Gleanings in Dialectics

is converted, because it follows per accidens accidentally from the universal negative, as was exemplified before. Regarding the universal affirmative, although it is said to be converted per accidens, it is not in the sense in which we said the particular negative is converted per accidens; rather, it is in the sense in which we rejected above that the particular and the negative could be converted per accidens in this way—namely, so that a particular affirmation follows from it per accidens, which can be converted simply in this figure: "Every man is an animal," per accidens "Some animal is a man," "Some man is an animal" per se in itself/essentially. The reason for the difference is what was stated: namely, that in the first referring to the previous discussion of the particular negative, the universal does not follow from the particular negative, and therefore the particular is not said to be converted per accidens into the universal, but it follows from it per accidens. However, in this case, because the particular follows from the universal, we rightly say the universal, which is not converted simply into the particular, is converted per accidens. But we do not say the particular affirmative is converted into the universal per accidens in the way we said the universal negative must be converted into the particular negative, although both are converted simply—that is, the universal negative and the particular affirmative. And this is because the particular follows from the universal negative, but the universal affirmative cannot in the least follow from the particular affirmative. Let us therefore define this conversion which is per accidens by saying: conversion per accidens is the transposition of terms with the universal determination changed into a particular one. For as is clear in the aforementioned, the change of the universal sign into a particular one always occurs in this conversion per accidens. From this definition, it is clear that what was also stated above is true: that a particular, whether affirmative or negative, is never converted per accidens into a universal according to the understanding of the younger scholars—as if the universal were the convertend of these—but only according to the understanding of Boethius, so that particulars always follow per accidens from universals, and why they follow secondarily, as we can easily see in the prior figures. From the aforementioned, it is also clear how the particular negation is said to be converted per accidens differently according to the mind of Boethius alone, when Aristotle says absolutely that it is not converted; and [how it differs from] the universal affirmative, which—since both are said to be converted by this conversion per accidens—the universal is such that the particular follows from it per accidens, whereas the particular negative is such that it follows from a...