The seventh and eighth chapters are expositions of the maxims contained in the fourth and fifth; they begin with these maxims, and have the appearance of being from the hand of a commentator. “The soul,” says Aristotle (De Anima, III. 8), “is in a certain sense the whole of existence. For existent objects are either perceived by the senses or thought; but knowledge itself is in a manner the object of knowledge, and perception the object of perception. What are known and perceived are either the things themselves or their forms. Knowledge and sense-perception are not the things themselves (the stone is not in the soul), but their form; so that the soul is like the hand. As this is the instrument by which we grasp instruments, so the understanding is the form by which we apprehend forms, and sense-perception the form of the objects cf sense.” Before this Aristotle had remarked (De Anima, III. 4): “It has been truly said that the soul is the _place of ideas_ (τόπος εἰδῶν): not the whole soul, but only the thinking soul, and these ideas do not exist in the soul actually, but only potentially.” That is to say, the ideas are at first only quiescent forms, not activities, and so Aristotle is not a realist. But the understanding makes these forms, like those of external nature, its objects, its thoughts, its potentiality, Aristotle therefore says in the seventh chapter: “The understanding thinks the abstract (τὰ ἐν ἀφαιρέσει λεγόμενα), just as it conceives snubnosedness not as snubnosedness that cannot be separated from the flesh, but as hollowness.” Then in the eighth chapter Aristotle goes on to say: “But as no object is separated from its perceived dimensions, so in the forms perceived by sense there are also objects of thought, both abstract conceptions and the qualities (ἕξεις) and determinations of the objects of sense. In this way he who perceives nothing by his senses learns nothing and understands nothing; when he discerns anything (θεωρῇ), he must necessarily discern it as a pictorial conception, for such conceptions are like sense-perceptions, only without matter. In what way then are our primary ideas distinguished, so as not to be mistaken for conceptions? Or is it not the case also that other thoughts even are not pictorial conceptions, but only that they are never found unassociated with such conceptions?” Since what follows contains no answer to the questions raised here at the very end, this would seem an additional indication that these portions follow later.[100] Aristotle concludes the seventh chapter with the words: “Speaking generally, the understanding is the faculty which thinks things in their real activity. Whether, however, it can think the absolute or not, unless it be itself separated from the sensuous, we shall inquire later (ὕστερον).” This “later” Buhle considers to have reference to the “highest philosophy.”[101]