Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, Secunda Pars Philosophiae Naturalis

We distinguish in generation between the adequate or total term and the formal or specified term. The first is usually called the term as that which is produced; the second, the term as that by which.

In the adequate term, or term as that which, we consider all the parts, the very integral nature that they constitute, subsistence by which such a nature subsists, and existence by which it exists. For a nature is said to subsist in a subsisting supposit as parts subsist in the whole—not because the nature or parts become supposits or persons in themselves, but because they are made determinate and affected by the very subsistence and personality in which they are, just as the parts of a line are terminated by a point, not because they themselves become a point, either per se or per accidens, but because they are affected and terminated by a single point. Just as a body is affected by whiteness without becoming whiteness, so the parts are brought together, terminated by that point; and the parts of a nature and the nature itself are not made another supposit or person in themselves through subsistence and supposit, but by one and the same subsistence they are made supposited and determinate, that is, subsisting.

Hence this sophism is invalid: Nature subsists through another, that is, through a person, whereas a supposit subsists through itself; therefore nature and supposit are distinct subsistents. The antecedent is answered by distinguishing: nature subsists through another which is the principle of subsisting and is communicated to it so that it may subsist—I grant; through another which is in itself a subsisting thing as that which—I deny. To the consequent, therefore there is one subsisting thing and another as that which—I deny the consequent; one as that by which and the other as that which—let it pass. But this is a distinction in the account of being, not two different subsistents, just as a white thing and whiteness do not make two white things as that which, but one as that by which and another as that which. For whiteness is called white as that by which, that is, the principle and form of the white thing, although body and whiteness are two entities.

The formal term is that by which something is constituted as through actuality and specification. But that by which a substance is constituted in its species when generated is either a partial form or the total form. The total form is the integral nature, consisting of form and matter united, as distinguished from the supposit or person; it is signified in the manner of a form, by which something is signified as the principle through which it is such—just as humanity is that by which a human being is human. A partial form is the principle distinguished from matter which, united to matter, composes the nature, from which the supposit or term of the nature results, unless divine assumption prevents this.

We therefore inquire here first about the total term: whether it is the composite itself as nature, or also the supposit, which is its term; and second about the formal term: whether it is the form itself or its union in matter.

On this matter there are various opinions of authors; see the Conimbricenses, On Generation, book 1, chapter 4, question 15, and the Carmelite Course, disputation 2, question 3. Regarding the total term, some have said that an action terminates in the composite, distinct from the action that terminates in the form, since they are distinct things. Others say that generation terminates intrinsically in the form, but extrinsically and secondarily in the whole composite, as though by a resultant, not as an essential term. Finally, others posit the composite itself, which is the nature, as the adequate term, but exclude the supposit or subsistence itself.

Authors are also divided concerning the formal term. Some say that only the form is the formal term, even if it is not itself produced and only the union is. Others say that union alone is per se the formal term of generation, not the form, because a union is newly produced in every generation, whereas a form is not always produced, as when a human being is generated. Something newly made must be assigned as the formal and specifying term of an action, since if an action makes nothing new, it is not an action. Finally, others say that the form is the formal term when it is drawn out or produced through generation; when it is not produced but united, union is the formal term. See the Conimbricenses in the place cited above. Finally, some say that generation agrees with creation in producing the whole, but differs precisely in being productive of a union.

I say, first: The total and adequate term of substantial generation is the composite or whole itself, not only insofar as it means nature, but also insofar as it means supposit, though subsistence does not function in this whole as a constituent, but as the terminus of the constituted nature. Nevertheless, it is truly attained intrinsically by generation, not extrinsically.

This conclusion is explicit in St. Thomas, who continually teaches that becoming itself, like being itself, belongs only to a subsisting thing or hypostasis, as is clear in ST III, q. 35, a. 1, where he says: “Birth can be attributed to something in two ways: in one way as to a subject, in another as to a term. It is attributed as to a subject to that which is born; and this is properly the hypostasis, not the nature. For since being born is a kind of generation, just as something is generated in order to be, so something is born in order to be. But being belongs properly to a subsisting thing; for a form that does not subsist is said to be only because something is by it, whereas a person and hypostasis are signified in the manner of a subsisting thing.” He teaches the same concerning creation and any other becoming that is toward a subsisting thing, ST I, q. 45, a. 4. One may also see the Philosopher, Metaphysics VII, text 27¹, where he says that “neither the species comes to be, nor anything that should be called the form which is in a sensible thing; neither is there generation of it, nor of what its being was.” St. Thomas, lecture 7², says: “Since generation is of that which comes to be, it is clear that generation is not of the form, but of the composite. Nor again is the what-it-was-to-be of the thing generated, except accidentally; rather, the form and what-it-was-to-be is what comes to be in another, that is, in matter, not per se.” So St. Thomas.

