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. Again, comparing the blood and the
bile, some speak of the former as hot and of the latter as cold, while
others invert the description. If there be this endless disputing
about hot and cold, which of all things that affect our senses are the
most distinct, what are we to think as to our other sensory
impressions?
The explanation of the difficulty appears to be that the term
'hotter' is used in several senses; so that different statements,
though in verbal contradiction with each other, may yet all be more or
less true. There ought, then, to be some clear understanding as to the
sense in which natural substances are to be termed hot or cold,
solid or fluid. For it appears manifest that these are properties on
which even life and death are largely dependent, and that they are
moreover the causes of sleep and waking, of maturity and old age, of
health and disease; while no similar influence belongs to roughness
and smoothness, to heaviness and lightness, nor, in short, to any
other such properties of matter. That this should be so is but in
accordance with rational expectation. For hot and cold, solid and
fluid, as was stated in a former treatise, are the foundations of
the physical elements.
Is then the term hot used in one sense or in many? To answer this we
must ascertain what special effect is attributed to a hotter
substance, and if there be several such, how many these may be
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