Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, Secunda Pars Artis Logicae

To understand the point of difficulty clearly, WE SUPPOSE that we are not now speaking of the sign and signification as the relation itself in which a sign formally consists, as we showed above¹; for a relation is in no way effective, but is purely a relation to a term, and to regard something is not to cause it. We are therefore speaking of the foundation of sign and signification, insofar as it represents something to a cognitive power, for which it substitutes and whose place it takes in representing it to that power. AND WE INQUIRE whether this leading and presenting, or representation, of its significate to the power is a kind of effecting, or in what kind of cause it should be placed.

In the very act of signifying or representing we can DISTINGUISH three things that seem to belong to making an object present in a power; for to represent is nothing other than to make an object present to, or united with, a power.

The first is the emission or production of species, which takes place from an object and an extrinsic sign into a power.

The second is the arousal of a power so that it attends; this is distinct from the impression of species itself, for even after receiving species one needs to be aroused in order to attend.

The third is concurrence with the power in eliciting knowledge of the thing signified. In eliciting this act, the extrinsic sign concurs by means of the intrinsically received species, through which it concurs not only in forming knowledge of itself but also of the signified, to which it leads. This concurrence with the power, however, is not signifying,² because this concurrence belongs to the eliciting of cognition. The eliciting of cognition is not signifying; if it is cognition of the signified, it is the term and end of signifying, for the sign moves in order that knowledge of the signified be received. But if it is cognition of the sign itself, it is presupposed to signifying, because from what is known it leads to something else, or signifies it. We do not doubt that this representation of the signified and leading of the power to attain it, since it is something newly occurring in the nature of things, must have some efficient cause. But we inquire whether, insofar as it depends on the sign, it depends in the order of efficient causality, so that the sign effects signification and signifying in second act is effecting; or whether it is effected by another cause, while the sign has the role of an object objectively.

LET THERE BE A SINGLE CONCLUSION: Signifying or representing is in no way effected by the sign, and, speaking formally, signifying is not effecting.

Thus this proposition, “A sign effects,” is never per se in the fourth mode. This conclusion, very common among recent Thomists, who often discuss it in their daily disputations, may first be gathered from St. Thomas, De Veritate, q. 11, art. 1, ad 4³, where he says that “the proximate efficient cause of knowledge is not signs, but the reasoning that proceeds from principles to a conclusion.”

But it has its FOUNDATION chiefly in two principles:

The first is that an object, insofar as it exercises objective causality with respect to a power and represents itself, does not do so efficiently; it is merely as an extrinsic form, which is applied and made present to the power through species by another efficient cause. If the object itself also has the effective power to apply itself, it has this materially and per accidens, as in natural things a form exhibits its presence in matter. Yet that presence, insofar as it comes from the form, is not effected efficiently but formally; it is effected efficiently by what applies and unites the form.

The second principle is that a sign succeeds to and substitutes for the object in this same line and order of objective causality, but not in the character of what applies efficiently or leads the power to the signified efficiently. It does so objectively, not principally but by substitution. For this reason a sign is called instrumental: not as an instrument of an efficient cause, but as a substitute for the object—not informing as a species does, but representing from outside.

The first principle is explained as follows. As we saw in the preceding article, the character of an object does not consist in its emitting and producing its species in a cognitive power, and so on. For species are sometimes infused efficiently by God, as in angels and infused knowledge, without the object impressing them efficiently. The fundamental reason is that the character of an object is preserved in something's being passively representable and knowable by a power. But to be passively representable in itself and as such does not imply a power that applies and unites the object to the power; it implies that which is united and made present. For just as to represent is to make present, so to be represented and representable is to be made present. If, then, the character of an object is preserved by its being representable, it follows that actively making a representation lies outside the character of an object and is not required for it. Likewise, if a form consists in being something unifiable with matter as that which informs it and makes matter intimately present to itself, the character of form cannot consist in its efficiently applying and uniting itself to matter. Hence St. Thomas compares an object to a form or actuality by which a power is made actual and informed. The intelligible is an act of the intellect, as he teaches in Summa theologiae I, q. 14, art. 2, q. 79, art. 2, and many other places. Therefore representing, or making present, does not belong to the object itself, as formally an object, as though it were the efficient cause of this presentation; it belongs to it as a form and act presented and united to the power.

For the same reason it is clear that arousing efficiently does not belong to the character of an object: both because this arousal is effected by another cause, either inwardly by God or outwardly by a person or another agent who proposes and applies the object to sense; and because in arousal the object is what is applied to the power, and it is not required that the object itself be what applies it efficiently. Finally, in producing knowledge, an object placed within a power through a species can concur efficiently, not by the force of an object as specifying, but by the force of a power determined and actualized by the object, from which the power and object constitute one principle in act; the object itself does not add an efficient power to the power. This concurrence or production of cognition is not signifying or representing: the eliciting of cognition presupposes an object represented to the power and moving it to tend toward consummate cognition and representation of the signified. Thus that cognition of the signified is the term and end of signification, for it moves one to know.