From these words it is gathered that if what is generated as the total term and as that which is neither the form alone nor the quiddity or “what” (for this is the total form or nature itself, since a partial form alone is not the quiddity and nature but its principle), it remains that the total term is the supposit itself. Hence it is also clear that those who say Aristotle did not recognize a supposit or person in substances either did not read or did not notice his words. For he says that what comes to be and is generated is not the form or quiddity, but the composite. By “form” he means the partial form, while by “quiddity” or “nature” he means the total form; it remains, then, that by “composite” he means the supposit itself, since this alone is distinguished from nature, or the total form. St. Thomas often observes this passage of the Philosopher to prove that forms do not come to be, but the composite itself, or subsistent thing, as in ST I, q. 65, a. 4, and elsewhere.

The foundation of the conclusion is taken from St. Thomas’s own teaching: generation primarily and per se tends to constitute a thing in being integrally and perfectly. But a thing’s nature does not have its whole being unless it has that being as subsisting and per se, since it is proper to substance to have determinate and subsisting being. Indeed, it is incompatible with a nature to have being unless it either subsists in itself or is united to another subsisting thing, as human nature is in Christ. Therefore, so long as generation does not give such being, subsisting either in itself or in another, it is incomplete and imperfect, and is not considered to give its whole effect. The adequate term, then, is that in which generation comes to rest, where the very generated being is terminated and comes to rest. It comes to rest in what subsists; therefore the subsistent in such a nature is the total term and as that which of generation.

This is confirmed because it belongs to the generator not only to give the form but also what follows upon the form, such as proper attributes. But subsistence is more intimate than attributes, since these are accidents and pertain to the adornment or operation of substance. Subsistence, by contrast, is its intrinsic and substantial terminus; hence the union with the subsistence of Christ was substantial in human nature. Therefore it belongs more to the generator to give subsistence than to give proper attributes. I pass over the fact that, according to St. Thomas, existence belongs properly to the hypostasis or supposit as that which, and to nature as that by which, as he teaches in ST III, q. 17, a. 1, and as we showed in Physics VII, q. 7³. Therefore, if generation tends to give being, its total term and term as that which will be that to which being belongs as that which, namely the subsisting supposit itself.

From this follows the last part of the conclusion: subsistence itself, or the supposit, belongs to the intrinsic term of generation, and is not merely an extrinsic term that results, as the Conimbricenses, question cited above, article 4, conclusion 2, and others seem to hold. For an intrinsic term is one directly and per se attained by an action, not secondarily and mediately, presupposing another primary term. But a subsistent thing cannot be a mediate and secondary term that presupposes another primary thing produced, since complete and integral being is found primarily and per se in the subsistent itself, not prior to subsistence. Therefore the thing as subsistent, and subsistence itself, enter into the intrinsic term of generation as belonging to the integration and completion of the generated thing—not as a constitutive predicate, but as the intrinsic terminus of the generated thing with respect to its being.

I say, second: The formal term of generation is not union, but the form constituting the generated thing. Union, insofar as it means the application and joining of the extremes, is not the term but an application. What results from such union, if taken in the manner of a supposit, is the formal term as the total form.

This conclusion, common among Thomists, is established by St. Thomas himself in ST III, q. 35, cited above⁴, a. 1. After saying that birth and generation are attributed as to a subject to the person itself and not to the nature, he adds that “birth is attributed to nature as to its term; for the term of generation and of every birth is form, and nature is signified in the manner of a form.” Here St. Thomas speaks of the formal term, not the total term, which is the subject, as he had already said: the person. One may see the same in Sentences III, d. 8, q. 1, a. 2⁵, and especially in Sentences I, d. 5, q. 3, a. 1⁶, where he says: “The term of generation in creatures can be taken in two ways, just as the principle can. For the generator itself is called the principle of generation, and what is generated corresponds to this principle as its term. The principle of generation is also called that from which generation begins; in this sense the principle or beginning of generation is the privation of the form to be introduced, and the opposed term is the form introduced through generation.” So St. Thomas.

