Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, Secunda Pars Artis Logicae

THREE things are briefly to be treated in this article. First, how an accidental predicate is verified of a subject: by reason of the name or by reason of the thing inhering in it. Second, with respect to which inferiors it is called the fifth predicable: with respect to its singulars, as white with respect to this and that white thing, or with respect to subjects. Third, whether the fifth predicable is predicated only with respect to existing subjects or also with respect to possible ones.

Some affirm of the first point that, when an accident is predicated of a subject, only the bare name is predicated. For the Philosopher says in chapter 5 of the Categories Before the Categories¹ that there is nothing to prevent the name of things that are in a subject from being predicated of the subject, whereas it is impossible for their account to be predicated. The reason is that predication by the substantive verb “is” states the identity of predicate and subject, but there is no such identity between a subject, which is substance, and an accident.

Nevertheless, the exact opposite must be said: in these accidental predications it is not the name itself that is predicated, but the thing signified by the name, though denominatively.

This opinion is seriously deficient, because it does not distinguish two ways in which denomination occurs: first, from the side of the name, as white from whiteness; second, from the side of the form signified, even when the names themselves do not share in it, as the name officious is derived from office, not with respect to the name but with respect to the thing signified by the effect or diligence. Hence it does not predicate the name but the thing. It is plainly evident that when I say “Peter is white,” I verify this not by reason of the name but by reason of the thing signified. For if that name is verified of Peter, it must be verified by reason of what it signifies, not by reason of the word itself; it would be ridiculous to say that Peter is the word “white.” What is signified, however, is the thing itself, namely, something that has whiteness. Therefore it is this thing that is predicated and verified in these accidental predications. This is what we mean by these predications: that those accidents are present in and belong to those subjects, not that the names alone do so.

We have said more about these matters above, question 5,² when treating the predication of concrete accidentals.

THEREFORE, IN REPLY TO THE OPPOSITE ARGUMENT, the common exposition of Aristotle is that accidents are said of a subject according to their name and not according to their account—that is, not quidditatively but denominatively—because the term account there signifies essence, and the essence of an accident does not belong to the essence of a subject. Otherwise, if they were predicated according to the name alone and not according to the thing signified, they would be common only in name and not in reality, and would therefore be equivocal.

In reply to the argument from the notion, an accident is the same in reality as its subject by denominative and concrete identity, not by essential and intrinsic identity. For, as St. Thomas says, Summa theologiae I, q. 13, a. 12, “in a true affirmative proposition the predicate and subject must signify the same thing in reality in some way” (note: in reality, not in name), because even in accidental predicates “the predicate and subject are the same in supposit.” An accident in the concrete—for example, white, since it means “having whiteness”—is the same as its subject by reason of the term having. And because predication by identity is one thing and predication by denomination another, as St. Thomas says in Sentences III, d. 5, in his exposition of the text,³ we do grant that every predication requires some identity, but denominative and accidental identity, such as is found between an accident in the concrete and a subject, suffices; complete and essential identity is not required.

Concerning the second difficulty, the inferiors of the fifth predicable are the subjects of which it is said denominatively and accidentally, not things constituted from an accident and a subject, of which it is said essentially and quidditatively. For example, white is predicated essentially of this and that white thing, but as the fifth predicable it is predicated of the subjects in which it inheres, whether those subjects differ in species or not.

THE REASON IS CLEAR, because the fifth predicable is predicated accidentally in the category of quality. Therefore its inferiors must be those to which it is related accidentally in the category of quality. It is related in this way only to subjects, since it belongs to them accidentally and in the manner of a form actualizing and qualifying them. With respect to its proper inferiors—for example, white with respect to this and that white thing—it is predicated essentially, because it expresses their entire quiddity. Since white signifies whiteness in the concrete, it can refer either to the inferiors of whiteness, which are inferiors on the side of the form, or to inferiors on the side of the subject connoted by white. If it refers to the inferiors of the form, it is said essentially of them: just as this whiteness and that whiteness essentially participate in whiteness, so this white thing and that white thing essentially participate in white on the side of the form. But if the inferiors are considered on the side of the subject, they participate accidentally in the notion of white; consequently, with respect to them it is predicated accidentally in the category of quality, which is what the fifth predicable is.

But you will object: White, for example, cannot be a universal with respect to Peter and Paul unless it abstracts from them, not insofar as they are subjects but insofar as they are white. Therefore the subjects themselves, taken in themselves, are not inferiors of this predicable.

The consequence is clear, since those are inferiors from which it abstracts. Therefore, if it abstracts not insofar as they are subjects but insofar as they are white, they will be inferiors insofar as they are white. The antecedent is proved in two ways. First, abstraction of an accident from a subject insofar as it is a subject is formal abstraction, for a form is abstracted from matter; but abstraction of a universal must be total. Second, this universal, the fifth predicable, must abstract from its inferiors insofar as they are alike or agree in something, not insofar as they agree essentially; therefore it abstracts insofar as they agree accidentally. But they agree accidentally in being white insofar as they are white; therefore white in common abstracts from them insofar as they are white.

It is further confirmed as follows: the subjects themselves are accidentally inferior to white, because Peter and Paul are accidentally identified in whiteness. Therefore, with respect to these subjects, white is a universal and accidentally predicable; hence it is not one of the species of predicables, since predicables are per se universals.

