Disputationes metaphysicae

1. What the formal and the objective concept are, and in what they differ.—First of all the common distinction of the formal and the objective concept is to be supposed. That is called the formal concept which is the very act, or (what is the same) the word, by which the intellect conceives some thing or common notion; which is called a concept because it is as it were the offspring of the mind; and it is called formal either because it is the last form of the mind, or because it formally represents to the mind the thing known, or because in truth it is the intrinsic and formal term of the mental conception, in which it differs from the objective concept, so to speak. That thing or notion is called the objective concept which is properly and immediately known or represented through the formal concept; as, for example, when we conceive man, that act which we effect in the mind in order to conceive man is called the formal concept; but man, known and represented by that act, is called the objective concept—a concept indeed by extrinsic denomination from the formal concept, through which its object is said to be conceived; and therefore it is rightly called objective, because it is not a concept as a form intrinsically terminating the conception, but as the object and matter about which the formal conception is concerned, and to which the eye of the mind directly tends; on account of which it is called by some, following Averroes, the understood intention; and by others it is called the objective notion. Hence is gathered the difference between the formal and the objective concept, that the formal is always a true and positive thing, and in creatures a quality inhering in the mind, whereas the objective is not always a true positive thing; for we sometimes conceive privations and other things which are called beings of reason, because they have being only objectively in the intellect. Likewise the formal concept is always a singular and individual thing, because it is a thing produced by the intellect and inhering in it; but the objective concept can indeed sometimes be a singular and individual thing, in so far as it can be presented to the mind and conceived through the formal act, but often it is a universal or confused and common thing, such as man, substance and the like. In this disputation, then, we chiefly intend to explain the objective concept of being as such, according to its whole abstraction, according to which we said it is the object of metaphysics; but because it is very difficult, and depends much on our conception, we take our beginning from the formal concept, which, as it seems to us, can be better known.

Various opinions are reported

2. The first opinion absolutely denies that there is one formal concept of being which is in truth one in itself, and prescinded and distinct from the other concepts of particular beings. So thinks Cajetan, opusc. De nominum analogia, cc. 4 and 6. For although he speaks obscurely, and distinguishes concerning a perfect or imperfect concept, that distinction nevertheless coincides with another of Fonseca to be treated immediately; whence, if he is read attentively, he in truth thinks this; and Fonseca said that he had attained the truth, or come nearer to it, Metaphysics IV, c. 2, q. 2, sect. 3. The foundation is that otherwise being would be univocal, and not analogous, which we shall see below to be false. The consequence is proved, because those things are univocal whose name is common, and the notion of substance accommodated to the name is the same, on the testimony of Aristotle at the beginning of the Categories; but the name of being is common to all beings; therefore either the notion of the name is one and the same, and so being will be univocal, or it is not one, and so neither will the formal concept of being be able to be one, because the formal concept has its unity from some one thing or notion conceived, which it adequately regards. Whence, if that concept is also adequate to the word or name of being, it cannot be more one than the notion of being signified by that name is one.

3. The second opinion, which is rather an explanation of the preceding, is that of Ferrariensis, Contra Gentiles I, c. 34, who distinguishes a twofold concept: one he calls what the name means, the other what the thing is; the former, he says, can be one in the concept of being, but the latter not at all; and he founds both on the analogy of being. And it is explained in this way from the common notion of analogues; for they can be conceived in two ways: in one way, by the proper real concept signified by the name, and in this way, in so far as they are analogous, they do not have one real concept but several, as is evident both in analogues of proportionality and of proportion or attribution; for if, on hearing this name, laughing, the proper concept of the thing signified is formed, not one but a twofold concept is formed: one of man, who is properly and formally laughing; the other of the meadow, which is so called only through a certain proportionality. But if not both of these concepts but only one is formed, that word is not conceived according to its whole analogy or common signification with respect to those things, but either only as it is univocal with respect to men, or only as it is transferred and metaphorically signifies the meadow. And it is similar in analogues of attribution, for example, healthy; for if the proper concept of the thing signified is formed, it is not one but manifold: one of the animal, which is formally and properly healthy; others of the other things which are called healthy extrinsically through various relationships or denominations from the health of the animal. But in each of these analogues one very confused concept can be formed, which pertains rather to the signification of the word than to some thing, as if, on hearing the name healthy, you conceive that which has order to health. So, then, in the present case, on hearing the name of being, a confused concept can be formed, comprehending whatever has being or a relationship to being; but this is only a concept of what the name means; yet, if the things signified by that name are truly conceived, not one concept is formed but several.

4. The opinion of Fonseca, closely akin to this.—Nor does Fonseca, above, differ much from this opinion, distinguishing a threefold concept of being, namely distinct, confused and intermediate, that is, partly confused and partly distinct. The distinct is that which determinately and expressly represents all the simple entities which being immediately signifies, and this is not one but several. The confused is that which represents all things confusedly and indeterminately, and this is one. But the intermediate, which is partly confused and partly distinct, is that which determinately represents one nature, for example substance, but the others, namely quantity, quality, etc., implicitly and indeterminately, in so far as all agree with substance by a certain proportion; and this too is said to be one.

5. That so great a diversity of distinctions hinders clarity rather than helps it.—But distinctions of this kind seem to me to be multiplied without cause, and rather to confuse the matter than to explain it. For we ought to speak of the formal concept of being not according to what can be known and comprehended about all the things comprehended under this word, as they are in themselves, but as they are signified by this word; otherwise the discussion will not be about the concept of being in so far as it is being, but about the concept of all things both existing and also possible, in so far as they are such and are distinguished among themselves, in which way they can be distinctly conceived by one formal concept by no one except God alone, as the same author rightly noted. But in this sense even the concept of substance or of living thing, if it is explicit and distinct in that way, will only be that by which all substances or all living things, in so far as they are, are distinctly conceived, in which way God alone too will be able to have a distinct formal concept of them—of substance, of living thing, etc.

6. You will say that substance, living thing and similar names do not immediately signify these or those substantial or living natures, but the notion of substance, of living thing, etc., and therefore, for forming a distinct concept corresponding to the significate of such a word, it is not necessary to descend to the particular natures; but that it is otherwise with being, because it immediately signifies entities, at least simple ones, that is, those not composed of a common nature and a contracting difference. But this is in truth false, as will be more fully evident from the following section, and is now briefly evident from the common mode of conceiving. For who would say that being immediately signifies God as he is God, even though God is most simple and not composed of a common nature and a contracting difference? Finally the same can be asked of substance, accident, and the other genera or simple concepts. Likewise, why will being be said to signify immediately simple entities rather than those composed of a common nature and a contracting difference, such as animal, habit, etc.? For being as such comprehends all things generally under itself, and just as in the concept of substance or of quality nothing is included which is not being, so neither in the concept of animal or of habit. But that a composite concept can be resolved into several, of which neither includes the other, but not a simple concept, matters little for mediate or immediate signification. For who would believe that being immediately signifies rational, and not man, because rational expresses a simple concept and man a composite one? And so, stopping properly and precisely at the formal concept of being as such, it does not pertain to it that through it particular beings should be distinctly conceived according to their proper and determinate notions; and therefore the concept of being as such, if one stops at it, is always confused with respect to particular beings as they are such. And therefore St. Thomas, I, q. 14, a. 6, says that if God knew other things than himself only in so far as they are beings, he would know them only in common, confusedly and imperfectly; whence he concludes that he knows them not only according as they communicate in the notion of being, but also according as one is distinguished from another; he thinks, therefore, that the concept of being as such, stopping precisely at it, is always confused with respect to any determinate notion of being, as it is such in itself and is distinguished from the others, whether it be composite or simple.

7. The manner of speaking of the others is not approved.—Wherefore that member about the concept partly confused and partly distinct is also superfluous for explaining the present matter. First indeed, because the concept of substance is improperly said to be implicitly or confusedly the concept of accident, and universally the proper concept of the first analogate is most improperly said to be a confused concept of the other analogates, which are secondary, although many speak thus, saying that, just as the same name, although it immediately signifies the first analogate, secondarily signifies the others, so the formal concept of the first analogate confusedly represents the others, in so far as they are similar or proportional to that first one; for what distinctly represents something seems consequently to represent, at least confusedly, other things similar to it. But although this is of small moment, and perhaps about the manner of speaking, it does not meet with my approval, because such a proper and distinct concept of the first analogate is only one, and formally represents only the first analogate itself; in which it is not rightly compared with the name, because a name signifies only by imposition, and therefore the same name which primarily and properly signifies one thing can by transference be imposed to signify other things secondarily; but the concept of a thing only naturally represents the thing itself, and therefore, if it is the proper and adequate concept of the first analogate according to its proper notion, it cannot represent the rest; whence neither does it of itself make them known, but at most can be as it were the origin or occasion for the others to be conceived and denominated according to some proportion or relationship to the first analogate; which is not enough for the special and proper concept of the first analogate to be called implicit or confused with respect to the others. Next, I ask whether that concept of the first analogate is altogether the same as the concept which corresponds to the proper name of the same thing or nature, for example substance, or whether it is diverse. This latter cannot be said, because, if each is the proper concept of substance, it cannot be understood in what the diversity consists, such that one is said to represent accidents and not the other. But if the former is said, then that concept can no more be said to represent accidents than the proper concept of man represents other animals; indeed it can be said less, since there is less likeness. Likewise, because otherwise it would have to be said that substance has one formal concept in some way common to substance and accident, which is in truth most improper and rigorously false; because, although accident expresses a relationship to substance, the concept of substance nevertheless in no way represents that relationship, but only its term, and that not formally under the notion of term, but according to its absolute notion; therefore this is not enough for that concept to be called an implicit or confused concept of accident. And the same can easily be considered in the other analogates or their concepts; for the formal concept of a laughing man as such is in no way a confused concept of the meadow, nor is the proper concept of a healthy animal the concept of medicine, and so of the others. And the reason is that what founds an analogy of this kind is either some real agreement or likeness between the analogates, as we shall say below of being, and that is not represented through the proper concept of any analogate; or it is not a proper likeness, but only a certain proportion or attribution, and this too is not enough for the proper concept of one analogate, as such, to represent in some way the others, but only that form through order to which the others are denominated such; which form is represented through such a concept absolutely and as it is such in itself, and not with a relationship to the others.

8. I add further: whatever may be the case with this manner of speaking, that the determinate concept of substance is called confused with respect to the other genera of beings, or accidents, it nevertheless still cannot be called the formal concept of being as such; both because it is the proper formal concept of substance as substance, whereas the proper concept of being must be diverse from the concept of substance, since being is rightly divided into substance and accident; and also because being does not immediately signify substance, as I shall show below; therefore neither does it immediately express the proper formal concept of substance. It remains, therefore, that the formal concept of being as such, compared to determinate beings as they are such, is always a confused and indistinct concept in representing this or that being. I say, however, with respect to particular beings as they are such, because with respect to that object which it immediately and properly represents (whatever that may be), it can be said to be, and truly is, a proper and distinct concept; just as the same concept of animal, which is confused with respect to man, is proper and distinct with respect to animal as such, although under this same comparison the same simple concept is wont to be called confused with respect to that composite concept by which animal is conceived through its definition. And in a similar way, either in diverse men or in one at diverse times, one concept of being can be more distinct than another, and conversely one can be called confused with respect to another more distinct one, in so far as it happens that the very notion or quiddity of being as such is known more or less perfectly; which distinction of formal concepts is nothing to the purpose, because it is rather on the side of the one conceiving, and from a perfect or imperfect light or mode of conceiving, than from the relationship to the object, which we chiefly consider here.

The true opinion

9. These distinctions, then, being passed over, it must be said that the proper and adequate formal concept of being as such is one, prescinded in reality and in reason from the other formal concepts of other things and objects. This is the common opinion, as Fonseca, above, confesses; Scotus and all his disciples hold it, as we shall see in the following section; Capreolus, In I, dist. 2, q. 1, concl. 1 and 9, and in the answers to the arguments against them; and Cajetan, De ente et essentia, c. 1, q. 2, who cites St. Thomas, De potentia, q. 7, aa. 5 and 6; Soncinas, In IV Metaph., q. 1; Javellus, q. 1; Flandria, q. 2, a. 6; Hervaeus, Quodlibet II, q. 7; Soto, on the Categories, c. 4, q. 1; and it is plainly gathered from St. Thomas, in the places to be cited in the following section. And it is proved, first, by experience; for on hearing the name of being, we experience that our mind is not drawn apart or divided into several concepts, but rather gathered into one, just as when it conceives man, animal and the like. Secondly, because, as Aristotle said, De Interpretatione I, we express our formal concepts by words; but the word being is not only materially one, but also has one signification from its original imposition, by virtue of which it does not immediately signify some nature under a determinate and proper notion under which it is distinguished from others. Hence neither does it signify many things as they are many, because it does not signify them according as they differ among themselves, but rather as they agree among themselves, or are similar; it is therefore a sign that to this word there also corresponds in the mind one formal concept, by which what is signified by this word is immediately and adequately conceived. Or rather, conversely, by this sign we gather that the imposition of such a name proceeded from such a mode of conceiving things by one concept. Thirdly, we can argue from the concept of existence; for it seems self-evident that there is one formal concept of existence as such, because whenever we speak and dispute about existence in this way as about one act, we in truth form not several concepts but one; therefore also the formal concept of the existent as such is one, because, just as the abstract is conceived after the manner of one, so also the concrete as precisely so constituted; therefore similarly one formal concept corresponds to being as such; for being either is the same as existent, or, if it is taken as existent in aptitude, its concept has the same notion of unity. Hence also the concept of being is wont to be called not only one but also most simple, so that the ultimate resolution of the other concepts is made to it; for through the other concepts we conceive this or that kind of being, but through this one we prescind all composition and determination; whence this concept is also wont to be called of itself the first which is formed by man, because, other things being equal, it can more easily be conceived of any thing whatever; all of which St. Thomas hands down, De veritate, q. 1, a. 1, and q. 21, a. 1; and Avicenna, Metaphysics II. Wherefore concerning the unity of this most common and confused concept there is almost no one who doubts; but we have shown that no other concept can truly and properly be called the concept of being as such which is not confused with respect to particular beings as they are such. Finally, if the formal concept of being is not one, there will therefore be several; how many, then, will there be? There is no greater reason for two than for three, or for any other number; because, if these concepts are multiplied, it is necessary that they be multiplied according to some diversity of the things or entities comprehended under the breadth of being; but these entities can be multiplied to infinity, and be distinguished according to their proper notions; and if once it is posited that the concept or concepts of being as such represent determinate natures of being, even as distinct, there is no reason why one should stop at two rather than at three or four, etc., as will be more evident from what we shall say in the following section about the objective concept; for although the formal concept, in so far as it is made by us and in us, can seem better known by experience, the exact knowledge of its unity nevertheless depends much on the unity of the object, from which acts are wont to take their unity and distinction.

10. From which it is understood, first, in what sense and for what reason this formal concept is said to be prescinded according to the thing itself from other concepts, namely because in reality it is really distinct from the concept of substance as such, of accident, of quality, and the other similar ones; for we are speaking of the human intellect, which, while it divides in the mind even those things which are not distinct in reality, divides concepts within itself, forming really distinct concepts of the same thing according to the diverse prescission or abstraction of the thing conceived; in which way the formal concepts of divine justice and mercy are in us really prescinded or distinct, although mercy and justice are not distinguished in themselves. So, then, the concept of being as such, since in representing it prescinds from the proper notion of substance as such, of accident, and of all the others, must necessarily be really prescinded and distinct in itself from the proper concepts of such notions or natures as they are such; and this too all easily confess.

11. Secondly it is gathered from what has been said that this formal concept of being, just as it is one in itself according to the thing, so also according to its formal notion, and according to that too is prescinded in reason from the formal concepts of particular notions. It is evident, first, because this concept is in itself most simple, as objectively, so also formally; therefore it has in itself one simple adequate formal notion; therefore according to it it is prescinded from the other formal concepts. Secondly, because, just as our mind, by prescinding things which are not distinguished in reality, really distinguishes its formal concepts within itself, so conversely, by confusing and joining things which are distinguished in reality, in so far as they are similar in themselves, it unites its concept, forming it one in reality and in formal notion; but in this way beings are conceived by this formal concept of being; for the mind takes all those things only as they are similar among themselves in the notion of being, and as such forms one image, representing by a single formal representation that which is; which image is the formal concept itself; that concept, therefore, is simply one in reality and in formal notion, and according to it prescinded from those concepts which more distinctly represent particular beings or their notions.

12. The formal concept of being as such is not multiplied according to the multitude of particular objects.—Thirdly it follows that this formal concept of being is not only one, but also cannot be several according to its relationship to more determinate objects, or objects more distinctly conceived on the side of the objects. These formal concepts can indeed be multiplied, either according to number in diverse subjects, or in the same subject at diverse times, perhaps also according to species on the side of the one conceiving, in a higher mode or with greater clarity and more distinct apprehension of the very formal notion of being as such (although perhaps this whole distinction is only according to more and less within the same species, especially stopping at the concepts which can naturally be formed by man); but from the greater or lesser determination of the object the concept of being as such cannot be multiplied; because, as has been shown, by the very fact that one does not stop at the common conception of being as such, but descends to this and that being as they are such, although formal concepts are multiplied, the concept of being as such is not, but the concept of substance, or of accident, etc., is adjoined.

