Disputationes metaphysicae

1. Reasons render the question doubtful.—Six transcendentals are commonly wont to be enumerated: being, thing, something, one, true, good; from which it seems to be gathered that there are five attributes of being, because there are so many predicates which are convertible with it, and no more. On the contrary, however, is the fact that neither can all of these have the notion of an attribute, and besides these others can be thought out by us. The first can be proved from what has been said, because thing formally expresses only the quiddity of a thing, and the ratified or real essence of being; [but this is not a property of being];¹ whence many think that thing is a more essential predicate than being itself. Similarly something, since it is immediately distinguished against nothing, seems to signify most formally nothing other than being itself; for something seems to be said as the same as having some quiddity; but this formal signification coincides with the signification of thing and of being.

2. The second is proved, because besides these predicates others seem common to every being, as, for example, to endure and to be somewhere; for these necessarily accompany all beings. But if you say that these do not belong to being except as existing, whereas here the discussion is of being according to itself, abstracting from actual existence, against this is the fact that those properties of duration or local presence too can be considered according to themselves abstracting from actual existence, and as such will be understood to have a per se connection with being; whence, just as this predication, being is one, is of perpetual truth, the copula being absolved from time, so also this one, being has duration or local presence. There is, however, a special difficulty about the very being of actual existence, for it seems to be a certain property of being itself taken according to itself, because it does not belong to it essentially nor altogether accidentally. Again, besides these simple attributes there seem to be others complex or disjunct; for just as it can be said to be a property of number that it is even or odd, and of quantity that it is finite or infinite, so it can be said to be an attribute of being that it is finite or infinite, in act or in potency, or similar things. Finally, if negations or relationships of reason suffice for the attributes of being, as has been said, these could be multiplied to infinity, such as to be the same, not to be impossible, to be lovable, to be intelligible, etc.

Resolution of the question

3. The attributes of being are only three.—This question is proposed only in order that we may reduce this treatment of the attributes of being to certain heads; and therefore it must briefly be said that, if we speak properly and do not feign distinctions not at all necessary, there are only three proper attributes of being, namely one, true and good. For that these three are distinct among themselves at least in formal notion, whether that be negative or positive, real or of reason, anyone will easily persuade himself. First, from the common opinion of all who write on this matter. Secondly, from the common mode of conceiving and the signification and interpretation of the words themselves; for one as such signifies only that the thing is integral and undivided in itself; whence it formally adds a negation, in which it is distinguished from true and good. But these are distinguished among themselves because true expresses an adequation or relationship to the intellect, but good to the will or appetite as fitting to it, whether it expresses this formally or fundamentally; but these are very diverse notions or relationships. Which can also easily be declared from their contraries; for unity is opposed to multitude, goodness to malice, truth to falsity; but these are very distinct. Finally, from what we shall say in particular about these attributes this will be more evidently established, and at the same time we shall show that each of these attributes belongs to every being and so is convertible with being; these three, therefore, are attributes of being.

4. Thing and being are not related as essence and attribute.—But that besides these there are no others can be gathered from the doctrine of St. Thomas; for although he often enumerates those six transcendentals and declares their notion and sufficiency, as De veritate, q. 1, a. 1, q. 21, a. 1, and often elsewhere, yet when he treats in particular of these properties he never treats except of those three, as is evident from I, qq. 5, 11 and 16, and in the said disputed questions. And it can be declared in this way from what has been said; for thing and being, according to common use, are used as synonyms; and sometimes they are said of actually existing being, but sometimes they prescind from actual existence; wherefore neither is an attribute of the other. A sign of which too is that one is never predicated of the other, and if it is so predicated, it is judged to be a nugation or an identical predication. But the others are predicated of being, and are adjoined to it as an adjective to a substantive; for so we say one being, true being, etc.; but being and thing are substantives, and cannot be joined in that way; it is therefore a sign that one is not an attribute of the other. But if we wish to distinguish these two with that rigour with which St. Thomas above, following Avicenna, distinguished them, that thing prescinds from actual existence and signifies mere quiddity, whereas being is taken from to be and expresses only actually existing being, then it is evident that thing does not signify an attribute of being, but is a most quidditative predicate. And rather being will signify something outside the essence, at least in creatures. Yet neither can being be called an attribute of thing; for existence is not an attribute of the existing creature, either because it does not flow from its intrinsic principles, but comes to it from without, or because it does not belong to it necessarily and per se; whence neither does the actual existence of a creature properly fall under science, in so far as it actually depends on the free will of the Creator; but what this existence is, and how it is distinguished from the essence of the creature, is an obscure matter, which we shall dispute below in treating of created being in particular. But if, according to a certain opinion treated above, being, not only as it expresses what actually exists, but also as it expresses what is apt to exist, were distinguished from thing, as the latter absolutely expresses that which has a real quiddity, then being would be the first attribute of thing; but this was disproved above, because aptitude for existing enters into the first notion of real quiddity, and in this the real quiddity is first distinguished from the non-real or feigned. In these two, therefore, no attribute of being is contained. I know that Averroes, in his paraphrase, chapter on Thing, says that thing signifies not only a true thing but a feigned one; but this is common to being, and is only according to an equivocal signification. Of which and of the other equivocal significations of these words I shall speak in what follows.

