Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, Secunda Pars Artis Logicae

WE ASSUME that impressed species are given, which are united to the power in place of the object in order to elicit cognition or awareness, since this is brought forth by the power and the object. Hence the object must be made united or present to the power and determine it to elicit cognition. And since the object cannot itself enter the power and be united to it, this must occur through some form, which is called a species. It contains the object in an intentional and cognizable mode in such a way that it can make the object present and united to the power. Because nature has established this form or species for this office, it is said to represent the object to the power, because it presents the object to the power or makes it present. It is also called a likeness of the natural object, because by its very nature it performs the object's role, or is the very object in intentional being. This unity or agreement is called a likeness, and likewise because it is given for the formation of an expressed likeness. It is called impressed because it is impressed upon the power and added to it from an extrinsic principle; it does not proceed and issue from the power itself as an expressed species does. For it is given to the power to elicit cognition, and thus functions as a principle and cooperates with the power to elicit cognition, not as a term proceeding from the power itself and its cognition. This will be discussed at greater length in On the Soul III¹; see also St. Thomas, On Power, q. 8, art. 1², and opusc. 13³, 14⁴, and 53⁵, and Quodlibet 7, art. 1⁶, as well as many other places where he explains the nature of the impressed species.

WE INQUIRE, then, whether this species, which represents the object as a principle of cognition, has the character of a formal sign, just as it has the character of something representative.

LET THERE BE ONE CONCLUSION: An impressed species is not a formal sign.

This conclusion is drawn first of all from St. THOMAS, who, speaking of a sign in the common sense of the word—the sense that applies to a formal sign—says in On Truth, q. 9, art. 4, ad 4⁷, that it is “anything known in which something is cognized; and thus an intelligible form can be called a sign of the thing cognized through it.” But an impressed species is not an intelligible form that is something known in which something is cognized, since, to be something known, it would have to be either a cognized thing or a terminus of cognition. An impressed species, however, is only that by which the power cognizes as by a principle, as is clear from St. Thomas, Quodlibet 7, art. 1⁸, Summa theologiae I, q. 85, arts. 2 and 7, and Sentences IV, dist. 49, q. 2, art. 1⁹. Therefore it does not have the character of a sign in the common sense, or of an intelligible form functioning as a sign, as a formal sign does.

THE BASIS IS that an impressed species does not represent the object to the cognitive power or to the power's cognition; rather, it unites the object to the power so that the power may cognize. Therefore it is not a formal sign.

The consequence is proved from the intrinsic character of a sign itself, because a sign's proper and essential office is to manifest something else, or by manifesting it to lead a power to something. Before cognition, however, a species cannot manifest anything to a power, since every manifestation presupposes cognition or takes place in cognition itself; but an impressed species does not presuppose cognition to which it might manifest something, because it is a principle of cognition. Once cognition has been elicited or posited, it is no longer the impressed species that manifests, but the expressed species, which is the terminus in which cognition is completed. For cognition neither tends toward the impressed species nor cognizes in it. Therefore the impressed species is not what formally manifests the object to cognition, but what produces cognition, at whose terminus—that is, in the expressed species—the object is rendered manifest. Thus, in the impressed species the object concurs as a principle of cognition determining the power to elicit cognition, not as a cognized object and, consequently, not as something manifested. For nothing is rendered manifest to a power within the power itself except insofar as it is cognized. Therefore what does not manifest to cognition does not render the object manifest, and consequently does not signify it.

This is confirmed because it cannot in any way be verified of an impressed species that it is a formal awareness which immediately represents by itself. Therefore it is not a formal sign, since this is required by its definition.

