Name: Ordinatio
Author: John Duns Scotus

Prologus I: Prologus Totius Operis

Articulus I: I. To the Second Question

Because according to the Philosopher Metaphysics 2.3.995a13-14: “it is absurd to look for knowledge and the way of knowing at the same time,” I reply first to the second question, which inquires about the way of knowing this proposition ‘God exists’. And, as to its solution, I first set down the idea of a self-evidently known proposition, and I state as follows: When a proposition is said to be self-evidently known, by the phrase ‘self-evidently’ is not excluded every cause whatever, because the terms of the proposition are not excluded; for no proposition is known when the knowledge of the terms is excluded. Therefore a self-evidently known proposition does not exclude knowledge of the terms, because we know the first principles to the extent we know the terms; but what is excluded is every cause and idea that is outside the concept of the terms of a self-evidently known proposition. A self-evidently known proposition, then, is said to be one that gets its evident truth from nothing outside the proper terms, which are part of it.¹
Further, what are those proper terms from which it must be evident? – I say that, in this regard, one term is the definition and the other the thing defined, whether the terms are taken for the words that signify or for the concepts signified.²
I prove this from the Posterior Analytics 1.6.75a25-27, because the ‘what it is’ or the definition of one of the extremes is the middle term in demonstration; therefore one of the premises does not differ from the conclusion save as the thing defined differs from the definition, and yet the premise is a self-evidently known principle; the conclusion, however, is not self-evidently known but is demonstrated. Therefore as to the idea of a self-evidently known proposition, the concept of the definition is different from the thing defined, because if the concept of the definition and of the thing defined were the same, there would, in the most potent demonstration, be a begging of the question; again, there would then only there be two terms, which is false.
This is proved, second, as follows, through Aristotle Physics 1.1.184a26-b3, that names bear to the definition what the whole does to the parts, that is, that a confused name is known prior to the definition; and a name introduces confusedly what a definition introduces distinctly, because a definition divides a thing into its elements; therefore the concept of a quiddity, as it is introduced by the name confusedly, is naturally known before the concept of it as introduced distinctly by the definition is known, and so it is another concept and another extreme term.³ – From this further: since a proposition is self-evidently known that gets evident truth from its own terms, and other terms are concepts of the quiddity distinctly (as imported by the definition) and concepts of the quiddity confusedly (as imported by the name), it follows that a proposition will not be self-evidently known of a quiddity confusedly taken, a quiddity which is only known if the same be conceived distinctly through a definition.
There is also proof of this conclusion because otherwise any other proposition, which is necessary and per se in the first mode [Posterior Analytics 1.4.73a34-37] (as this proposition: ‘man is an animal’ and ‘man is a body’, up to ‘[man is a] substance’), would be self-evidently known; for if the idea of each extreme is assigned by the ideas of the distinctly conceived extremes, it appears manifestly that one extreme includes the other. Similarly, otherwise any proposition would be self-evidently known in the special sciences that the metaphysician could possess as self-evidently known from the definitions of the extremes, which is not true, because the geometer does not use any principles as self-evidently known save those that have evident truth from terms confusedly conceived, to wit by conceiving line confusedly; but it is evident that a line is length without breadth when not yet distinctly conceiving, in the way considered by the metaphysician, what genus line pertains to. But the other propositions that the metaphysician could conceive, to wit that line is a quantity and one of this sort -- such propositions are not possessed by the geometer as self-evidently known.
This is clear, third, because the demonstration of some predicate about a defined thing stands well with the predicate being self-evidently known of the definition.⁴
Therefore all and only those propositions are self-evidently known that, from terms conceived as they are the terms of the proposition, have or are of a nature to have the evident truth of the combined proposition.⁵
From this is plain that one is to distinguish between a self-evidently known and a self-evidently knowable proposition, because they are the same; for a proposition is not called self-evidently known because it is self-evidently known by some intellect (for then, if no intellect actually knew it, no proposition would be self-evidently known), but a proposition is said to be self-evidently known because, as far as concerns the nature of the terms, it is of a nature to have the evident truth contained in the terms also in any intellect that conceives the terms. But if some intellect not conceive the terms, and so not conceive the proposition, the proposition is, as far as concerns itself, no less self-evidently known; and it is in this ways that we speak of things self-evidently known.
From this is also plain that there is no distinction between the self-evidently known in itself and to nature and to us, because whatever is in itself self-evidently known, though not actually known, is yet as far as concerns the terms evidently true and known to any intellect, provided the terms are known.⁶ ⁷
Nor is the distinction valid that some propositions are self-evidently known in the first order and some in the second, because any propositions self-evidently known, when the proper terms are conceived in the way they are the terms, possess evident truth in their own order.
From these points I say to the question that that proposition is self-evidently known which conjoins these extremes: existence and the divine essence as it is this, or God and his proper existence, in which way God sees that essence and existence under the most proper idea by which it is in God, in which way neither existence nor essence are understood by us now but by God himself and by the blessed; because the proposition has from its terms evident truth for the intellect, for the proposition is not per se in the second mode [Posterior Analytics 1.4.73a37-b5], as if the predicate be outside the idea of the subject, but is per se in the first mode [n.19] and is immediately evident from the terms, for it is the most immediate proposition, to which are resolved all assertions of anything about God however he is conceived. Therefore this proposition ‘God exists’ or ‘this essence exists’ is self-evidently known, because the extremes are of a nature to make this proposition evident to anyone who perfectly apprehends the extremes of this proposition, because existence belongs to nothing more perfectly than to this essence. By thus understanding, therefore, by the name of ‘God’ something that we do not perfectly know nor conceive as this divine essence, is ‘God exists’ thus self-evidently known.
But if it be inquired whether existence is present in any concept which we conceive of God, so that the sort of proposition in which existence is asserted of such a concept is self-evidently known, for example as about a proposition whose extreme terms can be conceived by us, that is, can in our intellect be a concept said of God, but not one common to him and creatures, namely necessary existence or infinite being or supreme good, and of such a concept we can predicate existence in the way it is conceived by us, – I say that no such proposition is self-evidently known, for three reasons:
First, because any such proposition is a demonstrable conclusion, and a ‘conclusion-why’. Proof: whatever first and immediately belongs to something can be demonstrated of whatever is in it⁸ by a ‘demonstration-why’ through what it first belongs to as through a middle term.⁹ An example: if the triangle first have three angles equal to two right angles, it can be demonstrated of whatever is contained in triangle that it has three angles etc. by a ‘demonstration-why’ through the middle term which is ‘triangle’, to wit that some figure would have three [angles equal to…] etc., also about any kind of triangle that it has three angles etc., although not first. But existence belongs first to this essence as this in the way the divine essence is seen by the blessed; therefore of anything in this essence that can be conceived by us, whether it be as something superior or as a property, existence can be demonstrated through this essence, as through a middle term by a ‘demonstration-why’, just as by this proposition ‘a triangle has three etc.’ there is a demonstration that some figure has three etc.; and consequently it is not self-evidently known from the terms, because then there would be no ‘demonstration-why’.¹⁰
Second in this way: a self-evidently known proposition is self-evidently known to any intellect from known terms. But this proposition ‘there is an infinite being’ is not evident to our intellect from the terms; proof: for we do not conceive the terms before we believe the proposition or know it by demonstration, and in that prior stage it is not evident to us; for we hold it from the terms with certitude only by faith or demonstration.
Third, because nothing about a concept that is not simply simple is self-evidently known unless it be self-evidently known that the parts of the concept are united; but no concept that we have of God which is proper to him and does not belong to creatures is simply simple, or at any rate no concept that we distinctly conceive to be proper to God is simply simple;¹¹ therefore nothing is self-evidently known about such a concept unless it is self-evidently known that the parts of the concept are united; but this is not self-evidently known, because the union of these parts is something demonstrated, by the two [earlier] reasons [nn.27-28].
The major is manifest from the Philosopher Metaphysics 5.29.1024b31-32, because an account in itself false is false about everything; therefore no account is true of anything unless it is in itself true. Therefore in order for it to be known that something is true of some account, or for the account to be true about something, one must know that it is in itself true; but no account is in itself true unless the parts of the account are united. And just as one must know as regard quidditative predications that the parts of the account can be united quidditatively, to wit that one formally contain the other, so one must know as regard the truth of a proposition asserting existence that the parts of the account of the subject or of the predicate are actually united. An example: just as the proposition ‘irrational man is an animal’ is not self-evidently known when speaking of quidditative predication, because the subject includes something in itself false, for it includes a proposition that includes contradictories in itself, so this proposition ‘man is white’ is not self-evidently known if it not be self-evidently known that man and white are actually per se conjoined; because if they not be conjoined in actual existence, this proposition is true ‘nothing is a white man’, and consequently its converse will be true ‘no white man is’; therefore its contradictory is false ‘a white man is’.
Proof of the minor: whatever concept we conceive, whether of good or of true, if it is not contracted by something so that it is not a concept simply simple, is not a concept proper to God. Now I call a concept simply simple which is not resolvable into other simple concepts any one of which might in a simple act be distinctly conceived.
From this last reason [sc. the third, nn.29-31] a response to the [following] instances is clear, when the argument is made ‘this is self-evidently known, necessary existence exists’ (proof, because the opposite of the predicate is repugnant to the subject; for if it does not exist, it is not ‘necessary existence’), ‘this too is self-evidently known, God exists’, because, according to every exposition posited by Damascene On the Orthodox Faith 1 ch.9, ‘God’ is named from actual operation, that is, from warming or burning or seeing,¹² therefore, according to every acceptation [of the term], ‘God exists’ is the same as ‘what is actually operating exists’, which seems self-evidently known, because, as before, the opposite of the predicate is repugnant to the subject.¹³
For this reason I reply to these points [n.32] in another way, that none of these propositions, ‘necessary existence exists’ or ‘what is actually operating exists’, is self-evidently known, because it is not self-evidently known that the parts that are in the subject are actually united. When it is said that ‘the opposite of the predicate is repugnant to the subject’ [n.32], I say that it does not follow from this that the proposition is self-evidently known unless the repugnance is evident, and unless it is evident also along with this that each extreme has a simply simple concept or that the concepts of the parts are simply united.¹⁴

