The problem might also be raised, What is that which unifies the
elements into a soul? The elements correspond, it would appear, to the
matter; what unites them, whatever it is, is the supremely important
factor. But it is impossible that there should be something superior
to, and dominant over, the soul (and a fortiori over the mind); it
is reasonable to hold that mind is by nature most primordial and
dominant, while their statement that it is the elements which are
first of all that is.
All, both those who assert that the soul, because of its knowledge
or perception of what is compounded out of the elements, and is
those who assert that it is of all things the most originative of
movement, fail to take into consideration all kinds of soul. In fact
(1) not all beings that perceive can originate movement; there
appear to be certain animals which stationary, and yet local
movement is the only one, so it seems, which the soul originates in
animals. And (2) the same object-on holds against all those who
construct mind and the perceptive faculty out of the elements; for
it appears that plants live, and yet are not endowed with locomotion
or perception, while a large number of animals are without discourse
of reason. Even if these points were waived and mind admitted to be
a part of the soul (and so too the perceptive faculty), still, even
so, there would be kinds and parts of soul of which they had failed to
give any account.
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