The foundation is gathered from this: in the adequate and total term of an action, that which functions in the term itself as form is the formal term, since it per se specifies the action and makes the generated thing like the generator. These are the functions of the formal term: to formalize the total term itself, which it does by specifying or constituting it and making the generated thing like the generator. But it is clear that the form of the term is not the union itself, but something united. For union functions as a communication and application by which the extremes are communicated. Therefore the constituting form must be the communicated and united extreme. This is what the generator ultimately intends: it intends to make the generated thing like itself in form, and it ceases once assimilation has been achieved. But it does not cease in the union, since union is an application by which the form is made united. Therefore the united form functions as the formal term more than the union that joins it.

This is confirmed because if this union, by which this form is united, were applied to another form, it would unite that form to matter in the same way. Therefore what is properly distinctive and formally constitutive of this generation is not union for the sake of union, but the united form. Hence even when a form is not produced through generation, but is introduced in order to be united, so that only the union is produced, the union is still not produced as that which formally constitutes, but as that which formally communicates and applies what constitutes as form.

From this it follows that when a formal term is assigned and designated by reason of some formality, if “formal” is taken to mean what is communicated and unites, then union is the formal term; but if it means the formality that terminates and constitutes, making the generated thing like the generator, then the formal term is not union. In speaking of the formal term, one should indicate it chiefly according to how it terminates rather than how it mediates.

It is indeed true that a form cannot constitute formally without connoting and presupposing union as a condition and application; yet the united form itself functions as the constituent. Thus, as we said above, article 3, following Cajetan on ST I, q. 118, a. 2, in human generation, although the form is not produced and the union is, it is not the union alone that is attained by generation, but also the united form itself—not according to the form’s being in itself, but according to its being-in. The union thus functions as condition and the united form as what formally constitutes and terminates.

Arguments are resolved.

First, one argues against the first conclusion: true generation is preserved without the supposit being produced or attained, and likewise without the nature being produced; therefore neither is the supposit the total term of generation nor the nature its formal term.

The antecedent is clear first in generation: the Blessed Virgin generated Christ, which was true generation, since she was truly his mother, and yet she did not attain the supposit, either by producing it—since no created supposit existed in Christ—or by uniting it to the nature, since this union was not made through the Virgin’s action but through God’s immediate assumption. It is also clear because the supposit results once the nature is posited, as a mode or term added to it. Hence, if humanity were now released from the Word, a created subsistence would result anew. Therefore the term of generation is wholly produced by the action, since what remains comes about only by a resultant. The supposit, then, does not belong to the intrinsic term of generation as an action; it results once the term of the action is posited. Finally, St. Thomas in no way attributes the account of term to the supposit itself, but the account of subject of generation; he attributes the account of term to the nature, as is clear in ST III, q. 35, a. 1, because the nature, consisting of the union of matter and form, is a complete and total substance. Therefore by itself it terminates the total action, and to be the total term producible by generation it needs nothing else. Yet because that nature is terminated by the supposit and is in it as in a subject, the supposit is called the subject of generation, not its term: it does not terminate the action, but is subjected to, or underlies, the terminating nature.

As for the second part, the antecedent is proved from divine generation, in which the total term is the proceeding Person, while nature does not have the account of even a formal term; otherwise it would be distinct from the principle from which it proceeds, and there would not be only one nature in the three Persons.

I answer by denying the antecedent. To the first proof, the answer is that some suppose the Blessed Virgin’s action in producing Christ’s humanity and its existence to stop in such a way that she is called Mother of God—that is, of the person subsisting in that humanity—only materially, secondarily, and accidentally. It would be as if God now assumed my humanity after its subsistence had been destroyed: the mother who bore me would be called Mother of God materially and accidentally, because she would be the mother of a human being whose nature had been assumed by God. Thus, by producing humanity existing in itself and terminating the Virgin’s generation, she is called Mother of God because she is mother of the humanity that was assumed by God in another action not belonging to the Virgin. For if the generator’s action does not touch the supposit but stops at the being of the nature, whatever supposit is applied to that nature will be related to it materially; on this account the Blessed Virgin would not be called Mother of God formally and per se.

