Abstract

The last six lines of Aristotle's Metaphysics A.7 draw some important conclusions about Aristotle's predecessors' (the Presocratics' and Plato's) grasp of the four types of cause. Aristotle argues that his account of his predecessors supports his conception of the four causes and his claim that in first philosophy, too, we should seek to understand our subject-matter on the basis of these four causes. I offer a detailed textual and philosophical interpretation of these lines, connect them with Aristotle's argument in Metaphysics A.1-6, and examine their metaphysical, epistemological, and methodological presuppositions.