Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, Secunda Pars Artis Logicae

This CONTROVERSY is well known between the school of St. Thomas and that of the Subtle Doctor Scotus. For Scotus holds that being is univocal with respect to the ten categories, and this follows from his position, according to which he judges being to express one objective concept, abstracted from its inferiors and contractible to them. St. Thomas, as we shall soon see, holds the opposite.

THEREFORE, ONLY TWO matters are to be treated by us here: First, to determine whether being is analogical or univocal with respect to the ten categories. Second, if it is analogical, what kind of analogy it is. We shall speak of the second matter in the following article, and of the first here. We are not treating the analogy of being with respect to God and creatures, since that does not belong to our present inquiry and can easily be resolved from the resolution of this question.

Regarding the first matter, then, SCOTUS’S POSITION is that being is indeed univocal with respect to the ten categories, but is not a genus. By “univocal” he means a concept so one that its unity suffices for contradiction, by affirming and denying it of the same thing, as he expressly says in 1 Sentences, distinction 3, question 2, § Second, without asserting. In several other places, however, Scotus asserted that being is equivocal, or analogical, with respect to the ten categories, namely because it lacks the univocity sufficient to be a genus or one of the five predicables. For Scotus always removed the character of genus from being on account of the Philosopher’s express authority in Metaphysics 3, text 10¹ and Metaphysics 4, text 2², and often elsewhere. Nor is it necessary to distinguish further among the various kinds of univocity, as some disciples of Scotus do (as may be seen in Aretinus’s Formalities, p. 78); for now it suffices to distinguish between univocal in the sense of being a genus or one of the five predicables, and univocal without being a genus, which is all Scotus grants to being. Below we shall prove that no such distinction should be made: if being is not a genus, neither is it univocal.

Scotus’s argument rests chiefly on that principle, which many outside his school also admit: the concept of being, and of every proper proportionality analogue, is one and abstracted from its analogates with the same abstraction by which any univocal concept is abstracted from its inferiors. From this it seems forcefully to follow that being must be univocal: that abstracted concept is one and has its inferiors included potentially, not actually; therefore it is contracted by them through additions that determine and divide that superior concept. Hence nothing prevents it from being a univocal concept; for all the inequality or diversity in it arises from the contracting differences, not from the superior character, which is precisely one. The same is found in animal and other genera: all inequality arises from the differences, all unity from the superior concept.

That principle, which this position takes as its foundation, seems sufficiently proved as follows. The concept of being cannot immediately represent several things as actually included in that representation, because actually not including and actually not representing are the same, as is not being the object of that representation. But the common concept of being does not represent several things to us actually—for example, quantity, quality, and so on—but one thing distinct from them. These are not part of the essential concept of being in common; otherwise, wherever being were found, these would be found. Therefore being can be represented without them, since anything can be represented without whatever is not part of its quidditative concept, as animal is represented without its differences, which it includes potentially and confusedly. Likewise, then, if the quidditative character of being does not include these inferiors or depend on them, it includes them only potentially and confusedly. That is to be explicitly and actually one, while the many are only potential—which is proper to univocity, since it includes only potentially those things by which it is diversified.

They add other inconveniences as though they were signs by which we can detect the unity of that concept of being abstracted from its inferiors. For one can be certain of the character of being while uncertain about this or that being: from afar, for example, I may know that what I see is a being and doubt which being it is. This requires a diversity of concepts; for I cannot simultaneously be certain and uncertain, or doubtful, about the same thing. Again, in these predications, “Substance is being” and “Quality is being,” the predicate does not predicate something that is all beings, even proportionally, for that would make the predication false. Therefore it predicates only one predicate, not several objects actually included in it; otherwise several things would actually be applied to the subject, although they do not actually belong to it. For substance is not actually quantity, quality, and the other beings, which would nevertheless be applied to it if they were actually included in the concept of being. Finally, if it were so, what is signified by the name “being” would not serve as a middle term in demonstration, because it would not signify one thing, which alone serves true demonstration. Thus there would be no science of being, if it were not a middle term for demonstrating attributes; nor would it admit contradiction, since that would not be the same thing said of the same thing.

NEVERTHELESS, FOR A RESOLUTION I SAY: Common being with respect to the ten categories cannot have a univocal concept, whether it is taken to mean only the concept of complete being or as abstracting from the complete and the incomplete.

