Kitap 4
1
We must pronounce whether it pertains to the same science to study both the so-called axioms in mathematics and substance, or to different sciences. It is obvious that the investigation of these axioms too pertains to one science, namely the science of the philosopher; for they apply to all existing things, and not to a particular class separate and distinct from the rest. Moreover all thinkers employ them—because they are axioms of Being qua Being, and every genus possesses Being—
2
but employ them only in so far as their purposes require; i.e., so far as the genus extends about which they are carrying out their proofs. Hence since these axioms apply to all things qua Being (for this is what is common to them), it is the function of him who studies Being qua Being to investigate them as well.
3
For this reason no one who is pursuing a particular inquiry—neither a geometrician nor an arithmetician—attempts to state whether they are true or false; but some of the physicists did so, quite naturally; for they alone professed to investigate nature as a whole, and Being.
4
But inasmuch as there is a more ultimate type of thinker than the natural philosopher (for nature is only a genus of Being), the investigation of these axioms too will belong to the universal thinker who studies the primary reality. Natural philosophy is a kind of Wisdom, but not the primary kind.