The antecedent is proved: An impressed species is a principle of formal awareness, for it constitutes the intellect in first actuality in order to elicit formal awareness. But it belongs to the character of formal awareness that both it and its terminus, namely, the word, proceed from the intellect. Although it is not absolutely necessary that the word proceed from every intellect that understands through it, it is enough that it either be formed by that intellect or be united to it after having been formed by another, as in the probable opinion that the divine essence is united to the blessed in place of a word. Yet although it does not proceed from the intellect of the blessed, it is nevertheless united, or at least related, as an understood principle intrinsic to them and as the medium in which their cognition and understanding occur. If formal awareness is taken to mean the act of cognition itself, it is evident that it does not apply to an impressed species, since the species is not a proceeding act, but a principle of act and cognition. If it is taken to mean something proceeding from the intellect, not by way of an act but by way of a term proceeding vitally, that is an expressed species, not an impressed one. Therefore nothing proceeding from the intellect is an impressed species, and consequently it is in no way formal awareness, because formal awareness must proceed either as an act or as a term, since it is something vital, insofar as its formal effect is to render the knower vital and formal. An impressed species, then, is not formal awareness and thus is not a formal sign.

THE ARGUMENTS ARE ANSWERED.

First it is argued: An impressed species is truly and properly representative of the object, its likeness, and a substitute acting in its place. It is not representative objectively, effectively, or instrumentally; therefore it is representative formally and as a formal sign.

The consequence is clear, because to be representative by way of a sign, it suffices that it represent something other than itself and act as a substitute for what it represents.

The major premise belongs to St. Thomas in several places where he calls the impressed species a likeness and representation. For example, in On Truth, q. 8, art. 1, body¹⁰, he says that that by which a seeing person sees is either a likeness of what is seen or the essence of what is seen. He adds that cognition occurs according to the agreement of a likeness, an agreement that consists in representation. It is clear that that by which a seeing person sees is an impressed species. And in his commentary on On Memory and Recollection, lect. 3¹¹, he says that in the imagination a kind of sensible figure is impressed and remains when the sensible object has departed, just as the figure of a ring is impressed in wax. It is certain that the sensible object impresses nothing in the power except an impressed species. Finally, in Against the Gentiles I, chapter 53, he says that both the understood intention and the intelligible species are likenesses of the object; and because the intelligible species, which is the principle of understanding, is a likeness of the external thing, the intellect consequently forms an intention of that thing which is like it. Here he speaks most clearly of the impressed species, as distinguished from the expressed species.

The minor premise is proved as follows. First, the impressed species is constituted in the genus of representations, because it belongs to the intentional genus. It does not represent as an object, but as performing the object's role; therefore it represents as a medium between the power and the object. Nor does it represent instrumentally, because it does not move by a cognition of itself that pre-exists; for the species is not cognized in order to represent. Nor does it represent effectively, since, as we showed in the preceding question, there is no effective representation or signification. Therefore it represents formally, insofar as by itself and through union with the power it makes the power itself like the object with an intentional likeness that is representative.

It is confirmed: If the impressed species is not a formal sign because it does not represent to cognition, but functions as a principle of cognition on the side of the power, and yet truly belongs to the genus of representations, then it represents as a principle of cognition and thus represents effectively to cognition itself. In that case, effective representation or signification would exist.

THE REPLY to the major premise is, first, that it is true that an impressed species is a representative likeness of the object, but as a principle of cognition, not as formal awareness or as something presupposing awareness to which it represents. For this reason it is called a virtual likeness, since it is a principle from which formal likeness and formal awareness arise. But in this it lacks the character of a sign: although it is a likeness and representation of the object that unites it and makes it present to the power, it does not make it present to cognition; rather, it is a principle of cognition. For what represents to a power and not to cognition does not represent by actually manifesting, since actual manifestation does not occur without actual cognition; instead, it represents—or unites and makes the object present—so that manifestation and cognition themselves may be elicited. St. Thomas speaks of this kind of virtual likeness, functioning as a principle.

If you object that the definition of a sign does not say that the sign represents to the cognitive power or to cognition itself, nor that it is a medium or principle of representing, then we are voluntarily adding all these things to the definition of a sign.

