Short Fragments and Testimonia from Uncertain Works 83
a shape it is genuinely small and of such a shape (for the edges of the
images are broken off by the movement through the air), and when it
again appears big and of a different shape, again it is in a similar manner
big and has that different shape-the object being, however, now not
the same in the two cases. For it remains for distorted opinion to think
that the same object of presentation was observed from close up and
from a distance.
- It is a property of sense-perception to grasp only that which is
present and stimulating it, such as colour, but not to decide that the
object here and the object over there are different. So for these reasons
all presentations are truebut have some
differences [among them]. For some of these [opinions] are true and
some are false, since they are our judgements upon presentations and
we judge some things correctly and some badly, either by adding and
attaching something to the presentations or by subtracting something
from them-in general terms, by falsifying the non-rational sense-per-
ception. - Therefore, according to Epicurus, some opinions are true and
some are false; those which are testified for and those which are not
testified against by clear facts are true, while those which are testified
against and those which are not testified for by clear facts are false. 212.
'Testimony for' is a grasp, by means of clear facts, that the object of
opinion is such as it once was thought to be. For example, when Plato
is approaching from the distance I guess and opine, because of the
distance, that it is Plato; but when he approached there was further
testimony that it was Plato (since the distance was reduced) and [finally]
the clear facts themselves testified to it. 213. 'Lack of testimony against'
is the consistency of the non-evident thing which is the object of supposi-
tion and opinion with what is apparent. For example, when Epicurus
says that there is void, which is a non-evident object, he confirms this
through a clear fact, i.e., motion; for if void does not exist, then motion
ought not to exist, since the moving body would have no place to shift
into because everything [would] be full and dense; 214. consequently,
since there is motion what is apparent does not testify against the non-
evident thing which is the object of opinion. 'Testimony against', how-
ever, is something in conflict with 'lack of testimony against'. For it is
the joint elimination of what is apparent along with the supposed non-
evident thing. For example, the Stoic says that there is no void, holding
that it is something non-evident, and thus along with this supposed fact
one ought to eliminate what is apparent, by which I mean motion; for
if there is no void it follows necessarily that there is no motion, according
to the mode [of argument] which we have already indicated. 215. Similarly