Disputationes metaphysicae

1. Since good is a connotative or denominative name, we are not here inquiring what that is which is denominated good; for it is certain that that, speaking in common, is being, which precedes the good in nature or reason, as was said above and will be more evident from what follows; but we inquire what that form or notion is from which a thing is denominated good. In explaining which there is the same variety of opinions as in the other attributes of being.

2. The first opinion says that goodness expresses no real notion, but only a relation of reason of the fittingness of one thing to another. Which opinion is indicated by Capreolus, In II, dist. 34, q. 1, and is explained in this way. For goodness, as is evident from the word itself and from the common mode of conceiving, does not add to being some privative notion, because privation rather expresses the lack of perfection or goodness; it expresses, therefore, a positive notion. Again, it does not formally express the very notion of entity, both because these two are conceived and explained by us by diverse concepts and definitions; and also because otherwise goodness would not be a property of being, but rather those words would be synonyms. Nor can goodness include entity in its concept and add something to it, because a property does not intrinsically include in its concept the nature or essence of its subject. It is necessary, therefore, that goodness express something superadded to being; but this cannot be something real, because, as was shown at length above of the attributes of being in common, to real being as such there cannot be added some real notion, distinct not only from the nature of the thing but even by reason, which would be its attribute. Likewise, because such a notion can be neither absolute nor a real relation, as we shall prove below; therefore the good can add over being only something of reason, which can be nothing but the aforesaid relation of fittingness. Which discourse seems to be St. Thomas’s, De veritate, q. 1, a. 1, and q. 21, a. 1. And it can be confirmed because the good and the desirable are the same in the thing, although the same respect is not signified by these names; for desirable expresses the formal denomination from the appetite, or the respect to it; but good does not express this formally, but that which on the side of the object is the foundation of such denomination or relationship, on account of which this causal statement is true: Because it is good, it is desirable. But every thing is desired on account of the fittingness which it has with the one desiring; for each one loves what is fitting; therefore the notion of good consists in this notion of fittingness; but this notion of fittingness is nothing but a relation, as the word itself shows; and it can be explained, because the same thing as regards all absolute things is fitting to this and unfitting to that, as heat is fitting to fire and unfitting to water; therefore fittingness consists in relation; and not a real one, as we shall show; therefore one of reason.

Goodness is not a relation of reason

3. But nevertheless this opinion has virtually been disproved above as regards two things. First, that it denies that these attributes of being include entity in their formal and intrinsic concept, which we have shown to be false both in common and in each of those treated above, and in the present case it seems more manifest; for what does not include entity is nothing; but who would conceive goodness to be nothing, since it draws the appetite and is said to have the notion of final cause, and is the very perfection of the thing, either integral or in part, as we shall explain? Whence St. Thomas, I, q. 48, a. 5, says that the good per se and chiefly consists in perfection; but perfection without entity cannot even be understood. Whence Augustine, De doctrina Christiana I, c. 32, says that in so far as we are, we are good. The second is that a relation of reason is an attribute of being; for, speaking properly of a relation of reason as it expresses something feigned by the mind and as it were added to things, we have shown this to be false, and in the present case it is also evidently established. First, because, as Aristotle teaches, Metaphysics VI, at the end, the good is in things, and in this he distinguishes it from the true; it is not, therefore, formally only a relation of reason. Next, because, as from Augustine, De natura boni, c. 3, St. Thomas treats, I, q. 5, a. 5, the good consists in mode, species and order, which we shall also expound below; but these are not feigned by the intellect, but exist in things themselves; therefore neither is the notion of good. Likewise, because this is the difference between the true good and the apparent, that the apparent is feigned and apprehended by the intellect alone, but the true good subsists in the thing itself and is supposed before every feigning of the intellect; whence it is said of God: He saw all things that he had made, and they were very good; but he did not see in them a relation of reason; goodness, therefore, does not consist in a feigned relation, nor is this required for it.

