In De ente et essentia D. Thomae Aquinatis commentaria

Whether “being” and “essence” signify immediately the predicaments themselves or their natures, or mediately.

Around this passage there arises a very difficult doubt: whether being and essence signify immediately the predicaments themselves or their natures, or mediately. In this doubt I shall do three things. First, the title of the question will be explained; second, Scotus’s opinion will be brought forward and refuted; third, St. Thomas’s opinion will be set forth.

For the first, know that “to signify mediately” in the present context is to signify something through some superior thing: thus animal signifies its species mediately (namely, through a sensible nature), for animal does not signify man except because man is an animated, sensible substance. “To signify immediately” is to signify something not through some superior nature or reality, but first through itself: thus animal signifies the sensitive grade or sensitive reality immediately, as is evident. The doubt, then, concerns this: whether being signifies some grade or reality abstractible from the categorial natures, common to them as an essential superior is common to its inferiors, and thus signifies the predicaments mediately; or whether it signifies the categorial natures themselves immediately. So much for the first point.

As to the second, Scotus, as can be gathered from I Sent. dist. III, qq. 2 and 3, and dist. VIII, q. 2, holds that being signifies the ten predicaments mediately. For he imagines that from any similar things one objective reality can be abstracted, common and prior to both; and thus, since substance and accident have a similarity in being, one objective concept common and prior to both substance and accident can be abstracted from them, and this is signified by the name “being.” For clearer understanding, I shall set forth at length the process of these abstractions. Since Socrates agrees with Plato in humanity and not with Brunellus, humanity, common and prior to them, can be abstracted from them; then, since man agrees with Brunellus in sensibility and not with a plant, animality, common and prior to them, can be abstracted from them; then, since animal agrees with a plant in vegetative life and not with a stone, life, common and prior to them, can be abstracted; then, since a living thing agrees with a stone in corporeity and not with intelligences, corporeity can be abstracted; then, since body agrees with intelligences in substantiality and not with accidents, substantiality can be abstracted; then, since substance agrees with accident in real entity and not with beings of reason, entity, common and prior to them, can be abstracted. Since this last abstractible reality is abstracted from that which being signifies immediately, it follows that the categorial realities or natures are included mediately under the signification of being.

Many means could be brought forward to confirm this position. But, so that we do not digress into the analogy of being and the comparison of transcendentals with the predicaments—whether they are their quidditative predicates or not—we omit them for now, because special questions concerning these matters will follow below.

Against this opinion I argue in two ways. First, by the authority of Aristotle, VIII Metaphysics, text XVI, where, in solving the question why a quiddity is one, he says that in separate substances no other cause should be sought, because in them there is nothing but form, which is immediately through itself being and one; just as being is immediately through itself substance and quantity and the other predicaments, without awaiting something else that makes it into the categorial natures. From this authority the argument is as follows: being signifies a reality prior to the predicaments; therefore it awaits something contracting it to the predicaments. The consequence is evident, but the consequent is contrary to Aristotle. Therefore, by destruction of the consequent, the antecedent is destroyed: being does not signify a reality prior to the predicaments.

Second, by the authority of the Commentator, X Metaphysics, commentary XVIII, who says that this name “being,” and “one,” signifies what it signifies in the predicament of substance, quantity, and quality in its first signification, without a medium and not through some common thing. What could be clearer? I do not argue from reason, since that would require exceeding our limits.

As to the third, I set forth St. Thomas’s opinion, to be drawn from two conclusions. The first is this: Being signifies one formal concept common in representing substance and accident, God and creature.

The second is this: Being signifies, as an objective concept, some real thing found in all genera, distinct according to reason from the proper objective concepts of all the genera, expressing no grade above the generic, specific, and individual natures.

For understanding the terms, note that concept is twofold, formal and objective. A formal concept is a certain image that the possible intellect forms in itself, representatively and objectively, of the thing understood; it is called an intention or concept by philosophers, but a word by theologians. An objective concept, however, is the thing represented by the formal concept, terminating in it the act of understanding. For example, the formal concept of a lion is that image which the possible intellect forms of the leonine quiddity when it wishes to understand it; the objective concept of the same is the leonine nature itself, represented and understood. Nor should one think, when it is said that a name signifies a concept, that it signifies only one of the two: the name “lion” signifies both concepts, though in different ways; for it is the sign of the formal concept as the medium, or by which, and it is the sign of the objective concept as the ultimate, or which. Hence it is the same to speak of the concept of being and of its signification.