This conclusion is unquestionably St. Thomas’s, and I am surprised that some authors wish to deny it while claiming to speak in St. Thomas’s sense. Thus he affirms it in 1 Sentences, distinction 22, question 1, article 3, reply to objection 2³, where he says: “The equivocal is divided in one way, the univocal in another, and the analogical in another. The equivocal is divided according to the things signified, the univocal according to differences, but the analogical according to diverse modes. Hence, since being is predicated analogically of the ten genera, it is divided into them according to diverse modes.” Nothing could be more explicit than St. Thomas here. Likewise, in the same book of the Sentences, distinction 25, question 1, article 2⁴, and in the Sentences commentary for Annibaldus at the same place⁵, he lays down as a general rule that “whatever things do not agree in one most general genus cannot have anything predicated of them univocally.” It is clear that being is above the most general genera, that is, the ten categories. Similarly, in 1 Sentences, distinction 19, question 5, article 2⁶, he proves that being and the other transcendentals are said analogically of their inferiors. In question 1 of Truth, article 1⁷, he proves that being cannot be contracted by addition (the way a univocal is contracted by differences), but by modes that explain it in diverse ways. That its concept is not altogether abstracted from the inferior categories is drawn from what he teaches in Metaphysics 8, lecture 5, § He solves the foregoing⁸, where, following the Philosopher, he says: “Since the ten categories do not stand to being by addition in the way species stand to genera by the addition of differences, but being itself is manifestly this, it is clear that being does not await something added in order to become this—that is, substance, quantity, or quality.” Here he plainly excludes from being a concept contractible by addition, and consequently assumes that it is neither univocal nor inclusive of several things only potentially, since they cannot be added to it. Therefore it is not actually separated from them, although it does not explain them. Finally, in Metaphysics 4, lecture 1⁹, he teaches plainly that being is not said univocally of substance, accident, and the other categories. See also Metaphysics 3, lecture 8¹⁰.

NOR CAN ONE SAY that when the Philosopher and St. Thomas say being is not said univocally but as “healthy” is said with respect to medicine, they are speaking not of being absolutely, but of being per se, which is the first being; for such being belongs to an accident only denominatively and by attribution, insofar as it is called a being of a being. This fails, because if being there means substance or the first being, an accident, by virtue of such attribution, ought to be called or denominated substance by an extrinsic denomination, as a plant is called healthy from the health of an animal. But the Philosopher is not speaking of such a denomination. For an accident is absolutely called a being by intrinsic denomination, but not substance, either intrinsically or extrinsically. Further, the very being which he denies to be univocal with respect to substance and accident in Metaphysics 4, text 2¹¹, he denies in Metaphysics 3, text 10¹² to be a genus in any way. But if he were speaking of the first being, which is substance, he would not deny it to be a genus at least with respect to some things, namely substances themselves, whereas he plainly says that being absolutely is not a genus.

OTHERS ANSWER that in these passages, and in Metaphysics 7, text 15¹³ and many others, where the Philosopher teaches that being is neither equivocal nor univocal but analogical, he denies not logical univocity to being but physical univocity. This fails, because physical analogy is compatible with the character of a genus: body, for example, is said by physical analogy of corruptible and incorruptible things, yet it truly and properly is a genus. Aristotle, however, attributes such analogy to being, while denying it the character of a genus, as is clear from the cited passage in Metaphysics 3; therefore he is not speaking of physical analogy. Further, physical analogy is only an inequality caused in the inferiors by the differences themselves, in which the superior character is not included. Physical univocity, by contrast, is equality even in the inferiors that contract the superior character, as is found only in atomic species, which have equality in their individuals. Therefore, if the Philosopher excludes from being only physical univocity, he denies of it only that it is an atomic species, and consequently would not deny it to be a genus—which, nevertheless, he expressly does.

To explain the reason and foundation of this assertion, observe that in the conclusion we are speaking both of complete and incomplete, or categorial, being. The difference between them is this: being as it abstracts from the complete and incomplete is included in the contracting modes or differences; but complete being includes them, because it is completed through them. For being cannot otherwise be called complete or categorial except because it is completed by the modes through which it is contracted. This is clear because being can be made complete only through some mode by which it is distinguished from the incomplete. Such a mode, then, is either equal to being itself and accompanies it, or is inferior to it. If equal, it functions as an attribute of being and is no less transcendent than being itself, like the true and the good; and so it does not make being complete, since it leaves it transcendent and consequently included in the differences. If inferior, it is a contracting mode, since it is less extensive than being as such. Therefore being is completed by the modes through which it is contracted, and thus includes them; complete being is nothing other than the ten categories themselves. Although categorial being in common with all categorial beings could be conceived, it would be common in the sense of intending to place something in a category. But if categorial being is conceived on the side of nature, only what is placed in a category—not what abstracts from the categories—can be called a categorial thing.

