a sect of philosophers, otherwise called Peripatetics.

The Aristotelians and their dogmata prevailed for a long while in the schools and universities; even in spite of all the efforts of the Cartesians, Newtonians, and other corpucularians. But the systems of the latter have at length gained the pre-eminence; and the Newtonian philosophy in particular is now very generally received. The principles of Aristotle's philosophy, the learned agree, are chiefly laid down in the four books de Celo; the eight books of Physical Anschauung, Φυσική ἀναγνώσις, belonging rather to logic, or metaphysics, than to physics. Instead of the more ancient systems, he introduced matter, form, and privation, as the principles of all things; but he does not seem to have derived much benefit from them in natural philosophy. His doctrines are, for the most part, to obscurely expressed, that it has not yet been satisfactorily ascertained what were his sentiments on some of the most important subjects. He attempted to refute the Pythagorean doctrine concerning the twofold motion of the earth; and pretended to demonstrate, that the matter of the heavens is ungenerated, incorruptible, and subject to no alteration: and he supposed that the stars were carried round the earth in solid orbs. The reader will find a distinct account of the logical part of his philosophy, by Dr Reid professor of moral philosophy in the university of Glasgow, and in the second volume of Lord Kames's Sketches of the History of Man. Mr Harris has published a commentary on his Categories, under the title of Philosophical Arrangements.