I prove the first conclusion, then, by the following means. All similar things, under any similarity, even analogical or imitative, can be represented by the same image according to that in which they are similar. But God and creatures, substance and accident, have at least an analogical similarity among themselves. Therefore, according to that in which they are similar, they can be represented by the same similarity. But they are similar in being. Therefore, by the same similarity they can be represented insofar as they have being. That similarity is the formal concept of being. Therefore, and so forth. The process is clear, and the propositions are conceded by everyone, once the major premise has been elucidated, which we persuade ourselves of from the notions as follows. Wherever an agent produces a likeness of itself in another, if what it produces is similar to something else according to that by which the first is similar, the third must be similar to both. This is because whatever is similar to something in that in which the latter is similar to another is similar to both; thus the species of Socrates produced in my eye by the image of Socrates in a mirror is a representative likeness both of the figure of Socrates in the mirror, from which it is immediately caused, and of the figure of Socrates in himself, from which it is mediately caused. But this is how it stands here: among things having an analogical similarity—God and creature, substance and accident—there is such a relation with respect to the formal concept. Therefore, and so forth.

This becomes clear by an example. Divine wisdom produces human wisdom, which is a certain likeness of it, though imperfect. Human wisdom produces a likeness of itself in our intellect, which is nothing other than wisdom in intentional being, just as wisdom outside the mind is wisdom in natural being. Since this likeness of wisdom in the intellect represents human wisdom according to that by which it is similar to divine wisdom, it represents it according to its proper formal account. It necessarily follows that here one likeness represents both, human and divine wisdom, since it is similar to both, although it is immediately modeled on human wisdom and mediately on divine wisdom. From this example in special terms, observe our proposal in transcendental terms, such as being. Since the being of a creature is likened to divine being, from which it is modeled, and accidental being is likened to substantial being, from which it proceeds, the likeness produced in the intellect by substantial or accidental being insofar as they are similar will be a representative image of all of them. Since a concept is required for understanding only in order to represent the thing objectively by one concept, the intellect is directed toward God and creature insofar as they are beings, and likewise toward substance and accident. It is not necessary to posit several concepts and multiply beings without necessity. That these things are said not only according to St. Thomas’s mind but also according to his express teaching is clear in I q. de potentia Dei, q. VII, a. 5, in the body, from which I took this argument; and in the same question, a. 6, where near the end of the body of the question he brings forward the example of a mirror and expressly says that our concept stands toward God and creatures as the species of a seen thing in a mirror: God stands as the thing producing its likeness in the mirror, creature as the species in the mirror, and our concept as the likeness expressed by the species in the mirror, representing both. Hence no sane mind can deny this in his way.

The second conclusion has three parts. The first is explained as follows: the objective concept of being is what is represented by its formal concept. But its formal concept represents that in which all real beings are similar, which must be in them. Therefore, the objective concept of being is something real found in all. Although the assumed proposition may be evident from what has been said, it is nevertheless explained further. Just as the formal concept of animal represents the foundation of generic similarity, and the formal concept of man represents the foundation of specific similarity, so universally every common image, in representing several things, represents the foundation of the similarity among those several things. This is evident in the example given above of the species caused in the eye by the species of Socrates in the mirror: for it represents not the similarity between the species in the mirror and Socrates, since that is a relation, but the foundation of that similarity, namely the qualities and features found in both. Thus the formal concept of being represents the foundation of the analogical similarity in being among all actually existing real beings. That this is in all of them without the work of the intellect is evident from the fact that they are similar outside the soul. Since this represented foundation is the objective concept of being, as was said, it is evident that the objective concept of being is something real found in all. This was the first part of the conclusion.

The second part of the conclusion follows from this. For if the objective concept of being is found in all, while no proper objective concept of substance or accident is found in all, it follows that they are not wholly the same, and that the concept of being is at least rationally distinct from the proper objective concepts of all. This was the second part of the conclusion.