Nevertheless, according to St. Thomas’s opinion, the Blessed Virgin is most properly and formally the true Mother of God, no less than Peter’s mother is formally the mother of that man. In the generation of human beings, the generator does not produce the form, nor its existence or subsistence; rather, the rational form, subsisting in itself, is created and infused by God. The generator unites matter to that form, and thus the being of the soul, which is made by God, is communicated by the generator to the body. The being in the body and in the whole composite is no other than the being of the soul thus communicated, because according to St. Thomas there is only one being in the composite: it comes from the form as from the principle by which, but belongs to the composite or supposit as that which. Since the rational soul therefore has being that exists per se, or subsists, though communicable to matter, the generation of a human being is said most formally to attain the person, insofar as the generator communicates to the body this very being of the soul that is communicated to the whole composite or person and makes an integral human being. Thus St. Thomas says in ST I–II, q. 4, a. 5, ad 2: “The being of the composite remains in the human soul after the body’s destruction. This is because the being of form and matter is the same, and this same being is the being of the composite.” Likewise in Christ there is only one being, which belongs to the person or supposit and is communicated to the nature, as the same St. Thomas teaches in ST III, q. 17, a. 2. Yet this being of the Word, or subsistence, was communicated in a certain order: first to the soul by a priority of nature, then to the body, because by nature he assumed the soul before the body, and the body through the soul, as St. Thomas teaches in ST III, q. 6, a. 1. Thus, at the very creation of the soul, the assumption of the Word intervened, preventing the soul’s own subsistence and existence and substituting his through assumption. Therefore, at the instant when the generative action of the Blessed Virgin attained the union of the body, formed by the soul which God infused, with that soul, it took up the very being and subsistence that it found in the assumed soul and communicated it to the body. Just as ordinary generative action communicates to the body the soul’s own natural being, and for this reason the mother is said most formally to be the mother of a human being and of the person subsisting in that humanity, so the Virgin’s generation communicated to the body the being and subsistence of the Word that it found in the assumed soul. Thus she is said most formally to be the mother of that human being, or Divine Person, as subsisting in that humanity consisting of body and soul. The Blessed Virgin did not efficiently attain the assumption itself, not even instrumentally, since this was done immediately by God together with the creation of the soul. Rather, through generation she communicated to the body the soul already assumed by God in the order of nature, just as later at the resurrection God again became man by uniting the soul to the body without a new assumption. For the assumption of the soul is virtually the assumption of the body, since the soul is by itself communicable to the body. If you say: if the whole subsistence and being of the Word was bestowed on the soul, and through the soul on the flesh, then when the soul was separated at death the flesh remained without the subsistence of the Word, just as the flesh of a dead human being remains without the subsistence of the soul that is separated. But that is erroneous, since otherwise the Son of God would not have been buried when his body was buried. The answer follows St. Thomas in ST III, q. 50, a. 2, ad 2, where he solves this argument: “The Word of God is said to have been united to the flesh through the soul insofar as the flesh belongs to human nature through the soul, which the Son of God intended to assume; not in the sense that the soul is a medium binding the things united. The flesh has from the soul that it belongs to human nature even after the soul is separated from it, insofar as, by divine ordination, a certain order to the resurrection remains in the dead flesh; therefore the union of the divinity with the flesh is not taken away.” So St. Thomas. His words make clear that Christ’s flesh remained united to the Word, not because it had a distinct subsistence supplied to it apart from the form, nor because the subsistence of the soul was communicated to the body after death, but because the dead flesh still belonged to human nature by reason of its ordering to the resurrection, and whatever belonged to human nature was not abandoned by the Word. Therefore that body remained assumed, not under the form of a soul nor separated from every form, but under the form of a corpse, assumed for a time insofar as it was required for the constitution of a dead human body, which was still ordered to human nature by reason of the resurrection.

To the second proof the answer is that the supposit does not result as an attribute, but as a term of the nature, absolutely required for its existence. Hence, just as existence does not result but is attained by the action, so too subsistence, which precedes it. Even if existence were prior, it would still be attained intrinsically by the action, because before subsistence existence itself is not terminated and complete, and therefore neither is the action that constitutes the produced thing in the state of a whole. The whole itself, then, is attained by the action. What results, by contrast, are accidents, which belong to the whole neither as parts nor as total modes or terms, as subsistence does.