Articulus II: II. To the Principal Arguments of the Second Question

To the principal argument of Damascene [n.10]: it can be expounded of the cognitive power naturally given to us by which we can know from creatures that God exists, at rate in general ideas (he subjoins there how he is known from creatures! On the Orthodox Faith 1 ch.3), or it can be expounded of knowledge of God under common ideas that agree with himself and with creatures, which are known more perfectly and eminently in God than in other things. But that Damascene is not speaking of actual and distinct knowledge of God is clear from what he says there: “no one knows him save as to how much he himself has revealed.”
To the second [n.11] I say that Anselm does not say that this proposition is self-evidently known, as is clear, because from his deduction it cannot be inferred that this proposition is true save through at least two syllogisms, one of which is this: ‘being is greater than any non-being, nothing is greater than the supreme thing, therefore the supreme being is not a non-being’, from oblique forms in the second mood of the second figure [of syllogism]; the other syllogism is this: ‘what is not a non-being is a being, the supreme thing is not a non-being, therefore etc.’ But how his reasoning is valid will be explained in the following question, in the sixth argument [n.137], about proving infinity.
As to the proof of the major [n.11] (I say the major is false when ‘that it exists is self-evidently known’ is taken; however the major is true, though not self-evidently known), when it is proved that ‘the opposite of the predicate is repugnant to the subject’, I say that it is neither self-evident that the opposite of the predicate is repugnant to the subject nor is it self-evident that the subject possesses a simply simple concept or that its parts are united in fact; and both these are required for that proposition to be self-evidently known.
To the third [n.12] I say that the inference ‘that truth in general exists is self-evidently known, therefore that God exists’ does not follow but is the fallacy of the consequent;¹ alternatively, the major can be denied. And when it is proved ‘if there is no truth, it is true that there is no truth’, the consequence is not valid, because truth is taken either for the foundation of truth in reality, or for truth in the act of the intellect combining and dividing; but if there is no truth, neither is it true that there is no truth, whether by the truth of reality, because there is nothing, or by the truth in the intellect combining and dividing, because there is no intellect. However the inference does well follow, ‘if there is no truth, therefore it is not true that there is any truth’, but the further inference does not follow, ‘therefore it is true that there is not any truth’; it is the fallacy of the consequent, from a negative having two causes of truth to an affirmative which is one of those causes.²
To the last principal argument [n.13] I say that propositions are not said to be self-evidently known because the extremes have a greater necessity in themselves, or a greater necessity in reality outside the intellect, but because the extremes, as they are the extremes of such a proposition, show evidently that their combination is in conformity with the ideas of the terms and with the relation of them, and this whatever being the terms have, whether in reality or in the intellect; for the evidence of this conformity is the evidence of the truth in the proposition, which is the proposition’s being self-evidently known. But, as it is, the proposition³ ‘every whole is greater than its part’, or anything similar, in any intellect that conceives the terms, naturally has such evidence from the terms, because from the terms it is evident that the proposition is in conformity with the relation and idea of the terms, whatever being the terms have; and therefore although there is less necessity in the terms, it does not follow that there is less evidence in the propositions.

Section I: A. The Existence of the Relative Properties of an Infinite Being is Made Clear

