Book 13
2
Moreover they are no help towards the knowledge of other things (for they are not the substance of particulars, otherwise they would be in particulars) or to their existence (since they are not present in the things which participate in them. If they were, they might perhaps seem to be causes, in the sense in which the admixture of white causes a thing to be white.
3
But this theory, which was stated first by Anaxagoras and later by Eudoxus in his discussion of difficulties, and by others also, is very readily refuted; for it is easy to adduce plenty of impossibilities against such a view). Again, other things are not in any accepted sense derived from the Forms.
4
To say that the Forms are patterns, and that other things participate in them, is to use empty phrases and poetical metaphors; for what is it that fashions things on the model of the Ideas? Besides, anything may both be and come to be without being imitated from something else; thus a man may become like Socrates whether Socrates exists or not,
5
and even if Socrates were eternal, clearly the case would be the same. Also there will be several patterns (and therefore Forms) of the same thing; e.g., animal and two-footed will be patterns of man, and so too will the Idea of man.