4. There are some, however, who say that, although some relations of reason are such that they depend on the feigning and thinking of the intellect, as the relations of genus or species, there are others which are in things themselves without the thinking of the intellect, as the relation of creator or lord in God. But these either speak equivocally of relations or involve a repugnance in words. For how are they in things themselves before the work of reason, if they are said to be relations of reason? Or in what do they differ from real relations, if they are subjectively in things and not only objectively in the intellect? Nor are those denominations of creator or lord, as they are understood to precede the thinking of the intellect, taken from relations of reason, of which elsewhere. Add that, of whatever kind this relation is feigned to be, the notion of goodness cannot consist in it, which will be more evident from what we shall say of real relation. But the foundation of this opinion at most proves that the good, besides the whole intrinsic entity of the thing, connotes something else extrinsic, or a denomination taken from the association of several things, especially when one thing is said to be good to another, as we shall declare below.

Goodness is not a real relation

5. The second opinion places the notion of goodness in some real relation superadded to being. Which opinion is to be founded and declared, the principle proved against the preceding opinion being taken, that goodness must consist in some real notion; for that cannot be merely absolute, as the argument made sufficiently proves, that the same thing is good with respect to one and evil with respect to another; it will be, therefore, a real relation. Which opinion is attributed to Durandus, In II, dist. 34, q. 1. But since Durandus in other things too denies proper real relations, his mind in the present case is other, as we shall see below. But whosever that opinion is, it is manifestly false. Which can be shown here by the same arguments by which we proved it of truth, applied with proportion. First, because God from eternity is good with the transcendental goodness common to the three persons, and yet in him there is no real relation common to the three persons. Secondly, because heat, wherever it exists, has its whole goodness, even if fire does not exist nor any other subject to which heat is fitting; therefore then too it does not have a real relation of fittingness; therefore goodness does not consist in this relation. Thirdly, even when heat exists in fire or justice in man, it is not its good on account of a real relation, for by the very fact that such a form through its absolute entity informs such a subject it is its good and perfection, every arising relation being prescinded either according to real duration, if in truth there is no such relation, or according to the intellect and the order of nature; for such extremes are according to their absolute entities and perfections prior in nature to a relation arising between them. Fourthly, because either that real relation expresses a real perfection and entity, or not. If it does not express (as many think) some real perfection, how can it be the goodness of some thing, since goodness expresses perfection? But if it expresses perfection, then also goodness; it expresses, therefore, a real relation of fittingness, and that relation will be its goodness; and so one will proceed to infinity, which argument is common in relations. Or, if that relation is fitting and good without such a relation of fittingness, the same could most easily be understood in any form or absolute thing whatever.

Goodness expresses nothing absolute distinct in the thing from entity

6. The third opinion is that goodness expresses a certain absolute and real property superadded to being and distinct from it from the nature of the thing, or formally; which opinion is attributed to Scotus, In I, dist. 3, q. 3, and in other places which were treated above; and it may be seen in Capreolus, In II, dist. 34, q. 1. And it can be proved from what has been said by a sufficient enumeration, because goodness must be something real; and it cannot be a relation; therefore it must be absolute. And in order that it be a property, it is necessary that it be in some way distinguished in the thing. But against this opinion proceed all the things which have been said in common of the attributes of being and in particular of unity and truth. And moreover, in order that it may be more clearly understood to be false in the present case, we can distinguish that some being is called good in two ways: in one way absolutely and in itself, namely because it is good in itself, in which way God is called good or a man good. In another way something is called good because it is good to another, in which way virtue is said to be good because it makes the one having it good; and so St. Thomas says, De veritate, q. 21, a. 1, that the good expresses the notion of what is perfective of another. Of which distinction we shall say more immediately. The thing, then, which is called good to another cannot be denominated good from some real and absolute mode distinct from the nature of the thing from its entity, because such a thing, precisely conceived in its entity, is by reason of it fitting to that to which it is called good, as health by itself, and not by reason of some superadded mode, is fitting to the animal; and virtue or science, from the precise fact that it is virtue and science, is fitting to man; it is altogether feigned, therefore, to posit in forms of this kind superadded modes by which they would be good; for let us prescind by the intellect such a mode and consider in science its essence alone, and we shall find it fitting and much proportioned to the human intellect. And similarly a form, from the precise fact that it is a form, is good and fitting to matter, and so of the others. Add that here too that argument has place, that it can be asked of that superadded mode whether it is fitting to another or not; for if it is not fitting, how can the form affected by that mode be fitting by reason of it? But if that mode too is fitting by itself (lest we proceed further and to infinity), the form too by virtue of its essence or ultimate difference will be able to be fitting by itself.

