[20]
Another topic consists in maintaining that the
cause of something which is or has been is something which would generally, or
possibly might, be the cause of it; for example, if one were to make a present
of something to another, in order to cause him pain by depriving him of it.
Whence it has been said: “
It is not from benevolence that the deity bestows great blessings
upon many, but in order that they may suffer more striking
calamities.1
” And these verses from the Meleager of Antiphon: “
Not in order to slay the monster, but that they may be witnesses to
Greece of the valor of
Meleager.2
” And the following remark from the Ajax of Theodectes,
that Diomedes chose Odysseus before all others,3 not to do him honor, but that his
companion might be his inferior; for this may have been the reason.
This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
View text chunked by:
Aristotle in 23 Volumes, Vol. 22, translated by J. H. Freese. Aristotle. Cambridge and London. Harvard University Press; William Heinemann Ltd. 1926.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.