13. This concept is not of the name only, but also of the thing.—Fourthly it is gathered from what has been said that this concept is falsely called a concept of the name only, and not of the thing signified by the name of being, and according to that notion by which it is signified by it. First, because, as I said, this concept is prior to the word and to its imposition for signifying things in such a way. For although as regards us concepts are often formed by means of words, nevertheless in itself and simply the concept is prior, which of itself brings forth the word by which it is expressed, and is the origin of its imposition; such a concept, therefore, is simply and absolutely a concept of the thing according to itself, and not only in order to the signification of the word, such that for this reason it would be called a concept of the name, or of what the name means. Secondly, because this concept is after the manner of a certain simple image naturally representing that which is signified by the word at pleasure; but in this alone consists its being a concept of the thing; although, because that concept is most simple, and therefore its object cannot be declared by a proper definition, we are wont to use descriptions to explain it, which seem only to declare the signification of the name more distinctly; and in this way it can be said in a good sense that that concept is of what the name means, provided it is not excluded that it is the proper and adequate concept of the thing immediately signified by that word.

14. Of which analogues there is one common notion.—The foundation of the first opinion (for enough has already been said about the second) touches upon the matter of the analogy of being, to be treated below, and depends also on what is to be said about the objective concept; for many think that the unity of the formal concept is not repugnant to analogy, but the unity of the objective concept is, of which afterwards. For now it is briefly said, from St. Thomas, In I, dist. 19, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1, that among analogues of attribution there are some which signify a form which is intrinsically only in the principal analogate, but in the others only through relationship or extrinsic denomination, such as healthy and the like; and to these the unity of a formal concept is repugnant, because the analogates do not have proper likeness and agreement among themselves. But there are others which signify a form or nature intrinsically found in all the analogates; and of this kind is being, as we shall see below, for accidents are not beings by extrinsic¹ denomination, but by the intrinsic nature or notion of being which they participate; and in analogues of this kind it is not unfitting that there should be one formal concept, simply and absolutely one in itself in reality and in adequate formal notion; but in what its analogy consists will be explained below.

1. The first reason for doubting.—The reason for doubting is twofold. The first was touched upon in the preceding section, and is founded on the analogy of being; because, if its objective concept is one, it is either by the unity of univocation, and so analogy is taken away, or by an analogous unity only, and so either it is not in truth one, or there is a contradiction in terms, because analogy intrinsically includes either several notions having only a proportion among themselves, or several relationships to one form, by reason of which the objective concept of an analogous name cannot be one. Which is declared and confirmed, because in order that being have one objective concept, it is necessary that all beings agree in one formal notion of being, which is immediately signified by the name being, because the unity of an objective concept requires the unity of a thing, or at least of a formal notion; but if all beings agree in one formal notion, then as such they have one and the same definition, as well as one objective concept; because, if the objective concept is one, its definition too can be one; therefore nothing is lacking to being for perfect univocation.

2. The second.—The second reason for doubting is that, if the objective concept of being is one, then according to itself it is prescinded and abstracted from all its inferiors, or the determinate notions of beings; the consequent is impossible; therefore so is the antecedent. The consequence is evident, because, if the concept of being is one, then formally and actually it does not include in itself the determinate modes of beings; for these are intrinsically opposed and effect distinction; whence it is impossible that they should be actually included in one objective concept; therefore, in order that the concept of being be one, it is necessary that it prescind from all these; but that this is impossible I show thus: because, if being as such prescinds from the determinate notions of beings, then, in order that it be contracted or determined to them, it is necessary that something be added to it; therefore what is added is either being or nothing; if nothing, how can it really determine being and constitute some proper notion of being? But if it is being, then being as such cannot be prescinded from it, for what is prescinded from another is not included in it. For it cannot be understood that being is prescinded from the modes by which it is contracted, and that it is nevertheless intrinsically included in them; nor, conversely, that the mode contracting being includes nothing but being, and yet determines it to a special notion of being. For contraction and determination are not understood without addition; but addition cannot be understood unless what is added is such that it does not include that to which it is added, either according to the thing or according to reason, according to the mode in which it is understood to be added. And it is confirmed, for on this account Aristotle said, Metaphysics III, text 10, that the genus is outside the notion of the differences, namely because it abstracts and prescinds from them; therefore, if the objective concept of being is prescinded and one, it is necessary that it not be included in the contracting ones.

3. The reason of the difficulty on the contrary side.—But on the contrary is the fact that to one formal concept one objective concept necessarily corresponds; but it has been shown that there is one formal concept of being; therefore one objective concept must necessarily be granted. The major is evident, because the formal concept has its whole notion and unity from the object; therefore, in order to be one, it is necessary that it tend to an object in some way one; but the objective concept is nothing other than the object itself as known or apprehended through such a formal concept; therefore, if the formal concept is one, it is necessary that the objective concept also be one.

Various opinions are reported

4. The first opinion.—In this question, those who deny that there is one formal concept of being consequently also deny that there is an objective one.¹ And so thinks Cajetan, in the places cited in the preceding section, in the first opinion; and Ferrariensis, in the place cited. But of those who admit one formal concept of being, Soncinas denies one objective concept, Metaphysics IV, qq. 2 and 3; and Hispalensis, In I, dist. 3, q. 1; Hervaeus and Flandria, in the places cited in the preceding section. It is also attributed to Capreolus, but in truth he does not teach it, as I shall say below. St. Thomas too is cited for this opinion, I, q. 13, a. 5; De potentia, q. 7, a. 7; De veritate, q. 2, a. 11; in which places he indicates that to words which are common to God and creatures there corresponds not one notion conceived or signified, but several. The foundations of this opinion were touched upon at the beginning; for although many arguments are brought forward by these authors, the force of all of them is placed in the two difficulties touched upon. The aforesaid authors do not agree, however, in explaining the concept, or rather the objective concepts, which correspond to being. For some say that through the formal concept of being all the genera of beings are immediately represented, in so far as they have some proportion or relationship among themselves, as Ferrariensis; and Cajetan thinks the same. Others say that through the formal concept of being this disjunct is immediately represented, substance or accident, as Soncinas, Hervaeus and others. Again, others say that all the genera or notions, or simple concepts, are represented absolutely, not copulatively nor disjunctively, but² simply, as Fonseca, Metaphysics IV, c. 2, q. 2, sects. 4 and 7.

5. The second opinion.—The second opinion, altogether contrary, is that there is an objective concept of being simply one. Scotus holds this, In I, dist. 3, q. 1, and In III, dist. 8, q. 1, and In II, dist. 3, qq. 3 and 6; Javellus, Metaphysics IV, q. 1; Soto, on the Categories, c. 4, q. 1; and Capreolus is of the same opinion, In I, dist. 2, q. 1. There is, however, a diversity among these authors, for Scotus posits this concept as prescinded from the nature of the thing from the inferior natures and the modes contracting being. Others, however, posit this unity of the objective concept only from our mode of conceiving, without prescission and distinction which would be in the things; of which diversity of opinions we shall speak in the following section. But of the other difference, which also exists among these authors as regards univocation or analogy, we shall speak below.

6. The third opinion, intermediate between the aforesaid, uses a distinction, and is explained in various ways. For some say that the objective concept of being, taken in itself and absolutely without its inferiors, is one, and prescinded from them in reason; but that, compared to its inferiors and as included in them, it is not one; and so they reconcile the reasons for doubting adduced at the beginning; for, because through the formal concept of being being is conceived according to itself and without any comparison to its inferiors, it is necessary that at least under this consideration that objective concept have unity. But when this concept is considered as existing in the inferiors themselves, it cannot have unity; for the inferiors themselves, for example substance and accident, differ by that very thing by which they are beings; therefore they cannot have unity in it as such, because they cannot agree and differ according to the same thing; and the reasons for doubting posited at the beginning also confirm this latter part. Otherwise Fonseca, above, supposing that distinction of the confused, distinct and intermediate concept, or partly confused and partly distinct, says of this third concept that it can indeed be one, but not prescinded from its inferiors, but that it is the concept of, for example, substance; and of the distinct concept he similarly says that it is not one adequate to being, except perhaps in God, but in us includes the concept of substance, quality, etc. But, as I said, these are in truth not concepts of being as such. Finally, of the confused concept of being, which bears on the matter, he says that it is in a certain way one and prescinded, yet not simply but in a certain respect; that it is indeed in some way prescinded, because it does not expressly and determinately contain what is proper to the inferior members; but that it is not simply prescinded, even according to reason, lest it follow that it is univocal. He declares, however, that this prescission is in a certain respect and not simply, because this confused concept of being so excludes the things which are proper to substance and the other simple entities that its essence is nevertheless not other than the essence of such entities.

7. But these distinctions, as I touched upon in the preceding section, do not seem to me to serve for explaining the matter; but the more they are multiplied, the more the matter seems to be obscured and confused. Omitting, then, the distinct or particular concepts of substance and of the other genera or members dividing being in common, we deal here only with that objective concept which immediately and adequately corresponds to that formal concept which we said in the preceding section corresponds in the mind to this word being and to the thing immediately signified by it; for the other particular concepts, taken according to themselves, are not concepts of being in so far as it is being, but as they are such or such beings.

The former assertion

8. There is one objective notion of being.—I say, therefore, first, that to the formal concept of being there corresponds one adequate and immediate objective concept, which does not expressly signify substance, nor accident, nor God, nor creature, but all these after the manner of one, namely in so far as they are in some way similar among themselves and agree in being. In this conclusion the authors of the second opinion agree, and Fonseca does not dissent, and St. Thomas very much favours it, in the places cited above, De veritate, q. 1, a. 1, and q. 21, a. 1, in so far as he says that the concept of being is most simple and the first of all, and is determined to substance, quantity, etc., through a certain determination and expression of such a mode of being, where it is necessary that the discussion be of the objective concept; for the formal is not determined nor contracted. Whence more openly, I, q. 5, a. 3, ad 1, St. Thomas says: Substance, quantity and quality contract being, by applying being to some quiddity or nature; but contraction cannot be understood without some unity and community of the objective concept. And in the same way Aristotle favours this opinion, Metaphysics IV, text 7, where he says that metaphysics considers being in so far as it is being, under which the other genera are contained; where St. Thomas says that first philosophy considers common being and the things which belong to it as such. By reason this opinion can be proved thus. It is necessary that the formal concept of being have some adequate object; but that is not an aggregate of various natures of beings according to some determinate notions of them, however simple; therefore it is necessary that that concept be one according to some agreement and likeness of beings among themselves. The consequence is evident from a sufficient enumeration, because we suppose (what is self-evident) that that objective concept is not one by real unity, that is, numerical or entitative; for it is evident that this concept is common to many things. The major assumed is likewise evident, because that formal concept is an act of the intellect; but every act of the intellect, as every act, in so far as it is one, must have some adequate object from which it has its unity. But the minor is proved, because, if that adequate object is from an aggregation of several natures of being, I ask what these natures are, and how they are aggregated in that concept; for this can in no way be conceived and understood. Which will also be evident by excluding all the modes in which this has been asserted, or can be thought out.

9. Being does not immediately signify substance and accident.—For, first, what Soncinas says, that that concept consists of substance and accident as such, is plainly false; for either those two are included in that concept copulatively, and this he does not say, nor can he say it; otherwise it would falsely be said that substance is being, or that quality is being, because neither is substance substance and accident, nor is quality, and so of the others. Or those two are included disjunctively, as Soncinas himself says; and this, besides being against experience, as I shall say immediately, implies the univocation of being, which he himself intends to avoid; for this disjunct, substance or accident, belongs as truly, simply and equally primarily to accident as to substance; because, just as for the truth of a disjunctive proposition the truth of one part suffices, so for a disjunct predicate to be predicated equally primarily and simply it suffices that one part of it belong equally primarily and simply to the subject; but accident is as truly and as properly accident as substance is substance; therefore that disjunct belongs as truly and properly to accident by reason of one part as to substance by reason of the other. Which can be seen in all similar predicates; for to be God or creature, for example, is said as truly and properly of man as of God, and so of others. Or finally those two are included simply, that is, without conjunction or disjunction, namely substance accident. And this is first of all against experience, because what is conceived is perceived by the mind, and in this way falls under experience; but we, on hearing the name of being, and conceiving precisely what we understand to be signified by this word, do not perceive with the mind substance as such nor accident as such, as anyone can experience in himself.

10. Next, that formal concept is simple and limited, and in reality prescinded from the proper formal concepts of substance and accident as they are such; therefore through it substance and accident are not represented properly and distinctly, as they are represented through the two concepts of substance and accident. For it cannot be said that that one concept of being contains in a more eminent mode that whole formal representation which is in those two concepts taken together; for this mode of universality in a formal concept is foreign to the human intellect, of which we are treating, and is scarcely found in the angelic; that concept, therefore, is not universal through the eminent representation of many as they are many, but through the confusion of many as they are in some way one. But if through that concept substance and accident are not represented as properly and distinctly as through the two proper concepts of substance and accident, no medium is understood as to how they could be represented according to what is proper to them, but only as they are in some way similar among themselves; therefore that concept does not consist of substance and accident represented even in the said mode absolutely and simply.

11. Add moreover that according to such a concept it is scarcely understood what is definitely predicated of something when it is said to be being; for what is predicated is the objective concept; if, therefore, that concept is this whole, substance accident, this predication, this is, is equivalent to this: this is substance accident; but a predication of this kind cannot be made determinately, or truly, or falsely, unless each part of the predicate is understood to be predicated copulatively or disjunctively, since those two parts are not joined after the manner of substantive and adjective so as to be predicated after the manner of one; although, even if it were done in this way, the sense would return copulative, and a false proposition would result. Again, against this whole opinion there is added that, if each of these, substance and accident, is found in that concept in any of the aforesaid modes, I inquire further what concept of substance is included there; for substance there is taken either for created substance, or for uncreated, or for some objective concept common to both. The first and second cannot be said, because being, of which we are now speaking, is common to created and uncreated being, as we said above that it is the object of this science; but if the third is said, an argument ad hominem arises thence against the aforesaid authors; both because substance is something analogous to uncreated and created substance; therefore if, notwithstanding the analogy, there is one objective concept common to created and uncreated substance, there will also be able to be a concept of being. And also because created substance is more distant from uncreated than accident from created substance; it would be necessary, therefore, speaking consistently, to add something to that concept, saying that it consists of the determinate notion of created substance and of accident, which is nevertheless incredible in itself, and can be attacked more efficaciously by the arguments given. And there still remains a similar argument on the side of the other member, namely accident; for this too, according to the aforesaid authors, is analogous, and at least with respect to some accidents it is perhaps true, as I shall say below; I shall inquire, then, similarly, whether accident enters the concept of being according to some common concept, or (so to speak) according to part of an objective concept common to all accidents; and against each the arguments given can be applied, and finally it can be concluded that this member too must be divided into several others.

12. The concept of being does not include all the first genera.—For this cause, then, perhaps, others have said that the adequate object of that formal concept of being is, or includes, all the first genera, or all the simple entities which proximately divide being. But against this opinion the former arguments proceed in the same way. First, because such natures can be included in such a concept neither copulatively, nor disjunctively, nor simply and without any copula, as is evident by applying the discourse given in the same way; for it has the same force, as will easily be evident to anyone considering. Second, from experience, because by virtue of the conception of being we do not perceive all these definite natures of being as they are such, and as they are distinguished among themselves; and it would be much more difficult to perceive so many natures than substance and accident only; and it is much more incredible that there should be one formal concept in us which distinctly represents all these natures than substance and accident alone; and if the formal concept of being does not so distinctly represent these natures as they are such, and as they are distinguished among themselves, it is concluded that it represents them only as they agree among themselves, and are in some way similar, which is what is intended. The consequence is evident because, as I declared a little before, between these two no medium can be found in the present case. Third, because by almost the same reason by which this objective concept of being is said to include all the first genera, or all simple entities, it would have to be said to include all entities, however composite, man, lion, etc., according to their proper notions, which no one has said hitherto. The consequence is evident, because, if being includes all the genera, or simple natures, in its concept, it is either because the notion of being as such does not prescind from them according to the thing, or because they add nothing to being which is not being, or because the notion of being is understood according to reason to be immediately determined, or contracted, to those natures. But the first and second of these reasons proceed in the same way in any entity whatever, even in the lowest species; for according to the thing the notion of being no more prescinds from the notion of man or horse, etc., than from the notion of substance and accident; nor does man add to being something which is not being, any more than substance or quantity, etc. But the third reason is not brought forward consistently, because, if being as such does not express one objective notion or concept, there is nothing in being as such, as regards the thing conceived, which can properly be divided, determined or contracted, either immediately or mediately; therefore that reason in no way prevents all entities, whatever they may be, from being included in the concept of being, if some are said to be determinately included; nor can a sufficient reason be assigned for some more than for others.

