Nesnelerin Doğasına Duyu Verildiğinde: Yaşayan Evren

That no being can give to others what it does not possess within itself has been demonstrated by us elsewhere, and is confessed by almost all wise men; experience also teaches us sufficiently. For we have never seen light beget darkness, nor heat cold, nor the thorn soothe, nor the heavy lift. "Nor do they gather figs from thistles," says the Messiah. And the same is evident in all things. Indeed, a mass that is hot can become cold, but cold cannot be produced by heat, nor can heat be converted into cold. Heat, even when besieged by intervening cold, is strengthened and grows; yet cold does not add heat to it, but it increases by itself, since by nature it is diffusive and multiplicative, which does not happen to things that are sterile by themselves. Since, however, animals (by the testimony of all) have sense, and sense does not arise from nothing, it must of necessity be affirmed that the Elements, the causes of things, have sense, and indeed all of them. For we will demonstrate that what is inherent in one of the Elements belongs to all. Therefore, the heaven and the earth and the world have sense, and animals remain within it, just as worms inside the belly of the human body, which do not perceive the intellect, will, and sense of the human because they are not proportioned to their sense.