7. And hence it is easily understood that in the thing which is called good in itself and absolutely, too, that mode is feigned. For either the thing is called good essentially or accidentally, in which way a studious man is called good. In this latter way goodness is indeed something distinct from the thing which is denominated good, as health is distinct from the healthy and beauty from the beautiful; whence sometimes it is a mode of the thing so affected, as figure, but sometimes it is an entity added to another being to perfect it, as science is added to the intellect. Yet this is not the goodness which we are now considering, because such goodness with respect to that being to which it happens is not an intrinsic attribute of being, but is a certain accident of it; whence it is not transcendental goodness, but can be called formal or material goodness, or objective, or another similar one, according to the various respects of fittingness which one thing can have to another. Unless perhaps that goodness is considered with respect to the very thing or form which is called good to another, of which it has already been said; or with respect to the whole constituted through it, in which way it is an intrinsic part of its entity, as the form is an intrinsic part of the composite and can be called a certain good or its goodness; and in this way it now pertains to the essential goodness of that constituted thing as such. Of this, then, too it is evident that it cannot add an intrinsic and absolute mode distinct from the nature of the thing from the entity of the thing, because the goodness of the whole is nothing but that which arises from the goodness of the parts; but it has been shown that the goodness of the form adds nothing intrinsic beyond the form, and consequently neither does the goodness of matter over matter, nor the goodness of union over union; therefore neither will the goodness of the composite add some distinct property over the whole entity of the composite as such. And it is declared by applying the argument made; for, that property being prescinded, there remain in that composite the whole goodness of the matter and form united among themselves; therefore also the goodness of the composite. But if neither in composite being does goodness add that mode, nor in simple being which is ordered to composing another, it is evidently inferred that also in simple substances substantial, or essential, or transcendental goodness adds nothing intrinsic to their entity; for the reason is the same or greater, because these beings are both simpler and more perfect.

8. And hence a fortiori is attacked the opinion which Soncinas reports, Metaphysics IV, q. 19, which asserted that this transcendental goodness is a certain accident truly and properly pertaining to the predicament of quality. Which is evidently false, both because a transcendent predicate cannot be limited to one genus; and also because each thing is good by itself, which is not only most certain in God, but also in the other beings, from the discourse made. For the soul, for example, precisely by reason of its substance has something of perfection and is good and fitting to man and desirable by him; and the same holds in quantity and in qualities themselves; for in individual species there is proper goodness and perfection; whence goodness does not constitute a proper genus or species of quality; otherwise one quality would be good through another, which is ridiculous; especially since the same quality can be good to one and evil to another.

Goodness absolutely does not consist in the real perfection of being

9. There is, then, a fourth opinion, that goodness expresses nothing other than the intrinsic perfection of the thing, which is absolute in absolute things and relative in relative ones. Whence it seems to come about as a consequence that the good is nothing other than being itself in so far as it has in itself something of perfection. This opinion is attributed to Hervaeus, Quodlibet III, q. 2; yet there he rather thinks that goodness expresses entity in so far as it is perfective of another, or in so far as it is ordered to the perfection of another, than as it has in itself some perfection, of which sense I shall speak below. Otherwise, then, this opinion can be explained, that the goodness of each thing is that perfection by which each thing is perfect in its entity; whence, if it is being simply, it will have in itself so much perfection by reason of which it will also be in itself a certain good; but if it is being in a certain respect, or being of a being, as the part of a whole or the accident of a subject, so it will be the good of that whose being it is; and by reason of the entitative perfection which it has it will be called in itself a certain good; but by that reason by which that perfection either is instituted or is apt to perfect another, it will be called the good of another. Whence, just as an accident by the same entity is in itself a being and the being of another, so by the same perfection it is in itself, that is, intrinsically, a certain good and the good of another. In this way, then, it is rightly understood and explained that goodness in each thing is nothing besides the perfection of each.