13. The concept of being does not include substance explicitly and the others implicitly.—Therefore, finally, it can be said otherwise that in the adequate object of the formal concept of being there are included not several determinate and distinct natures of being according to what is proper to them, nor all under some one common nature, but only one determinately and expressly, and the others implicitly and confusedly, for example, the nature of substance as such determinately and expressly, but the natures of accidents implicitly. But this mode too can be attacked no less efficaciously than the preceding ones. First, because I showed above that through the formal concept explicitly and determinately representing substance as substance, accidents are in no way represented, neither implicitly nor confusedly, if we speak properly, as I declared at length in the preceding section. Secondly, here too the argument taken from experience can be urged, from Soto, for we experience that we conceive of some thing that it is being, and doubt whether it is substance or accident; as, for example, of quantity we know evidently that it is a reality; but whether it is substance or accident we either doubt or are in opinion; therefore in that concept of being substance as substance is not included, that is, expressly and according to its proper notion. Thirdly, because otherwise the objective concept of being and the objective concept of substance would be the same; because the objective concept of substance is nothing other than the notion of substance determinately and according to its proper mode conceived by the intellect; but in the same way the notion of substance is said to be conceived through the concept of being. Again, if in the notion of substance so conceived the concepts of accidents are included confusedly or implicitly, whether it is signified by the name of being or by the name of substance, they will be included in the same way; because the notion conceived is the same, and the mode of conceiving it is the same, namely expressly and determinately; the objective concept of substance and of being, therefore, will be the same; but the consequent is plainly false and against the common mode of conceiving; for this predication, substance is substance, is identical, but this one not at all, substance is being; they differ, therefore, not only in names, but also in the objective notions which are predicated. Likewise, otherwise it would be the same to distribute every substance and every being. Likewise this proposition, accident is being, would be as false as this, accident is substance; all of which are plainly false.

14. An a priori proof of the conclusion.—Finally, from the thing itself and as it were a priori, our opinion is proved against all the aforesaid, because all real beings truly have some likeness and agreement in the notion of being; therefore they can be conceived and represented under that precise notion by which they agree among themselves; therefore they can constitute one objective concept under that notion; therefore that is the objective concept of being. The antecedent seems self-evident from the terms; for, just as being and non-being are primarily diverse and opposed, on account of which it is said to be the first principle of all, anything whatever either is or is not, so any being whatever has some agreement and likeness with any being whatever; for the intellect finds a greater agreement between substance and accident than between substance and non-being or nothing; the creature too participates in some way the being of God, and therefore is said at least to be his vestige on account of some agreement and likeness in being; by which reason we investigate the being of God from the being of the creature, and similarly the being of substance from the being of accident. Finally, by this reason we attribute to them some common properties or attributes, such as to have some goodness or perfection, to be able to act or communicate oneself, and the like; there is therefore in the thing itself some agreement and likeness between all real beings. The first consequence too is sufficiently clear of itself, both because all beings are knowable under that notion and agreement; and also because by this reason other things which have some agreement among themselves are conceived under it unitedly and conjointly, more or less in proportion to the greater or lesser agreement; and finally because in the thing there is a sufficient foundation for this mode of conceiving, and in the intellect there is not lacking the power and efficacy for such a mode of conception, for it is supremely abstractive and prescissive of all notions. And hence the second consequence too is easy, because, as we have said, the unity of an objective concept does not consist in real and numerical unity, but in formal or fundamental unity, which is nothing other than the aforesaid agreement and likeness. But the last consequence is evident, the others being presupposed, because, if such an objective concept is possible, it is transcendent, most simple, and in this way the first of all, which are the attributes of the concept of being. Likewise, that agreement is founded in the act of being, which is as it were the formal element in the concept of being; whence the argument is also taken that, just as the objective concept of being itself or existence is one, so also the concept of being. Finally, all things are founded on what we adduced above from St. Thomas, that the analogy of being is not in some form which is intrinsically in one analogate only and extrinsically in the others, but in being or entity, which is intrinsically participated by all; in that notion, therefore, all things have a real agreement, and consequently an objective unity in the notion of being.

The latter assertion

15. The objective concept of being is prescinded from every particular notion.—I say, secondly: this objective concept is prescinded according to reason from all the particulars or members dividing being, even if they are most simple entities. This conclusion seems to me to follow necessarily from the preceding one; because, since all determinate beings in some way dividing being are distinct among themselves and objectively many, they cannot be understood to agree in one objective concept unless at least according to reason a prescission and abstraction is made from the proper notions in which they are distinguished. But because the whole difficulty consists in this abstraction and prescission, it must first be declared, and afterwards the conclusion proved per se and from its proper principles.

16. It is to be noticed, therefore, that the abstraction or prescission of the intellect does not require a distinction of things, or the prescission of some notion or mode which, from the nature of the thing, precedes in the thing itself the prescission of the intellect; but that in a most simple thing a prescission of this kind can be made in various ways, namely, either after the manner of form from subject, or conversely after the manner of subject from form, or after the manner of form from form; as in God we prescind God as such from his act of will, and the act of will from God, and the act of will from the act of intellect; and similarly we prescind the subsistence of God from the nature of God as its mode, not that the intellect affirms it to be a mode, but that on its own side it conceives it after the manner of a mode. So, then, the intellect abstracts and prescinds something from something as the common from the particular, not on account of a distinction or prescission which precedes in the thing, but on account of its own imperfect, confused or inadequate mode of conceiving; by reason of which in the object which it considers it does not comprehend all that is in it as it exists in reality, but only according to some agreement or likeness which several things have among themselves, which are considered after the manner of one under that notion. From which it comes about that for an objective concept prescinded according to reason from other things or concepts a prescission of things according to themselves is not necessary, but a certain denomination from the formal concept representing that objective one suffices; namely, because through it that object is not represented according to all that is in the thing, but only according to such a notion of agreement; as is evident in the objective concept of man as such, which is said to be prescinded according to reason from Peter, Paul and the other singulars, from which it does not differ in the thing. But that prescission according to reason is a denomination from the formal concept; because, namely, man, as he is presented to such a concept, is not represented according to every mode in which he exists in the thing, but according to the agreement which several men have, who are conceived after the manner of one under that notion.

17. The reason for the conclusion.—This prescission of reason in the objective concept having thus been explained, then, it is not difficult to show that it is found in the objective concept of being; because through the formal concept of being neither God, nor created substance, nor accident is represented according to the mode in which they are in the thing, nor as they differ among themselves, but only as they in some way agree among themselves and are similar; therefore that which is immediately and adequately presented to this formal concept is prescinded according to reason from the proper objective concept of substance or accident. The antecedent has been proved in the preceding conclusion, adding also what was said in the preceding section; but the consequence is evident, because prescission according to reason consists in nothing else, as has been explained. And it is confirmed, first, for the objective concept of being is not according to reason the objective concept of substance, or of accident, or of any other determinate genus; nor is it an aggregate of all of them; therefore it is something one prescinded according to reason from them. The major and minor have been proved above; the consequence is evident, because this prescission according to reason consists only in a distinction of reason in order to the formal concepts. It is confirmed, secondly, for on account of this prescission this is not identical: substance is being, nor this: accident is being, and yet each is true, because in them something is understood to be predicated which is common to both and according to reason distinct from both. And by this reason too, as we argued above, it can happen that after conceiving something under the notion of being one doubts whether it is substance or accident, which cannot be understood without at least a distinction of reason. It is confirmed, thirdly, because for no other reason is there an objective concept of substance prescinded according to reason from all substances, and of accident from accidents, except on account of the agreement which they have, and according to which they can be precisely conceived; therefore the same must be said of the concept of being.

18. An evasion is refuted.—Perhaps someone will answer that there is not a real agreement between all beings in the notion of being, as there is between all substances in the notion of substance, or between accidents in the notion of accident. But either the sense is that between beings as such there is no real agreement, or that it is not as great as between the others. The first is plainly false, nor can it be understood except by those who think that accident, for example, is not called being except by extrinsic denomination, as medicine is called healthy, as Cajetan sometimes seems to indicate, opusc. De nominum analogia, c. 2; but it is not likely that he thought so, as will be said more fully below in treating of the analogy of being; and expressly the same Cajetan, I, q. 13, a. 5, teaches that being, although it is said analogically of God and creatures, is said of them intrinsically; and it indeed seems self-evident that something cannot be a real being by extrinsic denomination; for this is the proper notion or foundation of beings of reason, as will be said afterwards; it is necessary, therefore, that what is a real being be such really and formally through its intrinsic entity, which is the same as itself, and inseparable from it, even if all other things are understood to be prescinded or separated from it; and so accidents too, although the entity of substance is separated from them, are understood to retain intrinsically their entity, by which they are real beings; and therefore above we said with St. Thomas that the analogy of being does not exclude that the formal notion signified by being is found intrinsically in all the analogates. Hence, however, it necessarily follows that they have among themselves some real agreement according to their intrinsic notion of being, as has also been proved above. But that this agreement is perhaps not as great as that between substances or accidents among themselves in their proper notions matters nothing for the present point, for at most it concludes that the unity of the concept of being is not as great, but not that it is none, or not sufficient for the prescission of the objective concept according to reason. Just as the agreement between substances as such is not as great as that between men, and nevertheless each suffices for the unity and prescission of the objective concept.

19. It can be answered otherwise, and a difference assigned, because the notion of being is intimate to all, and therefore does not seem able to be prescinded even according to reason from any, whereas the other notions are not so intimate to things. But this difference too is none, if taken with proportion; for the notions of substance and accident too, taken most commonly, are intimately in all substances and accidents, under whatever notion they are prescinded and considered. This, therefore, in no way impedes the prescission of the objective concept, especially since it has been shown that this prescission is not always founded in some distinction of the thing, but only in such a mode of conceiving, by which the thing is considered under one aspect and not under another.

20. Another evasion is refuted.—Many things can be objected against this doctrine, which partly touch the analogy of being, partly its distinction or inclusion in all the things or modes determining it, of which we must speak in what follows. For now this alone is objected: that it follows from what has been said that the predicaments are not primarily diverse, because they agree in some common notion. The answer is that the predicaments are not called primarily diverse because they agree in nothing, since it is evident that several agreements or likenesses intervene between various predicaments; for the predicaments of accidents, besides the notion of being, agree in the notion of accident; some also agree in the notion of absolute accident and are distinguished from the respective, etc. They are called primarily diverse, therefore, because they agree in no genus, as Porphyry indicated in the chapter on species. Likewise, because they do not differ by proper differences, but by themselves, as will be evident from what is to be said in sect. V.

Corollaries from the preceding doctrine

21. The intrinsic mode of substance or accident is not included in the concept of being.—From these things I infer, first, that in this objective concept of being, so prescinded, the intrinsic modes of substance or of the other members dividing being are not actually included. It is evident, because they would be included either as constituting that concept of being, or as dividing it. Not the first, because it is impossible that one, as one, be constituted by opposite modes or differences. Nor the second, because that concept would then already be actually divided into two, and so that concept would not be one, the opposite of which has been proved. And I confirm it, for I ask what it is to include those modes actually; for either it is that in the thing itself that common concept of being actually includes those modes in the things in which it exists; or it is that in the mind, or in that objective concept, as precisely terminating such a formal concept, those opposite modes are actually included. The first of these is true, but not to the point, because this objective concept is considered as prescinded and adequate to the formal concept of being as such, and not according to the whole reality which it has in the thing in all its inferiors; for in this way the concept of being can neither be prescinded nor one, since it actually includes all that is necessary for the distinction of all the genera and concepts; nor can it properly and truly be called the concept of being as such, but they are rather several concepts of all beings according to their whole realities, from which the prescinded concept of being is not distinguished in reality. It is confirmed, for in this way the concept of man too can be said actually to include all individuals, because the objective concept of man, as it exists in the thing itself, really includes the individuals themselves and their proper modes, nor is man distinguished in the thing from his individuals any more than being is divided from substance, accident and the other genera, as will be evident below; but it will very improperly be said for this reason that the objective concept of man actually includes all individuals or their individuating principles. But speaking of the prescinded concept of being in the other sense, which is more to the point, it is false that it actually includes the opposite modes of the inferior genera, because as such it includes only what is represented through its formal concept; but through that formal concept these modes are not represented expressly and distinctly according to their proper notions, because the intellect, conceiving as such, perceives none of these, as is known from what has been said and from experience itself, and from other similar cases; for for no other reason is man said not to include the individuals actually, but only potentially, except because, as he is represented through the prescinded concept of man, no individual notion is considered in him, but only the notion of man.

22. Being does not immediately signify substance or accident.—Secondly it is inferred that this word being does not immediately signify substance or accident, or the other genera or simple entities according to their proper notions, but the objective concept of being as such, and by reason of it the genera or entities in which it exists in the thing itself. So think all the authors cited, both here and in the conclusion of the preceding section, especially Scotus, In I, dist. 3, qq. 1 and 3; Avicenna, Metaphysics I, c. 4, is also cited; Algazel, c. 6; and it is taken from St. Thomas in the places cited, and De ente et essentia, c. 1, where Cajetan in reality thinks the same, although he differs from Scotus and constitutes in this a difference between being and other names signifying determinate genera or species; but in truth there intervenes none which pertains much to the present matter, except that which is to be treated in the following section. Whence this is rather declared and proved: first, by the example of man (and the same holds of similar cases); for it immediately signifies man, and mediately Peter, in whom in reality the notion of man is found; therefore similarly being, etc. The consequent is proved from parity of reason, because in both cases the name is common, and in both the objective concept is prescinded according to reason from the inferiors, and the name does not signify them except on account of some agreement which they have among themselves.

23. Secondly it is declared a priori, because, just as words express the formal concepts of the mind, so also they immediately signify the objects which are immediately represented through concepts of this kind; for they serve to express concepts in so far as what the concepts naturally represent, words signify by imposition; and therefore a word is sometimes imposed in common, because the concept which it expresses is also common; therefore that very thing which is the immediate object of the formal concept is the immediate significate of the word adequate to that concept; but such is this word being with respect to the formal concept of being.

24. Thirdly this is declared more fully, because this word being so signifies many things that it comprehends them all from a single and first imposition; it is therefore a sign that it does not signify them immediately, but by means of some objective concept common to all of them. The antecedent is declared from the difference between the analogy of this word and of others which are analogous only through proportionality or an extrinsic relationship to one; for in the others the word always from its original imposition signifies only one thing, but afterwards through some metaphor it has been transferred to signify another; whence it comes about that it immediately signifies both as it were by a double imposition and signification. In which they agree with equivocals, and differ only in that in equivocals each imposition is equally first and does not emanate from the other, as in the aforesaid analogues. Examples are: laughter from its first imposition signifies only a certain action of man; but afterwards this word was transferred to signify the pleasantness of a field; similarly healthy from its first imposition signifies only the health existing in an animal; but afterwards it was transferred to signify other things which have a relationship to the health of the animal. And the reason is both that this manifold signification and imposition did not arise from one concept but from many, and also that it is not founded in a real agreement of the things signified, but only in an extrinsic relationship or proportion. But the name being, from its proper and original imposition, has a signification common to all beings, as is evident both from the common use and apprehension of such a word, and from its formal or quasi-formal significate, which is to be, which of itself is common and intrinsic to all real beings; and finally because that imposition arose from a single formal concept of being as such. And hence the first consequence too remains proved, because one word cannot by virtue of one imposition signify many things as many, but as they are in some way one; and therefore it is of the notion of a common word that, at least according to reason and in order to the concepts which words express, it does not immediately signify many things as they are such. Which can be shown in the present case, for being does not immediately signify substance alone, otherwise accident would not be intrinsically being; nor does it signify at once substance as substance nor accident as accident, as can easily be declared by running through those three members posited above, namely that it can immediately signify them neither disjunctively, nor copulatively, nor simply, as will easily be evident by applying the arguments given above. For these three, the formal concept, the objective concept, and the word, keep a proportion among themselves, and therefore we often argue from one to another, not indeed committing a vicious circle, but taking of each what is better known to us, or seems more easily conceded by others.

25. Fourthly I argue: because on account of this immediate signification of the common concept or notion of being, being can most properly be distributed, by saying, every being is good, and divided, for example, into substance and accident; for not only the word is divided there, but what is signified by the word. On this account too a comparison is excellently made by saying that this is a more perfect being than that, which Aristotle also makes, Metaphysics VI, c. 1. And finally we excellently use this word as an extreme or middle term of a syllogism, for the unity of the word would not serve for reasoning except by reason of one proximate and immediate significate. And in this way that common reason is excellent, that being in so far as it is being is the object of the intellect, or of the science of metaphysics; whence it is necessary that there be something one immediately signified by that word; for this reason can be efficacious in so far as that is not only an object in some way, but is also a subject about which demonstrations are made and a middle term for demonstrating something of the inferiors. Finally the experience often touched upon is added, because on hearing the name of being we conceive something, and not substance nor accident. For it cannot be said (as some indicate) that we then stop at the concept of the word, because this is against experience; for he who knows the signification of the word being forms another concept than he who is ignorant of it; for the latter conceives the word and stops there, or doubts what is signified by that word; but the former besides the word conceives the thing signified and in no way doubts about the signification, and yet does not conceive substance nor accident; this word, therefore, has another more immediate significate.

26. But Soncinas objects some reasons which we shall bring forward in the following section; for they prove only that being does not signify some medium distinct from the nature of the thing from substance and accidents, not that it cannot be distinguished by reason through a confused concept of the mind. He objects next Aristotle, Metaphysics X, text 8, saying that being signifies the ten predicaments, which Averroes explains of the first signification and without a medium, whom Alexander of Hales follows there. He objects, secondly, Aristotle, Metaphysics VI, text 4, saying that if there are no beings abstracted from matter, natural philosophy is first philosophy, that is, the science of metaphysics can in no way be distinguished from it; which consequence would not be good if being as being signified something common to substance and accident, for that could be the object of metaphysics even if there were no immaterial beings. Thirdly we can object Aristotle, Physics I, text 25, where he indicates that being does not signify something one which can be the middle term of a syllogism; for on this account he rejects that reasoning of Parmenides: Whatever is besides being, is non-being; but non-being is nothing; therefore whatever is besides being, is nothing.

