[1025a]
[1]
Such are the
meanings of "false" in these cases. (3.) A false man is one who
readily and deliberately makes such statements, for the sake of doing
so and for no other reason; and one who induces such statements in
others—just as we call things false which induce a false
impression. Hence the proof in the Hippias1 that the same man is false and true
is misleading;for it
assumes (a) that the false man is he who is able to
deceive, i.e. the man who knows and is intelligent; (b) that the man
who is willingly bad is better. This false assumption is due to the
induction; for when he says that the man who limps willingly is better
than he who does so unwillingly, he means by limping
pretending to limp. For if he is willingly lame, he is
presumably worse in this case just as he is in the case of moral
character."Accident" <or
"attribute"> means that which applies to something and is truly
stated, but neither necessarily nor usually; as if, for example, while
digging a hole for a plant one found a treasure. Then the finding of
treasure is an accident to the man who is digging the hole; for the
one thing is not a necessary consequence or sequel of the other, nor
does one usually find treasure while planting.
[20]
And a cultured man might be white; but since
this does not happen necessarily or usually, we call it an accident.
Thus since there are attributes and subjects, and some attributes
apply to their subjects only at a certain place and time, any
attribute which applies to a subject, but not because it was a
particular subject or time or place, will be an accident.Nor is there any definite
cause for an accident, but only a chance, i.e. indefinite, cause. It
was by accident that X went to Aegina if he arrived there, not because he intended to go
there but because he was carried out of his course by a storm, or
captured by pirates.The
accident has happened or exists, but in virtue not of itself but of
something else; for it was the storm which was the cause of his coming
to a place for which he was not sailing—i.e. Aegina."Accident" has also another sense,2 namely,
whatever belongs to each thing in virtue of itself, but is not in its
essence; e.g. as having the sum of its angles equal to two right
angles belongs to the triangle. Accidents of this kind may be eternal,
but none of the former kind can be. There is an account of this
elsewhere.3
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