The third part of the same is explained as follows. If the objective concept of being were some grade above the specific and generic grades, then, when the specific and generic grades are considered precisely, together with their precise properties, it would not be necessary to find in them, as so considered, the properties of being. This is false. Therefore, by destruction of the consequent, and so forth. The consequence is explained because animal signifies a grade other than man; therefore, according to a precise differential concept, the properties of animal do not belong to man, as the falsity of this reduplicative expression shows. Man, insofar as he is rational, is two-footed, with “two-footed” expressing in a circumlocution a property proper to animal. Likewise, if being signifies a grade other than substance, it follows that, when the constitutive account of substance is considered precisely, substance is not one, true, or good, and so forth—things that name properties of being. The falsity of the consequent is proved as follows. Man, insofar as he is precisely rational, is one with a unity that is a property of being. Man, insofar as he is rational, signifies a grade other than being, according to you, against whom I argue. Therefore, the property of being belongs to other grades precisely distinct from being, taken in this way, which is the opposite of the consequent. The assumed proposition is found in Scotus, II Sent. dist. III, q. 1, who maintains that a unity intermediate between numerical unity and generic unity is a property of being, and follows specific nature by reason of the ultimate difference. The same proposition may also be made clear for now as follows: man, insofar as he is rational, is formally indivisible, supposing that rational is the ultimate difference; therefore, man insofar as he is rational is formally one, for unity is nothing other than indivision. But there will be fuller discussion of this when we treat of the unity of nature. For now it is enough that in the specific grades taken precisely, and likewise in the generic grades, properties of being are found. This was to be proved, and consequently that being does not signify a grade distinct from specific and generic natures. This was the third part of the conclusion.

But since the thing signified by this name “being” is something found in all, and is not a grade distinct from the specific and generic grades, it remains to declare what it is. This is explained as follows. Every generic, specific, differential, or individual grade has within itself something that can be conceived in many ways. According as each grade is a thing having being, it is implied by the name “being” and belongs to the objective concept of being. But according as such a grade is considered absolutely, it is signified by its proper name, and its objective concept is, for example, humanity. By its own formal perfection, through which it is distinguished from the other perfections of the universe, humanity has what is required for it to be represented, known, and signified by the formal concept of humanity and by the name “humanity.”

Humanity, considered in this way, also has what is due or belongs to it: quidditative being and actual existence. Thus it is represented by the formal concept of being as a part of its objective concept, and is signified by the name “being.” Animal likewise has these two things within itself, and so with the others. Hence the objective concepts of being are generic and specific natures insofar as they have being; for in this way they ground the analogical similarity of which we speak. Therefore being and its properties are preserved in every grade taken precisely: each grade, so considered, has within itself that by which it exists, is undivided, and is conformable to the intellect and appetite, and so forth. Those who posit being as abstractible from specific and generic grades cannot preserve this. That these things accord with the doctrine of St. Thomas I appoint as judge anyone who carefully examines his teaching. Below, when we treat of the analogy of being, we shall demonstrate this; for now let what has been said suffice, especially since both the first and second parts of the conclusion follow from the preceding conclusion, which is plainly St. Thomas’s.

The third part, moreover, is asserted unanimously by all Thomists. Thus it is clear how the concept of being is abstractible from all beings, insofar as they are similar—not in the Scotist manner—and it is clear how what St. Thomas says here is true, namely, that essence signifies something common to all the natures of all genera and species. For he does not intend that essence signifies some nature common to all natures, but that it signifies all natures insofar as they are similar in this, that they are beings. For each nature, insofar as it exists (by which things are things), has the account of essence, just as each thing has the account of being insofar as it has being, or is.

And because that through which a thing is constituted in its proper genus or species is what we signify by a definition indicating what the thing is, it follows that philosophers change the name “essence” into the name “quiddity.” This is what the Philosopher in VII Metaphysics frequently calls what it was to be, that is, this through which something has being as a what. It is also called form, insofar as form signifies the perfection or certainty of each thing, as Avicenna says in II Metaphysics of his work. It is also called nature by another name, taking nature according to the first of the four modes which Boethius assigns in On the Two Natures, namely, insofar as nature is said to be that which can in any way be grasped by the intellect. For an intelligible thing is so only through its definition and essence. Thus the Philosopher also says in V Metaphysics that every substance is nature. The name “nature,” taken in this way, seems to signify the essence of a thing according as it has an order or ordering toward the thing’s proper operation, since no thing is deprived of its proper operation. The name “quiddity,” however, is taken from the fact that it is signified through a definition; but essence is said according as through it, and in it, a thing has being.

In this third part of the chapter, as he is about to explain how the names of essence differ from one another, he enumerates five names for it: namely, essence, quiddity, what it was to be, form, and nature. Their rationale and difference are handed down clearly and plainly in the text, so that there is no need to add anything.

Nevertheless, note concerning what is brought forward from Boethius that Boethius says in On the Two Natures and One Person of Christ that nature is taken in four ways: first, every intelligible thing; second, every substance; third, the intrinsic principle of motion; fourth, specific essence or difference. If you do not have Boethius, see these modes, if you please, in St. Thomas, II Sent. dist. XXXVII, q. 1, a. 1. St. Thomas takes nature here in the first mode, since in this way it is common to substantial and accidental essences, generic and specific, and so forth.