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53. Again, the science of definition, of division, and of
partition, although it is frequently applied to falsities, is not
itself false, nor framed by man's device, but is evolved from the
reason of things. For although poets have applied it to their
fictions, and false philosophers, or even heretics that is, false
Christians to their erroneous doctrines, that is no reason why it
should be false, for example, that neither in definition, nor in
division, nor in partition, is anything to be included that does not
pertain to the matter in hand, nor anything to be omitted that does.
This is true, even though the things to be defined or divided are not
true. For even falsehood itself is defined when we say that falsehood
is the declaration of a state of things which is not as we declare it to
be; and this definition is true, although falsehood itself cannot be
true. We can also divide it, saying that there are two kinds of
falsehood, one in regard to things that cannot be true at all, the
other in regard to things that are not, though it is possible they
might be, true. For example, the man who says that seven and three
are eleven, says what cannot be true under any circumstances; but he
who says that it rained on the kalends of January, although perhaps
the fact is not so, says what posssibly might have been. The
definition and division, therefore, of what is false may be perfectly
true, although what is false cannot, of course, itself be true.
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