5. Something, according to the various etymologies of the word, is a synonym either of being or of one.—Again, something can have a twofold etymology or interpretation. One is that something is the same as having some quiddity; for whether this was the first derivation of the word or not, it seems now in common use to be taken in this sense; for something and nothing are judged to be opposed contradictorily or privatively; but nothing signifies the same as non-being or not having any entity; something, therefore, is the same as having some entity or quiddity. In this signification, then, it is evident that something is not an attribute, but a synonym of being; and it is judged the same, even according to formal notion and concept, to say of something that it is something and to say that it is being; and so Fonseca thinks of this attribute, Metaphysics IV, c. 2, q. 5, sect. 2.

6. But the other etymology of this attribute is that which St. Thomas touches upon in the places cited, namely that aliquid is said as it were aliud quid, “another what”, which seems more conformed to the first imposition of this word, as is evident from the Latin authors; according to which this word formally signifies something distinct from being, namely distinction from another, or the negation of identity with another. In this sense, however, this attribute either is not diverse from one, or is included in it as consequent upon it. For that is called one which is undivided in itself and divided from every other, as we shall see below; therefore in the notion of one is included that negation which is imported in the word something, or it is reduced to it; and therefore this attribute does not so increase the number of these attributes that it is necessary to treat specially of it; but once the notion of one has been explained, and consequently of multitude, which is opposed to it, and of identity or distinction, which are in some way founded in its notion, this predicate something will remain explained. For although the negation enclosed in it can be distinguished by reason from the negation included in one, in that one expresses the negation of multitude, but something only the negation of identity with another—in which way one and something are distinguished by St. Thomas, De veritate, q. 1, a. 1—nevertheless, because the latter negation is founded in the former, and has no special difficulty in the doctrine to be handed down about these attributes, it is not necessary to distinguish them. Some, however, as Javellus, in the treatise De transcendentibus, c. 3, say that something expresses actual division from another being, so that before the creation of the world God would be one, but not something. But this is said most improperly; for who would say that a being is not something because other things do not exist? Indeed in that sense something cannot be an attribute of being, since it does not belong to every being; therefore, as it is an attribute, it expresses only that negation in aptitude and with respect to another existing or possible being; and in this way, as I said, it is founded in unity and is explained together with it.

7. From the said six transcendentals, then, there remain only the three enumerated above which can be attributes of being, whose sufficiency St. Thomas hands down in the place cited from De veritate, and q. 21, a. 1; because the attributes of being must add something over being, and cannot add something positive and real; therefore either something negative, or something positive of reason, or through denomination or fittingness to something extrinsic. In the former way the attribute of one is constituted, because that negation of indivision in itself and of division from every other follows upon every being considered according to itself and absolutely, and there is no other which necessarily belongs to every being as such. In the latter way the two other attributes are constituted, one through relation or fittingness to the intellect, the other through relationship and fittingness to the appetite and will; for these two faculties and no others are universal, and regard every being under a diverse notion.

8. What order is kept among the attributes of being.—And hence authors gather that of these three attributes unity is the first, because it is absolute; for it belongs to every being of itself, and not through denomination from another extrinsic thing, nor properly through relation to another, which true and good in some way signify, in so far as they express fittingness with another; but absolute things are prior to respective ones in their genus. You will say that one too, as it expresses division from another, imports a relationship to another. The answer is, first, that that negation is not of the notion of one, that there be another from which it is distinguished, but only follows upon one that it is apt to be distinguished; for God will be one even if there is nothing from which he is divided. Next, that negation is not a relation, but rather the negation of a relation, for identity rather is a relation, and that is the negation of identity, or certainly its foundation, and consequently it cannot be the foundation of any relation of reason. Finally, even if we feign it after the manner of a relationship to another, it is of itself prior to the other relations of true or good, because it is in a certain way more abstract, because it regards another only under the notion of being; for so one is said to be divided from every other, of whatever other notion that may be. And so Aristotle, Metaphysics IV, c. 1, joins one with being as its first attribute; and St. Thomas, I, q. 11, a. 2, ad 4, thinks that after being, one is what is known first of each being; which things Soncinas treats more fully, Metaphysics IV, q. 24, and Javellus, treatise De transcendentibus, c. 1.

9. A comparison between the attributes of being in perfection.—Of the other two transcendentals or attributes of being, however, true is prior to good, as St. Thomas taught, I, q. 16, a. 4. And it is evident, because goodness is in a certain way founded in truth; for in order that health be good, it is supposed to be true health; for if it is feigned, it will not be good, and so of the others. Whence true expresses order to the intellect, good to the will; but the intellect is a prior power to the will. But if anyone wishes to compare these attributes in perfection too, and asks which of them is more perfect, it can first of all easily be answered that formally, and according to what they add over being, they express no perfection, because they express or add nothing real to being itself; whence under this notion there is nothing to be compared, because comparison supposes something positive; but in so far as they signify in some way being itself and declare its nature, they express altogether the same perfection of being, and so from this side too they cannot be compared, because comparison requires distinction.