In the first principal article I will principally show three things. First then I will show that there is something in effect among beings which is simply first¹ in efficient causality, and that there is something which is simply first in idea of end, and something which is simply first in eminence; second I show that that which is first in one idea of primacy is first also in the other primacies; and third I show that that triple primacy belongs to one nature alone such that it does not belong to several natures differing in species or in quiddity. And so in the first principal article there will be three partial articles.
[First partial article] – The first article among them includes three principal conclusions, through a triple primacy; and each of the three conclusions has three conclusions on which it depends: the first is that something is first, the second is that that thing cannot be caused, the third is that that thing actually exists among beings. And so in the first article there are nine conclusions, but three principal ones.
Now the first conclusion of these nine is this, that some efficient cause is simply first such that neither can it be an effect nor does it by virtue of something other than itself cause an effect. The proof is because some being can be an effect. An effect of itself, then, or of nothing, or of something else. Not of nothing, because that which is nothing is cause of nothing; nor of itself, because there is nothing that makes or generates itself, Augustine On the Trinity 1 ch.1 n.1; therefore of something else. Let that something else be a. If a is first in the way expounded [n.43 init.], I have what was proposed; if it is not first, then it is effective secondarily, because it can be the effect of another or cause an effect by virtue of another, for if a negation is denied the affirmation is asserted.² Let that other be granted and let it be b, about which one argues as was argued about a, and thus either one proceeds ad infinitum, where each thing will be second in respect of a prior, or one stops at something that has no prior; but an infinity is impossible in ascending causes, therefore primacy is necessary, because what does not have a prior is posterior to nothing posterior to itself, for a circle in causes is unacceptable.³
Against this reasoning there is a double instance: first,⁴ that according to philosophizers an infinity in ascending causes is possible, as in the example they posit about infinite generations,⁵ where none is first but each is second, and yet they posited this without circularity.
Second, it seems that the argument proceeds from contingents and so is not a demonstration. The proof of the antecedent is that the premises assume the existence of something that is caused; everything such exists contingently.⁶
To exclude the first instance [n.44] I say that the philosophers did not posit that an infinity was possible in essentially ordered causes but only in accidentally ordered ones, as is clear from Avicenna in Metaphysics 6 ch.5 94rb-va, where he speaks of an infinity of individuals in a species.
And, in order to show the proposed point better, one must know that there are causes essentially ordered and accidentally ordered. Here one must note that it is one thing to speak of causes per se and per accidens, and another to speak of causes per se or essentially and accidentally ordered. For in the first case there is only comparison of one thing with one thing, namely of the cause with the thing caused; and a cause per se is one that causes according to its proper nature and not according to something accidental to it,⁷ and a cause per accidens the converse;⁸ in the second case the comparison is of two causes with each other, insofar as something is caused by them.
And causes that are per se or essentially ordered differ from causes that are per accidens or accidentally ordered in three ways.
The first difference is that in per se ordered causes the second, to the extent it causes, depends on the first, but not in a per accidens ordered cause, though it may depend in being or in something else.⁹
The second difference is that in per se ordered causes there is a causality of another idea and another order, because the superior is more perfect, but not in accidentally ordered causes; and this difference follows from the first, for no cause essentially depends in its causing on a cause of the same idea, because in the causing of something one thing of one idea is enough.
The third difference is that all causes ordered essentially and per se are necessarily required together for the causing, otherwise some essential and per se causality would be lacking to the effect; but it is not so in accidentally ordered causes, because the simultaneity of them in causing is not required.¹⁰
From these points the proposed conclusion is shown, namely that an infinity of essentially ordered causes is impossible. Likewise second, that an infinity of accidentally ordered causes is impossible unless a stand is posited in essentially ordered causes; therefore in every way an infinity in essentially ordered causes is impossible. Even if an essential order is denied, an infinity is still impossible; therefore in every way there is some first thing that is necessarily and simply efficient cause. – Of these three assumed propositions let the first for brevity’s sake be called a, the second b, and the third c.
Proof of the them. First a, namely that an infinity of essentially ordered causes is impossible. The proof is first because¹¹ a totality of essentially ordered causes is from some cause that is not any part of the totality, because then it would be cause of itself. For the whole totality of dependent things is dependent, and not on any part of the totality.¹² Second because an infinite number of causes, namely of essentially ordered causes, would actually exist at once, from the third difference above [n.51],¹³ which no philosopher has posited. – Next, third, because the prior is what is nearer to the beginning, Metaphysics 5.11.1018b9-11; therefore where there is no beginning, nothing is essentially prior. – Next, fourth, because the superior cause is more perfect in causing, from the second difference [n.50]; therefore what is infinitely superior is infinitely more perfect, and so possessed of infinite perfection in causing, and consequently it does not cause in virtue of another, because anything such causes imperfectly, because dependent in causing on another cause. – Next, fifth, because an effective thing does not necessarily posit any imperfection; therefore it can be in something without imperfection.¹⁴ But if no cause is without dependence on something prior, it will not be in anything without imperfection. Therefore independent effective causality can exist in some nature, and that nature is simply first; therefore effective causality simply first is possible. This is enough, because from this the conclusion is later [n.58] drawn that such a first effective cause, if it is possible, exists in reality. And thus by five reasons is a made plain.
Proof of b [n.52], namely that an infinity in accidentally ordered causes is impossible unless a stand is posited in essentially ordered causes, because an accidental infinity, if posited, is not simultaneous, clearly, but only successive, as one after another, such that the second in a way flows from the prior. Yet it does not depend on it in causing; for it can cause when it does not exist just as when it does exist, as a son generates when his father is dead as when he is alive. Such an infinity of succession is impossible save from some nature that endures permanently, on which the whole succession and any part of it depend. For no deformity is perpetuated save in virtue of some permanent thing that is no part of the succession, because all the successive members of the succession are of the same idea;¹⁵ but something is essentially prior, because any part of the succession depends on it, and that in another order than on the proximate cause which is some part of the succession.¹⁶ So b is plain.
There is proof too of c [n.52], namely that if an essential order be denied, an infinity is still impossible. The proof is because, since from the first reason here adduced, namely that nothing can be from nothing [n.43], it follows that some nature is effective, if an essential order of active causes is denied then that nature causes in virtue of nothing else; and although it be in some individual posited as caused yet in another it is not caused, which is the proposed conclusion about the nature; or, if it be in anything posited as caused, at once a contradiction is implied by denying the essential order, because no nature can be in anything posited as caused such that there be an accidental order under it without an essential order to another nature.
To the second instance posited above, which says that the reasoning proceeds of contingents and so is not a demonstration [n.43],¹⁷ I respond that one could argue thus: some nature is effected because some subject is changed, and so the term of the change begins to be in the subject, and so that term or composite is produced or effected; therefore there is some efficient thing, by the nature of correlatives, and then the first reason [n.43] can in truth be contingent, but manifest. – However, one can argue thus, by proving the first conclusion [n.43] in this way: this is true, ‘some nature is effectible, therefore some nature is effective’. The proof of the antecedent is because some subject is changeable, because some being is possible, by distinguishing the possible from the necessary [Prior Analytics 1.13.32a18-20: ‘the contingent is that which, whether it exists or not, nothing impossible follows’], and by proceeding in this way from things necessary. And then the proof of the first conclusion is about quidditative being or about possible being, but not about actual existence. But of that of which possibility is being proved now, actual existence will be proved further in the third conclusion [n.58].
The second conclusion about the first effective thing is this, that the simply first effective thing cannot be caused [n.42]. The proof is because it is a non-effectible independent effective thing. This is clear first [n.43] because, if it is causative by virtue of another or is effectible by another, then either there is a process to infinity, or a circle, or a stand at some non-effectible independent effective thing; that thing I say is first, and something else is plainly not first, from the things you have granted. Therefore there is also this further conclusion: if that first thing is non-effectible then it is un-causable, because it cannot have final, or material, or formal cause. The proof of the first consequence, namely that if it is non-effectible then it cannot have final cause, is that a final cause only causes because the cause moves metaphorically the efficient cause to causing its effect, for the entity of an end-ed thing does not in another way depend on itself as on something prior; but nothing is a cause per se save as the caused thing essentially depends on it as on something prior. – Now the two other consequences, namely that if it is non-effectible then it does not have material or formal cause, are proved together, because what does not have an extrinsic cause does not have an intrinsic cause either, because the causality of an extrinsic cause states perfection without imperfection, but the causality of an intrinsic cause necessarily states an imperfection annexed to it, because an intrinsic cause is part of the caused thing; therefore the idea of an extrinsic cause is naturally prior to the idea of an intrinsic cause. Therefore when the prior is denied so is the posterior. – The same consequences are also proved because intrinsic causes are caused by extrinsic ones, either in their existence, or insofar as they cause the composite, or in both ways, because intrinsic causes do not cause the composite by themselves without an agent. – From these statements the second conclusion is plain.