27. Fourthly Aristotle can be objected, Metaphysics VII, c. 4, text 15, saying that being itself is said of all the genera or predicaments, yet not similarly, that is, not according to the same notion and concept. Fifthly the same Aristotle is cited, Metaphysics VIII, c. 6, text 16, saying that being itself this indeed, that is, per se and as it is such, is at once substance, quality, quantity, etc., and therefore is not placed in the definition, as if he said that being descends immediately to the first genera; in which places Averroes, Alexander and St. Thomas so explain and think. Sixthly Aristotle is brought forward, Prior Analytics I, c. 28, where he indicates that the first genera are such that nothing is said of them, as Alexander and Philoponus seem to explain.

28. Solution.—To the first testimony the answer is that Aristotle says nothing there about immediate signification, but only about the general and equal predication of being and one; for they are found equally in all the predicaments, and thence he concludes that they are the same among themselves. For the efficacy of which reason it is not necessary that every medium of reason be taken away in this signification. Whence St. Thomas says there that being signifies the natures of the ten genera according as they are in act or in potency, in which he sufficiently indicates that it does not signify them immediately according to their proper notions, but according to some common one. The exposition of Averroes, therefore, is not necessary to us, although he himself sufficiently declares that he excludes only a medium which is a genus, and which signifies a definite and properly contractible nature, of which we shall speak afterwards. To the second some answer that the argument of Aristotle is good, yet not founded on this, that being cannot signify a concept common to substance and accident, but on this, that if there were no thing abstracting from matter according to being, the notion of being as such would not abstract from matter any more than the notion of body or of natural being, and therefore the consideration of being as such would not transcend the limits of natural philosophy, because then material substance would be the first being; but the science of the first being and of common being is the same, as he had said at the beginning of Book IV, and St. Thomas and Scotus notice in the said place of Book VI.

29. This common answer, however, needs greater examination. For it can first of all be doubted whether, even if there were no immaterial substances, a science of metaphysics distinct from physics and mathematics would have to be granted. For it seems it should be so asserted, for then there would be a notion of being abstracting from material substance and from quantity and the other accidents. There would also be common properties, such as true, one, same, diverse, whole, part, etc., of which neither physics nor mathematics now treats, nor would they then treat, since they are more common and exceed their proper objects. Therefore a third science superior to both would be necessary, which would accordingly be metaphysics. Whence it can secondly be doubted whether that science would then be prior to natural philosophy; for it seems it should be so said, because it would be about a more abstract and prior object.

30. It is indeed probable to me that, even with that hypothesis granted, there would still remain room for the science of metaphysics; for now only one part of it is that which disputes about spiritual substances; as regards the other parts, therefore, it could then remain, and dispute about being and the other transcendentals, and about the ten predicaments, and about the universal principles and causes. This being posited, however, nevertheless according to the mind of Aristotle, in the place cited, natural philosophy would be the first science or philosophy, at least in dignity and excellence, since it would treat of the most noble object, namely of substance as such, and of every substance; and consequently it would also treat of the first causes and principles of things, not indeed according to the abstraction of the mind, but according to the thing.

31. Whence finally it is said that it seems more probable that in that case a special science of metaphysics distinct from natural philosophy would not be necessary. The reason is that then philosophy would treat of every substance, and consequently of all accidents, even of quantity as it is a property of substance, and as regards its entity and essence, and in so far as it is distinguished both from substance itself and from all its other properties, because this whole consideration of quantity would not abstract from sensible matter nor exceed the breadth of the object of philosophy. And by the same reason the division and consideration of all the predicaments would pertain to the same philosophy, because there would be nothing in them not founded in reality in sensible substance; for the predicaments of accidents would not extend more widely than the predicament of substance. Again, the consideration of all essences and of all real causes would pertain to philosophy, for the same cause. And finally by parity of reason it would treat of the predicates common to substance and accidents, nor would it be necessary on account of these alone to constitute a special science, because they would not abstract from sensible matter, and the concept of being would not be other than the concept of material being. Nor would it stand in the way that the notion of being and similar common notions would be common to mathematical and physical things, because that community would only be according to real agreement, not according to some peculiar abstraction pertaining to the constitution of the object of a science. Just as now too continuous and discrete quantity agree in the common notion of quantity, and yet there is not one common mathematics, because physics sufficiently treats of that agreement and common notion, in which no special abstraction constituting a peculiar knowable object is found; so, then, it would be in that case.

32. To the third testimony, omitting the exposition of Soto and others, who say that that proposition is false, whatever is besides being, is non-being, because being said simply is taken for substance—for this is rigorously false, as I shall show below, and moreover, the proportion of predicate and subject being kept, it would still be true to say that whatever is besides being is non-being—omitting (I say) this exposition, the answer is that Aristotle does not deny that being can be the middle term of a syllogism, nor does he reject the reasoning of Parmenides on this account, but both because he took being to be one properly and rigorously, although it is only analogous, and also because he used the word one equivocally; for thus from the premisses posited above he concluded that that which is, or being, is one; therefore whatever is besides one is nothing; so as to conclude that all things are one, which is a manifest equivocation, for he intended that all things are one in the thing itself; but being, if it is taken precisely, and as it were immovably, is not one in this way, but only in reason; but if it is taken distributively and for individual beings, then indeed each being is one, but all things are not one.

33. To the fourth that exposition is denied; for when Aristotle says that being exists in all, but not similarly, it is not rightly explained as not by one concept, but as not in the same mode, because it is said of substance simply, but of the others in a certain respect, as St. Thomas explains. The fifth proves only that being is not such a medium as is properly contracted to its inferiors by something which is not being, but by simple determination, by which each genus is of itself being, and such being, which is most true, as we shall see more fully, sects. 5 and 6; it does not, however, exclude a medium concept from our confused mode of conceiving. To the sixth I answer first of all that Aristotle makes no mention there of the ten first genera; but he says absolutely that there are some things which are predicated of others, but nothing of them; which we can explain of the transcendentals, of which nothing is predicated as superior, for so that proposition seems to have to be restricted; for as an equal, there is nothing of which something cannot be predicated, since the transcendentals themselves are predicated properly of one another, and not altogether identically. Whence if anyone wishes to explain that member of the ten genera, he must restrict it otherwise to superior predicates which are genera or species; for absolutely how can it be true, since it is evidently established that many things are predicated of the first genera? Indeed Aristotle himself, Posterior Analytics II, c. 14, indicates that some superior or more universal predicates are contained within a genus, but others are said of others even outside a genus, which all the expositors understand to have been said on account of being and the like.

34. The concept of being, even as it is compared to its inferiors, is prescinded from them.—Finally it follows from what has been said that being expresses a concept one and prescinded not only as it is considered absolutely abstracted, but also as it is compared to its inferiors in order to be predicated of them, or is considered as existing in them. It is proved, because after any abstractive knowledge of a common concept from particulars the intellect can make a comparative one; therefore that very thing which is abstracted in being it can compare to its inferiors; for there is no greater repugnance in the concept of being than in other common ones, but rather the same reason, namely because that whole concept is in the inferiors themselves, whether it is distinguished from them in reality or in reason only, for this matters nothing; indeed, the less the distinction between them in reality, the more truly will one be attributed to the other; for thus, although we prescind the wisdom of God, and distinguish it from God by reason, comparing it to God we truly and properly say that wisdom is in God. In this manner, then, the notion of being precisely conceived is rightly compared to substance and accident and is said to be in them, and in this way these predications are made, substance is being, and accident is being. Whence it is confirmed, because every such comparison or composition is made from simple concepts; therefore, after the intellect has conceived being precisely, it can at the same time conceive substance or accident according to their proper concepts, because these simple concepts have no repugnance among themselves, as is self-evident; therefore similarly the intellect can then compare being to substance as existing in it, and similarly to accident; therefore the concept of being, even as compared to the concept of substance and accident, is prescinded from them according to reason.

35. You will say: therefore the concept of being, even as included in its inferiors, is prescinded from them, which is repugnant to what has been said above, because as included in its inferiors it is nothing other than they themselves, since there is nothing in them which is not being. The consequence is evident, because being cannot be compared to its inferiors or predicated of them except as it is in them; therefore, if as expressing a prescinded concept it is compared to its inferiors, then also as it is in them it will be prescinded. The answer is that there is an equivocation from our mode of conceiving to the thing itself, and conversely. Rigorously, therefore, the consequence is denied, because, although the concept of being, which is prescinded by us according to reason, is in its inferiors, nevertheless as it is prescinded, formally speaking, it is not in its inferiors; that is, it does not have in them that state or mode of being which it has by extrinsic denomination from the prescission of the intellect. But when it is said that this concept, even as prescinded, is compared to its inferiors and attributed to them, the sense is not that according to that prescission or denomination it is attributed to its inferiors, but only that that notion so conceived, compared to its inferiors, is found included in all of them. Wherefore, if that reduplication is not made of the notion of being as prescinded, but the discussion is simply of the notion of being precisely conceived, it is true that that notion is in the inferiors and is altogether and intimately included in them, and nevertheless is prescinded by reason, although in the thing it is not prescinded.

36. But at once a difficulty presses, because according to these things nothing seems to be lacking to the concept of being for the notion of a proper universal, for it will be one in many and of many. But this difficulty depends on the two reasons for doubting posited at the beginning of the section. One is about the univocation of being, because if being is not univocal, that reason suffices for it not to be properly universal; but how it does not follow from what has been said that it is univocal, and what it lacks for univocation, is to be treated below in its proper place, in dealing with the divisions of being; for now I only assert that all the things we have said about the unity of the concept of being seem far clearer and more certain than that being is analogous, and therefore that the unity of the concept is not rightly denied in order to defend analogy; but if one of the two had to be denied, it would rather be analogy, which is uncertain, than the unity of the concept, which seems to be demonstrated by certain reasons, that would have to be denied. In reality, however, it is not necessary that either be denied, because for univocation it is not enough that the concept be in itself in some way one, but it is necessary that it regard many with an equal relationship and order, which the concept of being does not have, as we shall expound more fully in the place cited. The other difficulty was about the mode in which being descends, or is drawn, to its inferiors according to reason, concerning which matter we shall make a proper section a little below, because it both has an obscure difficulty and depends on other things to be said first.

1. Explanation of the question.—This question can seem common to all superior grades or concepts with respect to their inferiors, of which we must treat in Disp. V, sect. 1, and Disp. VI, sect. 2. But here it has a special difficulty on account of the transcendence of being, and therefore it must be briefly dispatched here, supposing that, besides the perfect real distinction which intervenes between entities mutually separable, another lesser one can be found in things before the intellect, such as is wont to be between a thing and a mode of the thing, as we shall say more fully below. Here, then, we suppose as certain that the notion of being is not really distinguished in the former way from the inferiors in which it exists, which is self-evident in every common predicate, and will be evident a fortiori from what is to be said.¹ We inquire, however, whether to be such or such being adds some mode distinct from the nature of the thing and before the intellect from being itself, so that being, and such being, for example substance, are distinguished from the nature of the thing in their formal notion, in so far as substance adds some mode which being does not express.

Arguments for the affirmative part

2. The first.—It seems from what has been said to follow that this should be affirmed. First, because the notion of being is the same in the thing as is conceived in the mind; but as conceived in the mind it does not include the mode of substance or accident; therefore neither in the thing itself; but the notions of substance or accident include their modes; therefore the notion of being in the thing is distinct from them. The major (for all the rest are known) is proved, because we do not say that the notion of being is in the thing in the same way in which it is conceived, as regards, namely, the mode which it has from the prescission of the one conceiving; but we say that that notion conceived is the same as is in the thing; and this seems self-evident, because the intellect in this concept does not feign the thing or the notion conceived; therefore it conceives the same one which is in the thing.

3. The second.—Secondly, things which are separable in reality are in some way distinct in reality, because these two include negations of the same notion, or equivalent ones, especially in finite things; but the notion of being is separable in reality from the notion of substance, for it is preserved in accident, and conversely it is separable from the notion of accident, because it is preserved in substance alone; therefore it is in some way distinct in reality from them. You will say that the notion of being which is in substance is not separable from it, nor that which is in accident from it, and therefore a distinction from the nature of the thing between them is not necessary. But on the contrary, for the aforesaid mode of separation suffices for a distinction from the nature of the thing, namely, that somewhere one notion can be found without another; because, if in the thing they are altogether the same, it does not seem intelligible, especially in finite things, that they should not always accompany each other, because things which are altogether the same in reality are the same everywhere; but in accident, for example, the notion of being and the notion of substance are not the same; therefore neither are they the same according to themselves and absolutely.

4. The third.—Which is declared thirdly in this way, because substance in reality is not substance by the same thing by which it is being (and the same holds of accident); therefore there is some distinction from the nature of the thing between the objective concept of being and of substance, even as they are in the thing in substance itself. The antecedent is evident, because substance is being by the same thing by which accident is, for in the notion of being they are one; therefore substance is not substance by that by which it is being, otherwise whatever was constituted in the notion of being by that reason would also be constituted in the notion of substance. But the first consequence is proved, because a distinction from the nature of the thing is excellently gathered from distinct formal or constitutive effects; since, therefore, something other is constituted by the notion of substance than by the notion of being as such, it is necessary that in the thing they have some distinction.

5. The fourth.—Fourthly, it is wont to be judged a difficult argument that it seems impossible that the same thing according to the same should agree with another and differ from it; but substance in reality and before any intellect agrees with, or is similar to, accident in the notion of being, but differs from it, or is dissimilar, in the notion of substance; therefore these two are distinguished from the nature of the thing in some way in substance itself; otherwise according to altogether the same it would be similar and dissimilar to accident. That this is impossible is proved because these two include a contradiction, for agreement and likeness express some notion of unity; for likeness is founded in unity, as Aristotle said, Metaphysics V; but dissimilitude rather expresses a notion of multitude. And the contradiction is confirmed and explained; because, if in substance the notion of substance and of being is altogether the same, then whatever is of the essence of substance is of the essence of being, and conversely; otherwise they would differ essentially, for when anything whatever is added or taken away the essence is changed; but if they differ essentially, then in the thing itself they have some distinction, for the essential notion consists in the thing itself. But if whatever is of the essence of substance is of the essence of being, it follows both that the notion of substance is found in accident, with which it agrees in the notion of being, and that it is not found, because in truth accident is not substance, but dissimilar to it. It follows also that substance is similar to accident in the notion of being, because this is supposed, and not similar, because the notion of being in substance is not of the same mode as the notion of being in accident. And consequently it also follows that the notion of being is affirmed of accident on account of its agreement with substance, and can be denied on account of the disagreement which it is said to have in the same notion. Finally, agreement and disagreement express essentially diverse relations; therefore they require in the thing essentially diverse foundations and reasons of founding or terminating.

6. On account of these and similar arguments some think that being expresses an objective concept distinct from the nature of the thing and prescinded from all its inferiors and from the concepts, however simple, contained under it, such as substance, accident and the like; and this is commonly judged to be the opinion of Scotus, In I, dist. 3, qq. 1 and 3, and dist. 8, q. 2, and In II, dist. 3, q. 1; and the Scotists follow it, who a fortiori think the same of all universal predicates, of which more fully below.

The true opinion

7. Nevertheless it must be said that the objective concept of being, as it exists in the thing itself, is not something distinct from the nature of the thing and prescinded from the inferiors in which it exists. This is the common opinion of the whole School of St. Thomas, which first of all all those necessarily teach who deny that the objective concept of being is prescinded in reason, as Soncinas, Cajetan, Ferrariensis; and Cajetan specially declared it in the said opusc. De ente et essentia, c. 1, q. 2; and Fonseca holds the same, in the place cited, although he seems to think otherwise about the distinction between superior and inferior essential predicates, Metaphysics II, c. 2, text 11, and elsewhere, of which below in its place. The same also a fortiori all hold who deny that the genus is distinguished from the nature of the thing from its species, or the species from its individuals, as Gregory, In I, dist. 8, qq. 2 and 3; Capreolus, q. 4, a. 3, in the answer to the arguments against the second conclusion; Soncinas, Metaphysics VII, q. 36; Soto, on the Logic, q. 3, a. 26.² Capreolus specially holds the same opinion, In I, dist. 2, q. 1, in the answer to Scotus’s arguments against the last conclusion. And it is the open opinion of St. Thomas, Contra Gentiles I, c. 26, fourth argument; indeed Scotus too, Metaphysics X, text 3, seems to hold this opinion; for he constitutes a difference between being and one; for being (he says) predicates the same nature really and formally of the genera of which it is predicated quidditatively; but one, although it predicates the same nature really, does not predicate it formally, because one expresses an attribute, not an essence. Although perhaps Scotus spoke there in another sense, namely that being expresses the essence of all the genera, yet not the whole, whereas one is altogether outside the essence. And this opinion is taken from Aristotle, Metaphysics VIII, last chapter, text 16, where he says that being itself is determined by itself, without anything added, to substance, quantity, quality, and therefore is not placed in definitions, because it does not express a determinate nature contractible through some difference. And so the Commentator, St. Thomas, and Alexander of Hales explained it there; but Scotus explains that Aristotle excludes differences really distinct, but not formally distinct. But this is both openly against the mind of Aristotle and is not said consistently even by Scotus himself, because the inferior genera too are not really distinguished from their differences, but at most formally, according to the doctrine of the same Scotus; therefore Aristotle excludes this distinction and composition too in the determination of being to its inferiors.