With this established, the ARGUMENT FOR THE CONCLUSION is formed as follows: Being is included in the contracting modes or differences, or is predicated of them; if it is complete being, it includes them. Therefore it does not express a concept simply one, but one that is unequal and diverse, since it is included in the differences themselves. This is manifest: something is said to be included in differences when it is predicated of them and belongs to them even insofar as they formally express diversity; for this diversity is something. Therefore what is included in the differences communicates diversity itself to them, and so includes it actually, because what something communicates it includes actually. Moreover, the differences themselves, or contracting modes, do not resolve into two concepts, one insofar as they express agreement in something, the other insofar as they express difference; rather, they are a simple concept of differing. Otherwise there would be an infinite regress, if in every difference there were a concept of agreement in one thing and of difference through another; we would say the same of that second difference, and so on. Therefore the concept included in and predicated of the differences is purely a cause of diversity, not a source of agreement. And since it is also called one with respect to the things that agree in being, it is partly one and partly diverse, and thus analogical.

SOME ANSWER that differential characters are not being, but modes of being. But let that be so: let a difference be a mode of being. Either that mode is something in the nature of things or it is nothing. If nothing, then it makes things differ by nothing, which is not to make them differ. If it is something apart from nothing, then it is a being, because in this most general understanding of being whatever is opposed to nothing is called a being.

Others from Scotus’s school, such as Father Merinero, On Equivocals, disputation 1, question 1 and following, distinguish two considerations of being: being what and being such. They say that being what is being contractible and potential with respect to its inferiors. They say that being such is being that actualizes and determines, or contracts—that is, the difference itself. They therefore say that being what is not included in the contracting differences, because an infinite regress would follow: if the ultimate differences included being what, they would agree in it and again differ from one another, not through that in which they agree, but through something else by which they differ. One would then inquire again about that mode of difference, and so on to infinity. The process must therefore end in something that does not include being what, even if it is being such, that is, a difference.

But this answer is neither true nor does it remove the difficulty. It is not true, because that being such, or mode of difference, either includes being what or does not. If it does not, then it is nothing, since being what, or being something, is what is opposed to nothing and recedes from nothing. Or if being such too is opposed to nothing, then being such and being what agree again in this: that they are something and not nothing, or truly and properly have being. I shall then ask of that concept common to being such and being what how it is included intrinsically in each, since both intrinsically have being outside nothing and are opposed to nothing itself. But if being such includes being what, then certainly it is intrinsically and quidditatively being—for that is what including being what means. Therefore being what is included intrinsically in intrinsic modes and ultimate differences, since these are being such. It does not remove the difficulty, because I shall ask how these modes, which are called being such, agree in being such in common and yet are distinct from one another, since they are diverse. For if they are distinguished by some added mode or difference, I shall again ask how that mode agrees and differs from the other differences through another added mode, and so on to infinity. But if it is said that those differences or modes differ wholly within the character of being such and not through something added, even though they agree in that common character, why should we not say the same about the character of being what: that these differences or modes agree in it and yet are primarily diverse from one another, since being primarily diverse does not remove agreement in transcendentals?

Therefore one must say that being is intrinsically imbibed in these modes, because they truly are something real and outside nothing. There is no infinite regress, because they differ and agree in the same character—or rather, not in the same character, since analogues do not have unity simply, but are partly the same and partly diverse. Although insofar as they explain agreement they do not explain diversity, they nevertheless implicate and include it actually but confusedly, as we said in the preceding question, article 5.

Finally, our assertion is explained from another foundation: If being is univocal, it follows that it is a genus with respect to the ten categories, which the Philosopher expressly denies in Metaphysics 3, text 10¹⁴, and St. Thomas there in lecture 8¹⁵. This is clear because being is included in the differences, which is wholly opposed to the character of a genus, as often said; otherwise, too, there would not be ten supreme genera if being were a genus with respect to them. The consequence is proved because nothing is lacking to univocal being for it to be a genus. For it is predicated quidditatively—it is included quidditatively and intrinsically in every nature. Likewise, its concept is one, not included in the contracting differences according to this opinion, contractible by addition, and inclusive of its inferiors only potentially. Therefore nothing is lacking for it to be a genus.

