Kitap 13
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Now Socrates devoted his attention to the moral virtues, and was the first to seek a general definition of these (for of the Physicists Democritus gained only a superficial grasp of the subjectCf. Aristot. Phys. 194a 20, Aristot. De Part. Anim. 642a 24. and defined, after a fashion, the hot and the cold; while the PythagoreansCf. Aristot. Met. 1.5.2, 16. at an earlier date had arrived at definitions of some few things—whose formulae they connected with numbers—e.g., what opportunity is, or justice or marriage); and he naturally inquired into the essence of things;
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for he was trying to reason logically, and the starting-point of all logical reasoning is the essence. At that time there was as yet no such proficiency in Dialectic that men could study contraries independently of the essence, and consider whether both contraries come under the same science.
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There are two innovationsThis is perhaps too strong a word. What Aristotle means is that Socrates was the first thinker who attached importance to general definitions and systematically used arguments from analogy in order to arrive at them. The Greeks as a whole were only too readily impressed by analogy; Socrates merely developed an already prevalent tendency. For an example of his method see the reference at Aristot. Met. 5.29.5 n. which, may fairly be ascribed to Socrates: inductive reasoning and general definition. Both of these are associated with the starting-point of scientific knowledge.