8. The first reason.—It is proved by reason, first. If being and substance are distinguished from the nature of the thing, they are related either as whole and part, or as including and included, or as altogether co-distinct. This latter no one says, nor can it be apprehended; otherwise substance, taken precisely and formally as co-distinct from being, would not include being, which is impossible, since it is of the essential concept of substance to be being simply. But that the first too cannot be said is proved, for if being and substance are distinguished in that way, substance can be resolved into two concepts distinct from the nature of the thing; therefore in any singular substance there is that distinction from the nature of the thing which precedes the intellect, and must be in the singular things themselves; those two concepts, therefore, will be distinguished not only as they are apprehended by us, but also in the thing itself. But that this is impossible can be shown on the side of each concept; first on the side of the concept of being itself, for if in the thing itself it prescinds and is distinguished from the mode contracting it to the being of substance, I ask what kind of being is that which is understood to remain when that mode is prescinded. For either it is common being, abstracted from all singularity, or being determined to singular being. The first is evidently false, both because otherwise there would be in the thing itself a universal thing, universally, which is repugnant, because that being is existing and produced in reality; therefore it is intrinsically determined and singular; and also because it is incommunicable to another besides this substance, if we speak in the individual. The second, therefore, must necessarily be said, and then I ask whether in being so prescinded from the mode of substance there is some distinction from the nature of the thing between the common notion of being and such being, or not; for if there is a distinction, the same argument returns; for it will be necessary to resolve that concept into two, and so proceed to infinity; but if there is no distinction, then, in order that the common notion of being be determined to such being, it is not necessary to feign a distinction from the nature of the thing between them; therefore neither in order that being be determined to substance; for the reason is the same, and all the arguments made at the beginning can be applied to that concept of being which is said to be prescinded from substance as it really exists in it, and must necessarily be solved in it, and so no foundation will remain for feigning such a distinction. Besides, a real and singular entity can scarcely be conceived by the mind which nevertheless, in its intrinsic and essential notion, most formally does not include the notion of substance or accident.

9. Next, the same can be shown on the side of the other concept, or mode contracting being; for I inquire whether being is intrinsically included in it or not; if it is not included, it is nothing; substance, therefore, adds nothing over being, nor can that effect a distinction between being and substance; indeed, neither can it determine or contract being or constitute substance; for how will that which is nothing accomplish all these things? But if it is included, then that mode too includes the whole concept of substance, and of it the question returns whether it is distinguished from the nature of the thing from being or not; for if it is not distinguished, the same can be said of substance; but if it is distinguished, it will be necessary to resolve it into two other concepts distinct from the nature of the thing, and so proceed to infinity. It could be answered to this argument by denying the two-membered partition posited at the beginning, namely, that being is distinguished from substance as part from part, or as part from whole, but rather as a simple common concept from a simple particular concept, so that the common is included in the particular, although not conversely. But although this answer perhaps takes something true, as we shall expound more fully below, nevertheless it manifestly follows from it that there cannot be a distinction from the nature of the thing between the concept of being, as it really exists in its inferiors, and those inferiors. For if the inferior concept, for example of substance, is simple, so that it cannot be resolved into two concepts distinct among themselves from the nature of the thing, how can it be understood that there is in it a distinction from the nature of the thing between it and something included in it? This very thing, therefore, sufficiently declares that this mode of distinction is not actually in the things themselves, but only as in its foundation, and is completed through the prescission of reason.

10. The second reason.—Secondly, the concept of being is prescinded not only from creatures, but also from God; but in God the concept of being as such is not distinguished from the nature of the thing from the concept of such being, namely uncreated or infinite; therefore neither in the other beings. The major is evident from what has been said, and the minor too is certain, both from the supreme simplicity of God, for if there were in him any distinction from the nature of the thing, he would not be supremely simple; and also because otherwise there would be in things some real notion distinct from the nature of the thing from all others, of itself and by its nature prior to God as he is God, namely that notion of being which in God would be distinct from the notion of God; but this is impossible, because God as God is essentially the first being in duration, in perfection and in nature. Finally, because that very notion of being which is in God essentially has the divine properties, such as to be independent and uncreated; whence also according to that notion of being as it is in the thing God is infinitely distant from creatures. By which arguments Soncinas, Metaphysics IV, q. 2, contends to prove that being does not express a prescinded objective concept; but they prove it of prescission according to the thing, not of prescission according to reason. But the first consequence of the argument is proved, because, although the concepts inferior to being in creatures are not as simple as the concept of God, and therefore their reason can seem unlike, nevertheless in the present matter it is the same; both because, if the reasons made at the beginning showed a distinction from the nature of the thing between being and its inferiors, they would show altogether the same in God, for they can be applied in the same way, as will be evident in the solutions; and also because with respect to being as such the inferior concepts of creatures too are simple, and in them no reality can be understood prior in nature to the proper entity of each according to its determinate notion. For how can it be conceived that in substance there is really or from the nature of the thing some entity prior under the notion of being than under the notion of substance?

11. The third reason.—Finally I argue: because the mere distinction of our concepts, by which we conceive something after the manner of common and particular, does not sufficiently indicate a distinction from the nature of the thing in the thing conceived; therefore neither does it indicate it in the concept of being with respect to its inferiors; therefore there is no such distinction. This second consequence is evident, because no other indication or vestige of such a distinction can be thought out, which is not to be asserted not only without a sufficient, but also without a compelling reason, because, speaking universally, distinctions are not to be multiplied without cause, and especially and specially this one, which can scarcely be conceived by the mind. But the first consequence is evident, because there is no greater reason concerning the common and particular concept in being than in the others; indeed in being, on account of its transcendence, there is less reason for distinction. But the first antecedent is evident first of all in divine things alone, for the concept of divine person is common to the three divine persons, which agree in that common notion and are distinguished in their proper ones, and yet in each of them the notion of person and the notion of such a person are not distinguished from the nature of the thing, but by reason only. Next it is evident also in notions common to God and creatures, as has almost already been explained in the notion of being as it exists in God. And it can also be declared in the notion of wisdom, for example, in which created and uncreated wisdom agree in some way, and yet neither in uncreated wisdom are the common notion of wisdom and the proper notion of such wisdom distinguished from the nature of the thing, on account of its supreme simplicity and perfection; nor can those two notions be distinguished from the nature of the thing in created wisdom, because, however much you prescind the notion of wisdom, if you consider it existing in the thing in created wisdom, you will understand it as intrinsically created, and consequently in the thing itself undistinguished, and in no way prescinded from the nature of the thing from that mode by which it is determined to the being of created wisdom; otherwise it would be necessary to understand in created wisdom some real notion of wisdom which not only according to reason but also according to the thing would abstract from the notion of created and uncreated, which is both most absurd and cannot be conceived by the mind, because whatever there is of entity in created wisdom is made and dependent. Finally, the same can be shown in notions common to created things alone, which we shall do at length below in disputing about universals; now it is briefly declared, because from the subtlety and mode of conceiving of the human intellect these superior and inferior concepts can be varied and multiplied in infinite ways; it is therefore a sign that this is not always founded in a distinction which is in the things, but in our mode of conceiving, some foundation of likeness, agreement or eminence of the things themselves being supposed; otherwise it would be necessary to feign in each thing infinite modes distinct from the nature of the thing, by which it would be fully constituted in itself and fully distinguished from others. Which is declared by one or another example, for the common sense, for example, has the power of perceiving the objects of all the external senses; therefore there can be abstracted a concept common to sight and the interior sense, namely of a sense perceptive of colour, and another common to hearing and the common sense, namely of a sense perceptive of sound, and so of the others. But who would say that in the common sense the power of perceiving colour or sound is distinguished from the nature of the thing between themselves, or that the power of sensing in common is distinguished in that sense from the proper power and mode by which it attains its objects, and not rather that there is there one simple power which attains all those objects, which the intellect, conceiving inadequately, compares with other things, and so abstracts common concepts, distinct not in the thing but in reason? The same holds in the light of the sun, in so far as it has both the power of illuminating, in which it agrees with the brightness of fire, and of heating, in which it agrees with heat, and of drying, in which it agrees with dryness; and from all these the intellect can abstract various concepts, all of which it is frivolous and without foundation to think distinct from the nature of the thing in the light.

Solutions of the arguments

12. The first is answered.—To the arguments posited at the beginning, then, the answer is, first in general, that in all of them there is a great equivocation, arguing from the objective notion as prescinded by the intellect to it as it is in the thing, and attributing to the things themselves what belongs only by extrinsic denomination to the notions conceived and prescinded, as they are under such a consideration and prescission of the intellect. And this is most of all to be considered in all these argumentations, which are founded only on the mode of speaking and conceiving. For as we conceive, so we speak; whence, just as our concepts, even if they are true and not false, are nevertheless not always adequate to the things themselves, so also words are commensurate with our concepts; and therefore we must beware lest we transfer our mode of conceiving to the things themselves, and on account of a diverse mode of speaking think that there is a distinction in the things where there truly is none.

13. To the first, then, the answer is by denying the first consequence; for the notion of being is said to be the same in the thing as is in the mind because in truth all beings have in the thing that likeness and agreement under which the intellect conceives them when it conceives being; and because this mode of conceiving being is inadequate with respect to beings as they are in the thing, therefore the notion of being so conceived is said not to include the determinate modes of beings; in which expression the discussion is no longer of the notion of being absolutely and as it is in itself, but as it is under the denomination of the intellect; whence it is the same as if it were said that through that concept being is not considered under the express notions of the inferior beings, but only by a common and inadequate concept; and therefore it is not rightly inferred that in the thing itself too the notion of being as it is in individual beings does not include their proper notions or modes. The major proposition assumed could also be distinguished, namely that the notion of being is the same in the thing as is conceived in the mind; for it is the same really, yet not in reason; and this is enough for it to be able in the thing to include the proper notions of the inferior beings, although as precisely conceived it does not include them; just as divine wisdom is the same in the thing as is conceived in the mind, although as conceived in the mind it is not understood to include justice, which in the thing itself it essentially includes; because that it does not include it as conceived means only that it is not expressly and distinctly considered as including it, by that prescissive concept, not a negative one.

14. To the second.—To the second it was rightly answered there that the notion of being in substance is not separable from substance, and similarly in accident; and hence rather identity and indistinction from the nature of the thing is gathered, because things which are so related in the thing that they neither are really distinguished nor can one be separated from the other, nor conversely, there is no reason why they should be distinguished in the thing itself, unless from elsewhere there is some sufficient principle of distinction, of which none is found in the present case. Whence to the rejoinder the answer is that the notion of being which is found in substance is not found the same according to the thing in accident, nor conversely, but only the same according to reason, that is, according to a certain agreement and likeness which reason can precisely conceive after the manner of one; and for this it is enough that such a notion, which is conceived in this way as common, be distinct according to reason from the proper notions of substance and accident. For what is proper to an infinite thing is only that the same thing in number be communicable to many really distinct things, through perfect identity with each and all of them, although each of them is incommunicable. But that the same thing, which is really simple in itself, that is, not composed of grades distinct from the nature of the thing, should be really incommunicable to another with which it has some likeness and agreement, by reason of which some notion common to both is conceived in them, this does not exceed the perfection of a finite thing; indeed in any thing whatever, however imperfect, something of this kind can be found.

15. To the third.—To the third the answer is, first, that substance in the thing itself is being by the same thing by which it is substance, and conversely, namely through its intrinsic nature and entity which it has in the thing; and the same holds, proportion being kept, in accident. Wherefore in the same sense substance is not being by the same thing by which accident is, nor conversely; for accident is being through accidental entity and in order to substance; but substance is being through substantial entity, absolute in itself from order or relationship to a subject; nor in this way (speaking in the same sense) are accident and substance one in the notion of being, as they are constituted in the thing itself. Secondly it is said that, if we speak not according to the thing, but according to prescinding reason, then substance is not substance by the same thing by which it is being—by the same thing (I say) according to reason; but from this sense it can only be concluded that the notion of being and of substance are distinguished by reason in substance itself, and similarly the notion of being and of accident in accident. And in the same way substance and accident can only be said to be constituted by the same thing in the notion of being in the way in which they are one in that concept, namely according to reason. Whence it can only be concluded that that notion common to both is distinguished from their proper ones through the prescission of the intellect.

16. How the same entity can agree and differ through the same most simple notion.—To the fourth: it seems impossible to some that the same thing according to the thing, without any distinction from the nature of the thing which it has in itself, should be the principle or foundation of agreement and distinction from another, on account of the argument given. Others, however, think that this is indeed repugnant in univocal agreement, but not in analogous, which would be enough for us. I, however, think that even in univocal agreement it is not repugnant, as is evident from examples, both in divine and in created things. For the Father and the Son agree univocally in the notion of person; for who will deny that there is some unity and agreement there, or affirm that it is analogous, since in the notion of person one is as perfect as the other? And yet in the individual persons no distinction from the nature of the thing can be feigned between the foundation of distinction and of agreement. For the same paternity, most simple in itself in its relative entity, is really distinguished from filiation and agrees with it in the common notion of relation or personality; and it is similar as it were generically and dissimilar as it were specifically, although in it these grades or concepts are not distinguished from the nature of the thing. In creatures, quantity and quality (as is probable) agree univocally in the notion of accident, and yet in each of them the notion of accident is not distinguished from the nature of the thing from the proper one, as will be said more fully below; and I think the same is the case with all species with respect to their individuals, as will be said in its place. The reason, however, is that if distinction and agreement are of diverse orders, it is not repugnant that they be founded in the same thing; for thus one does not involve the negation of the other, indeed in a certain way it requires it. And so it is in the present case; for the distinction is real, but the agreement according to reason only, and therefore it is not repugnant that two simple things which are really primarily diverse according to the thing should according to reason have a unity founded in the real likeness or agreement which they have among themselves. For things which are diverse in the thing can be similar in that very thing in which they are distinguished; indeed likeness intrinsically demands distinction according to the thing with some unity of reason, or formal, or fundamental unity, for the same thing is not properly similar to itself. But if this agreement or likeness is imperfect, such as it is in the analogy of being and the like, it is more easily understood how things, however primarily diverse among themselves, can nevertheless have some imperfect agreement; for they are not called primarily diverse because they are in no way similar among themselves—for this it is not necessary to find in any real things or notions—but because they are primarily distinguished by themselves; with which distinction the aforesaid imperfect agreement stands. An example of this matter is in God, in whom no distinction of grades from the nature of the thing can be thought out; whence that most simple nature by itself is altogether distinct from created nature, and yet at the same time is the principle of some analogous agreement in a certain respect with the same; these two, therefore, are not repugnant.

17. To the last confirmation the answer is evident from what has been said. For it has already been said that the notion of substance and of being in substance is altogether the same according to the thing, yet differs by reason, and by the prior consideration has in substance the same essential notion, yet diverse by reason; and the same holds of the notion of being and of accident as they are found in accident; but conversely accident and substance compared among themselves are said to have in the notion of being the same essential notion according to reason only, not according to the thing; and in all the inferences made in that confirmation an equivocation is committed, by not distinguishing the diverse notions and modes of agreement and distinction.

1. What Avicenna understands by the name of being.—Since it has been said that being expresses one objective concept, it is necessary to declare briefly in what its formal or essential notion consists, at least by some description or explanation of the terms; for, since that notion is most abstract and most simple, it cannot properly be defined. It was, then, the opinion of Avicenna, which the Commentator and St. Thomas report, Metaphysics IV, comm. 3, and Book X, comm. 8, that being signifies a certain accident common to all existing things, namely being itself, which he said happens to things, since it can be conferred on them and taken away. Which opinion is founded on the signification of the word being; for it is derived from the verb sum and is its participle; but the verb sum, said absolutely, signifies the act of being or existing; for to be and to exist are the same, as is evident from the common use and signification of these verbs; being, therefore, adequately signifies that which is; whence in Aristotle, Physics I, text 17, and often elsewhere, that which is is placed in place of being, that is, that which has the act of being or existing, so that being is the same as existent; being, therefore, expresses formally being or existence, which is outside the quiddity of things.

2. Touching on this opinion, Soto, without naming Avicenna, c. 4 of the Antepraedicamenta, q. 1, at the end, first says that being is always the participle of the verb sum, as existent is of the verb existo, and formally signifies being, but materially that which has being; afterwards, however, he declares that being signifies not only what is in act, as existent does, but what is in act or in potency, because of a non-existent man it is truly said that he is being, as that he is animal or substance; and nevertheless he concludes that being is not said quidditatively of things, especially created ones, because it expresses a relationship to being, which is outside the essence of the creature. And in this he constitutes the difference between being and thing, that thing is predicated quidditatively, because it signifies a true and ratified quiddity absolutely, and without order to being; but being is not predicated quidditatively, because it does not signify quiddity absolutely, but under the notion of being, or in so far as it can have being; and by this reason he thought it was said by Aristotle, Metaphysics VIII, text 16, that being is not placed in the definitions of things. Which whole doctrine Soto seems to have taken from Cajetan, opusc. De ente et essentia, c. 4, just before q. 6, where besides other things he says that Avicenna is reproved only because he calls being an accidental predicate; for properly being is not an accident, but a substantial act; but that he is not worthy of reproof because he denies that being is an essential or quidditative predicate; for this is true, since being is outside the quiddity; and he cites St. Thomas, Quodlibet II, a. 3, saying that being is predicated essentially of God alone, which he also indicates, I, q. 3, aa. 4 and 5, and Contra Gentiles I, cc. 25 and 26.

