Shall we then say that numbers alone are quantity? Shall we attribute
this privilege to Numbers in themselves, which are beings, because
they exist in themselves?[250] Shall we grant the same privilege to
numbers existing in things which participate in them, and which serve
to number, not unities, but ten oxen, for example, or ten horses?
First, it would seem absurd that these numbers should not be beings,
if the former ones be such. Then, it will seem equally absurd that
they should exist within the things they measure, without existing
outside them,[251] as the rules and instruments which serve to measure
exist outside of the objects they measure. On the other hand, if these
numbers that exist in themselves serve to measure, and nevertheless do
not exist within the objects that they measure, the result will be that
these objects will not be quantities since they will not participate in
quantity itself.