Commentaria in Primam Partem Summae Theologiae

In the title, prior according to reason, that is, according to the order of the formal rationes of being itself. For being (ens) and good, since they are distinguished by their rationes, must be ordered according to them—and surely in no other order than that which is by nature apt to exist among formal rationes: which is called the order of reason, and consequently has a prior and a posterior according to reason. And this order consists in this: namely, that the posterior ratio presupposes another in itself, and not conversely. So that the sense is: whether the ratio of good precedes, on its own merit, the ratio of being (entis).

II. In the body, a single responsive conclusion to the question: Being is prior in thought than good. – It is proved. Each thing is knowable insofar as it is in act. Therefore being is the proper object of the intellect. Therefore it is the first intelligible. Therefore it falls first into the conception of the intellect. Therefore it is prior in thought than good.

The antecedent is proved from IX Metaphysics. The first, second, and third consequences are left as self-evident. The fourth, however, is proved: because the ratio signified by the name is that which the intellect conceives of the thing. – All things are clear. For this argument concludes not only that being (ens) is prior in ratio to the good, but to all the others, as is evident.

III. Concerning this argument a doubt arises: for it is either intended to infer that being (ens) is prior in the order of reason in itself, or with respect to us. If in itself, this conflicts with what was said above in question III, article V. For there it was said in the text¹ that nothing is prior to God, neither in reality nor in understanding: but from this sense it follows that being is prior to God in the order of reason. For if being is the first intelligible, just as sound is the first audible, the other things must be posterior intelligibles, as is clear from I Posterior Analytics²: for what first belongs to something, the rest belong by reason of that. -- If with respect to us, then the question posed has not been satisfactorily answered. For the doubt turns on whether the ratio of being in itself is prior to the ratio of the good: and not whether with respect to us it is prior.

IV. To this, a twofold answer can be given. First, that being (ens) can be compared to other things of its own order, that is, to other formal rationes; and it can also be compared to the things themselves subsisting. If the ratio of being is compared to the other rationes, taking the rationes of things as distinguished from the things themselves, then being is the first intelligible in itself, and the others are posterior according to the intellect. But among ly these others is not included the quod quid erat esse of God: for a ratio cannot exist without also being a thing, since it cannot abstract from existence, because it is esse itself. -- But if the ratio of being is compared both to the rationes and to the things, then it is not simply the first intelligible: rather, the deity is the first intelligible. Thus intelligibility belongs to God prior to its belonging to being; indeed, it belongs to being because it belongs to God: for God is not intelligible by participation. -- And thus both texts are preserved. For there God is said absolutely to be first according to the intellect, whereas here being is said to be first among the formal rationes.

Second, it can be said that an amphiboly occurs here in ly with respect to us: for it can determine either the order or the intelligibles. If it determines the order, then it is distinguished from the order considered in itself; and thus the objection proceeds. And the answer must be that the discussion concerns the order considered in itself. For, as is clear from the title, the question here is not about the order of cognition, that is, what is first known by us: but about the order of reason, namely which formal ratio is prior. -- If it determines the intelligibles, then it distinguishes our intelligibles from those not intelligible by us. And according to this sense it must be said that what is inquired into here are the intelligibles with respect to us, that is, our intelligibles, or those intelligible by us: so that the present discourse is about the order considered in itself of our intelligibles. And on this account, being (ens) is the first intelligible considered in itself among the things intelligible by us: whereas God is the first intelligible simply speaking. -- And this sense accords with the surface of the letter, which speaks of the object of our intellect, while "to signify by a word" is mixed in. Although this does not compel us to deny that what follows must be interpreted concerning intellect absolutely, insofar as it is intellect, whose proper object alone is established to be being (ens). For every intellect, taken according to its proper nature, has received its own proper object: the divine indeed the deity, the angelic its own substance, the human what a thing is of material things, etc., as will become clear in their proper places³.