But if he says, “This is his utterance,” meaning that it is being uttered by him, people would call him a liar. For “utterance” may denote either the act of uttering or the words uttered. Likewise, “recitation” and “reading” may denote either the act itself or the actual speech being read and recited.

The basis of this is to understand what hearing speech from its speaker has in common with hearing it from someone conveying it on the speaker’s behalf, and what distinguishes the two. In both cases, it is the original speaker’s speech. In one case, however, it is heard from him in an unqualified sense, without an intermediary; in the other, it is heard from him in a qualified sense, through the intermediary who conveys it. Similarly, sometimes you see the sun, moon, and stars directly, without needing an intermediary, and sometimes you see them in water, a mirror, or the like, through that transparent body. In both instances, they are what you intend to see. In one case, however, you see them themselves directly, in an unqualified sense; in the other, you see them in a qualified sense, through an intermediary.

If you say, “What is seen is their likeness, their image, or something of the sort,” the response is: You recognize the difference between seeing a thing’s image in the form of its shadow, or its likeness in the form of a representation made of it, and seeing it in water or a mirror. Here, although seeing it necessarily involves an intervening image, what one intends to see is the actual thing. Its appearance, however, varies according to the mirror: it appears large if the mirror is large, and small