3. Being both participle and noun.—In order to explain this matter and remove the equivocation, we must use the customary distinction of being which Cajetan and Soto, above, reject without cause. But Fonseca rightly embraces it, Metaphysics IV, c. 2, q. 3, sect. 2, and St. Thomas sufficiently indicates it in the said Quodlibet, although not in the same words. Being, then, as has been said, is sometimes taken as the participle of the verb sum, and as such signifies the act of being as exercised, and is the same as actually existent; but sometimes it is taken as a noun signifying formally the essence of that thing which has or can have being, and it can be said to signify being itself, not as exercised in act, but in potency or aptitude; just as living, as it is a participle,¹ signifies the actual use of life, but as it is a noun signifies only that which has a nature which can be the principle of vital operation. But that this distinction must necessarily be admitted by the aforesaid authors is evident, for the former signification is founded in the propriety and rigour of the verb sum, which, said absolutely, signifies actual being or existence; whence also the dialecticians say that in a proposition de secundo adiacente the verb is is never absolved from time. And it is evident also from common use, for if someone says Adam is, he signifies that he exists. This verb, however, rigorously has its participle included in itself, into which the aforesaid proposition can be resolved. Again, it is evident from common use that being, even taken for real being (as we are now speaking), is attributed not only to existing things, but also to real natures considered according to themselves, whether they exist or not; in which way metaphysics considers being, and in this way being is divided into the ten predicaments. But being in this signification does not retain the force of a participle, because a participle co-signifies time, and so signifies the actual exercise of being or existing; and therefore this word existent can never be said of a thing which does not actually exist, because it always retains the force of the participle of the verb existo; therefore it is necessary that being in this latter signification be taken in the force of a noun. Whence the aforesaid authors in reality admit this partition, although they despise it in words, for it is the same to say that being sometimes signifies a thing actually existing, sometimes only in potency, as to say that it is sometimes taken as a participle, sometimes as a noun, or, as others speak, participially and nominally. For by the very fact that being does not signify actual entity and existence, it is no longer taken in the force of a participle, but as a verbal noun. Whence St. Thomas, in the said Quodlibet, after he has treated of being as it is said from actual being, subjoins: But it is true that this name being, according as it imports the thing to which such being belongs, thus signifies the essence of the thing, and is divided by the ten genera.

Resolution of the question

4. What being as participle imports.—This signification of the word, then, being supposed, the resolution of the question taken in common is easy. For it must be said, first, that, being taken in act, as it is the significate of that word taken in the force of a participle, its notion consists in this, that it is something actually existing, or having a real act of being, or having actual reality, which is distinguished from potential reality, which is actually nothing. This whole, since it consists only in the declaration of a most simple concept, cannot be proved otherwise than from the common mode of conceiving and from the signification of the word explained by us. And finally, because from what has been said in the preceding sections it can be evident that being under this notion can have one formal and objective concept, common to all actually existing beings, since they are similar among themselves and agree in actual being and entity, it is evident also that that concept can be signified by this word; therefore the notion of being so taken and of its concept cannot consist in anything else, nor can it be explained otherwise.

5. I say, secondly: if being is taken as it is the significate of this word taken in the force of a noun, its notion consists in this, that it is that which has a real essence, that is, not feigned nor chimerical, but true and apt really to exist. The proof of this conclusion is proportionally the same as that of the preceding, because this simple concept cannot be understood or explained in another way.

What a real essence is

6. What being as noun is.—It only remained to be expounded what a real essence is, or in what its notion consists; for since essence is that according to which a thing is said or denominated being, as St. Thomas says, De ente et essentia, c. 2, which is most of all true of being taken in this acceptation, it cannot therefore be sufficiently explained in what the notion of real being consists unless it is understood in what the notion of real essence consists. In which two things can be asked, which are indicated by those two words: first, in what the notion of essence consists; second, in what its being real consists. The first cannot be expounded by us except either in order to the effects or attributes of the thing, or in order to our mode of conceiving and speaking. In the first way we say that the essence of a thing is that which is the first and radical and most intimate principle of all the actions and properties which belong to the thing, and under this notion it is called the nature of each thing, as is evident from Aristotle, Metaphysics V, text 5; and St. Thomas notes it, De ente et essentia, c. 1, and Quodlibet II,² a. 4, and often elsewhere. In the second way, however, we say that the essence of a thing is that which is explained through the definition, as St. Thomas also says in the said opusculum De ente et essentia, c. 2; and in this way too that is wont to be said to be the essence of a thing which is first conceived of the thing; first (I say) not in the order of origin (for in this way we are wont rather to begin the conception of a thing from those things which are outside its essence), but rather in the order of notability and primacy of the object; for that is of the essence of a thing which we conceive first to belong to it and first to be intrinsically constituted in the being of a thing or of such a thing; and in this way essence is also called quiddity in order to our expressions, because it is that through which we answer the question what the thing is. And finally it is called essence because it is that which through the act of being is first understood to be in each thing. The notion of essence, therefore, can be declared by us in these ways.

7. But what it is for an essence to be real we can expound either by negation or by affirmation. In the former way we say that that essence is real which involves no repugnance in itself, nor is merely feigned by the intellect. In the latter way, however, it can be explained either a posteriori, through this, that it is the principle or root of real operations or effects, whether in the genus of efficient, or formal, or material cause; for thus there is no real essence which cannot have some real effect or property. But a priori it can be explained through an extrinsic cause (although this holds true not simply of essence, but of created essence), and thus we say that that essence is real which can really be produced by God and constituted in the being of actual being. Through an intrinsic cause, however, this notion of essence cannot properly be explained, because it itself is the first cause or intrinsic reason of being, and most simple, as it is conceived by this most common concept of essence; whence we can only say that that is a real essence which of itself is apt to be, or really to exist. In these ways, therefore, the common notion of being can be declared by us; but a more exact understanding of this matter depends on several questions. The first is, what kind of entity a real essence has when it does not actually exist. The second, what actual existence is, and for what it is necessary in things. The third, how existence is distinguished from essence. But because these questions are almost proper to created being, and require a prolix disputation, we therefore defer them until Disp. VII,³ content for now with the aforesaid description of being and essence.

In what being in act and being in potency agree

8. One doubt, however, concerning the two conclusions posited cannot be passed over here, although it touches the division of being into being in act and being in potency; namely, whether that twofold signification of being taken nominally and participially is merely equivocal, or so analogous that no concept common to both members corresponds to it, or whether it has some common concept; for if this latter is said, the most common notion of being has not yet been sufficiently explained by us; for we have declared the notions of the individual members, but not the notion of being as common and abstracting from both members. Next, such a concept and its notion, indeed also its name, will be most difficult to explain, because it will be signified neither by being taken nominally nor participially; but no other mode of signifying abstracting from these two can be feigned. But if the first is said, it follows that there cannot be a concept of being common to God and creatures as possible, but only as actually existing, which seems plainly false and against the common mode of conceiving, and against all that has been said above about the most common concept of being. It follows next that man is said equivocally of a true possible man and of one actually existing. The consequence is evident, because the reason concerning man with respect to those two members is the same as concerning being with respect to being in act and in potency, or concerning being taken nominally and participially; for, as the participle signifies being in act, so the noun signifies being in potency. But the consequent seems plainly false; for man, by virtue of the same imposition, signifies man, whether actually existing or possible; indeed also the simple concept of man, which corresponds to that word, equally represents an existing or possible man; there is not, therefore, equivocal signification there; the same, therefore, holds proportionally of being taken under that twofold notion or signification, and of the concept which corresponds to it.

9. Resolution.—An example accommodated to the understanding of the resolution.—The answer is that being according to that twofold acceptation does not signify a twofold notion of being dividing some common notion or common concept, but signifies the concept of being more or less prescinded; for being taken in the force of a noun signifies that which has a real essence, prescinding from actual existence, not indeed excluding it or denying it, but only abstracting prescissively; but being as it is a participle signifies real being itself, or that which has a real essence, with actual existence, and so signifies it more contracted. Whence, just as animal said of the genus itself precisely taken, and of the brute in so far as it is such an animal, does not divide some concept common to animal as such and such an animal, but expresses the same notion of animal as prescinded or as contracted, so it must be said of being under that twofold acceptation. And a more accommodated example is in disposition, as it signifies a certain species of quality distinct from habit and the genus common to both; for it does not have some common signification by which it would immediately signify another concept common to the genus and the species (for this is impossible, because nothing is common to the genus and the species besides the concept of the genus itself); it signifies, therefore, either immediately the genus itself, or immediately a certain species, by a twofold signification. So, then, being does not signify some concept common to being taken nominally and participially, but immediately has a twofold signification, by which it signifies either being prescinding from actual existence or being actually existing. Wherefore that twofold signification is either equivocal or approaches most of all to equivocation according to a certain transference founded in some proportionality. For being seems first to have signified a thing having real and actual being, as the participle of the verb of being; thence, however, that word was transferred to signify precisely that which has a real essence. Similar to this is the case of that word disposition; for, as it signifies genus and species, it without doubt has an equivocal signification, or at most one analogous according to a certain proportionality.

10. To the example of the word man, then, which was brought forward to the contrary, the answer is that it is not similar; for man does not have a twofold signification, one by which it signifies man precisely or in potency, another by which it signifies existing man as such, but only a single one, by which it signifies man precisely, whether he exists or not; which signification is proportional or similar to that which being has taken only in the force of a noun. But the other, which it has in the force of a participle, is not found in this word man, nor is there any incomplex and simple term which signifies the whole of what is signified by this complex expression, existing man. But if we feign that the word man is transferred to signify this whole, it will then have a twofold equivocal signification, which we say is in the name of being.

11. From which it is further understood that being taken in the force of a noun does not signify being in potency, in so far as it is privatively or negatively opposed to being in act, but signifies only being as it precisely expresses real essence, which is very different; for, just as prescissive abstraction is diverse from negative, so being taken nominally, although it precisely expresses being having real essence, does not add a negation, namely of lacking actual existence, which negation or privation being in potency adds. Which is manifestly evident also from this, that being taken in the force of a noun is common to God and creatures, and can be truly affirmed of God; but being in potency can in no way be predicated of God; indeed not even of existing creatures as such is it properly said, because they are no longer in potency but in act; whereas being can be said of them both as a participle and as a noun, because, although they have actual existence, it is also truly said of them that they have a real essence, prescinding and not denying actual existence.

12. Whence finally it is understood that being precisely taken, as it is signified in the force of a noun, can properly be divided into being in act and being in potency, and that being in act is the same as being signified by this word taken in the force of a participle; and so those two signify the notion of being either prescinded or determined to actual existence, whether this determination be essential, as it is in God, or outside the essence, as it is judged to be in creatures, of which matter we must dispute below; but being in potency also expresses real being as regards real essence, contracted and determined not through something positive, but through the privation of actual existence. But being so contracted, or as conceived in such a state, is not signified by this word being, nor by any other incomplex word known to me, but only by these complex terms, possible being, being in potency and the like; all of which are to be diligently attended to, for on these significations of words the true conception of things depends much, and from these too the division of being into being in act and being in potency has in great part been expounded in passing, which we shall treat again afterwards professedly.

Whether being is an essential predicate

13. And hence it is gathered in passing that the most common notion of being, which is signified by that word taken in the force of a noun, is essential and is predicated quidditatively of its inferiors, although being, as it expresses actual existence and is signified by the participle of being, is absolutely not an essential predicate except in God alone. This latter part, as far as it pertains to God, is theological, and is wont to be treated from natural principles below, on Book XII, and I have discussed it at length in tom. 1 of the Third Part, in Disp. XI, sect. 1, and we shall touch on something below in disputing about God. But as far as it pertains to creatures, it depends on what is to be said below about the distinction of existence from essence in the creature; for now let us suppose, whether they are distinguished or not, that it must absolutely be said that to exist is not of the essence of the creature, because it can be given to it and taken away from it, and so has no necessary connection with the essence of the creature precisely conceived, under which notion it is invariable and is necessarily said of each thing whose essence it is; by this reason, therefore, being taken participially is said not to be predicated quidditatively or essentially of creatures, and as regards this the opinion of Avicenna recited above is true, and St. Thomas admits it, in the said Quodlibet II and in the other places cited above; and Avicenna can be reproved only either because he thought existence to be a true accident, of which below in its place, or because he omitted the other acceptation and explanation of being, and therefore thought it must simply be denied that being, under some notion under which it is divided into the ten predicaments, can be essential to all of them.

14. The other part of the conclusion, then (which Soto undeservedly seems to deny), is proved, because to have a real essence belongs to every real being and is most of all essential to it; therefore being under the aforesaid notion is an essential predicate. Moreover, to be being in this way belongs to the creature even if it does not exist, in which way this proposition, man is being, is said to be of eternal truth; but it does not belong to it per se in the second mode, as some property, because it does not suppose something prior from which it would emanate as an attribute; for rather that is the first concept of any real being whatever; therefore it belongs to it as an essential predicate and of the quiddity of the thing. And in this way St. Thomas said, in the said Quodlibet, that being signifies the essence of the thing and is divided by the ten genera. But Aristotle said that being is not placed in definitions not because it is outside the quiddity, but because it does not express a determinate nature, but intimately transcends all things, just as others say of being as it is signified by this word thing, of which Soto, above, concedes that it is predicated quidditatively, because it signifies real quiddity absolutely; for to signify real quiddity is the same as to signify real essence, which being signifies as it prescinds from actual existence, because essence and quiddity are altogether the same, and only the etymology of the names is diverse. But that an essence or quiddity is real cannot be understood without order to being and real actual entity; for we do not otherwise conceive that some essence which does not actually exist is real, except because it is such that it is not repugnant to it to be an actual entity, which it has through actual existence; although, therefore, actually to be is not of the essence of the creature, nevertheless order to being, or aptitude for being, is of its intrinsic and essential concept; and in this way being is an essential predicate.

15. Whence I gather in passing that being taken in the force of a noun and thing are or signify altogether the same, and differ only in the etymology of the names; for thing is said from quiddity, in so far as it is something firm and ratified, that is, not feigned, by which reason it is called real quiddity; but being in the aforesaid signification expresses that which has a real essence; they import, therefore, altogether the same thing or real notion. Whence Avicenna, tract. I of his Metaphysics, c. 6, because he did not distinguish that twofold signification of being, divided it between being and thing; for he said that being formally signifies actual existence, but thing only quiddity or real essence, as St. Thomas noted, In II, dist. 37, q. 1, a. 1. Therefore, by attributing to being that twofold signification explained above, one of them coincides with the signification of the name thing, namely that which belongs to being taken in the force of a noun. And so St. Thomas, in the said Quodlibet II, says that the name being, according as it imports the thing to which being belongs, signifies the essence of the thing and is divided by the ten genera. And by these things satisfaction has been made to all the things which were adduced concerning the first opinion.

1. Complete beings, and indeed incomplete ones resolvable into several concepts, participate the notion of being.—This question has no difficulty in complete beings, or those which are conceived by the intellect after the manner of complete beings, such as are all individuals, species and genera which are directly constituted in some predicament up to the supreme genera; for being is divided into these, and is predicated essentially of them, and consequently of all the other inferiors which are contained under them. Next, not only of complete beings and concepts, but of any partial or incomplete beings whatever which are resolvable into several real concepts, it is also undoubted that being is intimately and essentially included in them, because, if they are resolvable into several real concepts, then at the least they must be resolved into the concept of being, which is the most universal of all. Likewise this will be evident a fortiori from what is to be said.

2. These things being supposed, it is the opinion of Scotus, In I, dist. 3, q. 3, and dist. 8, q. 2, and In II, dist. 3, q. 6, that being is not included in the ultimate differences, nor in the intrinsic modes by which it is determined to the first ten genera, nor in its proper attributes, which are convertible with it, such as one, true, good, of which elsewhere he thinks that they are positive and real properties, as is evident In II, dist. 3, q. 1, in the answer to the arguments. But what Scotus understands by the ultimate difference is explained by him obscurely enough; for he does not call ultimate that difference which constitutes the lowest species, for there he expressly says that rational or rationality is not an ultimate difference if the rational soul is in the thing itself diverse from the sensitive. He calls ultimate, then, the difference which is taken from the ultimate reality of the form, but non-ultimate that which is taken from the whole form; as, if there is (he says) in man one soul, which is really vegetative, sensitive and rational, in it diverse grades or formal realities are distinguished, and the difference which is taken from the ultimate reality is called ultimate, not only because it constitutes the lowest species, but because it differs from the others by itself, and is not resolvable into several concepts; but if we feign that the rational soul as such is an integral and per se distinct form from the sensitive and all the superior ones, then, just as such a form is intrinsically and quidditatively being, so the difference taken from it is also intrinsically and quidditatively being, and therefore its concept is not simply simple, but can be resolved into the concept of being and some other mode by which the concept of being is determined to the being of such a difference; and therefore such a difference is not ultimate, since it differs from others through something distinct from itself.