THE DISCIPLES OF SCOTUS ANSWER that it is not a genus because it is contracted not by differences but by intrinsic modes. There is a distinction between these two ways of contracting: a difference comes in as though extrinsically, and without it the common character can be perfectly conceived, as animal without rational; but without an intrinsic mode a thing cannot be perfectly conceived. An intrinsic mode also does not alter the essence it modifies, just as modes of intensification and remission do not alter quality; a difference, however, alters the thing to which it comes and constitutes it in another reality. Hence, for a genus to be contracted by differences, the concept of the genus must be taken from a reality that is in essential potency to the reality from which the difference is taken; all of this is found in being.

But this solution, perhaps unwillingly, concedes what we intend: the concept of being cannot be perfectly separated from the modes that contract it and cause diversity. It follows that this concept does not have unity simply, and thus Scotus’s foundation collapses. For if we cannot conceive a reality without its intrinsic mode, nor perfectly separate it from the mode, as these authors say, then that concept is not abstracted from the modes that cause diversity; thus it includes them actually, not potentially, although it does not explain them. For if it included them potentially, it could be perfectly understood without them, just as animal is perfectly understood without rational, although it includes it potentially. Or, if it is perfectly abstracted from them, the differences are not intrinsic modes, and therefore being will be a genus.

And the implication of this solution is confirmed: on the one hand, it posits that being has an objective concept so one and abstracted from its inferiors that it remains in potency to them, since it does not include them actually; on the other hand, it says that being is not a genus because the reality from which that concept of being is taken is not in essential potency with respect to the reality from which the intrinsic mode is taken. If, then, it is not in potency to such a reality, it actually includes it, and therefore also the modes derived from it. Or it includes them in no way, neither actually nor potentially, but stands apart from them; then it would not be contractible or actualizable through them, nor would it stand to them even potentially, although they contract being quidditatively. Therefore the only possibility left is that it includes them actually but does not explain them. This is our position, but it destroys univocity of the same genus.

Others, then, such as Master Cabero here, treatise 4, disputation 3, doubt 7, admit that being is a genus and say that the Philosopher denied this of complete being in common. They thus concede that the ten categories are not genera primarily diverse, at least those that signify forms of denomination and intrinsic reality. They say only that they are supreme respectively, since, for example, no quantity higher than quantity and no substance higher than substance is found. But this is nothing and destroys the whole order of the ten categories. For if a supreme genus is taken only relatively, not absolutely, animal too will be called a supreme genus, since nothing higher is found in the character of animal; and so all subaltern genera will be supreme in this way and there will be almost infinitely many categories, or only one category will be constituted, namely complete being. Both possibilities are excluded from the Peripatetic school.

From these points the foundations advanced for Scotus’s position remain refuted. For it is manifestly deduced that the concept of being cannot be perfectly abstracted from its inferiors and be so one that it includes plurality potentially, not actually, whether complete being is meant or being is taken as abstracting from the complete and incomplete. Apart from the points raised in the preceding question, article 5, this is effectively proved from the transcendence of being, from which St. Thomas proved in Metaphysics 3, lecture 8¹⁶ that being is not a genus: namely, because on account of its transcendence it is included intrinsically in the differences, as has been explained.

But if you say: At least complete being is not transcendent, just as, although substance common to complete and incomplete substance in its category is transcendent, nevertheless it is not completed through its inferior differences but through the common character of substance insofar as it is made categorial. The answer is that above we showed clearly enough that complete being can be called complete only through the inferior modes that contract it. Substance, however, in order to be made complete, needs no inferior difference, but only a common mode, which is required by the mode of existing in itself. For in this way it is ordered to subsisting and becomes a certain whole in the genus of substance, which is to be separated from incomplete substance. But being has no common mode of being by which it is made complete; for if it is common to being, it is transcendent like being itself and is thus imbibed in all things, including incomplete ones.

AS FOR THE PROOFS MADE AT THE BEGINNING: To the first, it is answered that in the concept of being several things are not represented actually and explicitly, expressing their diversity; they are, however, represented confusedly and under the proportion of having being, which is to conceive those several things implicitly. But implicit is not the same as potential. The implicit in potency signifies something determinate in itself but determinable to several things by addition, as animal with respect to rational and irrational. The implicit in confused actuality, however, signifies all things without determination of any one, but as they are comprehended in one confusion, as when from afar we see a crowd confusedly. And “not representing actually” is “not including actually”—I distinguish: Not representing explicitly in actuality is not including explicitly in actuality, I grant; not representing explicitly in actuality is not including even confusedly in actuality, I deny.

