For the principles, though small
in size, are great in potency; this, indeed, is what is meant by a
principle, that it is itself the cause of many things without anything
else being higher than it for it to depend upon.
The heat or cold also of their habitat contributes to make some
animals of such a character as to be deep-voiced, and others
high-voiced. For hot breath being thick causes depth, cold breath
being thin the opposite. This is clear also in pipe-playing, for if
the breath of the performer is hotter, that is to say if it is
expelled as by a groan, the note is deeper.
The cause of roughness and smoothness in the voice, and of all
similar inequality, is that the part or organ through which the
voice is conveyed is rough or smooth or generally even or uneven. This
is plain when there is any moisture about the trachea or when it is
roughened by any affection, for then the voice also becomes uneven.
Flexibility depends on the softness or hardness of the organ, for
what is soft can be regulated and assume any form, while what is
hard cannot; thus the soft organ can utter a loud or a small note, and
accordingly a high or a deep one, since it easily regulates the
breath, becoming itself easily great or small. But hardness cannot
be regulated.
Let this be enough on all those points concerning the voice which
have not been previously discussed in the treatise on sensation and in
that on the soul.
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