3. The foundation of Scotus.—And hence is taken the first and principal foundation of Scotus, for one difference is not another, as is self-evident; therefore either it agrees with the others in the quidditative concept of being, or not; if it does not agree, then it does not include such a concept in its quiddity and essence, which is what we intend; but if it agrees with the others in that concept, it is necessary that it differ through something else; therefore one difference will differ from the others through another difference; therefore that difference was not ultimate, since it is resolved into another further one; and then of that other difference it will further have to be inquired in the same way whether it includes the quidditative concept of being, in which it agrees with the others; and so either we shall proceed to infinity, or we must stop at some ultimate difference which so differs by itself from all other things or concepts that it does not agree with them even in the concept of being, and consequently does not intrinsically and quidditatively include the notion of being; for, if it included it, it would agree in it with the others; and if it agreed, it would need another difference by which to differ, according to the doctrine of Aristotle, Metaphysics V, c. 9, and Book X, c. 5, that things which agree among themselves differ by differences. And this reason can be applied in the same way to the intrinsic modes by which being is contracted to the first ten genera; for, since each of those genera is conceived after the manner of a complete being, it is certain that it quidditatively includes the notion of being, in which all those genera agree; therefore it is necessary that they differ by some modes or differences; of those modes, then, it is further asked whether they include being; for if they do not include it, this is what we intend; but if they include it, it must be asked through what they differ from the others and how being is contracted to those modes; and so either one will proceed to infinity, or one must stop at some difference or mode which does not include being; therefore, since there is no greater reason for one than for another, one must stop at that first mode by which being is contracted to substance, quantity, etc.

4. The second reason of Scotus.—And this the second reason of Scotus most of all confirms, taken from the proportion between metaphysical and physical composition; for each is made from potency and act, or (as Scotus speaks) from the determinable and the determining; but in physical composition the ultimate resolution is made to an ultimate determinable potency, which in its entity includes nothing of the determining form or act, and to an ultimate determining form or act, which includes nothing of the determinable potency; therefore similarly in the metaphysical composition of all beings the resolution must be made into ultimate determinable and determining concepts, of which one does not include the other, nor conversely; but every such resolution on the side of the determinable concepts is ultimately made into the concept of being, in which as such no determining mode or difference is actually included; therefore also on the side of the determining concept there must correspond some mode or difference which in no way includes the determinable concept of being. Finally, about the attributes of being Scotus multiplies several reasons, which I now omit, because of those attributes we must speak professedly in the following disputation.

The opinion of Scotus is refuted

5. The Scotist explanation of the ultimate and non-ultimate difference is attacked.—This opinion of Scotus the Thomists deservedly attack, although some of them sometimes favour it, as I shall note below. And first indeed that distinction of the ultimate and non-ultimate difference, as it is proposed and explained by Scotus, both supposes a false foundation and is insufficient. The first is evident, because in truth there is no difference which is taken from the whole physical form. First indeed, because according to the truer opinion there is in the substantial composite only one form, and yet every substantial composite has some agreement with other composites and with all created substances, and consequently from its form, as it has agreement with them, some non-ultimate difference is taken; therefore no difference is taken from the whole form, but the ultimate is taken from the ultimate grade or reality of it, as Scotus himself speaks. Which reason proceeds of composite substances, but is more evident in simple or immaterial created ones, which consist of genus and difference, because in them there is only one simple nature, physically speaking, from which non-ultimate and ultimate differences are taken according to its diverse grades or concepts. And the reason proceeds in the same way in accidental forms, for from one and the same form according to the thing, for example whiteness, the non-ultimate difference of colour and the ultimate one of whiteness are taken. Next, even if we granted that there are several forms in the substantial composite, there would be no difference taken from any whole form. For feign that the rational soul in man is distinct from the sensitive, etc.; still rational would not be a difference taken from the whole form. It is proved, because according to that form man would have agreement with the angels in intellectuality; therefore from that form another prior difference would be taken; therefore the difference of rationality, as it is proper to man, would still in that case not be taken from the whole form, but from its ultimate grade; indeed between that form and the others there would necessarily be an agreement, either in the common notion of substantial form, or in the notion of soul and principle of life with respect to other really distinct souls; therefore according to all these notions non-ultimate differences could be taken from it; therefore there would be no difference which would be taken from the whole form; for on account of similar reasons in accidental forms there can be none from which one whole single difference is taken, as Scotus admits.

6. Also of the lowest differences.—Whence it can further be shown that the division of Scotus is insufficient. For, omitting the difference which is said to be taken from the whole form, which in truth is none, as I have shown, Scotus himself admits that there is an ultimate difference which is taken from the ultimate reality of the form; therefore it is necessary that he admit another genus of differences, which is taken neither from the whole form, nor from its ultimate reality, but from the form according to some common or superior reality, as will be the difference of sensitive in man, if in him the sensitive soul is not really distinct from the rational, or as the difference of colour in whiteness. Such a difference, therefore, is neither ultimate, as is self-evident, nor non-ultimate according to the declaration of Scotus, because it is not taken from the whole form, but only from a certain grade of its reality; therefore differences of this kind are insufficiently enumerated by Scotus. And it remains to be asked whether according to his opinion these differences, which are neither taken from the whole form nor are ultimate, intrinsically and quidditatively include being or not. For if they do not include being, it follows that there are no real differences at all which include being, which he himself denies, and is quite absurd in itself; because, if no difference is being, there are no real differences in things, and consequently neither are real essences constituted through them, nor are they essentially distinguished. But if those differences include being, then the same must be said of the ultimate differences, even if they are not taken from the whole form, but from its ultimate grade. This consequence is proved, first, because these subaltern differences, for example sensible, are not taken from the whole form, but from a certain real grade of it, and this is enough for them to include being; therefore much more will this suffice for the ultimate differences to include being. The consequence is evident, because such a difference is taken from a more perfect grade of that form; as, for example, sensible and rational, the true opinion about the unity of the soul in man being supposed, are differences of which neither is taken from the whole form, and sensible is taken from it according to a superior and less perfect grade; yet, because the form, even considered according to that precise grade, is real and a true being, therefore that difference intrinsically and essentially includes being; but rational is taken from the same form according to an inferior real grade, and a more perfect one, and the form from which it is taken, even according to that consideration, is real and a true being; therefore with much greater reason the real difference intimately and essentially includes being. Moreover there is no greater reason for one than for the other, for the concept of the difference sensible is as simple as the concept of the difference rational; for neither formally includes the other, nor conversely. Which I declare thus: for, as Scotus himself indicates, this difference, rational, does not properly differ from others through another difference, but through itself, because, while it is that by which another differs, it is at the same time also differing by itself, lest we proceed to infinity and make the difference itself a species, as consisting of a genus and another difference; but all this proceeds in the same way in the superior difference, namely sensible, because that too does not consist of another difference, nor is it a species, but differs by itself from the other opposed to it, in so far as it divides and contracts the superior genus and constitutes its own proper subaltern species; the reason, therefore, of each difference is the same, and the same holds of all the superior ones. But if you say that differences of this kind are subaltern and determinable through the ultimate differences, this first of all matters nothing for these rather than those to include being; indeed, according to the discourse of Scotus given above, it rather follows that these differences, as they are determinable by the inferior ones, do not include them, and in so far as they determine the superior ones, also cannot include the superior ones themselves, and consequently are as simple as the ultimate differences can be. And moreover the ultimate differences too, especially according to the opinion of Scotus, are determinable through individual differences; therefore in this too the reason is the same concerning them.

7. Likewise the individual differences.—Whence it seems finally to follow, speaking consistently according to the opinion of Scotus, that the individual differences alone ought to be called ultimate, for they alone are taken from the ultimate reality of the form, and in no way differ through others, neither as through constituting differences (which is common to all differences, as has been said), nor as through differences contracting to inferiors, because they do not have them, which is proper to these individual differences. But neither did Scotus speak of ultimate differences in this sense, as is evident from the places cited and from the things we have adduced, nor can it be said of them that they do not include being, on account of the other reasons touched upon above, namely because these too are taken from the matter or form according to their true reality. Likewise, because the concept of the individual difference is not in itself simpler than the concept of the specific or generic difference, even if it is not so common or contractible; for this matters nothing for the simplicity of the concept, for rather the superior and more universal are wont to be simpler. And moreover the reasons which we shall make about the intrinsic modes will prove it also of these individual differences, for, as I shall show, their reason is the same or proportional.

8. The intrinsic modes of being imbibe the notion of being.—Now, therefore, the opinion of Scotus is also shown to be false concerning the intrinsic modes. First, because either those modes are positive and real, or not. This second neither is said by Scotus, nor is true, as I shall show against some in the following section; for how could they constitute various essences of things, and the essential distinction between them, if they were not real and positive modes? But if they are of this kind, how can it be conceived by the mind that they do not intrinsically and essentially include being? For, as we showed in the preceding section, being intrinsically is that which has a true and real essence; either, therefore, these modes have some real essence, and so are intrinsically and essentially being; or they have none, and so can neither constitute a real essence, nor add anything real for contracting the superior concept and constituting a determinate essence and distinguishing it from others. And it is confirmed, for if these modes are not being, then they are nothing; therefore they can contribute nothing to constituting real essences. Some answer that these modes are not being ut quod, yet are being ut quo, or something of being, and hence are neither simply and univocally being, as Scotus speaks, nor altogether nothing. But this answer seems to consist only in words, since to be being ut quo is nothing other than to be a real form or act in metaphysical constitution or composition; but there can be no real form or act of anything unless it is in itself something real, which is to be in itself real being; therefore it is repugnant to say that something is a real quo, and not being ut quod, for that quo must necessarily be founded in a quod of this kind. Which can be shown by induction in every physical composition. But the reason is the same in metaphysical composition, because in it too potency and act are conceived as constituting an integral reality or essence; whence, considered in themselves too, they must necessarily be conceived as having something of reality or essence, at least partial; otherwise they could not be conceived as apt to constitute and complete a real essence; and this reason can be applied to all differences, both ultimate and non-ultimate, generic, specific and individual.

9. Secondly, the reasons made about the differences can conversely be applied here, especially that one, that the non-ultimate, that is, the subaltern, difference includes being because it is taken from the form according to some grade of its reality; but these intrinsic modes too are taken from the form or nature according to some grade of its reality; therefore they too include being. The minor is declared, for in substance the mode per se is taken from the reality of any substantial nature whatever, in so far as it agrees with others in aptitude for subsisting, and so in immaterial substances that mode is taken from the whole simple form according to that precise notion; but in material ones from the whole metaphysical form or integral nature, and consequently from the matter, in so far as on its part it contributes to subsisting, and from the form, in so far as it absolutely constitutes the substantial nature. The first consequence, therefore, holds from parity of reason, and because, just as this intrinsic mode immediately determining being is conceived as something simple, differing from the others by itself and not through another mode, so also is the difference, both subaltern and ultimate, as has been declared.

10. That being is a genus, and the mode of being a true difference, is inferred from the opinion of Scotus.—The answer of Scotus to the inconvenience inferred is refuted.—Thirdly, because, if the concept of substance is resolved into the concept of being and the concept of a mode altogether co-distinct from being, and contracting it, and not including it, nothing can be lacking to this mode for it to be a true difference, nor to being for it to be a genus, especially since Scotus supposes that being is univocal. The consequence as to the former part is proved, because nothing else is of the notion of a difference except that it essentially contract a superior univocal and quidditative predicate, not including it, and with it constitute some essential grade after the manner of its form, from which it has that it is predicated (as they say) in quale quid, and consequently that it makes something differ from others; but all these belong to the modes contracting being according to the doctrine of Scotus. But as to the other part the consequence is proved, because it is only of the notion of a genus that it be a univocal and quidditative predicate, or in quid, not expressing the whole quiddity down to the last grade (on account of which it is wont to be said to be predicated in quid incompletely), and that it be apt to be contracted and determined through essentially distinct differences, from which it has that it is predicated of many things differing essentially; but all this belongs to being according to the principles of Scotus. Whence conversely Aristotle, Metaphysics III, text 10, proves from this that being cannot be a genus, because it is essentially included in all the differences and modes by which it is contracted, which is repugnant to a genus, as the same Aristotle proves, Topics VI, c. 3. Scotus answers that being is not a genus because, although not in all, it is at least included in some differences, namely in the non-ultimate differences, which are taken from the whole form. But this first of all has been shown to suppose something false, because there are no differences which are taken from the whole form in the sense intended by Scotus, that is, which are taken from the whole form totally (so to speak) and not according to some precise grade or concept. And next it does not satisfy; for what does it matter that being is included in some ultimate and remote differences, for it not to be a genus with respect to substance and accident, into which it is proximately and univocally divided through proper differences outside its notion? Indeed, conversely, according to the opinion of Scotus it would have to be inferred that those non-ultimate differences, as they are feigned by him, are not proper differences, but certain species of being; for they are resolvable into the concept of being, quidditative and univocal to them, and into some ultimate difference which does not include being; nothing, therefore, will be lacking there for the constitution and composition of a species.

11. Fourthly, these intrinsic modes are unequal in entitative perfection; therefore they are beings. The antecedent is evident, because substance is more perfect than accident, and not by reason of that in which they agree; therefore by reason of that in which they differ; therefore by reason of its own proper intrinsic mode. Which is also self-evident; for substance is more perfect for this reason, that it is per se, whereas accident is in another; therefore the very mode of being per se is more perfect than the mode of existing in another; therefore each has some perfection; therefore entity, for perfection cannot be conceived without real entity; for either they are the same, or perfection supposes entity and is its property. Whence a new argument or confirmation can be made; for in these modes (and the same holds of all differences) the attributes of being are found; for they are something, for they are not nothing; and one, for each mode is undivided in itself and distinct from every other; and good, because they have their definite perfection and appetibility; and true, because they are not feigned and are intelligible per se. Finally, the mode by which substance is constituted must be in some way substance; for, as Aristotle said, Physics I, c. 6, substance is not constituted from non-substances; and the same holds proportionally of the mode of accident; but what is substance is also being; therefore.

12. An explanation of the opinion of Scotus which could be feigned.—Hence, however, someone can take occasion to explain the opinion of Scotus, or certainly to introduce another new one. For the difference or mode constituting substance is not complete substance, but incomplete; for by this reason substance, which is the most general of the predicament of substance, can have differences in which it is not included, because that genus is only complete substance, whereas the difference is only incomplete substance; in this manner, then, it can be said that the being which is determined to the being of substance, quantity and the others which are placed in the straight lines of the predicaments is only complete being, and therefore is not included in the intrinsic modes by which it is determined, nor even in the differences, which are also incomplete beings; and in this sense all the reasons given do not proceed against this opinion, because it is not denied that differences and modes are in some way beings, but only that they are complete beings, which has no absurdity.

13. It is shown to be foreign to the mind of Scotus and false.—But this exposition neither is according to the mind of Scotus, nor is true in itself. The first is evident, because Scotus specially denies that being is included in the ultimate differences, but concedes that it is included in the non-ultimate ones; he is not speaking, therefore, of complete being, because in this way no difference is complete being. Next, Scotus speaks of the most universal concept of real being which our mind can abstract, as is manifestly evident from the places cited; but complete being explained in the aforesaid way is not the most universal concept of being, for, since incomplete beings have something of entity, they have some real agreement with complete beings; therefore a more universal notion of being can be conceived, which according to reason prescinds from these. But that that opinion is false in itself is shown by three reasons. The first is only ad hominem, supposing the opinion of Scotus that being is univocal; for then it follows more evidently, according to the aforesaid interpretation, that complete being is one genus common to the ten predicaments, because it has real differences outside its notion, and all the other things required for the notion of a genus, as is evident by applying the reason given above.

14. The second reason is that being most commonly taken, as it is transcendent, and the object of metaphysics or of the intellect, abstracts from complete and incomplete; for all these, as is evident from the mode of signifying, are related by way of addition to being in so far as it is being, in order to the prescission or expression of our concepts. And at least there is no doubt that being can be signified and conceived in this generality, as I was saying a little before; but in this way we are now speaking of being, because as such it is the object of metaphysics; therefore being of this kind is intrinsically included in the differences and intrinsic modes. But if perhaps the authors of the aforesaid opinion say that they are not speaking of being of this kind, but of complete being, first of all they are not speaking to the matter with which we are now dealing. Next they do not escape the difficulty which is chiefly intended to be declared in this whole opinion, namely, how being descends to its inferiors; for, although they say that complete being is contracted to substance through a certain mode which is neither complete being nor altogether nothing, but incomplete being, it remains for them to explain how and through what most common being is determined to the being of complete or incomplete being. For of that which complete being adds over being I shall inquire whether it includes being most commonly taken; for if it does not include it, it will be nothing, and all the arguments given will proceed; but if it includes it, then the difference or mode contracting or dividing includes the very thing divided. Whence of that mode it will remain to be inquired through what it is distinguished from being in common itself, which it includes in itself, and through what it differs from other beings, and so this explanation will fall into the difficulties which Scotus intends to avoid.

15. The third reason, and the most proper, is that that concept of complete being common to the ten predicaments, as they are constituted in straight lines, and not to other things, is impossible, because incomplete substances, which are not placed directly in the predicament of substance, are more perfect beings than accidents, which are placed directly in the predicament of accident. Which is evident, whether we consider incomplete substances physically or metaphysically, for prime matter is more perfect, and has more of entity, than quantity, and substantial form more than quality. Similarly rationality, as it is a substantial difference, is something more perfect than any accident whatever; therefore being, as it is common to substance and accidents, is much more common to incomplete substances, and consequently to everything which under any notion whatever includes entity, for this agreement alone can be considered between substance and accident. Whence that concept of complete being, if it is the concept of being which is per se one, can only be the concept of substance.

