Aristotle - index for METAPHYSICA Book 9 Part 1

Potency and complete reality

Paragraph 1 We have treated of that which is primarily and to which all the other categories of being are referred - i.e. of substance.

Paragraph 2 We have pointed out elsewhere that 'potency' and the word 'can' have several senses.

Paragraph 3 Obviously, then, in a sense the potency of acting and of being acted on is one (for a thing may be 'capable' either because it can itself be acted on or because something else can be acted on by it), but in a sense the potencies are different.

HTML by

created 1996/11/25 modified 2009/04/26


Paragraph 1	We have treated of that which is primarily and to which all the other categories of being are referred - i.e. of substance.
Paragraph 2	We have pointed out elsewhere that 'potency' and the word 'can' have several senses.
Paragraph 3	Obviously, then, in a sense the potency of acting and of being acted on is one (for a thing may be 'capable' either because it can itself be acted on or because something else can be acted on by it), but in a sense the potencies are different.