THE REPLY is that white can abstract in either way: from this and that white thing, and from its subjects. But it can abstract from subjects in two ways. One is as a physical form from a subject, and as an abstract from a concrete; the other is as a denominative term from what is denominated. If it abstracts as a form from a subject, or as an abstract from a concrete, the abstraction is formal; in that case it is not white but whiteness that is abstracted, and this is not predicated of a subject, because it is signified as a part in relation to the whole, which is white. If instead it abstracts as a denominative term from what is denominated, then white is abstracted as the fifth predicable from this or that subject, which is inferior to white on the side of what is connoted, not on the side of the form. Thus formal abstraction requires that the accident be abstracted not in the concrete but in the abstract, as a form from matter. But if white is abstracted in the concrete, it functions by way of total abstraction and, when compared with subjects, is the fifth predicable; when compared with the inferiors of the form, it is quidditative.

You will likewise understand that what is present and absent according to physical inherence is not white but whiteness; what is present and absent according to denomination is white in the concrete.

To the second proof it is said that white is not abstracted from Peter and Paul or other subjects insofar as they are formally white (for in that respect they are inferiors of the form signified by white), but insofar as they are denominable—or rather, insofar as they can be denominated—by white. Insofar as they agree in white in this way, they agree accidentally or denominatively; and white is contained in them not formally but denominatively. For they are then considered not as subjects formally white, but as denominable by white. In this way they agree in something extrinsic to them, namely, in white, and consequently are accidentally inferior to it, as to the fifth predicable.

In reply to the confirmation, the inferiors are accidentally subjects on the side of the thing that is subject; but the notion of being subject and predicable is per se a true notion of predicating and being subjected, as universality requires. Thus the notion of the fifth predicable is per se the notion of a universal and per se requires inferiors, though not inferiors that have per se necessity in the nature and form being predicated, but contingent inferiors. Accordingly, what is accidentally predicated of many has universality, or a reference to many, per se—just as it belongs per se to opinion to concern contingent propositions, and to freedom to act contingently.

Concerning the third difficulty, IT IS CERTAIN that accidental predicates, in order actually to exercise affirmative predication, require the existence of the subject as a condition.

The reason is that in accidental predications the verb “is” is not free of time; therefore the predication is verified dependently on the existence of its terms, and if the subject does not exist, it is not verified. I mean that existence is required in the relevant time: a past predication for past things and a future one for future things.

THE DIFFICULTY, HOWEVER, IS whether not only the exercise of accidental predication but also universality itself—the aptitude for accidental predication—regards only existing inferiors. Some affirm this, moved by the reason that an accident can regard non-existing subjects only as possible subjects, in which it can possibly exist. But possible existence is not predicated accidentally, but essentially, as when one says: “Adam possibly walks” or “Adam is possibly white.” Therefore the universality of the fifth predicable does not regard possible subjects.

It is confirmed as follows: with respect to non-existing subjects, predication is impossible, since it is contingent and requires existence as a condition. But if predication is impossible, universality or predicability cannot obtain.

NEVERTHELESS, the opposite seems truer: the universality of the fifth predicable is not destroyed merely by the destruction of the subjects’ existence, because universality consists in an aptitude, on the part of the nature, to be predicated of many. The fact that those many are not actually given is no intrinsic impediment to that aptitude and is not opposed to it; it is opposed only to the exercise of predication itself. What is opposed to an act or exercise does not destroy an aptitude and power: opposition to act is not opposition to potency.

This is confirmed by a physical and real accident: its separation from a subject does not deprive it of its aptitude to inhere in that subject, since this follows from the nature of the accident. Likewise, an accident considered metaphysically in the concrete does not lose its power to be predicated contingently of many, because this capacity is not removed by the lack of existence in its subjects; only their application, so that it be in them, is removed.

You will say: The notion of the concrete is removed, because every subject that it could involve is destroyed; thus only the accident in the abstract remains.

But on the contrary: only singular subjects are destroyed by the lack of existence; a subject in common can still be conceived. The concrete of an accident in common is not a singular subject, but a subject taken in common, just as white as such does not have only this or that body as the subject of its concretion, but body in common.

IN REPLY TO THE OPPOSITE ARGUMENT, an accident has only a possible relation to non-existing subjects, so that it may belong to them. However, this possible existence and relation is not what is predicated; it is a condition on the side of the predicable thing. If possibility itself were predicated, it would be predicated of the subject essentially, not accidentally. For every modal proposition, if true, is an essential proposition. The examples offered proceed in this way. We, however, say that an accident in common, with the subjects’ existence set aside, has an aptitude to be predicated contingently of them—not by predicating the possibility itself, but with respect to a form that can belong contingently to them once the subjects exist.

Thus, in a word: possibility taken as a predicate makes a proposition essential; possibility on the side of the subjects of which an accidental form can be predicated does not make the predication essential, but leaves it with its aptitude and power to be predicated contingently, although its exercise cannot occur without the subjects’ existence.

In reply to the second argument, it is said that such predication is impossible of non-existing subjects, not because the accident itself is deficient, but because the subjects’ application is deficient. A separated accident likewise retains the possibility of inhering, although it does not actually inhere or become applied while it remains in that state.