10. But the proof of this opinion so expounded can be taken, first of all, from what has been said, from a sufficient enumeration; because goodness is neither a relation of reason nor a real one, nor something absolute added to being; nothing else, then, remains which it can be except the perfection of the thing. Next, because good and perfect are the same, as St. Thomas teaches, I, q. 5, aa. 1, 3 and 5, and as we shall declare below; therefore goodness and perfection too are the same; for good and perfect are the same not only materially but formally, because each thing is good in so far as it is perfect. Finally, in this way the notion of goodness can easily be conceived and declared, and there is no reason which compels the addition of something else, nor can what that would be easily be explained or understood; it is therefore a sign that the notion of goodness consists in this.

11. But, although this opinion seems of itself easy and perspicuous and in great part declares the matter, it does not altogether do so, and therefore it is necessary to add something else on account of two things. First, because according to this exposition the good is not an attribute of real being, but its essence. Whence good and being will be convertible rather as synonyms than as subject and attribute. The sequel is evident, because nothing is more essential to real being than to have something of perfection, and until something is conceived as a being of some perfection it is not conceived as real being; whence in this sense, if there is some difference between these two names, it will be rather in etymology than in the thing signified, because being has been taken from the act of being, but good from the perfection which the act of being formally and of necessity includes. The second is the argument proposed above, that the same thing is called good to one and evil to another, although it includes the same perfection.

The good adds to being the notion of fittingness

12. It must be said, then, that the good can add over being only the notion of fittingness, which is not properly a relation, but only connotes in another a nature having a natural inclination, capacity, or conjunction with such a perfection; whence goodness expresses the very perfection of the thing, connoting the aforesaid fittingness or denotation arising from the coexistence of several things. Durandus intends this conclusion in the place cited, and it can be proved, first, from a sufficient enumeration from all that has been said against the other opinions, and because nothing else can be thought out, those being excluded. Secondly, because the things which were adduced in favour of the last opinion without doubt prove that perfection is included in the concept of goodness; and the things which were said against the first opinion also confirm the same, because goodness cannot not include entity and consequently perfection. Again, the things which were objected against the last opinion are excellently saved, the aforesaid connotation being posited; for that suffices that there be some distinction of reason founded in things between the good and being, so that the good can thus be attributed to being as a property and not be synonymous with it, because formally it is one thing to be or to have entity, another by reason of entity always to have some fittingness, which the notion of good declares. Next, this is enough for the same thing, retaining the same perfection, to be good to one and evil to another; for when it is called good to one, besides the perfection of that which is called good, there is connoted in the other, to which it is called good, the connatural inclination or capacity of the other; but in another, to which it is called evil, there is connoted the lack of such capacity or inclination, or rather a contrary inclination; therefore in this way all the things which are found in goodness are saved without another relation adjoined, as was said also in a similar case of truth. Finally this can be declared by induction in all goods; for the honest good, by the opinion of all, expresses the good which is per se fitting to rational nature as such; likewise the delightful good is nothing other than the good having fittingness with sensible nature, as Cajetan treats at length, I-II, q. 32, a. 1, explaining how this is not a relation, but the thing itself as accommodated to such a nature, which can express nothing other than the mutual connection of things and fundamental proportion; and the same is found in its own way in the useful good, which expresses only the good apt and accommodated to the end intended. The fittingness, therefore, which the good expresses is rightly declared in the aforesaid way.

13. An objection.—Only one difficulty remains, because in this way the notion of good is explained not adequately but only in part: for, as I was saying above, the good is wont to be said of things in two ways, namely either because the thing is good in itself, or because it is good to another; which division is taken from Augustine, De Trinitate VIII, c. 3, and from St. Thomas, In II, dist. 27, q. 1, a. 2, ad 1, De virtutibus, q. 1, a. 2, ad 1, and I-II, q. 26, a. 4, where he also adds that what is good in itself is absolutely and simply good, but what is good to another is only good in a certain respect. In which sense the same St. Thomas is wont to say that an accident is not good as having goodness, but because it contributes to the goodness of the subject, as may be seen in III, q. 11, a. 5, ad 3; and I-II, q. 55, a. 4, ad 1, he says that the virtues are not so much certain goods as certain goodnesses, which was said not because they do not have perfection in themselves, but because they have it accommodated to perfecting another. As accidents are said to be beings of a being rather than beings, because each thing has as much of goodness as it has of being, as the same St. Thomas says, I-II, q. 18, a. 1. Scotus has the same distinction of the good according to itself or with respect to another, Quodlibet XVIII. But the aforesaid notion of good, as it has been explained by us, belongs to the thing only as it is called the good of another; for under this notion it is excellently explained that for a thing to be good expresses the perfection of such a thing, connoting in another a capacity, inclination or other similar connection; but this cannot belong to that goodness by which a thing is called good in itself, because this goodness is said altogether absolutely and without any respect to another, even fundamental or according to expression; in that way, therefore, neither the adequate nor the chief notion of good is explained.

