These lectures present an overview of Aristotle's metaphysics and philosophy of science, and their relation to his systematic study of living things. After a brief outline of the deepest essentials of Aristotle's pillosophy, the first lecture examines his concepts of matter, form, potentiality, and teleological causation, and his doctrines of (i) the irreducibility of form to matter, (ii) the unity of matter and form, and (iii) the individuality of form. 

The second lecture identifies the central features of Aristotle's scientific epistemology and then shows that epistemology at work in his three great biological treatises. It concludes with some remarks on the vitality of Aristotelian studies today and its implications for the near future of academic philosophy.