 The second, very short essay is entitled “A Course (ephodos) by Syrianus, the Son of Philoxenus, on Book Gamma of Aristotle’s Metaphysics”. This book of the Metaphysics begins with an exposition of first philosophy as dealing with being in general, that is, with what is insofar as it has being, as well as the properties that belong in and of itself to anything that has being. Aristotle then continues with a defense of the Law of Non-Contradiction (for any proposition P, it is not the case that both P and not-P) being one of these properties. Syrianus discusses each of these main topics of the book, but keeps his own comments short because, as he says, the book “has already been sufficiently elucidated by the most diligent Alexander (of Aphrodisias)” (54, 12f).