The third conclusion about the first effective thing is this: the first effective thing is actually existing and is a nature truly actually existent in the way it is effective [n.42]. The proof of this: if that to whose idea it is repugnant to be from another can exist, it can exist from itself; but it is repugnant to the idea of the simply first effective thing to be from another, as is plain from the second conclusion [n.57]; likewise too it can exist, as is plain from the first conclusion where the fifth proof for a was set down [n.53], which proof seems less to conclude and yet it concludes this. But the other proofs for the a [n.53] can be brought to bear on the existence which this third conclusion proposes, and they are about contingents, though manifest ones; or let them be taken of the nature and quiddity and possibility of a, and they proceed from necessities. Therefore a simply first effective thing can be of itself. But what is not by itself cannot be by itself, because then a non-being would bring something into being, which is impossible, and further it would then cause itself and so would not be altogether un-causable. – This last point, namely about the existence of the first effective, is made clear in another way, because for the universe to lack a possible supreme grade in its being is unacceptable.
Next to the three conclusions made clear about the first effective thing, note a certain corollary which contains as it were the three proved conclusions, namely that the first effective thing is not only prior to other things but, because a contradiction is involved in something else’s being prior, so to the extent it is first, it exists. The proof is as before [n.58]; for being uncausable is most of all included in the idea of such a first, as is proved from the second [n.57]; for if it can be (because this does not contradict its being, as proved from the first [nn.53, 56]), it follows that it can be of itself, and so it is of itself.
Next to the first three conclusions about the efficient cause I propose three similar conclusions about the final cause. Some final cause is simply first, that is, it is neither orderable to another nor is it naturally end of other things in virtue of something else. And it is proved by five reasons similar to those set down for the first conclusion about the first effective thing [n.53].
The second conclusion is that the first final cause is un-causable. The proof, because it cannot have an end, otherwise it would not be first; and, further, therefore it is in-effectible. The proof of this consequence is because every per se agent acts for an end, from Physics 2.5.196b17-22, where the Philosopher intends this to hold also of nature, about which it is less evident than about an agent that acts from deliberate choice. But that of which there is no per se efficient cause is not effectible, because in no genus can the per accidens be first, as is plain in the proposed case, especially about causes acting per accidens, which are chance and fortune, which according to Aristotle, Physics 2.6.196a5-13, are necessarily reduced to causes acting per se as to things prior, namely to nature and intellect or deliberate choice. Of that therefore of which there is not any per se agent there will be no agent; but of that of which there is not an end there is not any per se agent; therefore it will be in-effectible, for what can have an end is excelled by the end in goodness and consequently in perfection, – and so on, as was proved of the first effective cause [n.57].
The third conclusion is that the first final cause is actually existent and that to some actually existing nature that primacy belongs. The proof is from the first way about efficient causality [n.58].
A corollary: it follows that the first is so first that it is impossible for there to be a prior, and this is proved like the corollary in the prior way [n.59].
To the three conclusions already posited about both orders of extrinsic causality, I propose three similar conclusions about the order of eminence. Some eminent nature is simply first in perfection. This is plain because among essences there is an essential order, for according to Aristotle forms are related like numbers, Metaphysics 8.3.1043b33; in this order there is a stand, which is proved by the five ways that are above about a stand in effective causes [n.53].
The second conclusion is that the supreme nature is uncausable. The proof is that it is unendable, from the preceding [nn.57, 62]; therefore it is uneffectible and, further, therefore uncausable. These two consequences were proved in the second conclusion about effective causes [n.57]. Again, that the supreme nature is uneffectible is proved because everything effectible has some essentially ordered cause, as is plain from the proof of b itself in the first conclusion about the first effective thing [n.54]; now an essentially ordered cause excels its effect.
The third conclusion is that the supreme nature is something actually existing, and it is proved from the preceding [nn.58, 62].
Corollary: that there is some nature more eminent or superior to it involves a contradiction; it is proved as is the corollary about the efficient cause and the end [nn.59, 63].
[Second partial article] – As to the second article [n.41] I say that the first efficient cause is the ultimate end.¹⁸ The proof is because every efficient cause per se acts for an end, and a prior efficient cause for a prior end; therefore the first efficient cause for the ultimate end. But it acts principally and ultimately for nothing other than itself; therefore it acts for itself as for an end. Therefore the first efficient cause is the first end.¹⁹
Likewise, the first efficient cause is the first eminent cause. The proof is because the first efficient cause is not univocal with other effective natures, but equivocal; therefore it is more eminent and more noble than they. Therefore the first efficient cause is the most eminent.
[Third partial article] – As to the third article [n.41] I say that since that in which there is the triple primacy is the same thing, for that in which one primacy is the others are in too, there is also in it a triple identity such that the first efficient cause is only one in quiddity and in nature. To show this I show first a certain preliminary conclusion, and second the principal conclusion. Now a preliminary conclusion is that the efficient cause that is first by this triple primacy is necessarily existent of itself. The proof is because it is through and through uncausable, for there is a contradiction involved in something’s being prior to it in the genus of efficient or final cause and consequently in the genus of any cause at all; therefore it is altogether uncausable. From this I argue: nothing is able not to be unless something positively or privatively incompossible with it can be; but for that which is from itself and is through and through uncausable, there cannot be anything which is positively or privatively incompossible with it; therefore etc. The major is plain, because no being can be destroyed save by what is positively or privatively incompossible with it. The proof of the minor is that that incompossible thing can either be from itself or from another; if from itself and it is from itself, then two incompossible things will be at the same time, or neither of is, because each destroys the being of the other; if from another, then to the contrary: no cause can destroy some being on account of the repugnance of its effect to that being unless it give to its effect a more perfect and intense being than is the being of the other destructible thing; of no being from another is its being from its cause nobler than is the being of something necessary of itself, because every caused thing has dependent being, but what is from itself has independent being.
Further to the intended proposition, from this is proved the unity of the first nature, which is the thing principally intended in this third article. This is shown by three reasons. First in this way, because if two natures are necessarily existent they are distinguished by some real proper reasons, and let them be called a and b. The reasons are either formally necessary or not. If they are,²⁰ then each nature will be necessarily existent by two formal reasons, which is impossible, because since neither of the reasons per se includes the other, each of the natures, taken separately, would be necessarily existent.²¹ But if by the reasons by which they are distinguished neither is formally necessarily existent, then the reasons are not reasons for necessarily existing, and so neither is included in necessary existence, because whatever entity is not necessarily existent is of itself possible, but nothing possible is included in necessary existence.²²
The second proof is because there cannot be two most eminent natures in the universe; so not two first effective things either. The proof of the antecedent is because species are related as numbers, Metaphysics 8.3.1043b33, and consequently there cannot be two in the same order; therefore much less can there be two first or two most eminent natures.
This is also plain, third, by reasoning about the idea of end, because two ultimate ends, if they existed, would have two coordinate orders of beings related to them such that these beings would have no order to those, because not to their end either, for things that are ordered to one ultimate end cannot be ordered to another, because there being two total and perfect causes in the same order of the same caused thing is impossible; for then something would be in some order a per se cause that, when not posited, the caused thing would nevertheless be. Therefore things ordered to one end are in no way ordered to another end, nor consequently ordered to things that are ordered to the other end, and so from them no universe would come to be. – There is also a general confirmation of this, because there cannot be two things that are the total term of the dependence of some same thing, because then that thing would be the term of a dependence that, when it was removed, the dependence would no less have a term, and so it would not be a dependence on that thing. But other things are essentially dependent on the efficient and eminent and final cause. Therefore no two natures can be first the terms of other beings according to that triple dependence. There is therefore precisely some one nature which is the term of beings in accord with that triple dependence, and so which has this triple primacy.