14. Answer.—To this difficulty it can be answered, first, that we are here describing the goodness which is an attribute of being; but that the good is an attribute of being only as it expresses fittingness to another, or as it is the good of another; for in this way the good is in some way distinguished from being and belongs to every being, even the most perfect; for God, who is supremely good, is also the good of others, for God clearly seen is the supreme objective good of the rational creature, and the divine Word is the greatest good of the humanity of Christ. But the good absolutely taken, namely as it is good in itself, does not seem to pertain to the attribute of being but rather to its essence or entity, as I argued above, because the good in this way is the same as the perfect, as St. Thomas often says, I, q. 5; but the perfect is included in the essential concept of real being, because being with entity cannot be conceived without being conceived with essential perfection; both because being itself is a perfection, and also because essential perfection belongs to being per se primarily and in this differs from accidental perfection, whether it be extrinsic or intrinsic after the manner of a proper attribute. Whence through this essential perfection each thing is constituted in a certain grade of being, and through the same beings are distinguished and ordered among themselves. For so (as we were saying above) being is first divided into infinite and finite according to essential perfection; therefore essential perfection of this kind adds nothing over being and essence; therefore the good under this notion does not seem properly to be an attribute of being, but being itself. And in this way Scotus said, Quodlibet 6, that the magnitude of essential perfection is not other than the essence, even in creatures. Which all the others teach. And this can be explained by a similar case from the things which we were saying above of truth, namely that in so far as it expresses the absolute notion of true entity, that is, not feigned but ratified, as such it does not express an attribute of being, but only declares the very notion of real being, and therefore it is only an attribute as it connotes in some way fittingness to the intellect; so, then, it seems it must be said of the good, proportion being kept.

15. How the good and the perfect are compared.—Which answer will become more likely if it is exactly understood how the notion of the good and the notion of the perfect are related; for Aristotle says, Metaphysics V, c. 16, that that is called perfect outside of which no part can be taken, or to which nothing is lacking. In which sense not every good is perfect, as is self-evident, nor is every being perfect, although it is good; for a boy is a being and a man, yet not yet perfect; and a man having perfect quantity, but not the qualities or habits consonant with his nature, although he is in some way good, is nevertheless not perfect. In this sense, then, that is called perfect not which is any good whatever, but that which is consummated on every side, which is the simply good. Yet in another way that can be called perfect which under some notion of being has the perfection simply necessary and essential, in which way a boy can be called a perfect man as regards essence; and similarly the theologians say that remiss charity, although it is called imperfect with respect to intense, is nevertheless simply and as regards essence perfect, in which way John says, 1 Epistle, c. 2: He who keeps his word, in him truly the charity of God is perfected. And in this way the good and the perfect are convertible, indeed are altogether the same, as the good expresses that which is good in itself, or which has goodness, that is, the perfection due to it; but this is nothing other than to have the essence or entity due to it; therefore the good under this notion essentially and formally expresses nothing other than being; for to be perfect charity in the said way is in truth nothing other than to be charity, and so of the others. Indeed even to be perfect in the former way, or simply good, is nothing other than to be a being having the whole entity which is required for its completion.

