no doubt, a certain activity, but again this whole sphere is only the objective, the implicit element in one higher. As, moreover, the implicit in its sphere appears as a reality for the development of the Idea, it has two sides; the universal is already itself an actual, as, for example, the vegetative soul. Aristotle’s meaning is therefore this: an empty universal is that which does not itself exist, or is not itself species. All that is universal is in fact real, as particular, individual, existing for another. But that universal is real, in that by itself, without further change, it constitutes its first species, and when further developed it belongs, not to this, but to a higher stage. These are the general determinations which are of the greatest importance, and which, if developed, would lead to all true views of the organic, &c., since they give a correct general representation of the principle of realization. α. The nutritive or vegetative soul is therefore, according to Aristotle (De Anima, II. 4), to be conceived as the first, which is energy, the general Notion of the soul itself, just as it is, without further determination; or, as we should say, plant life is the Notion of the organic. What Aristotle goes on to say of nourishment, for instance, whether the like is nourished by the like, or by the opposite, is of little importance. It may, however, be mentioned that Aristotle (De Anima, II. 12) says of the vegetative soul that it is related only to matter, and that only after a material manner, as when we eat and drink, but that it cannot take up into itself the forms of sensible things: we, too, ourselves in practical matters are related as particular individuals to a material existence here and now, in which our own material existence comes into activity.