Resolution of the question

16. It must be said, therefore, that being in so far as it is being is intrinsically included in every being, and in every concept of a positive difference or mode of real being. So St. Thomas teaches, Contra Gentiles I, c. 25, and De veritate, q. 21,¹ a. 1, and indicates it in Quodlibet II, a. 3, and I, q. 3, a. 4; q. 4, a. 3, ad 1; q. 5, a. 1; and the Thomists teach it, Cajetan, De ente et essentia, c. 1; Soncinas, Metaphysics V, q. 14; Soto, on the Antepraedicamenta, c. 4. Fonseca holds the same, Metaphysics IV, c. 2, q. 3, and it is taken from Aristotle, Metaphysics III, text 10, whom I cited above. And, the things which have been said against Scotus being supposed, it is sufficiently proved by induction; because, if we speak physically of things, the notion of being is included in all substances and all their parts, and in all accidents and all real positive modes; for all these have in some way a true essence, that is, not feigned nor imaginary, but real, apt to exist outside nothing. But if things are considered metaphysically, being is included in all genera and species and individuals without controversy, and it has been shown by us that it is included also in the differences and in the positive intrinsic modes; but besides these there is nothing in things.

17. An objection is answered.—You will say that the attributes of being are besides all these, of which nothing has been said. The answer is: concerning these attributes it is placed in controversy whether they formally express something positive distinct from the nature of the thing from being, or only something negative or a being of reason. If, therefore, this latter is true, it must consequently be said that those attributes do not formally include being, and that this is not against the conclusion, because those attributes do not formally express differences or modes really determining or affecting being. But if the former opinion is true, it must consequently be asserted that these attributes in their formal concept include being, on account of the same reasons adduced above, and that these attributes are contained under the enumeration made, because they express real modes of being adequate to it or convertible with it; but which of these opinions is truer will be treated in the following disputation. But the a priori² reason of the conclusion has also already been touched upon, and is taken from the notion of being explained above, which is to have a real essence, in which it is not included that that essence be perfect or imperfect, integral or partial, but only that it be real; but this must necessarily be included in all things and real modes or differences. A posteriori, however, the general reason is also that in all these there is always found some real effect or quasi-effect, which cannot be understood without the inclusion of some entity; for they constitute, complete or integrate and distinguish real being, so that even that mode by which, in our manner of understanding, being in common is determined to God or uncreated being is conceived as constituting such a being; whence it cannot be conceived except under the notion of some entity. Likewise differences or modes of this kind are wont to be the roots of real properties or actions; therefore.

18. To the first foundation of Scotus the answer is that one difference, however ultimate, can be diverse from another even if it agrees with it in the common notion of being, as all teach of the first most general genera, which on this account are said not properly to differ, but to be primarily diverse, because otherwise they would not be supreme genera, but contained under another superior one, especially if the univocation of being is posited, which Scotus posits; but how this is to be understood will be declared in the following section. To the second the answer is, first of all, that that proportion between physical and metaphysical composition is not necessary; otherwise, just as of every form it is true that it includes nothing of matter, and of matter that it includes no form, so of every genus or determinable concept it would have to be verified that it includes no difference, and conversely of every difference that it does not include being, which is the first determinable. Secondly it is said that that proportion can be kept between metaphysical and physical composition as long as one stops at them, and it holds in this, that neither does the genus include the difference, nor the difference the genus, as neither matter includes form, nor form matter; but if, by resolving metaphysical composition, one arrives at simple concepts not composed of genus and difference, then in them, with respect to the superior transcendental predicates, the aforesaid proportion need not be kept, because in them that mode of determination is no longer found, but another, now to be explained.

1. The difficulty of the question.—This is the chief difficulty on account of which Scotus, Cajetan and others declined into extremely opposed opinions; some by denying a prescinded and abstracted concept of being, so that no contraction or determination of it is necessary, because this cannot be understood in any fitting way; because it can neither be made through non-being, as was shown in the preceding section, nor through some being, otherwise in that being the determination would be supposed already made, and one would proceed to infinity. But this opinion, if it is understood of abstraction according to the thing, or founded in some distinction from the nature of the thing, is true, and as regards this satisfies; but if it is understood of abstraction according to reason only, it is not true, as we have shown, and therefore it is necessary to explain also according to reason how this contraction or determination is made. Others, then, so prescind and abstract the concept of being that they think it is contracted and determined through something which is not intrinsically being, as Scotus philosophizes, who devised a prescission of this kind not only according to reason but also from the nature of the thing; yet he was deceived in two things, as I have proved: first, in positing such a mode of real abstraction and prescission; second, that being supposed, in feigning real positive modes or differences which are not beings.

2. A prescinded concept of being not being admitted, no contraction of it is necessary.—Soncinas, however, favours this part otherwise, Metaphysics IV, q. 1, ad 2, and q. 19, ad 7, and Book V, q. 14, when he says that the mode constituting substance, and consequently determining being to it, is only a negation or a being of reason. Whence (he says), although being is included quidditatively in substance, it is not included in that by which it is contracted to the concept of substance, because that is only a certain negation which we circumscribe by this word per se. But I do not see what induced Soncinas into this opinion, since he himself does not posit an objective concept of being prescinded from this disjunct, substance or accident; because, if it does not abstract from these, it needs no contracting mode, but by the mere removal of the other member the one member is left determined; but what is left cannot be intrinsically constituted by the mere removal of the other member, but by that which it intrinsically is. For by what reason can it be understood that substance, which is most perfect, is constituted in the notion of substance by a mere negation or by a being of reason? Whence almost all the arguments by which we proved against Scotus that the mode of being includes being proceed against this opinion, namely because substance cannot coalesce or be constituted except from substances. Likewise, because otherwise the mode by which being is determined to uncreated being too would be a negation. Moreover the concept of substance would formally be privative or feigned by reason, and not real; because that by which it is formally constituted is said to be negative or a being of reason. Finally, otherwise accident too would a fortiori be constituted by a negation, since it is less perfect than substance; there will therefore be a certain circle, because substance will be constituted by the negation of inherence, but accident by the negation of perseity, which is scarcely intelligible. Wherefore, although these simple things are sometimes explained by us through negations, the mind nevertheless rightly¹ conceives that real things themselves are not constituted by negations; thus we explain the difference of the brute through irrational, which we do not therefore conceive to be constituted by a negation; similarly we declare the infinity of God by a negation, which we rightly conceive to consist in a certain supreme and positive perfection; so, then, although we sometimes explain that substance is per se through the negation of inhering in another, we nevertheless conceive with the mind that it is not formally constituted by that negation, but by a positive perfection, by which it is understood to have the formal power of being per se without a subject in which it inheres; just as conversely in accident we understand that there is such a positive nature which demands adhesion to another in order to be able to be.

3. Substance and accident are constituted by positive perfections.—The third opinion, then, admits the contraction or determination of being to its inferiors through positive and real modes; but this determination can be explained in two ways. First, that it be after the manner of a composition from being and some mode, from which, as from metaphysical parts, the concept of substance, for example, is composed, and into which it is resolvable; which composition is not from genus and difference, only because being is included in the mode itself; for in these compositions, which are only through reason, it is not reputed unfitting that the determinable, when it is transcendent, be included in the concept of the determining. And by this reason they say that the concepts of substance and of the other supreme genera or differences are called simply simple, not because they are not resolvable into two concepts, for this is proper to being alone, but because they are not resolvable into two concepts mutually prescinding, because one must necessarily be included in the other, namely being in the mode, although conversely the mode is not actually included in being.

4. How some think being is determined.—But if you object that it is repugnant for such a resolution into two concepts to be made and for one to be included in the other, for if in the concept of the mode per se being is included, and the per se itself, then there is included in it all that is in the concept of substance; therefore no resolution has been made. It can be answered that being is indeed included in the mode per se, but otherwise than in substance; for in substance it is included as in a complete and perfect being, but in the mode only as in an incomplete one. Likewise substance includes the mode per se as a metaphysical part formally constituting it, and it is the whole constituted from being and the mode; but the mode per se includes itself, or rather is itself, not as a part of itself, but as that by which substance is constituted; and by this reason a true resolution of substance into being and per se is made; nor is altogether the same included in the mode as was conceived in substance.

5. But if the difficulty touched upon above is further urged about the contraction or determination of being to the mode per se itself, through what it is made, or how one does not proceed to infinity, there is a twofold way of answering. The former is that being is determined to per se through another mode, so that the mode per se is resolvable into two concepts, namely into the concept of being and of another nameless mode, distinct however by reason from the per se itself and less perfect; for the same reason which proves that substance itself is so resolvable seems also to prove it of the mode per se, for in it there is the notion of being modified, and otherwise than in substance, and otherwise also than in the mode of accident; therefore there can be distinguished there by reason the notion of being which is modified, and the notion modifying it, distinct by reason from that by which it is modified to substance, so that the modification itself is of a diverse notion. But according to this opinion it must consequently be said that that other mode too is resolvable into two other similar concepts, and consequently that one can so proceed to infinity, because there is no greater reason for stopping at one than at another. This, however, would be a great inconvenience if these concepts were posited as distinct from the nature of the thing, because it would be necessary to feign in substance infinite modes distinct from the nature of the thing and unequal in perfection, having a term on the side of the most perfect mode, proximately constitutive of substance itself, but not on the other extreme; so that all those modes would be there at once, and yet among them none infinite in perfection could be assigned; for these and similar things are in truth absurd. But if it is asserted that there is only a distinction of reason between these, and that this whole resolution and composition is through the prescission and denomination of the intellect, it does not seem a great inconvenience to admit all this; for the intellect can compare things among themselves in infinite ways, or prescind and abstract them; just as it can also prescind and abstract between two species into infinite genera, or to infinity, in so far as between two species other intermediate ones can be multiplied to infinity. But nevertheless this answer is not to be approved, even in this opinion; because the mind at once abhors a process to infinity, because otherwise there would be no mode or term of resolution for distinctly conceiving the thing, nor could the mind begin or effect such an abstraction and determination except by always stopping at a concept further resolvable into two other concepts, and beginning from another similar one. Whence all authors have tried to avoid this process; and it seems indeed repugnant to Aristotle, Metaphysics II, c. 2, texts 10 and 11, where he denies that one can proceed to infinity in quidditative predicates; for the opposite openly follows from the aforesaid process; and we shall immediately add other reasons, which are common, also against this answer.

6. The second answer, then, can be that the mode per se is not further resolvable into two concepts, but is distinguished by itself from every other complete or incomplete being; for when we proceed by resolving that which is constituted into that by which it is constituted, one must stop at that by which, lest we proceed to infinity. For what is the reason of constituting or distinguishing another is by this very fact per se distinct from every other; for thus in physical things the form is what distinguishes one composite from another, but it itself is distinct per se; and universally act is what distinguishes, but act itself is distinct per se. So, then, the mode per se (and the same holds of the others) contracts being to substance, which it constitutes and distinguishes from others, and at the same time separates itself too from others, and by itself determines being to itself; and so the process to infinity ceases. This answer is probable, yet it is not said consistently enough, nor does it sufficiently declare the matter, as will be evident from what is to be said in the following opinion.

The true opinion is explained

7. The fourth opinion, then, and the one which meets with my approval, is that this contraction or determination of the objective concept of being to its inferiors is not to be understood after the manner of composition, but only after the manner of a more express conception of some being contained under being; so that each concept, both of being and of, for example, substance, is simple and irresolvable into two concepts, and they differ only in that one is more determinate than the other. Which is rightly explained in order to the formal concepts; for they differ only in that through one the thing is conceived more expressly as it is in itself than through the other, by which it is only conceived confusedly, and precisely according to some agreement with other things; but all this can be done without proper composition, through mere confused or distinct, prescinded or determinate knowledge. So, then, to these formal concepts two objective ones are understood to correspond, simple and irresolvable into several concepts, of which one is said to be superior or more abstract than the other only because it corresponds to a more confused formal concept, through which the thing is not conceived according to the determinate mode in which it is in itself, but confusedly and precisely. That superior concept can also be understood to be included in the inferior without proper composition of the inferior; because all that is confusedly conceived in that prescinded concept is found in the other object more expressly conceived, and in that whole, under whatever notion it is considered. And finally the determination of the superior to the inferior and the addition of the inferior to the superior is understood, not as it were through the addition of part to part, but through the mere greater determination, or expression, or confusion of the same thing in order to the diverse concepts of the mind.

8. St. Thomas indicated such a mode of explaining this matter, De veritate, q. 1, a. 1, saying: What the intellect first conceives as most known, and into which it resolves all conceptions, is being; whence it is necessary that all other conceptions of the intellect be taken by addition to being; but nothing can be added to being as an extraneous nature, in the way in which a difference is added to a genus, because every nature is essentially being; but in this way some things are said to add over being, in so far as they express a mode of it which is not expressed by the name of being itself; and below: Substance does not add over being some difference, but by the name of substance a special mode of being is expressed. He indicates the same, De veritate, q. 21, a. 1. Scotus too indicated the same manner of speaking, In I, dist. 8, q. 3; he differs, however, in the manner of explaining, as is easily evident from what has been said.

9. The mode of contracting being that has been assigned is proved to be possible.—Moreover, that this mode of intellectual abstraction and determination is possible is proved by examples; for when we divide quantity into two-cubit, three-cubit, etc., it cannot be understood that the concept of two-cubit quantity is resolved into the concept of quantity and of two-cubit, because it is impossible to conceive two-cubit without quantity being conceived; it is therefore a sign that those two concepts are distinguished only as express and confused. Almost the same is the case in the concept of heat and of heat as eight, of which it is also a sign that the common concept of heat is included not only in the whole heat as eight, but also in each of its degrees; when, therefore, heat as eight is said, a distinct mode making a composition with heat as such is not added, but heat is expressed and conceived as it is in the thing. In the present case too this is manifest in the determination of being to infinite being; for infinity cannot be conceived as some mode added to being, or as something less than infinite being itself; there is there, therefore, only a more express and more determinate concept of a certain most simple being; and by this reason being itself is not simpler than God, although in the mode in which it is conceived it is more abstract. So, then, it can rightly be understood in the concept of substance and of accident.

10. Such a mode is most apt for unravelling all the difficulties.—But if this mode is possible, which suffices for the present, it can easily be persuaded that it is to be judged that it comes about in this way. First, because in this way the difficulty often inculcated in the preceding sections is easily dispatched; and it is explained how being can express a concept prescinded according to reason, and nevertheless be determined to its inferiors, and be intimately included in all of them, without a process to infinity and without proper composition. Secondly, because in this way it is excellently preserved how the supreme genera express simply simple concepts, and nevertheless the concept of being can be abstracted from them through the mere prescission of the intellect, which does not consist as it were in the separation of one from another, namely of the formal from the material or of the material from the formal, as happens in the abstraction of the genus from the differences, but which consists in knowledge in some way confused, by which the object is considered not distinctly and determinately as it is in the thing, but according to some likeness or agreement which it has with others; which agreement, in order to the concept of being, is in things according to their whole entities and real modes; and therefore the confusion or prescission of such a concept is not through the prescissive separation of one grade from another, but only through the prescissive knowledge of the confused concept from the distinct and determinate one. Whence, thirdly, this can be proved ostensively, because the concept of being is not prescinded according to the thing, but according to reason, as has been proved; but prescission according to reason can happen in those two ways, as has been shown, and no other can easily be feigned or thought out. Again, the quasi-formal prescission through the exclusion of one grade from another has no place in being, on account of its illimitation and transcendence; and because the containment on which its concept is founded is equally in the whole entity according to its whole self; therefore only the other prescission, through the confusion of the concept, can have place in being; therefore also conversely the modification or determination to the inferior genera can only be through a simple concept more express and determinate, because contraction must correspond proportionately to abstraction, and expression or determination to prescission.

11. Finally, against this opinion so explained no difficulty of any moment occurs; for nothing offers itself by which it could be shown that this mode of abstraction and contraction according to reason is repugnant, or does not suffice for all the things which are wont to be said or conceived of being and its inferiors, and for all the experience which may be taken or perceived from our mode of conceiving. I see only that the testimony of the Philosopher, Metaphysics III, text 3, can be objected, saying that a common predicate cannot be contracted through a difference which per se includes the common predicate itself. But, to omit that the testimonies taken from that book are not of firm authority, because Aristotle in that book teaches nothing by asserting, but by arguing and doubting, it is nevertheless falsely cited, because he is not speaking of any common predicate whatever, but of the genus, of which there is another reason; but being is not a genus; indeed Aristotle wishes to conclude this very thing there. Whence what some extend to every common or univocal predicate is said gratuitously, and beyond the mind of the Philosopher. Of which matter the discussion will return again below, in treating of universals and of the analogy or community of being and accident.

12. For what reason the supreme genera are said to be primarily diverse.—Hence it follows that the concept of substance and the concept of perseity, or of the mode per se, are not distinguished objectively, but only from the mode of conceiving, as that which or as that by which, as God and Deity; because in the thing there is not properly a by which and a which, but only a which; but the mind, because it cannot explain simple things except after the manner of composite ones, uses those modes of conceiving. And therefore I was saying above that it is indeed rightly said that one of these modes is distinguished from another by itself; yet, speaking consistently, that the same must be said of the genera themselves which are apprehended as constituted through such modes; because in truth there is there no constitution after the manner of composition, but through simple and adequate identity (as the theologians say of relation and the divine person), because whatever one includes, the other includes. Nor is there any reason why the mode per se should be distinguished by itself from another mode more than substance, since it too is proximately under being, and intimately and totally includes it. And by this reason the supreme genera are excellently said to be primarily diverse, not because they agree in no common confused concept, but because they do not have determinate differences which are outside the notion of that common one, or of being, but have their diversity by themselves in their proper and determinate natures, although they also have an imperfect likeness in the notion of being; for these two are not repugnant, as has been declared above.