8. We have now to ascertain what Heraclitus precisely means by Becoming. Becoming is a different conception from Being, yet it is not easy to see wherein the difference consists. Let us begin with our ordinary conception of Becoming. We say a thing becomes different from what it was, meaning thereby that it has undergone some change or series of changes. Our meaning here is, if I mistake not, that the thing is first in one definite state of Being, that next it is in another definite state of Being, that then it is in a third definite state of Being, and so on; and these states, though differing from each other, are all of them, in our estimation, states of Being. Our conception, I repeat, is this, that the thing is first in a particular state, and that it rests in that state a longer or a shorter time; that when it changes it passes into another particular state, in which it rests during another period of time longer or shorter. Becoming, then, in our ordinary conception of it, is merely a succession of states of Being, a series of existing changes which any object undergoes, and each of which lasts for some definite period of time.
9. But if this be our conception of Becoming, it is difficult to see wherein that conception differs from the conception of Being. It is merely the conception of a succession of different states, each of which is—is Being; while Being is the conception of one such state. But this seems to be no distinction at all.
