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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: similar principle circulating in each and all of them; for example, that
should be called 'fire' which is of such a nature always, and so of
everything that has generation. That in which the elements severally grow
up, and appear, and decay, is alone to be called by the name 'this' or
'that'; but that which is of a certain nature, hot or white, or anything
which admits of opposite qualities, and all things that are compounded of
them, ought not to be so denominated. Let me make another attempt to
explain my meaning more clearly. Suppose a person to make all kinds of
figures of gold and to be always transmuting one form into all the rest;--
somebody points to one of them and asks what it is. By far the safest and
truest answer is, That is gold; and not to call the triangle or any other
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