Disputationes metaphysicae

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.