The second principle is explained from the proper character of a sign as a sign: a sign is substituted for an object in order to lead it to the power in the way the object would do so of itself in its character as object. An instrumental, extrinsic sign represents the signified only by representing itself as a better-known object, and the signified as something virtually contained in it, or as less known, to which it bears some relation and connection. Its concurrence in representing the signified to the power is therefore the same as its concurrence in representing itself, because by representing itself it also represents the signified as pertaining to itself. Hence the emission of species and the arousal of the power belong to a sign in the same way as to an object when it represents itself: it causes this objectively, not efficiently. For a sign represents the signified only by first representing itself as an object, then extending its own representation to something else virtually implicit and contained in it. A sign therefore does not represent objectively in an absolute way, but objectively and instrumentally, as serving another. If it is a formal sign, it is clear that it represents not efficiently but formally through itself, as is clear from its definition and evident in knowledge and concepts, which will be treated in the following question.

THE ARGUMENTS ARE ANSWERED.

An objection may first be made from various authorities of St. Thomas. In Summa theologiae III, q. 64, art. 4, ad 1, he says “that in the voice there is a certain power for arousing another's mind, arising in the voice insofar as it proceeds from the speaker's conception.” This power of which St. Thomas speaks is a physically efficient power. For there St. Thomas says that the spiritual power in the sacraments is related in the same way as that arousing power in the voice. The power in the sacraments is effective; so too is the power in the voice for arousing, and consequently for signifying, since arousal occurs by signification.

Likewise, in De Veritate, q. 11, art. 1, ad 11⁴, St. Thomas says “that the words of a teacher are more closely related to causing knowledge than sensible things outside the soul, insofar as they are signs of intelligible intentions.” Therefore, insofar as signs cause knowledge, they do so not by representing objectively but by leading to the signified thing.

Again, in Sentences IV, dist. 1, q. 1, art. 1, question 1, ad 5⁵, he says that “a demonstration quia proceeds from a common sign.” But a demonstration produces knowledge efficiently by reason of its matter, from which it is composed, not by reason of a second intention. Therefore the sign from which a demonstration is composed efficiently influences knowledge.

Finally, in Opusculum 16, § Ostenso igitur etc.⁶, he says “that the action of a mirror, which is to represent, cannot be attributed to a human being.” Therefore there is a representing or signifying that is an action.

THE RESPONSE to the first passage of St. Thomas is that the arousing power in the voice is not the voice's actual signification or signifying, since someone is instead aroused so as to attend to the voice's signification. It is the very use of the intellect of the speaker, who manifests his concept by means of the voice, as Cajetan observes on that passage. This use is something beyond signification, since it applies the voice that signifies so that another may attend. Thus this arousal and arousing power, like a kind of latent energy, proceeds efficiently from the person uttering and using the voice, while the signifying voice moves representatively and objectively. St. Thomas compares this arousing power—that is, the use of the voice derived from the speaker's intellect—with the efficacious motion by which God moves and uses the sacraments to produce grace, because the sacraments are like signs and words of God, who arouses us to grace and produces grace itself. This power is quite distinct from the sacraments' signification, since it is added to it, just as the use of the voice and its arousing power are added to the voice's signification. For arousal occurs so that we may attend to the signification and be moved by it. This signification or representation, insofar as it comes from the signifying voice, is not efficient but objective. But insofar as the voice is moved by a speaker who arouses, it has an effective power to arouse—not arising from representation, but derived from the one who proposes and moves the signifying voice. Thus the speaker applies the signifying voice, while the signifying voice is what is applied and signifies representatively. We need not now dispute whether that power and use of the voice is some physical power added to the voice or something moral. It suffices for our purpose that this arousal, insofar as it is effective, whether morally or physically, is not signifying itself, nor does it proceed efficiently from the sign as signifying—unless perhaps signification itself is called an action and efficiency morally, metaphorically, or rather grammatically.

To the second passage from De Veritate, the response is that St. Thomas says the teacher's words are more closely related to causing knowledge, but he does not say they are so efficiently. It suffices that they are more closely related representatively or objectively, because a sign is a substitute for the thing signified.

To the third passage the response is that⁷ in a demonstration from a sign, the sign's representing and signifying does not effect the demonstration or produce knowledge. Rather, this proceeds efficiently from the intellect, moved by an object and by a sign that represents objectively, not efficiently. Accordingly, St. Thomas says in the passage cited above, De Veritate, q. 2, art. 1, ad 4⁸, “that the proximate efficient cause of knowledge is not signs, but the intellect itself.”

To the final passage the response is that representing is called the action of a mirror in a presuppositional sense, not formally, because by refracting light the mirror efficiently generates an image that represents.

A second objection is made: Some character of effecting is included in the very definition of an instrumental sign; therefore a sign, formally insofar as it is a sign, effects.

The antecedent is proved from Augustine's well-known definition: “A sign is that which, in addition to the appearances it presents to the senses, causes something else to come into cognition.” Both presenting appearances and causing something else to come into cognition imply efficiency; for by the same motion and causality by which it presents appearances in order to represent itself, it leads to cognition of another thing. But presenting appearances is effecting and producing them; therefore leading to cognition of another thing is also to act efficiently. This is included in the definition of a sign; therefore it is essential to a sign to effect insofar as it is a sign, which is to signify. For to represent efficiently is nothing other than to effect a representation. But a sign effects species, which are representations; therefore it represents efficiently.

