Four Elements
- "...four bodies are fire, air, water, earth." (339a15-16)
- "Fire occupies the highest place among them all, earth the lowest, and two elements correspond to these in their relation to one another, air being nearest to fire, water to earth." (339a16-19)
- "Fire, air, water, earth, we assert, originate from one another, and each of them exists potentially in each, as all things do that can be resolved into a common and ultimate substrate." (339a36-b2)
All terrestrial matter consists of these four elements. Various ratios of the elements combine to create the diverse materials found in nature.
Read more about this topic: Meteorology (Aristotle)
Famous quotes containing the word elements:
“Nature confounds her summer distinctions at this season. The heavens seem to be nearer the earth. The elements are less reserved and distinct. Water turns to ice, rain to snow. The day is but a Scandinavian night. The winter is an arctic summer.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It is a life-and-death conflict between all those grand, universal, man-respecting principles which we call by the comprehensive term democracy, and all those partial, person-respecting, class-favoring elements which we group together under that silver-slippered word aristocracy. If this war does not mean that, it means nothing.”
—Antoinette Brown Blackwell (1825–1921)