To the third objection it is said that St. Thomas attributes the account of term to the nature and the account of subject to the hypostasis or supposit, because the supposit supports and underlies the nature. Thus by the term taken absolutely he means the formal term as what is specified and toward which the action tends; by the subject he means the total term, since the supposit is not the subject from which generation proceeds—that is prime matter—but what is born through generation.

To the second part of the argument the answer is that divinity is not a term produced or proceeding, but communicated; thus it is the formal term of the generation of the Word, for it is that in which he is made like his principle. That generation, insofar as it is assimilative, communicates the Father’s nature; accordingly, nature as nature is its communicated, not produced, formal term. In the procession of the Holy Spirit, however, nature as nature is not even a communicated formal term, but is identical. Infinite love is the formal term, while the produced term is the subsisting Person, who is also called notional Love.

Second, one argues to prove that union, not form, is the formal term: what is always produced anew is union, whereas form is not always produced, as in the generation of human beings. But the formal term must be produced anew, since what is not produced does not terminate the action, not receiving being; a new action must give new being. Indeed, when a form is drawn out, it is produced only as drawn out and consequently as united to a subject; this distinguishes such production from creative production. Therefore the specific formal account of generation is the term as united, since it is precisely through this that it is ultimately distinguished formally from creation. Finally, we see the species of an action vary solely from a change in union: when a rational soul is united through generation or reunited through resurrection, the variation is not in the form but in its different union. Therefore a different union will be the different specifying account and formal term, since this is what specifies.

To the first part of the argument I answer that the formal term need not be produced anew in its own entity; it suffices that it be produced in its participation, through which it specifies. For the proper function of the formal term is to specify and formalize what is produced. It does not per se contribute to this that the entity of the specifying form be made anew; it is enough that the form itself be newly communicated to what it specifies, and thus that communication or union be made anew. Yet that union is not the formal term—that is, what formalizes and specifies—but what applies and unites. Therefore the formal account of the term is one thing, and the account of what is newly produced in the thing generated is another: the total term is produced anew, and being and production belong to it as that which. But the form, to which being belongs as that by which, need not be produced; it suffices that it be communicated and thus specify and formalize. Union itself is not the formal term, that is, the form that gives specification, but the application of the formal term. This teaching follows from St. Thomas, On the Power of God, q. 3, a. 9, ad 6, 20, and 21⁷, and is noted by Cajetan on ST I, q. 118, a. 2⁸.

To the second part of the argument the answer is that generation is not distinguished specifically from creation because the form is produced as united when it is drawn out. For in creation too, since the whole itself is produced, the parts are produced as united. But creation consists in producing the whole while presupposing nothing from the parts, making them all anew from nothing, both matter and form. This is why it differs from drawing out, which produces the whole while presupposing one part, namely matter; from its transformation the form is drawn out, and, applied to matter, it constitutes the whole. Thus, through reduction, the whole is not so much made as composed, whereas in creation it is made absolutely. Therefore generation and creation are not formally distinguished by reason of union, but by reason of the formal term: in creation it is the whole being made from nothing; in generation it is the form constituting such a being from a presupposed subject. Thus in creation too matter belongs to the formal term, since it belongs to the account of the whole being.

To the last part of the argument the answer is to deny that a different union alone constitutes a different formal term in a substantial action such as resurrection and generation; in both, union is produced. The formal difference between these actions therefore cannot be taken from union alone, but from the form itself, as it stands under a different account and mode of communicating itself to matter. The transformation required for the generation of a human being, which communicates the soul to the body, differs from that required for resurrection, which unites the soul to the body without such formation and dispositions, presupposing that the prior union has been corrupted; thus it regards the form as reunited, not merely as united. Likewise, Adam’s formation from earth was an action distinct from generation, not because the union was different as the formal term, since union was produced in both, but because the very form was communicated under a different mode of transformation, thereby grounding a different formality or relation for terminating the action, insofar as it produces different changes in matter in order to generate, resurrect, or form from earth. The formal term is taken from the form together with its relation to the process and the transformations by which it comes to be; these too are produced through the action as leading to the term. Whether in an accidental action, for example intensification, only union is produced anew or some formal perfection is also produced and added to the quality will be examined below, question 4⁹.