Kitap 13
20
Again, some things exist and come into being of which there are no FormsCf. Aristot. Met. 13.4.7, 8; Aristot. Met. 1.9.2, 3.; why, then, are there not Forms of these too? It follows that the Forms are not the causes of things.
20
Again, it is absurd that number up to 10 should be more really existent, and a Form, than 10 itself; although the former is not generated as a unity, whereas the latter is. However, they try to make out that the series up to 10 is a complete number;
21
at least they generate the derivatives, e.g. the void, proportion, the odd, etc., from within the decad. Some, such as motion, rest, good and evil, they assign to the first principles; the rest to numbers.From the Dyad were derived void (Theophrastus, Met. 312.18-313.3) and motion (cf. Aristot. Met. 1.9.29, Aristot. Met. 11.9.8). Rest would naturally be derived from unity. For good and evil see Aristot. Met. 1.6.10. Proportion alone of the derivatives here mentioned appears to be derived from number. As Syrianus says, the three types of proportion can be illustrated by numbers from within the decad—arithmetical 1. 2. 3, geometrical 1. 2. 4, harmonic 2. 3. 6.
22
Hence they identify the odd with Unity; because if oddness depended on 3, how could 5 be odd?sc. because (on their theory) 3 is not contained in 5. Thus oddness had to be referred to not a number but a principle—unity.