Subsection I: 1. Conclusions preliminary to infinity are proposed and demonstrated

Now, that the first being has intelligence and will I argue thus: some agent is a per se first agent, because to every cause per accidens some cause per se is prior, Physics 2.6.198a8-9, where Aristotle means this of nature, about which it is less evident; but every agent per se acts for an end.
And from this there is a twofold argument. First as follows: every natural agent, precisely considered, would act of necessity and just as much if it were not to act for any other end but was acting independently; therefore if it does not act save for an end, this is because it depends on an agent that loves the end; of such a sort is the first efficient cause, therefore etc.
Again, if the first agent acts for an end, then that end moves the first efficient cause as loved by an act of will or as only naturally loved. If as loved by an act of will, the intended conclusion is gained. If only naturally loved, this is false, because it does not naturally love an end other than itself, in the way the heavy loves the center and matter loves form; for then it would in some way be in relation to an end because inclined to an end. But if it only naturally loves the end which is itself, this is nothing save itself being itself, for this does not preserve the doubleness of idea in itself.
Another argument, by as it were bringing together the reason already made, is as follows: the first efficient cause directs its effect to an end; therefore it directs either naturally or by knowing and loving the end. Not naturally, because a non-knower directs nothing save in virtue of a knower; for it belongs first to the wise to order things, Metaphysics 1.2.982a17-18; but the first efficient cause directs in virtue of nothing else, just as neither does it cause in virtue of anything else, – for then it would not be first; therefore etc.
Again, something is contingently caused; therefore the first cause causes contingently, therefore it causes willingly.
Proof of the first consequence: any second cause causes insofar as it is moved by the first cause; therefore if the first cause moves necessarily, any other cause is moved necessarily and anything else is caused necessarily; therefore if some second cause moves contingently, the first cause too will move contingently, because the second cause, does not cause save in virtue of the first cause to the extent it is moved by it.
Proof of the second consequence: there is no principle of contingent operation save the will or something concomitant to will, because any other thing acts from the necessity of nature, and so not contingently; therefore etc.
There is objection against this reason, and first against the first consequence the argument is as follows, because our own willing could still cause something contingently, and so there is no requirement that the first cause contingently cause it.
Again, the Philosopher conceded the antecedent, namely that something is contingently caused, and he denied the consequent by understanding it of will, namely that the first cause causes contingently, by positing contingency in inferior things, not because God wills contingently, but as a result of motion, which causes necessarily insofar as it is uniform, but deformity, and so contingency, follows from its parts.
Against the second consequence, ‘if it causes contingently, therefore it causes willingly’: this does not seem to hold, because some of the things that are moved naturally can be impeded, and so the opposite can – contingently and violently – can come about.
To the first [n.82] one must say that if God is the first moving or efficient cause with respect to our will, the same follows about it as about other things, because he either necessarily moves the will immediately or he moves another thing immediately and this other thing, having been necessarily moved, would necessarily move the will, because this other thing only moves from the fact that it is moved. The ultimate result is that what is proximate to the will would necessarily move the will, even if what is proximate to the will is the will itself; and so it will necessarily will, and it will be necessarily willing. And further the impossibility follows that he necessarily causes whatever is caused.
To the second [n.83] I say that I do not call the contingent here whatever is non-necessary or non-eternal, but something whose opposite might happen when that something happens; therefore I said ‘something is contingently caused’ [n.79], and not ‘something is contingent’. Now I say that the Philosopher cannot deny the consequent by saving the antecedent through recourse to motion [n.83], because if that whole motion is from its cause necessarily, any part at all of it is necessarily caused when it is caused, that is, it is caused inevitably, so that the opposite cannot then be caused; and further, what is caused by any part of the motion is caused necessarily and unavoidably. Either therefore nothing happens contingently, that is avoidably, or the first thing causes immediately in such a way that it could also not cause.
To the third [n.84] I say that if some cause can impede it, this is only in virtue of a superior cause, and so on up to the first cause, and if the first cause necessarily moves the cause immediate to itself, there will be necessity up to the last one; therefore it will impede necessarily, and consequently no other cause can naturally cause.¹
Thus therefore it seems to have been shown in a triple way that the first agent has intelligence and will, the first of which ways is that nature acts for an end and only because it is dependent and directed to the end by a knower [n.76]; the second is that the first agent itself for an end [nn.77-78], and the third that some effect comes about contingently when it is caused [nn.79-87].
Further, as to the question preliminary to infinity, I prove second that its understanding and will are the same as its essence, and first of the volition of itself as of an object such that to love the first cause is essentially the same as the nature of the cause and of every act of its will. Proof. The causality and causation of the final cause is simply first, according to Avicenna Metaphysics 6 ch.5 (95rb), who says that “if there were knowledge about any cause whatever, knowledge about the final cause would be noblest;” for this cause, as concerns its causality, precedes the efficient cause, because it moves the efficient cause to act, – and therefore the causality of the first cause and the causation of it is, according to any causation in any genus of cause, through and through uncausable. But the causality of the first end is to move the efficient cause as a thing loved; but it is the same thing for the first end to move the first efficient cause as a thing loved by it and for the first efficient cause to love the first end, because for an object to be loved by the will is nothing other than for the will to love the object. Therefore that the first efficient cause loves the first end is through and through uncausable, and so is necessary of itself, and so it will be the same as the first nature. And there is as it were a conversion of the reasoning from the opposite of the conclusion, because if the first loving is other than the first nature, then it is causable, and consequently effectible; therefore it is from some per se efficient cause which loves the end. Therefore the first loving would be caused by some love of the end prior to this caused first loving, which is impossible.
Aristotle shows this fact about intelligence, Metaphysics 12.9.1074b17-21, because otherwise the first thing will not be the best substance, for it is through understanding that it is honorable.
Second, because otherwise its continuance will be laborious for it. Again, if it is not that [sc. the same as its essence], it will be in potency of contradiction to it; on that nature labor follows, according to him.²
These reasons can be made clear by reason. The first [n.90] thus: since the ultimate perfection of every being in first act exists in the second act whereby it is conjoined to what is best, especially if the best acts and does not merely make (for every intelligible is active, and the first nature is intelligible, from the premise [nn.75-88]), the consequence is that its ultimate perfection will be in second act; therefore if this act is not the substance of it, its substance is not best, because its best is something else.
The second reason [n.91] can be made clear thus: a potency merely receptive is a potency of contradiction; therefore since it is not of this sort, therefore etc. – But because according to Aristotle this reason is not demonstrative but only probable, let the intended proposition be shown in another way, from the identity of the power and of the object in itself; therefore they will have the same act. But the consequence, plainly, is not valid; an instance is that an angel understands itself and loves itself and yet an angel’s act of loving and of understanding are not the same as its substance.
This conclusion, namely that the divine essence is the same as its willing itself, is true from corollaries: for it follows first that that the will is the same as the first nature, because willing exists only in the will; therefore the will whose willing is uncausable is also uncausable; therefore etc. And likewise, willing is understood to be as it were posterior to the will; yet willing is the same as that nature; therefore the will more so.
Again, second, it follows that understanding itself is the same as that nature, because nothing is loved unless it is known; therefore if loving itself is necessarily existent from itself, the consequence is that understanding itself is necessarily existent from itself.
And if understanding is closer to that nature than willing, then the consequence further is that the intellect is the same as that nature, as was just argued about the will from willing [n.94].
There is a fourth consequence too, that the idea of understanding itself is the same as itself, because it necessarily exists of itself if understanding necessarily exist of itself and the idea of understanding itself is as it were pre-understood to the intellect.
Having shown of self-understanding and self-willing that they are the same as the essence of the first being, I show from other things the proposition intended, namely about all its understanding and willing. And let the third conclusion be this: no understanding can be an accident of the first nature. The proof is because it has been shown of the first nature that it is in itself the first effective thing [nn.43-56]; therefore it has from itself the resources whence, after everything else has been removed, it could cause anything causable, at least as first cause of the causable. But with its knowledge removed it does not have the resources whence it could cause the causable; therefore knowledge of anything else whatever is not other than its nature. – The proof of the assumption is because nothing can cause except from love of the end, by willing it, because it cannot otherwise be a per se agent, because neither can it act, for an end; as it is, however, there is pre-understood to its willing of anything for the end its understanding of it; therefore before the first moment in which it is understood to be causing or willing a, necessarily it is pre-understood to be understanding a; so without this it cannot per se bring a about, and so in the case of other things.
Again, the same thing is proved because all understandings of the same intellect have a like relation to the intellect, according to their essential identity or accidental identity (as is clear of every created intellect and its understandings), because they seem to be perfections of the same genus; therefore if some of them have a subject receptive of them, then all of them do, and if one of them is an accident each of them also is. But some cannot be an accident in the first thing, from the preceding conclusion [n.89], because there cannot be a non-understanding of itself; therefore none of them will there be an accident.
Again, understanding, if it is what can be an accident, will be received in the intellect as in a subject; therefore also in the understanding which is the same as the intellect, and thus a more perfect understanding will be in receptive potency in respect of a more imperfect understanding.
Again, the same understanding can be about setting several objects in order, therefore the more perfect it is the more the objects; therefore the most perfect understanding, with which a more perfect degree of being understood is incompossible, will be the same as the understanding of all objects. The understanding of the first thing is most perfect in this way; therefore it is the same as all intelligible objects, and that which is of itself is the same as itself, from what has just preceded [n.89]; therefore the understanding of all things is the same. And I intend the same conclusion to be understood about willing.
Again, this intellect is nothing but a certain understanding; but this intellect is the same for all things, and so is what cannot be of any other object; therefore neither can it understand another thing. Therefore there is the intellect for all things. – It is the fallacy of the accident to conclude from the identity of certain things among themselves to their identity with respect to a third thing with respect to which they are extraneous;³ and it is plain from a similitude: to understand is the same as to will; ‘if therefore to understand itself belongs to something, then willing too belongs to the same thing’, does not follow, but it only follows because it is a willing; which willing indeed is something that belongs to the same thing, because one must so understand ‘of the same thing’ that the inference can be drawn in a divided, not a conjoined, manner, on account of an accident.⁴
Again, the intellect of the first thing has one act that is adequate to itself and coeternal, because understanding itself is the same as itself; therefore it cannot have any other understanding. – The consequence is not valid. An example about the blessed who at the same time see God and something else even if they see God according to the utmost of their capacity, as is posited about the soul of Christ, and still it can see something else.
Again an argument: this intellect has in itself through identity the greatest perfection of understanding; therefore it has every other understanding. – Response: this does not follow, because an understanding that is lesser can be causable and therefore can differ from the uncausable, but the greatest understanding cannot.
The fourth principal conclusion about the intellect and the will of God is this: the intellect of the first thing understands always and with a distinct and necessary act any intelligible thing naturally before that thing exists in itself.
The proof of the first part is because the first thing can know what is thus intelligible; for this belongs to perfection in the intellect, being able distinctly and actually to know any intelligible thing; rather, to posit this is necessary for the idea of intellect, because every intellect is of the whole of being taken in the most common way, as will be determined d.3 [I d.3 p.1 q.3 nn.3, 8-12, 24]. But the intellect of the first thing can only have an understanding the same as itself, from what was just said [n.98]; therefore it has actual and distinct understanding of any intelligible whatever, and this the same as itself and so always and necessarily.
The second part, about priority, is proved thus, that whatever is the same as itself is necessarily existent, as was plain above [n.106]; but the being of things other than itself is non-necessarily existent. Necessary existence is of itself prior in nature to everything non-necessary.
It is proved in another way, that the existence of anything else depends on the first thing as on a cause and, as a cause is of something causable, knowledge of the causable on the part of the cause is necessarily included; therefore the knowledge will be naturally prior to the very existence of the known thing.
The first part of the conclusion is also proved in another way, because a perfect artisan distinctly knows everything to be done before it is done, otherwise he would not operate perfectly, because knowledge is the measure by which he operates; therefore God is in possession of distinct and actual knowledge, or at any rate habitual knowledge, of all things producible by him prior to those things.
Against this: there is an instance about art, that universal art suffices for producing universal things [Scotus, Metaphysics I q.5 nn.3-4, VII p.2 q.15 n.1] – Look there for a response [ibid. VII p.2 q.15 n.9]. response [ibid. VII p.2 q.15 n.9].

