Chapter 49

Quantity is an accumulation of units—for the unit is not called quantity. When one unit and one unit are combined, they become two. Thus quantity is not division, but an accumulation and addition of units. For, to divide two into separate units of one, this is division; but to say that one and one are two, this, rather, is addition.

One must know that quantity is the measure itself and the number—that which measures and that which numbers. Quanta, however, are subject to number and measure; in other words, they are the thing that are measured and numbered. Of the quanta, some are discrete and some are continuous. The quantum is continuous when one thing is measured, as when we have one piece of wood two or three cubits long, or a stone, or something of the sort. Being one, it is measured, and for this reason it is called continuous. Quanta, however, are discrete which are separated from each other, as in the case of ten stones or ten palm trees, for these are separated from each other. These, then, are said to be numbered, unless because of their small size and great number they are measured by the measure of something of the sort, as is grain and the like.

Those things are defined as continuous whose parts touch upon a certain common limit. Thus, since a two-cubit piece of wood, that is to say, a piece two cubits long, is one piece, then the end of one cubit and the beginning of the other are one. For they are joined together and connected, and they are not divided from each other. Discrete things are those whose parts do not touch upon a common limit, as in the case of ten stones. For, should you count off five and five, they will have no common limit connecting them. And should you put something in between this five and that five, then there will be eleven and not ten. The terms themselves, continuous and discrete, make this plain.

Now, among the discrete quanta come number and speech. By number we here mean things which are counted. And things which are counted are absolutely discrete, as has been shown. Speech, too, is discrete, for speech is counted in its words, and its parts do not have a common connecting limit. Thus, if the sentences has ten words and you separate them into groups of five, then they have no common limit connecting them. And so, shou