This is confirmed because many kinds of efficiency belong to a sign insofar as it signifies. Sacraments, which are signs, effect insofar as they signify; therefore in them signifying formally is effecting. Otherwise they would not formally be practical signs if they did not effect insofar as they signify. Likewise, insofar as it signifies, a sign is said to arouse a power, transmit species, and contribute to inferring a conclusion, all of which belong to efficient causality.

The response is that those two things included in the definition of a sign—presenting species and causing something to come into cognition—do not express efficiency by way of efficient causality. For presenting species is common to signs and non-signs: an object that represents itself without signifying itself also presents species, and it does not do this efficiently insofar as it is an object, as we have proved. Therefore the efficiency of signification cannot consist in presenting species. If external objects do impress species efficiently, that efficiency does not constitute them as objects; rather, it comes from some power, either a hidden power of heaven itself, as St. Thomas suggests in De potentia, q. 5, art. 8, as some think, or an evident power, such as light in colors or refracted air in sounds, and so on. In the second phrase, causing something to come into cognition, the word causing does not signify efficiency on the sign's part, but an objective representation, as it were, or representation in the role of an object. This does not signify efficient concurrence, but that of an extrinsic formal cause that moves representatively toward cognition of itself and, beyond this, toward knowledge of another.

To the confirmation, the response is that all the efficiency listed in the argument is extrinsic and added to the sign as signifying; signification does not per se require it to be joined to signification. Hence “a sign effects” is never per se in the fourth mode. The sacraments do not effect insofar as they signify because signification is formally an effecting; rather, efficiency is joined and attached to signification, either morally, insofar as they are practical and proceed from God's command and the minister's practical intention—not simply stating something, but directing an action—or also physically, insofar as they receive from God's command the power to produce grace. As for the added claims about arousing the power and transmitting species, we have already said that such arousal belongs to a sign not efficiently insofar as it is a sign, but objectively, or in the role of an object. Objective causality belongs to an extrinsic formal cause, not an efficient one.

A third objection is made: There can be a formal sign that is denominated formal not from the relation itself—which is what is most formal in a sign, otherwise every sign would be formal because it involves a relation—but from its foundation, since the relation of sign is founded on something that, by informing a power, represents to it, as a concept or act of knowledge does. Therefore, likewise, since the foundation of an instrumental sign effects—namely, transmits species, arouses and unites the power, and represents the thing to it—it can be said to signify efficiently, just as a formal sign is said to signify formally.

This is confirmed because a sign is truly called instrumental, and therefore also effective, since an instrumental cause is reduced to an efficient cause, not a formal one. Nor is it valid to say that it is an instrument logically, not physically. For a logical instrument is something that causes by means of an intention of reason. But a sign, especially a natural sign, does not cause by means of an intention of reason, but through the reality of its representation.

THE RESPONSE is that it is entirely true that a sign is formal or instrumental by reason of the foundation of the sign-relation itself, not from the side of the relation. Yet since this foundation is the very principle of manifesting another thing from the side of the object, or in the object's place, it is not incompatible with its acting in the order of formal causality from the object's side; it is incompatible with its acting in the order of efficient causality. For the very character of an object is in itself an act and form of a power and, per accidens, because it cannot exist entitatively within the power, it exists intentionally through its signs, which take its place, such as concepts and acts of knowledge. Thus extrinsic formal causality belongs per se to an object. It is not incompatible with its sometimes being intrinsic, per se or through its signs, joined and united to the power. But for it to move the power efficiently by applying and representing an object lies outside the line of objective causality and belongs to another line of causation, not to an object as object, as we have often said. If an object also has the effective power to apply and present an object by producing species, this will be per accidens and materially, or concomitantly, not per se, formally, and in the fourth mode.

But if you insist: What, then, is signifying and manifesting, if it is neither arousing nor emitting species nor efficiently producing cognition? The response is that it is making an object present to a power in the place of the object or signified. The presence of an object in a power in first or second act depends on many causes: on what produces species or applies the object efficiently; on the power, which also efficiently generates knowledge; on the object presenting itself formally from outside, or specifically; and on the sign as substituting for it in the same kind of objective causality—not as principal, but as its instrument or substitute, and not efficiently.

To the confirmation, the response is that a sign is called instrumental objectively, not efficiently—that is, it acts in place of an object, as was said. It is rightly called a logical instrument, not a physical one, not because it acts by means of an intention of reason, but because it does not represent or lead the power to the signified unless it is first known, and thus it signifies as something known. What belongs to a thing insofar as it is known is said to belong to it logically, because Logic treats things insofar as they are known. The truth is that this influence of the sign is not effective but objective: it acts in the role and place of the signified object, in the same order and line, not in the order of efficient causality, as has been proved. Thus this instrument is not reduced to an efficient cause, nor is it strictly an instrument, but metaphorically or logically.