16. And in this way St. Thomas is to be understood when he is wont to say (as may be seen in I, q. 5, a. 1, ad 1) that being simply and in a certain respect are compared otherwise among themselves in creatures than good simply and in a certain respect; for the thing has that it is being simply through substantial being, but in a certain respect through accidental being; but it has that it is good in a certain respect through substantial being, but simply through accidental being. Yet this last is to be understood not precisely of accidental being, but as conjoined to substantial being; for a man would not be good through accidental virtues unless he were supposed a man and consequently substantially and naturally good. Whence in those words in a certain respect and simply there seems to be an equivocation; for when they are said of being they seem to be said of substance and accident precisely compared; but when they are said of the good, they are said of created substance either solitarily taken or as affected by the dispositions and faculties connatural to it. Whence it comes about that, although in the mode of speaking there is diversity, in the thing nevertheless there seems to be no difference, because the goodness or perfection which an accident confers, if it is precisely compared to that goodness which substance confers, is also in a certain respect. For so it is universally true, what we reported above from St. Thomas, that each thing has as much of goodness as it has of being, and what we also reported from Augustine, that in so far as we are, we are good.

17. And so finally it comes about that the good absolutely said is nothing other than being itself, in which way things are called naturally good or perfect if they are consummated in their entity, and a man is called morally good if he has moral virtues or perfections, which are nothing but certain real forms and entities; so also God is called supremely good and perfect by reason of his entity, even if he is compared to nothing else, and so of the others. This doctrine and answer, then, expounded in this way, is probable and bears a certain clarity and facility, and Henry indicated it in the place cited above.

18. Nevertheless, on account of the use of words, another answer can be applied. For, although the former has this true, that the good under that notion does not differ in the thing from being, nevertheless they can be distinguished by reason, which is enough for the good to be assigned as a property of being after the manner of the other transcendentals. It is to be noticed, then, as regards the imposition or signification of the name, that being is said only from to be or entity, as we expounded above; but perfect expresses more clearly the perfection of being, in which it includes a certain negation, or at least without it its significate cannot be explained by us, namely that nothing is lacking to it according to that notion according to which it is called perfect. But good expresses some fittingness, by reason of which the thing has it that it is desirable; for the good is said through some order to appetite, as St. Thomas taught, I, q. 5, a. 1, from that saying of Aristotle, Ethics I: The good is that which all things desire, and it will be explained more immediately. Whence it is necessary that those things too which are called good absolutely and according to themselves are so denominated because they have perfection fitting to them and desirable; and so it also comes about that the good in this way formally signifies the perfection existing in such a thing, connoting in the same thing a capacity, inclination, or natural connection with such a perfection. Which is more clearly evident when such a perfection is distinct from the very thing which is denominated good by it; for when a man is called good by reason of virtue, there is formally signified virtue not in any way whatever, but as a certain goodness, in which is imported not only the perfection of virtue but also the fittingness which it has with human nature, connoting on the side of the nature itself a capacity or propensity to such a perfection. But in those things in which there is no distinction between the perfection and the thing which is called perfect, this fittingness or connotation seems more difficult to explain; yet it must be said that, although in the thing there is no distinction, they are nevertheless conceived and signified by us after the manner of distinct things, that is, after the manner of a denominating form and a denominated thing; and therefore that form is signified as a perfection accommodated to that in which it exists, in which its natural connection with such a form is reckoned; and so such a good is distinguished from being, at least by reason.

How the good and the desirable are compared

19. From the things which have been said of the notion of good, it may be understood how the good and the desirable are related. For some think that the same thing is formally and synonymously signified by these words, and consequently say that the good adds over being a respect to the desirable; whom St. Thomas seems to favour, in the said I, q. 5, a. 1, saying: The notion of good consists in this, that something is desirable; and a. 3, ad 1, he says expressly: The good does not add anything over being, but only the notion of the desirable; and a. 4, ad 1: The good (he says) regards appetite. He has similar things in I, q. 16, aa. 1 and 3, and Contra Gentiles I, c. 4, third reason; Aristotle favours it, Ethics I, c. 1, defining the good as that which all things desire. And it can be confirmed by taking a proportional argument from what has been said of the true; for the good is so compared to appetite as the true to the intellect; but the true adds over being only conformity to the intellect; therefore the good adds only fittingness to appetite. Others distinguish between the good and the desirable, as Cajetan, I, q. 5, a. 5, where he says that desirable is taken in two ways, namely fundamentally and formally. In the former way he says that the good and the desirable are the same, and so he expounds St. Thomas there; for the proximate reason on account of which the thing has it that it can move appetite is its goodness which it has with respect to the one desiring, in which is included not the mere entity and perfection of the thing according to itself, but as it has some fittingness with the one desiring. But in the latter way he says that the good is distinguished from the desirable at least by reason or denomination, because the desirable as such imports a respect to appetite and an extrinsic denomination coming from it, or arising from the fittingness and proportion between the good and the appetite; the desirable, therefore, formally explains something which the good as such does not express, by reason of which this causal statement is true: because the thing is good, therefore it is desirable; as this causal statement is also true: because the thing is lucid and coloured, therefore it is visible; for so the desirable is compared to the good as the visible to the lucid. Whence St. Thomas, Ethics I, c. 1, declaring that description of Aristotle, The good is that which all things desire, says that it was taken a posteriori, because the notion of the desirable is posterior to the notion of the good. And this opinion is true, which Capreolus had taught before, In I, dist. 2, q. 3, and afterwards Ferrariensis, Contra Gentiles I, c. 3.