Subsection II: 2. The infinity of God is proved directly

Having shown these preliminaries I argue for infinity in four ways. [First way] – First by way of efficacy, where the intended proposition will be shown in a twofold way: first because it is the first efficient cause of all things, second because it, to wit the efficient cause, knows distinctly all make-able things. Third, infinity will be shown by way of end, and fourth by way of eminence. The first way, on the part of the cause, is touched on by the Philosopher, Physics 8.10.266a10-24, 266b6-20, 267b17-26 and Metaphysics 12.7.1073a3-13, because it moves with an infinite motion; therefore it has an infinite power.
This reason is strengthened as to the antecedent as follows: the intended proposition is proved just as much if it can move through the infinite as if it were to move through the infinite, because it must be as equally in act as its power is; the thing is clear of the first thing to the extent it exists of itself [n.58]. Although therefore it not move with an infinite motion in the way Aristotle understands, yet if this antecedent be taken that, as far as it is of itself, it can move, a true antecedent is had and one equally sufficient for inferring the intended proposition.
The consequence [n.111] is proved thus, because if it is of itself, it moves with an infinite motion not by virtue of another; therefore it does not receive its moving thus from another, but it has in its own active virtue its whole effect all at once, because it has it independently. But what has in its virtue an infinite effect all at once is infinite; therefore etc.
The first consequence [n.111] is strengthened in another way as follows: the first mover has all at once in its virtue all the effects that can be produced by motion; but those effects are infinite if the motion is infinite; therefore etc.
Against these declarations of Aristotle, whatever may be true of the antecedent, yet the first consequence does not seem well proved. Not in the first way [n.113], because a greater duration adds nothing of perfection, for a whiteness that persists for one year is not more perfect than if it persisted for only one day; therefore a motion of however long a duration is not a more perfect effect than the motion of one day. Therefore from the fact that the agent has all at once in its active virtue a moving with an infinite motion, a greater perfection is not proved here than in there, save that the agent moves for a longer time, and of itself; and so one would need to show that the eternity of the agent would prove its infinity, otherwise it could not be proved from the infinity of its motion. – Then as to the form of the argument: the final proposition of the confirmation [n.113] is denied, save of infinity of duration.¹
The second confirmation [n.114] of the consequence is also refuted, because a greater intensive perfection is not proved by the fact that any agent of the same species can go on producing successively as many times as long as it lasts, because what has power for one such thing in one time has power by the same virtue for a thousand such things if it last a thousand times. And, among philosophers, an infinity is not possible save a numerical one of effects producible by motion (namely of things that can come to be and pass away), because in species they posited a finitude. Therefore an intensive infinity in an agent no more follows from the fact that it has power for an infinite number of things in succession than if it has power for two things only; for only a numerical infinity is possible according to philosophers. – But if someone prove a infinity of species possible, by proving some of the heavenly motions to be incommensurable and so never able to return to uniformity, even if they were to endure an infinite time and even if conjunctions infinite in species were to cause generable things infinite in species, whatever may be about this in itself, yet it is nothing to the intention of the philosopher, who denied an infinity of species.
The last probability that occurs for making clear the consequence of the Philosopher is this: whatever has power for some many things at once, any one of which requires some perfection proper to itself, is shown by the plurality of such things to be more perfect. Thus it seems one should conclude about the first agent that if it could cause infinite things all at once, that its virtue would be infinite, and consequently that if the first agent has all at once the virtue to cause infinite things, then, as far depends on itself, it could produce them all at once; although the nature of the effect does not permit it, yet the infinity of the thing’s virtue follows. The proof of this ultimate consequence is because what cannot cause a white and a black thing is not less perfect, because they are not simultaneously causable; for this non-simultaneity comes from a repugnance in them and not from a defect in the agent.
And from this I prove infinity as follows:² if the first thing had all causality formally at the same time, although the causable things could not be put into being all at once, it would be infinite, because, as far as depends on itself, it could produce infinite things all at once; and having power for several things at once proves a greater power intensively; therefore if it has this power more perfectly than if it had all causality formally, its intensive infinity follows all the more. But it does have all the causality of anything whatever as to the whole of what exists in reality itself more eminently than if it existed formally.
Although, therefore, I believe that omnipotence properly speaking, according to the intention of theologians, is a matter of belief only and cannot be proved by natural reason, as will be said in I d.42 [q. un. nn.2-3; below n.178], nevertheless an infinite potency can be naturally proved that at once, as far as depends on itself, has all the causality that would be at once capable of infinite things, if they were makeable at once.
If you object, the first thing does not of itself have power for infinite things all at once, because it has not been proved to be the total cause of infinite things,³ this puts nothing in the way, because if it had all at once that whereby it was the total cause, it would be nothing more perfect than it is now when it has that whereby it is first cause. – Also because the second causes are not required because of perfection in causing, because then what is more removed from the first cause would be more perfect, because it would require a more perfect cause. But if second causes are, according to the philosophers, required together with the first cause, this is because of the imperfection of the effect, so that the first thing along with some imperfect cause coulc cause an imperfect thing, which according to them it could not cause immediately. – Also because, according to Aristotle [Metaphysics 5.16.1021b31-32, 12.7.1072b28-34], the totality of perfections is more eminent in the first thing than if their formalities themselves were present in it, if they could be present in it; the proof of which is because a second cause proximate to the first cause has the whole of its causative perfection from the first cause alone; therefore the first cause has that whole perfection more eminently than the second cause that has it formally. The consequence is plain, because the first cause is the total and equivocal cause with respect to the second cause [n.69]. One may ask a similar question of the third cause with respect to the second cause or with respect to the first; if with respect to the first [sc. that the third has its whole causative perfection from the first cause], the proposition intended is gained; if with respect to the second, it follows that the second contains eminently the total perfection which is formally in the third. But the second has from the first that it thus contains the perfection of the third, from what has just been shown above [n.120]; therefore the first has to contain more eminently the perfection of the third than the second does, and so on in all other cases right up to the last cause. Wherefore that the first cause possesses eminently the whole causative perfection of all the causes, and possesses it more perfectly than if it had the causality of all of them formally, were that possible, seems in my judgment capable of being proved by the argument of Aristotle posited above [n.111] about the infinite substance, which is taken from the Physics and Metaphysics.⁴
According to this way of efficacy there is an argument⁵ that it has infinite power because it creates, for⁶ between the extremes in the case of creation [sc. the extremes of creator and created] there is an infinite distance.⁷ But this antecedent is set down only as something believed [n.119], and it is true that⁸ not-being would in duration as it were precede being,⁹ not however in nature as it were, after the way of Avicenna.¹⁰ – The antecedent is shown¹¹ by the fact that at least the first nature after God is from him and not from itself, nor does it receive being on the presupposition of anything else; therefore it is created.¹² But if one takes being and not-being as in this way prior in nature, then they are in that case not extremes of a change which that virtue would cause, nor does its being effected require its being changed. But whatever be true of the antecedent, the consequence is not proved, because when there is no distance intermediate between the extremes¹³ but the extremes are said to be distant precisely by reason of being extremes between each other, then there is as much distance as there is an extreme is greater. An example: God is infinitely distant from the creature, even than the highest possible creature, not because of any distance between the extremes but because of the infinity of one extreme.
It is in this way, then, that contradictories are not separate by any intermediates, because contradictories are immediate [Aristotle, Posterior Analytics 1.2.72a12-13] – such that however little something recedes from one extreme it is at once under the other extreme – but they are distant because of the extremes in themselves. Therefore this distance is as great as the extreme which is more perfect; it is finite;¹⁴ therefore etc.
There is a confirmation, because the total power over the positive term of a distance of this sort is power over the distance or the transition from extreme to extreme; therefore, from power over this transition infinity does not follow unless it follow from total power over its positive term. That term is finite.¹⁵
Now as for what is commonly said, that contradictories are infinitely distant, it can be understood thus, that is, indeterminately, because just as there is no distance so small that it does not suffice for contradictories, so there is no distance so great that, even if it were greater than the greatest possible, it would not extend itself to the contradictories. Their distance then is infinite, that is, indeterminate as to any distance, great or small; and therefore from such an infinity of distance the consequent about an infinite power intensively does not follow, just as neither does it follow on the smallest distance in which an infinite distance is thus preserved; and what does not follow on the antecedent does not follow on the consequent either.¹⁶
[The second way] – Having shown the intended proposition by way of the first efficient cause because the first efficient cause implies infinity, the second way follows, from the fact that it distinctly understands all make-able things. Here I argue as follows: intelligibles are infinite, and this actually, in an intellect that understands everything; therefore the intellect that understands them actually all at once is infinite. Of this sort is the intellect of the first thing.
Of this sort of enthymeme I prove the antecedent and the consequent. As to all things that are infinite in potency, such that in taking one after another no end can be reached, if all those things are actual at once, they are actually infinite; intelligibles are of this sort with respect to a created intellect, as is plain, and in the divine intellect all things are at once understood actually that are understood successively by a created intellect; therefore an infinity of things is in the divine intellect actually understood. Of this sort of syllogism I prove the major (although it seems sufficiently evident), because all such things that can be taken [one after another] are, when they are simultaneously existent, either actually finite or actually infinite; if they are actually finite, then by taking one after another one can in the end actually take them all; therefore if they cannot all be actually taken, then if such things are actually simultaneous, they are actually infinite.
