(62) Timaeus: the origin of its form, how that it above all others is the one substance which so divides our bodies and minces them up as to produce naturally both that affection which we call “heat” and its very name. The opposite affection is evident, but none the less it must not lack description. When liquids with larger particles, which surround the body, enter into it they drive out the smaller particles; but as they cannot pass into their room they compress the moisture within us, so that in place of non-uniformity and motion they produce immobility and density,

(23) The Motion which acts upon Sensible objects enters from without, and so shakes, drives, rouses and thrusts its participants that they may neither rest nor preserve their identity- and all to the end that they may be caught into that restlessness, that flustering excitability which is but an image of Life.

We must avoid identifying Motion with the objects moved: by walking we do not mean the feet but the activity springing from a potentiality in the feet. Since the potentiality is invisible, we see of necessity only the active feet- that is to say, not feet simply, as would be the case if they were at rest, but something besides feet, something invisible but indirectly seen as an accompaniment by the fact that we observe the feet to be in ever-changing positions and no longer at rest. We infer alteration, on the other hand, from the qualitative change in the thing altered.

Where, then, does Motion reside, when there is one thing that moves and another that passes from an inherent potentiality to actuality? In the mover? How then will the moved, the patient, participate in the motion? In the moved? Then why does not Motion remain in it, once having come? It would seem that Motion must neither be separated from the active principle nor allowed to reside in it; it must proceed from agent to patient without so inhering in the latter as to be severed from the former, passing from one to the other like a breath of wind.

Now, when the potentiality of Motion consists in an ability to walk, it may be imagined as thrusting a man forward and causing him to be continually adopting a different position; when it lies in the capacity to heat, it heats; when the potentiality takes hold of Matter and builds up the organism, we have growth; and when another potentiality demolishes the structure, the result is decay, that which has the potentiality of demolition experiencing the decay. Where the birth-giving principle is active, we find birth; where it is impotent and the power to destroy prevails, destruction takes place- not the destruction of what already exists, but that which intervenes upon the road to existence.

Health comes about in the same way- when the power which produces health is active and predominant; sickness is the result of the opposite power working in the opposite direction.

Thus, Motion is conditioned, not only by the objects in which it occurs, but also by its origins and its course, and it is a distinctive mark of Motion to be always qualified and to take its quality from the moved.

(8) Of this I'll give thee here on earth an instance, which the eye can see. Regard the animals down here - a man, for instance, swimming! The water moves, yet the resistance of his hands and feet give him stability, so that he is not borne along with it, nor sunk thereby. A: Thou hast, Thrice-greatest one, adduced a most clear instance. H: All motion, then, is caused in station and by station. The motion, therefore, of the cosmos (and of every other hylic to the cosmos, but by things interior [outward] to the exterior - such [things] as soul, or spirit, or some such other thing incorporeal. 'Tis not the body that doth move the living thing in it; nay, not even the whole [body of the universe a lesser] body e'en though there be no life in it.

(58) Timaeus: and uniform particles, is more stable than the first and is heavy, being solidified by its uniformity; but when fire enters and dissolves it, this causes it to abandon its uniformity, and this being lost it partakes more largely in motion; and when it has become mobile it is pushed by the adjacent air and extended upon the earth; and for each of these modifications it has received a descriptive name—“melting” for the disintegration of its masses, and for its extension over the earth “fluidity.” Again, since the fire on issuing from the water

(89) Timaeus: Further, as concerns the motions, the best motion of a body is that caused by itself in itself; for this is most nearly akin to the motion of intelligence and the motion of the Universe. Motion due to the agency of another is less good; and the least good motion is that which is imparted to a body lying in a state of rest and which moves it piecemeal and by means of others. Wherefore the motion that is best for purgings and renovations of the body consists in gymnastic exercises; and second-best is the motion provided by swaying vehicles, such as boats or any conveyances that produce no fatigue; while the third kind of motion, although useful for one who is absolutely driven to it,

(44) As an illustration of the fact just stated, we may consider the two opposites known as Hot and Cold, respectively; surely there can be no two qualities apparently more distinct and separate from each other—more diametrically different from each other. But careful examination shows us that the two contrasting things are really but degrees, conditions, and states of the same thing. There is no such thing as an "absolute hot," or an "absolute cold." There are merely different degrees of this Hot-Cold pair of opposites, which for convenience we call "Heat." We cannot point out a place on the thermometer where Hot ceases and Cold begins, or vice versa. The two states or conditions blend into each other, and any statement regarding them is found to be merely comparative. If we place one hand in a bowl of very hot water, and the other in a bowl of ice-cold water, and then suddenly withdraw both hands and plunge them into a bowl of lukewarm water, what happens d Simply this, that we find that the hot-water hand feels a sensation of coolness, while the cold-water hand feels a sensation of heat—each experience resulting from the comparison with the previous experience.

(3) Then passing on to the Physical Plane, they illustrate the Principle by showing that Heat and Cold are identical in nature, the differences being merely a matter of degrees. The thermometer shows many degrees of temperature, the lowest pole being called "cold," and the highest "heat." Between these two poles are many degrees of "heat" or "cold," call them either and you are equally correct. The higher of two degrees is always "warmer," while the lower is always "colder." There is no absolute standard-all is a matter of degree. There is no place on the thermometer where heat ceases and cold begins. It is all a matter of higher or lower vibrations. The very terms "high" and "low," which we are compelled to use, are but poles of the same thing-the terms are relative. So with "East and West"--travel around the world in an eastward direction, and you reach a point which is called west at your starting point, and you return from that westward point. Travel far enough North, and you will find yourself traveling South, or vice versa.

(58) Timaeus: Wherefore, fire most of all has permeated all things, and in a second degree air, as it is by nature second in fineness; and so with the rest; for those that have the largest constituent parts have the largest void left in their construction, and those that have the smallest the least. Thus the tightening of the compression forces together the small bodies into the void intervals of the large. Therefore, when small bodies are placed beside large, and the smaller disintegrate the larger while the larger unite the smaller, they all shift up and down

(58) Timaeus: So likewise of air, there is the most translucent kind which is called by the name of aether, and the most opaque which is mist and darkness, and other species without a name, which are produced by reason of the inequality of the triangles. The kinds of water are, primarily, two, the one being the liquid, the other the fusible kind. Now the liquid kind, inasmuch as it partakes of those small particles of water which are unequal, is mobile both in itself and by external force owing to its non-uniformity and the shape of its figure. But the other kind, which is composed of large