The preposition [Greek: para/], with acc. case, means _on account of_, _owing to_, &c. See Matthiæ and Kühner's Grammars, and the passage of Thucydides i. 141; [Greek: kai\ e(/kastos _ou) para\ tê\n e(autou= a)me/leian_ oi)etai bla/psein, me/lein de/ tini kai\ a)/llô| u(pe\r e(autou= ti proi+dei=n], &c., which I transcribe partly on account of Dr. Arnold's note, who says about [Greek: para\] here:--"This is exactly expressed in vulgar English, _all along of_ his own neglect, _i. e._ owing to his own neglect."] [Footnote 27: Ibid. II. xvii. p. 65, b. 33: [Greek: dei= pro\s tou\s e)x a)rchê=s o(/rous suna/ptein to\ a)du/naton; ou(/tô ga\r e)/stai dia\ tê\n u(po/thesin.]] Aristotle tells us that this was a precaution which the defender of a thesis was obliged often to employ in dialectic debate, in order to guard against abuse or misapplication of _Reductio ad Absurdum_ on the part of opponents, who (it appears) sometimes took credit for success, when they had introduced and demonstrated some absurd conclusion that had little or no connection with the thesis.[28] But even when the absurd conclusion is connected with the thesis continuously, by a series of propositions each having a common term with the preceding, in either the ascending or the descending scale, we have here more than three propositions, and the absurd conclusion may perhaps be proved by the other premisses, without involving the thesis. In this case the respondent will meet you with _Non per Hoc_:[29] he will point out that his thesis is not one of the premisses requisite for demonstrating your conclusion, and is therefore not overthrown by the absurdity thereof. Perhaps the thesis may be false, but you have not shown it to be so, since it is not among the premisses necessary for proving your _absurdum_. An _absurdum_ may sometimes admit of being demonstrated by several lines of premisses,[30] each involving distinct falsehood. Every false conclusion implies falsity in one or more syllogistic or prosyllogistic premisses that have preceded it, and is _owing to_ or occasioned by this first falsehood.[31] [Footnote 28: Analyt. Prior. II. xvii. p. 65, a. 38: [Greek: o(\ polla/kis e)n toi=s lo/gois ei)ô/thamen le/gein], &c. That the _Reductio ad Absurdum_ was sometimes made to turn upon matters wholly irrelevant, we may see from the illustration cited by Aristotle, p. 65, b. 17.]