Universa Philosophia

The dialectical error of asserting being of reason to be the adequate object of logic.— I pass over the obsolete opinion of some, who dream that being of reason in genus and species is the object of logic. Which P. Suarez, last disputation on Metaphysics, at the beginning, rightly calls a dialectical error.¹ For since the whole of logic is devoted to the doctrine of the mode of knowing, to what purpose will it deal with chimeras and other beings of reason? Are those necessary for reasoning rightly?

The first acceptation of being of reason.— I premise secondly that being of reason is used in many ways: first for a being produced physically by the intellect, which is reason. Which is indicated in many places by Aristotle, especially in 7 Politics, ch. 14, where he calls the intellectual arts arts of reason: not that they are beings of reason, but that they are in the intellect, which is reason. St. Thomas, opusc. 47, at the beginning, calls a syllogism an act of reason:¹ but in opusc. 48, in the treatise on demonstration, ch. 14: The process (he says) of science is as it were a certain motion of reason. This is being of reason effectively.

Second acceptation.— Secondly being of reason is taken for an act of the intellect, as denominating the object: which we can call being of reason denominatively. Thus it is taken by St. Thomas in 1 Sent., dist. 2, q. 1, art. 2, at the words And from this it is clear:¹ where he teaches that by this name, reason, is not signified something that is in the thing outside the soul, but that it is in the soul itself as in a subject: to which the thing outside the soul corresponds as the signified to the sign. He teaches moreover that the intellectual conception is related in three ways to the thing; but in one way, when the name does not signify the likeness of a thing existing outside the soul, but something that follows from the mode of understanding the thing that is outside the soul: as the intentions of genus and species: which intentions, although they do not have an immediate foundation in things outside the soul, yet have it immediately in the intellect: that is, they are immediately in the intellect, although not in the objects: but being of reason, as it is distinguished from every real being, has an immediate foundation neither within nor outside the soul: because they are nowhere, but objectively only in the intellect. Therefore St. Thomas establishes the inventions of the intellect, genus and species, in extrinsic denomination, from the fact that the thing is understood: in this sense he is to be taken in the treatise on the nature of genus, and in 4 Metaph., lect. 5.

Third acceptation.— Thirdly, being of reason is taken for some foundation for a being of reason, which foundation consists in some extrinsic denomination. Thus God is said from eternity freely to will through a respect of reason added to His essence. Of reason (I say) foundationally. In which sense Fr. Vazquez, tom. 2 on 1 p., disput. 115, num. 13, says that he spoke ¹ whenever he establishes such extrinsic denominations in a respect of reason: not indeed formally, but foundationally. The fourth signification, and the most proper of all, is ², by which being of reason is signified for a fictitious or chimerical being, which has only objective being in the intellect. This St. Thomas explained in 1, distinct. 2, quaest. 1, art. 3, § And from this it is clear. ³ Observe these in disput. 19 on metaphysics, § 2.

Common is the opinion of Thomists that the object of logic, or the adequate subject of attribution, is a being of reason, and not a real being. Soto in logic q. 5 proemial. Fr. Toletus q. 5 conclus. 4. Masius lect. 1 q. 13 proem. conclus. 5. Fr. Antonius Rubius q. 6 concl. 2, and very many others thought so with Durandus in 1 d. 33 q. 1 num. 10. Yet not all sufficiently agree what they mean by this word being of reason: they agree indeed that it is not a chimerical being of reason, of which I treated § 44 explaining the fourth signification of this word: for to what purpose would the logician apply himself to the contrivance of chimeras? or why does reasoning, the most excellent among human operations, depend on fictions? But the logician considers this operation either in itself or in some effect, so that we may learn to reason: they do not therefore take being of reason in that fourth signification, which is the most proper of all.

Fr. Toletus understands by being of reason an extrinsic denomination arising from intellection to objects understood: namely, that objects are defined, divided, and demonstrated. These denominations are indeed extrinsic to the objects themselves, but intrinsic to the cognitive power. Wherefore Toletus says that these denominations are real, yet extrinsic to the objects; and before the first foundation he says that between whiteness and the denomination of the known there is only this difference, that whiteness is intrinsically in the subject, whereas the denomination of genus is extrinsic to it. He says likewise that these denominations are called beings of reason, that is, of the intellect. In which sense he explains St. Thomas whenever he asserts that a being of reason is the object of logic. And so Fr. Toletus with St. Thomas takes being of reason denominatively in the second signification set out in § 43. But thus it is absolutely a real being: because that denomination, which is extrinsic to the object, is not distinguished from the act of the intellect denominating, which is a real being. In which sense Durandus spoke, cited in § 45, as clearly appears in 1 d. 19 q. 3 num. 7: for he does not distinguish these denominations from the denominating act.

Soto seems to indicate that from the act of the intellect there arises something distinct from it, which is a second intention, by which things are named and are genus, syllogism, etc. For he says that he is not to treat of being of reason effectively and subjectively in the first signification set out in § 42; for thus a being of reason is absolutely a real being: but that his discourse is about the being of reason as it is a condition in things, which belongs to them only from the operation of the intellect; from which operation he says second intentions result in things. Masius seems to agree, asserting that to a man apprehended as subject to animal there follows the notion of subject: which is a being of reason. Fr. Rubius seems more clearly to admit this germination of the being of reason from the act of the intellect. For in the § It is certain, he distinguishes a being of reason directly made by the intellect, which is a real act of it, from a being of reason not directly made by the intellect, but indirectly and per accidens.

I judge, however, that these authors do not understand that anything arises from cognition distinct from it, which as though a medium between cognition and the object denominates this genus or syllogism: but that their sense is the same as Toletus's: namely, that by the dialectician are considered the denominations of the known, of genus, etc., not indeed as they are quality, action, and passion, but precisely as they denominate objects known. For what they say, that this is a condition resulting from the acts, does not matter: because we frequently say that formal effects arise from the forms themselves: understand this in the genus of formal cause, not of efficient cause: as from whiteness white is said to result, and from cognition the knower. They therefore take being of reason purely denominatively in the second signification of § 43.

I am moved because Soto in conclus. 2 establishes as the principal subject of logic (which is principally intended among beings of reason) argumentation and reasoning. But who does not see that these are not distinguished from the acts of the intellect by which we argue and reason? For we do not reason through something distinct from the acts of the intellect, whether that be real or of reason; nor is the being of reason resulting thence an argumentation. Soto therefore understands by being of reason the acts of the intellect, not according to themselves as they are quality and action, but as they give to objects the passive and extrinsic denomination of the known, of genus, etc., which they bestow through themselves, as they bestow the denomination of the knower.

Masius explains himself more openly: for he says that this being of reason is what belongs to an object as apprehended through the intellect: for he does not establish anything interposed between apprehension and the object. Likewise that a column is right or left, he says is a being of reason: which nevertheless is not something interposed between the column and the man, but is an extrinsic denomination of the column from the man's right. In conclusion 4 he says that the formal and adequate object of the whole of dialectic is the intellectual composition of things, that is (he himself says) the very operation of the intellect is as it were the form which is considered in dialectic. But this composition, as it is considered by dialectic, he says is a being of reason, because it is a certain extrinsic form denominating the thing defined, etc. And so he takes being of reason denominatively, as it is taken in § 43, not however being of reason effectively as it is taken in § 42. Masius therefore differs in nothing from Fr. Toletus cited in § 46.