The reply is that these are not additions, but are contained in the definition, since a sign must essentially have a representation that manifests and leads to the signified. A representation that manifests can manifest only to cognition. Hence a representation that unites an object to a power so that the power may be constituted as determined to elicit cognition is not a manifestative representation; it is a representation, union, and presence of the object to a power that does not yet cognize. Thus, when an impressed species informs the power, it does not inform it by making it cognizant, as a formal sign does, since that is formal awareness; rather, it makes the power able to cognize. Consequently, it does not render the object actually manifested, but actuates and determines the power to elicit cognition, in which the object is manifested.

To the proof of the minor premise of the principal argument, the reply is that an impressed species is representative in none of those ways, because it does not represent by actually manifesting the object, but by actuating and determining the power, as a principle, to elicit cognition; and it does this formally. But this is not to be formally a sign, because it is not to represent by actual manifestation, as is required by the character of a sign, whose representation must be manifestative and not merely actuative of the power for eliciting cognition.

To the confirmation, the reply is that it does not follow that there is effective representation or signification, especially when we are speaking of manifestative representation, because this does not belong actually to an impressed species, but virtually. Indeed, it represents in no other way either, because the impressed species produces representation by actuating the power through informing it, not by producing something in the power. The production of an expressed representation does indeed take place effectively through the species, but this production is not representation; it is the production of the representing thing, namely, the expressed species. Actual representation will proceed from that species, not effectively but formally within the power; by contrast, an external sign represents in place of the object.

Second it is argued, that an impressed species has everything formally required for the character of an image, much more than an external image; therefore it has everything required for the character of a sign that actually represents.

The antecedent is proved: It has the two conditions required for the character of an image according to St. Thomas, Summa theologiae I, q. 93, arts. 1 and 2: namely, that it has likeness to something and originates from it. An impressed species is like the object, since it has an intentional agreement with it, and likewise it is derived and originates from the object.

The consequence is proved as follows: That image of the species has representation joined to it, since it is an intentional likeness; and this suffices for a concept to have the character of a formal sign, even if it is a terminus of cognition and not a medium, because it is not the ultimate terminus but is ordered to an external object. Therefore, likewise, although an impressed species has the character of a representing principle, since it is not the first principle—for that is the power itself—but mediates between the power and the object, it will have the character of a sign. Thus St. Thomas in Sentences IV, dist. 49, q. 2, art. 1, ad 15¹², and Quodlibet 7, art. 1¹³, calls the impressed species without qualification a medium of cognition.

THE REPLY is, first, that an impressed species is an image only virtually, not formally. For it lacks the second condition, namely, that it be expressed: it is not expressed by the object, but impressed. Thus seed separated from an animal is not an image, because although it originates from the animal, it is not a term expressed by it, but an impressed power for generating. Therefore not every origin from another constitutes an image; rather, the origin must be by way of a term ultimately intended.

Second, the consequence is denied, because the representation of an impressed species is not representation by way of a manifestative medium. It does not represent to cognition itself, but by way of a form determining and actuating the power so that it can cognize. In this it differs greatly from a concept, which, although it functions on the side of the term representing the object, nevertheless represents it to cognition itself; through it cognition is rendered terminated, and thus it represents formally and terminatively to the cognitive power by way of actual manifestation. An impressed species, however, although it is not the first principle, actuates the power before cognition and, consequently, before actual manifestation. Thus it is not a representative medium by manifesting, but represents virtually, by way of a principle for eliciting manifestation and cognition. Hence even an instrumental sign, which is an extrinsic object, is not said to signify and manifest except insofar as it is cognized, not before cognition. For it is a condition of an instrumental sign that it first be cognized in order to signify. When St. Thomas calls the impressed species a medium of cognition, he says that it is a medium by which, not in which; a medium by which is a principle of knowing, not something that actually manifests an object or a cognized thing.