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| Other Absurd Theories Respecting Matter and Its Incidents Exposed in an Ironical Strain. Motion in Matter. Hermogenes' Conceits Respecting It.
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Chapter
XXXVI.—Other Absurd Theories Respecting Matter and Its Incidents
Exposed in an Ironical Strain. Motion in Matter. Hermogenes’
Conceits Respecting It.
But see what a contradiction he next
advances6510
(or perhaps some
other reason6511
| 6511 Other than
“the right reason” above named. | occurs to him),
when he declares that Matter partly corporeal and partly incorporeal.
Then must Matter be considered (to embrace) both conditions, in order
that it may not have either? For it will be corporeal, and incorporeal
in spite of6512
the declaration of
that antithesis,6513
| 6513 The original,
“Adversus renuntiationem reciprocationis illius,” is an
obscure expression. Oehler, who gives this reading in his edition,
after the editio princeps, renders the term
“reciprocationis” by the phrase “negative
conversion” of the proposition that Matter is corporeal and
incorporeal (q.d. “Matter is neither corporeal nor
incorporeal”). Instead, however, of the reading
“reciprocationis,” Oehler would gladly read
“rectæ rationis,” after most of the
editions. He thinks that this allusion to “the right
reason,” of which Hermogenes boasted, and of which the absurd
conclusion is exposed in the context, very well suits the sarcastic
style of Tertullian. If this, the general reading, be adopted, we
must render the whole clause this: “For it will be corporeal and
incorporeal, in spite of the declaration of that right reason
(of Hermogenes), which is plainly enough above giving any
reason,” etc. etc. | which is plainly
above giving any reason for its opinion, just as that
“other reason” also was. Now, by the corporeal part of
Matter, he means that of which bodies are created; but by the
incorporeal part of Matter, he means its uncreated6514
| 6514 Inconditum. See
above ch. xviii., in the middle. Notwithstanding the absurdity of
Hermogenes idea, it is impossible to translate this word
irregular as it has been proposed to do by Genoude. | motion. If, says he, Matter were
simply a body, there would appear to be in it nothing incorporeal, that
is, (no) motion; if, on the other hand, it had been wholly incorporeal
no body could be formed out of it. What a peculiarly right6515
reason have we here! Only if you make your
sketches as right as you make your reason, Hermogenes, no painter would
be more stupid6516
than yourself. For
who is going to allow you to reckon motion as a moiety of
Matter, seeing that it is not a substantial thing, because it is
not corporeal, but an accident (if indeed it be even that) of a
substance and a body? Just as action6517
| 6517 Actus: being
driven. |
is, and impulsion, just as a slip is, or a fall, so is motion. When
anything moves even of itself, its motion is the result of
impulse;6518
| 6518 Actus ejus est
motus. | but certainly it is
no part of its substance in your sense,6519
when you make motion the incorporeal part of matter. All things,
indeed,6520
have
motion—either of themselves as animals, or of others as inanimate
things; but yet we should not say that either a man or a stone was both
corporeal and incorporeal because they had both a body and motion:
we should say rather that all things have one form of
simple6521
corporeality, which
is the essential quality6522
of substance. If
any incorporeal incidents accrue to them, as actions, or
passions, or functions,6523
or desires, we do
not reckon these parts as of the things. How then does he contrive to
assign an integral portion of Matter to motion, which
does not pertain to substance, but to a certain condition6524
of substance? Is not this
incontrovertible?6525
Suppose you had
taken it into your head6526
to represent matter
as immoveable, would then the immobility seem to you to be a moiety of
its form? Certainly not. Neither, in like manner, could motion.
But I shall be at liberty to speak of motion elsewhere.6527
| 6527 See below, ch. xli.,
p. 500. | E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
