§14 [48]
39
principium rationis suficientis fiendi ["principle of the sufficient reason of becoming"].68
principium rationis sufficientis cognoscendi ["of being known"] (cf. 5876, P. 649),
principium rationis sufficientisessendi ["of being"] (cf. 5874, p. 648),
principium rationis sufficientisagendi ["of acting"] (cf. 5721, p. 542).
τὸ πρῶτον {...} ὅθεν ἢ ἔστιν ἢ γίγνεται ἢ γιγνώσκεται ["the first whence of being or becoming or being known"] (Met. A 1, 1013a18f.).
Recapitulation
The previous sessions sketched the problematic that confronted the ancient philosopher: the disclosure of the Being of beings.
In Aristotle, the guidelines of the consideration: the four causes. We looked back on the main lines of pre-Aristotelian philosophy. At the end, we looked forward: the problem of foundations or reasons. Principle of sufficient reason, principium rationis sufficientis. Nihil est sine ratione sufficiente, cur potius sit, quam non sit.69 "Nothing is without a sufficient reason why it is rather than is not." Self-evident principle of all research. How to understand it? Whence its necessity? Does the principle arise out of the very Being of that about which it speaks; i.e., from the idea of Being and nonbeing? To answer, we must understand Being itself.
Let us leave Aristotle's problematics in the background and listen now only to the questions raised, and answers posed, by the ancient thinkers themselves.
68. Cf. Wolff, 5874, p. 648.
69. Cf. note 67 above.