The consequence of the first enthymeme [n.125] I prove thus, because where plurality requires or implies a greater perfection than fewness does, there a numerical infinite implies infinite perfection. An example: being able to carry ten things requires a greater perfection of moving virtue than being able to carry five; therefore being able to carry an infinite number of things implies an infinite moving virtue. Therefore, in the matter at hand, since to understand a is a perfection and to understand b is similarly a perfection, never is there the same understanding of the a and b and equally distinctly as two understandings would be, unless the perfections of the two understandings are included eminently in the one, and so on about three understandings, and further about an infinite number.¹⁷ It might also be argued in a like way about the idea itself of understanding as has been argued about the intellect and act, because a greater perfection in an act of understanding is inferred from the plurality of the things of which there is an idea of understanding them distinctly, because it is necessary that it include eminently the perfections of all the proper operations of understanding, each of which, according to its proper idea, posits some perfection; therefore infinite operations imply infinite perfection.
Second, following on this way about the understanding of the first thing I show the thing proposed thus: a first cause to which, in accord with the utmost of its causality, a second cause adds something of perfection in causing, does not seem able on its own to cause as perfect an effect as it can cause along with the second, because the causality of the first cause alone is lessened in respect of the causality of both; therefore if that which is naturally from the second cause and from the first together be much more perfectly from the first alone, the second cause adds nothing of perfection to the first; but every finite thing adds some perfection to a finite thing; therefore such first cause is infinite.
To the matter at hand: the knowledge of a thing is naturally generated by that thing as from the proximate cause, and especially the knowledge which is vision or intuitive understanding; therefore if that knowledge is in any intellect, without any action of such an object, merely by virtue of another prior object which is of a nature to be a superior cause with respect to such knowledge, the result is that that superior object is infinite in knowability, because an inferior object adds nothing in knowability to it; such a superior object is the first nature, because from the mere presence of it in the intellect of the first thing, without any other objection accompanying it, there is in the intellect of the first thing knowledge of any object whatever. Therefore no other intelligible adds anything to it in knowability; therefore it is infinite in knowability. Thus therefore is it in entity, because as each thing is related to existence so is it to knowability, from Metaphysics 2.1.993b30-31.
[Third way] – Again in the third way, namely on the part of the end [n.111], the argument is as follows: our will can desire and love, as the intellect can understand, some other thing greater than any finite thing; and it seems that the inclination to loving an infinite good supremely is more natural, for thence is argued a natural inclination in the will to something, because free will of itself, without a habit, promptly and with delight wants it; thus does it seem that we experience an infinite good in an act of loving, nay it does not seem that the will perfectly rests in anything else. And how would it not naturally hate that thing if it were the opposite of its object, just as it naturally hates not-being (according to Augustine On Free Choice of the Will 3 ch.6 n.18, ch.8 n.23)? It also seems that, if the infinite were repugnant to good, the will would, under the idea of the infinite, in no way rest in good, nor would it easily tend to it, just as neither to what is repugnant to its object. This reason will be confirmed in the next way [n.136], about the intellect.
[The fourth way] – Again, fourth, the intended proposition is shown by way of eminence [n.111], and I argue thus: it is incompossible with the most eminent thing that something else be more perfect, as is plain before [n.67]; but it is not incompossible to a finite thing that there be something more perfect; wherefore etc.
The proof of the minor is because an infinite thing is not repugnant to being; but the infinite is greater than everything finite. There is another way of arguing for this and it is the same: that to which it is not repugnant to be intensively infinite is not supremely perfect unless it is infinite, because if it is finite it can be exceeded or excelled, because to be infinite is not repugnant to it; to being infinity is not repugnant; therefore the most perfect being is infinite. The minor here, which is accepted in the preceding argument, does not seem capable of being shown a priori, because as contradictories contradict by their proper ideas and as this fact cannot be proved by anything more manifest, so non-repugnant things are non-repugnant by their proper ideas and it does not seem possible for this to be shown save by explaining their ideas. Being is not explained by anything more known, the infinite we understand through the finite (I explain this in vulgar manner thus: the infinite is that which no given finite thing exceeds precisely by any finite relation, but it exceeds still any such assignable relation).
In this way, however, is the intended proposition proved: just as anything whose impossibility is not apparent must be posited as possible, so also must that whose incompossibility is not apparent be set down as compossible; here no incompossibility is apparent, because finitude is not of the idea of being, nor does it appear from the idea of being that finitude is a property convertible with being. One or other of these is required for the aforesaid repugnance; for the properties that belong to the first being, and are convertible with it, seem sufficiently known to be present in it.
Again there is proof thus: the infinite is not in its mode repugnant to quantity, that is, by taking part after part; therefore neither is the infinite in its mode repugnant to being, that is, by existing in perfection all at once.
Again, if quantity of virtue is simply more perfect than quantity of bulk, why will an infinite be possible in bulk and not in virtue? But if it is possible, it is actual, as is plain from the third conclusion above, about effective primacy [n.58], and it will also be proved below [n.138].
Again, because the intellect, whose object is being, finds no repugnance in understanding something infinite, rather the infinite seems to be the most perfect intelligible. Now it is remarkable if to no intellect is a contradiction of this sort about its first object made plain although discord in sound so easily offends hearing; for if the disagreeable offends as soon as it is perceived, why does no intellect naturally flee from an intelligible infinite as from something not agreeable that thus destroys its first object?
Hereby can be colored the reasoning of Anselm about the highest thinkable good in the Proslogion, [nn.11, 35], and his description must be understood in this way:¹⁸ God is that than which, when known without contradiction, a greater cannot be thought without contradiction. And the fact that ‘without contradiction’ must be added is plain, for a thing in the knowing or thinking of which contradiction is included is said not to be thinkable, because in that case there are two opposed thinkables with no way of producing a single thinkable thing, because neither determines the other.¹⁹
The aforesaid highest thinkable without contradiction can exist in reality. This is proved first about quidditative being, because in such a thinkable supremely the intellect rests; therefore in that thinkable is the idea of the first object of the intellect, namely the idea of being, and this in the highest degree. – And then the further argument is made that it exists, speaking of the being of existence: the supremely thinkable is not in the thinking intellect only, because then it could exist (because it is a possible thinkable) and could not exist (because existing by some cause is repugnant to its idea),²⁰ as was clear before in the second conclusion [n.57] about the way of efficacy; therefore what exists in reality is a greater thinkable than what exists in the intellect only. But this is not to be so understood that the same thing, if it is thought on, is thereby a greater thinkable if it exist, but rather that anything which exists is greater than everything which is in the intellect only.
Or it [Anselm’s reasoning] is colored in another way thus: what exists is a greater thinkable; that is, it is more perfectly thinkable because visible or intelligible to intuitive intellection; when it does not exist, whether in itself or in something nobler to which it adds nothing, it is not visible. But what is visible is more perfectly thinkable than what is not visible but intelligible only in the abstract; therefore the most perfect thinkable exists. – The difference between intuitive and abstract intellection, and how the intuitive is more perfect, will be touched on later [I d.3 p.1 q.1-2 nn.29, 11, 18-19; q.3 nn.24, 10, 28], and elsewhere when there will be place for it [e.g. n.394 below, d.1 n.35 above].
Finally the intended proposition is shown from negation of an extrinsic cause, because²¹ form is limited [or: made finite] through matter;²² therefore what is not of a nature to be in matter is infinite.²³ ²⁴
This reasoning is not valid, because according to them an angel is immaterial; therefore it is in nature infinite. – Nor can they say that the existence of an angel limits its essence, because according to them existence is an accident of essence and naturally posterior; and thus in the first moment of nature the essence in itself, as prior to existence, seems to be intensively infinite, and consequently it will, in the second moment of nature, not be limitable by existence.
I respond briefly to the argument, for any being has intrinsic to it a grade of its own perfection, in which grade it is finite if it is finite and in which it is infinite if it can be infinite, and not by any accident to it.
There is also an argument ‘if form is limited in relation to matter, then if it is not in relation to matter it is not limited’; it is the fallacy of the consequent,²⁵ just like ‘body is limited in relation to body, therefore if it is not in relation to body it will be infinite’; ‘therefore the furthest heaven will be actually infinite’. The sophism is the one in Physics 3.4.203b20-22, that just as body is limited first in itself,²⁶ so a finite form is finite first in itself before it is limited in relation to matter, because of such a sort is nature in beings, that it is limited, that is, before it is united to matter, for a second finitude presupposes a first and does not cause it. Therefore in some moment of nature it will be finite in essence, therefore not made finite by existence; therefore it is not, in a second moment, made finite by existence.
I assert briefly one proposition, that any absolute essence finite in itself is finite as pre-understood to every comparison of itself to another essence.
[Epilogue] – From what has been said the solution to the question is plain. For from the first article [nn.41-73] one gets that some existent being is simply first with a triple primacy, namely of efficacy, of end, and of eminence [nn.42-58, 60-61, 64-66], and so simply that it is incompossible that there is something prior [nn.59, 63, 67]. And herein is existence proved of God as to the properties of God in respect of creatures, or insofar as he determines the dependence of the relation of creatures to himself [n.39].
From the second article [nn.74-144] one gets in a fourfold way that the first thing is infinite: namely first because it is the first efficient thing [nn.111-120], second because it is the first knower of all make-able things (the second way [nn.125-127] contains²⁷ four conclusions about the intelligibility of the first thing [nn.75-110]), third because it is the ultimate end [n.130], fourth because it is eminent [n.131-136]. According to the first way there is excluded a certain useless way about creation [nn.121-124], according to the second another way is touched on about the perfection and intelligibility of the first object [nn.128-129], according to the fourth exposition is given of the argument of Anselm in Proslogion, ‘God is that than which a greater cannot be thought’ [nn.137-139, 11, 35]; lastly there is excluded a useless way inferring infinity from immateriality [nn.140-144].
From the premised conclusions, proved and shown, the argument to the question²⁸ goes as follows: some being triply first among beings exists in act [nn.41-73, 145]; and that triply first thing is infinite [nn.111-141, 146]; therefore some infinite real being exists in act [n.1]. And it is the most perfect conceivable, and the most perfect, absolute concept that we can naturally have about God, that he is infinite, as will be said in I d.3 [p.1 qq.1-2 n.17]. And thus it has been proved that God exists as to the concept or existence of him, the most perfect conceivable or possible to be had by us of God.