To the second proof—that these inferiors are not of the quiddity of being in common, and so it can be perfectly represented without them—it is answered that those several things, as explicit with respect to their mode of diversity, are not of the character of being in common; those same things, as implicit in the proportional unity of having being, are part of the concept of being in common. Indeed, being in common is nothing other than whatever has being, taken under confusion and without any determination, except solely under the very proportion of having being. In this it differs from the concept of animal and other univocals, which not only include but explain a determinate degree to which addition can be made through the inferior contracting differences; for a character, or some explicit degree, can be contracted only through the addition of a further degree. But an analogical concept explains no determinate degree explicitly; rather, it confuses the analogates transcendentally under a proportional character. Thus the contraction and distinction of concepts occurs not through addition but through explanation of the confusion, as was explained in the preceding question, article 5.

If you object: The concept of being, or of an analogue, can be formed not only by representing no analogate determinately, but only indeterminately that in which the analogy occurs; it can also represent one analogate determinately—for example, substance—and the others indeterminately and confusedly, insofar as they resemble it in being. Therefore such a concept will not be wholly confused. The answer is that Cajetan admits both modes in his Opusculum on the Concept of Being. Nevertheless, when it determinately expresses one analogate and the other analogates confusedly, insofar as they are proportionally like it, that concept is univocal with respect to what it determinately expresses, because it represents one thing, but virtually analogical insofar as it extends to a likeness of confusion with the other analogates. Thus that likeness signifies no determinate nature, but indeterminacy and confusion in being, according to which the proportion among the analogates is established.

But some still press the point concerning complete being itself, insofar as it can be taken as common to two individuals, for example Peter and Paul; for it is not predicated unequally of them and consequently is not predicated analogically. The answer is that we already said above, in the preceding question, article 3, that it is not impossible for some analogue, if taken restrictively with respect to certain inferiors, not to exercise analogy there, because those inferiors are not diverse simply—just as “healthy” said of two animals is not analogical. Thus being restricted to two individuals does not exercise analogy, although it exercises transcendence, because singulars of the same species are so one that they do not have diversity simply, but only material diversity, which is extrinsic to the nature in which they wholly agree. Hence inclusion in such differences does not dissolve the unity of the concept simply, although by virtue of its transcendent concept it is analogical, because the character of transcendence requires that it not be restricted to those two individuals and consequently that it have diversity simply. Therefore nothing follows from this argument for the univocity of transcendentals in themselves.

AS FOR THE ARGUMENTS BROUGHT FORWARD LAST, the answer is: To the first, it is not impossible for the same concept or cognition, with respect to diverse things, to be doubtful and certain, obscure and clear. St. Thomas seems to admit this in the act of faith, in Summa theologiae II-II, question 1, article 4, replies 2 and 3, when he attributes to faith evident contact with the objects of belief under the aspect of credibility, but obscure contact under the aspect of the thing believed. Sight can be certain that something it sees from afar is an animal, yet doubt or be uncertain whether it is a horse or an ox, and so forth. This is especially true of negative doubt, that is, of not being certain. For an act that reaches several things under some aspect does not reach them all with equal clarity; one may be fully certain about one, but not another. Perhaps for positively doubting about one and having evident certainty about another, one act will not suffice even with respect to diverse things. But that is irrelevant to the force of the argument, which proceeds only from negative doubt. For if one begins to doubt positively, the confused concept of being is dissolved and one passes to articulating the concepts of the inferiors by doubting about them.

To the second objection we said in the preceding question, article 5, that in these predications, “Substance is being” and “Man is being,” the predicate “being” does not attribute the particular analogates to the subject insofar as they are many and considered in themselves, but insofar as they stand under that confusion and proportional unity of having being. That alone is predicated there, and it gives this sense: “Man is a possessor of being,” which is proportionally like quantity, quality, substance, and so forth, but is not substance, quantity, or quality explicitly and determinately.

To the last, it is answered that being can indeed be a middle term in a demonstration, since it has demonstrable attributes and does not signify diverse things insofar as they are diverse, as an equivocal does, but under a proportional unity and a certain confusion. This suffices for there to be science of it and, consequently, demonstration, and for it to have proper attributes, also transcendent and analogical ones, connected with that proportional character. This is expressly the Philosopher’s position in Posterior Analytics 2, chapter 11¹⁷, as Cajetan notes there, placing something proportional as the middle term of a demonstration. Similarly, contradiction can be made about that concept of being on account of the proportional unity it has, insofar as it stands under that confusion.

As for those who further object that being has a concept simply one because that concept is gathered together in having proper attributes common to substance and accident, this proves absolutely nothing, since it remained to be proved that those attributes are common univocally. But since they are common only analogically and transcendentally, like the true and the good, and so on, it is no wonder that the analogical unity of the subject suffices for them, and not unity simply.