, how has Aristotle not separated the universal, as he accuses Plato of doing?]
Every postulate and supposition is either universal or particular; but terms are neither of these.