Articulus IV: IV. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question

To the arguments of this question. To the first [n.1] I say that an infinite cause, active by necessity of nature, does not suffer anything contrary to it, whether something be contrary to it formally, that is, according as something agrees with it essentially, or virtually, that is, according to the idea of its effect which it virtually includes. For in each way it would impede whatever was incompossible with its effect, as was argued before [n.3].¹
On the contrary: is it really the case that the philosophers, when positing that God acts from necessity of nature, did not posit that there was anything bad in the universe? I reply: as was made evident in the proof that God is an agent through knowledge [n.86], the philosophers could not save the idea that something evil can happen contingently in the universe, but only that one order of courses would produce something that was receptive of a perfection, while another order would of necessity produce the opposite of that perfection; such that this perfection could not then be induced when all the causes come together, although absolutely a thing produced by some of the causes, when considered according to the idea of its species, would be receptive of the perfection whose opposite necessarily comes about.² But what the philosophers can say about our free choice and about badness of morals must be discussed elsewhere.
To the second [n.4] I say that the consequence is not valid. For proof of the consequence I say that there is not a like incompossibility of dimensions in filling up a place and of essences in existing simultaneously. For a single entity does not so fill up the whole nature of being that no other entity can stand along with it (but this must not be understood of spatial filling up but of, as it were, essential commensuration), but one dimension fills up the same place according to the utmost of its capacity. Therefore one entity can exist at the same time along with another, just as, in respect of place, there could exist along with a body filling the place another body not filling the place. Likewise the other consequence [n.4] is not valid, because an infinite body, if it existed along with another body, would become a greater whole than either by reason of dimensions, because the dimensions of the second body would be different from the dimensions of the infinite body, and of the same nature as them; and therefore the whole would be greater because of the diversity of dimensions, and the whole would not be greater because an infinite dimension cannot be exceeded. Here, however, the whole quantity of infinite perfection receives, in the idea of such quantity, no addition from the coexistence of another thing finite in such quantity.
To the third [n.5] I say that the consequence is not valid unless that which is pointed to in the antecedent, from which other things are separate, is finite. An example: if there were, per impossibile, some infinite ‘where’, and an infinite body were to fill up that ‘where’, it would not follow that ‘this body is here such that it is not elsewhere, therefore it is finite according to where’, because the ‘here’ points only to something infinite; so, according to the Philosopher, if motion were infinite and time were infinite, it does not follow that ‘this motion is in this time and not in another time, therefore it is finite according to time’. So, as to the intended proposition, it would be necessary to prove that what is pointed to by the ‘here’ is finite; but if it is assumed, the conclusion is being begged in the premises.
To the final one [n.6] I say that the Philosopher infers that ‘it is moved in non-time’ from this antecedent, that ‘infinite power exists in a magnitude’, and he understands ‘it is moved’ properly in the consequent, in the way motion is distinguished from mutation; and in this way the consequent involves a contradiction, and the antecedent too, according to him.³ But how the consequence hold I make clear in this way: if a power is infinite and acts from necessity of nature, therefore it acts in non-time. For, if it acts in time, let it be a. And let some other virtue be taken, a finite one, which acts in a finite time; let it be b. And let the finite virtue which is b be increased according to the proportion which b has to a, to wit, if b is a hundred or a thousand times a, let a hundred or a thousand times virtue be taken for that given finite virtue. Therefore the virtue so increased will move in the time a, and so that virtue and the infinite one will move in an equal time, which is impossible if an infinite virtue moves according to the utmost of its power and necessarily.
From this, then, that the virtue is infinite it follows that, if it act of necessity, it does not act in time; but from this, that in the antecedent is posited what exists in a magnitude [n.152], it follows that, if it act on a body, it properly moves that body, which speaks of virtue extensive⁴ per accidens. But such virtue, if it were to act about a body, would have the parts of such a body at different distances with respect to it, to wit, one part of the body closer and another part further away; it also has some resistance in the body on which it acts; which two causes, namely resistance and the diverse approximation of the parts of the moveable thing to the mover, make there to be succession in the motion and make the body to be properly moved. Therefore from the fact that in the antecedent the virtue is placed in a magnitude, it follows that it will properly move. And so by joining the two things together, namely that it is infinite and that it is in a magnitude, it follows that it will move properly in non-time, which is a contradiction.
But that does not follow of an infinite virtue which is not in a magnitude; for although it act in a non-time if it acts necessarily, because this is consequent to infinity, yet it will not properly move, because it will not have in the thing it acts on those two ideas of succession [n.153]. The Philosopher, therefore, does not intend that an infinite power properly move in non-time, in the way the argument proceeds [n.6], but that an infinite power in a magnitude properly move and in non-time [n.152], which are contradictories; and from this it follows that such an antecedent involves contradictories, namely that an infinite virtue exist in a magnitude.
But in that case there is a doubt. Since he posits a motive power that is infinite and naturally acting, it seems to follow that it would necessarily act in non-time although it would not move in non-time, rather then will nothing move another thing, properly speaking; and that this follows is plain, because the thing was proved before through the idea of an infinite power acting necessarily [nn.152-153].
Averroes replies, Metaphysics 12 com.41, that in addition to the first mover which is of infinite power there is required a conjoint mover of finite power, such that from the first mover there is infinite motion and from the second there is succession, because there could not otherwise be succession unless the finite thing acted along with it, because if the infinite thing alone acted it would act in non-time. This is refuted later in I d.8 [p.2 q. un nn.3, 8-20], where argument on this point is made against the philosophers, who posit that the first thing does of necessity whatever it does immediately. But the argument is not difficult for Christians, who say that God acts contingently; for they can easily reply that, although an infinite power acting necessarily do according to the utmost of itself, and so in non-time, whatever it immediately does, yet not an infinite virtue acting contingently and freely; for just as it is in its power to act or not to act, so it is in its power to act in time or to act in non-time; and so it is easy to save the fact that the first thing moves a body in time although it be of infinite power, because it does not act necessarily, nor according to the utmost of its power, namely as much as it could act, nor in as brief a time as it could act.

Prologus I: Prologus Totius Operis

Pars I: Pars 1 - On the Necessity of Revealed Doctrine

Quaestio I: Single Question: On the Necessity of Revealed Doctrine - Whether it be necessary for man in this present state for some doctrine to be supernaturally inspired

Articulus I: 1. Controversy between Philosophers and Theologians

Section I: A. Opinion of the Philosophers

Section II: B. Rejection of the Opinion of the Philosophers

Articulus II: II. Solution of the Question

Articulus III: III. About the Three Principal Reasons against the Philosophers

Articulus IV: IV. To the Arguments of the Philosophers

Articulus V: V. To the Principal Arguments

Pars II: Pars 2 - On the Sufficiency of Revealed Doctrine

Quaestio I: Single Question: On the Sufficiency of Revealed Doctrine Whether the supernatural knowledge necessary for the wayfarer is sufficiently handed on in Sacred Scripture.

Articulus I: I. On the Truth of Sacred Scripture

Articulus II: II. Principal Response to the Question

Articulus III: III. To the Principal Arguments

Pars III: Pars 3 - On the Object of Theology

Quaestio I: Question 1: Whether theology is about God as about its first object.

Quaestio II: Question 2: Whether Theology is about God under some Special Idea

Quaestio III: Question 3: Whether Theology is about All Things from the Attribution of them to its First Subject

Articulus I: I. Preliminary Remarks

Articulus II: II. About Necessary Theology

Section I: A. To the First Question, speaking of Theology in itself

Section II: B. To the Second Question, speaking of Theology in itself

Section III: C. To the First Question, speaking of Our Theology

Articulus III: III. On Contingent Theology

Articulus IV: IV. On Christ as First Object

Articulus V: V. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question

Articulus VI: VI. To the principal Arguments of the Second Question

Articulus VII: VI. To the Third Question

Section I: A. Opinion of Others

Section II: B. Scotus’ own Response

Articulus VIII: VII. To the principal Arguments of the Third Question

Pars IV: Pars 4 - On Theology as a Science

Quaestio I: Questions 1 and 2 - Whether theology in itself is a science, and whether it is subalterning or subalternate

Articulus I: I. To the First Question

Articulus II: II. To the Second Question

Pars V: Pars 5 - On Theology insofar as it is a Practical Science

Quaestio I: Question 1 - Whether theology is a practical or a speculative science

Quaestio II: Question 2 - Whether a science is called practical per se from order to action as to its end

Articulus I: I. What Action [Praxis] is

Articulus II: II. How Practical Knowledge is Extended to Action

Articulus III: III. From what Source Knowledge has Extension to Action

Articulus IV: IV. To the Second Question

Articulus V: V. To the First Question

Section I: A. The Opinion of Others

Section II: B. Scotus’ own Opinion

Articulus VI: VI. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question.

Articulus VII: VII. To the Principal Arguments of the Second Question

Book 1

Distinctio I: First Distinction

Pars I: First Part - On the Object of Enjoyment

Quaestio I: Question 1: Whether the object of enjoyment per se is the ultimate end

Articulus I: I. To the Question

Tractatus I: II. To the Principal Arguments

Quaestio II: Question 2 - Whether the ultimate end has only the one idea of enjoyability

Articulus I: I. To the Question

Section I: A. On the Enjoyment of the Wayfarer as to its Possibility

Section II: B. On the Enjoyment of the Comprehender when Speaking of the Absolute Power of God

Section III: C. On the Enjoyment of the Comprehender when Speaking of the Power of the Creature

Section IV: D. On the Enjoyment of the Comprehender and of the Wayfarer when Speaking of the Fact

Articulus II: II. To the Arguments

Section I: A. To the Principal Arguments

Section II: B. To the Reasons for the Opposite

Pars II: Second Part - On Enjoying in Itself

Quaestio I: Question 1 - Whether enjoying is an act elicited by the will or a passion received in the will

Articulus I: I. To the Question

Articulus II: II. To the Principal Arguments

Quaestio II: Question 2 - Whether when the end has been apprehended by the intellect the will must necessarily enjoy it

Articulus I: I. To the Question

Section I: A. The Opinion of Others

Section II: B. Attack on the Opinion of Others

Section III: C. Scotus’ Own Opinion

Section IV: D. To the Arguments for the Opinion of Others

Articulus II: II. To the Principal Arguments

Pars III: On the Enjoyer

Quaestio I: Whether Enjoying Belongs to God

Quaestio II: Whether the Wayfarer Enjoys

Quaestio III: Whether the Sinner Enjoys

Quaestio IV: Whether the Brutes Enjoy

Quaestio V: Whether All Things Enjoy