The arguments are satisfied

10. Why six transcendentals are enumerated.—To the reason for doubting posited at the beginning, then, the answer is that six transcendentals are not enumerated for this reason, that all signify distinct attributes of being, but that some are distinguished by this reason, while others only from the diverse etymology or imposition of the word. And so thing and being are distinguished, because the latter was taken from to be, the former from real quiddity. And similarly something and one are distinguished from their first imposition, in that one was said from the negation of division in itself, something from the negation of identity with another; but in the thing they signify the same attribute, because those two are required for perfect unity.

11. To the other part, however, by which it is proved that these attributes are more, the answer is, first, that duration is perhaps not something diverse from actual existence; and so the reason will be the same concerning both. But if perhaps in creatures it is distinct from the nature of the thing, it is deservedly not enumerated among the attributes of being, because it is a certain special being, as we shall see below in its place. And the same must be said of local presence; for as it is a mode of certain beings, it constitutes a special predicament, as we shall also say below. But of those disjuncts, finite or infinite, etc., it must be said either that they are properly not attributes of being in common, but rather its divisions, because either they essentially contract being itself in so far as it is being, or certainly neither dividing member belongs to it except as contracted or determined to some special notion of being, as we shall see below of finite and infinite; or certainly they signify diverse states of the same being, as to be in act or in potency, as we shall also say below; where we shall also declare how the existence of a creature is not its attribute. Or certainly these disjunct properties are reduced to simple ones, as same or diverse to unity.

12. Why some relationships of reason common to all beings are not attributes of being.—To the last the answer is that indeed several negations or relationships of reason can be thought out by us in being which are not formally explained by those attributes which have been enumerated by us; in which way some say that thing is an attribute which formally adds over being the negation of feigned or chimerical being. Others add same and diverse, for every being has a relation of reason of identity to itself and a relation of diversity from another, at least from non-being or from being of reason. Likewise a relation of likeness to another can be feigned, at least fundamentally, so that, just as equal is posited as an attribute of quantity, so assimilable (so to speak) would be an attribute of being; for there is no being which cannot have something in some way similar to itself, at least analogically; and infinite other denominations of this kind can be multiplied, as was touched upon in the argument. It must nevertheless be said that those attributes are sufficiently enumerated, either because they alone contribute to explaining the nature of being and have, both in things and in the usage of men, a sufficient cause and usefulness on account of which they have been thought out and distinguished; or, if any others of this kind can be thought out, they are contained virtually in these, or are reduced to them.

13. Thing does not formally express the negation of feigned being.—That thing, then, formally expresses some negation of feigned being is indeed feigned, and beyond every Latin signification of the word and the common conception of men; for thing is not a negative or privative term, but altogether positive. That negation is also irrelevant, both because it is more obscure to explain what feigned being is than what a thing is; and also because, if that negation is necessary for the attributes of being, it is rather to be founded in true; for that is called true being which is not feigned; or, if it is taken formally, it is included in one or something; because in the negation which something expresses it is included that it be divided from every other, and consequently also from feigned being. All the more because the notion of feigned being as such consists in a negation; for that is properly feigned being which can be so apprehended by the mind that it involves in itself repugnance and impossibility, which is a certain negation; and therefore real being is not properly divided from it by a negation, but formally by its own reality, as we shall say more fully in the following disputation in a similar case. And by the same reason are excluded similar negations which can be made by the mere reflection of the intellect, such as not to be diverse from itself, to be diverse from being of reason, not to be unequal to itself, and similar ones, which both are useless and can be multiplied to infinity, and are mere works of reason, which do not suffice for attributes of being, as we have said.

14. And hence it is also evident that it is not necessary to add identity or diversity among the attributes of being; because, as these can formally express relations of reason, they do not pertain to the attributes of being, as was said generally above; because such relations do not belong per se to being, but only extrinsically through the thinking, reflection or comparison of the mind; but if they are taken in so far as they have in the thing some positive or privative foundation, then they are sufficiently contained under unity, as we shall say below. And in the same way likeness (if this is common to every being) is reduced to unity; for if it is taken for a true relation, it is without doubt not an attribute, because it neither always belongs to every being, and to that to which it belongs, it belongs not per se, but by accident. And if perhaps it is said always to belong to an existing creature, still with respect to it it will be a certain accident, as the relation of the creature is. But if it is taken fundamentally, then it is to be reduced to unity; for so Aristotle said that likeness is founded in unity. Finally, in this manner the denomination intelligible, significable is reduced to truth; the notion of integral and perfect, and the denomination lovable, appetible, and the like, are reduced to good; it is not necessary, therefore, to feign more attributes.