20. The difference between the good and the true.—From which it is understood that the good is compared otherwise to appetite than the true to the intellect; for the transcendent true (for we are speaking of this) includes in its notion and denomination some conformity to the intellect; but the good formally in its notion and denomination does not include conformity to appetite, although this follows upon the notion of good. Whence the notion of the transcendent true is not properly supposed in the object so as to be formally attained by the intellect, but is a denomination taken from the proportion or conformity between the object itself and the power or its act; and therefore that truth is wont to be called a condition consequent upon or concomitant with the object of the intellect rather than formally constituting it; but goodness is supposed in the object of appetite and is the formal reason of attaining it; but desirability expresses a denomination taken from the proportion of such an object with such a power; whence it does not express the formal notion of the object, but a concomitant condition.

21. How the good is related to the notion of end.—From these things it is also evident how the notion of end is compared to the good. For St. Thomas says, I, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1, that the good, since it has the notion of the desirable, imports the relationship of final cause. And in the same sense he says, Contra Gentiles I, c. 38, third reason, that the good has the notion of end, namely in the way in which it has the notion of the desirable. For if the relationship and denomination of end is taken formally, it is not of the notion of good, but can follow upon it; for the end as such expresses the notion of cause in order to the means or to some action which comes about for the sake of the end, which relationship the good does not express, but only the notion of the fitting. But if the end is taken fundamentally, then it is attributed to the good, by which reason of goodness the end has the power of causing finally. But this is to be understood of the good simply, such as is the per se good; for if the good is taken in its whole breadth, it embraces not only the end but also the means, as will be evident from the following section.

1. The first division.—Before we treat how the good is an attribute of being, it is necessary to declare some divisions of the good, so that it may thus better be evident which notion of good is attributed to being. And first indeed the good is wont to be divided into the true good and the merely apparent good. That is called the true good which is such as it is thought and known to be; but the apparent that which is thought, yet is not in the thing. But this division belongs to the good in the same way in which it can be attributed to any being or notion of being; for there is true and apparent gold, and so of other things. But by a peculiar reason this partition is wont to be declared in the good, because, since the proper causality of the good is to move and allure the appetite, the good thought to be such does this almost equally with the true, because, since it is applied through knowledge to move the appetite, it moves as much as it is judged or thought to be, although in reality it is not such. Of the merely apparent or supposed good, then, there is nothing for us to say, because its notion consists only in this, that it is thought to be such as the true good is wont to be, although in truth it is not such. Whence as many as are the true goods, so many can be feigned by supposition, because in every genus of goods error and false estimation can be found.

2. The second division.—Secondly the good can be divided into that which is good in itself and that which is good to some other. Of which division enough has been said in the preceding section, where we indicated that, although the notion of good which is an attribute of being can be accommodated to each being in so far as it has perfection fitting to itself, it is nevertheless found more clearly in any being in so far as it is fitting and consonant to some other. To this is added also that this notion of the good of another supposes or includes the notion of good in itself; for nothing is properly and rigorously good to another except what is good in itself and has perfection fitting to another. I said properly and rigorously, because sometimes the lack of some form is thought good to something, although formally it confers no perfection on it nor has any in itself; but privation is not properly good, but is sometimes so denominated because it deprives of an unfitting form and under that notion is desirable. The good of another, therefore, supposes the good in itself, and therefore the other divisions of the good seem chiefly to be of that which is good to another, and they will be explained by us in it; yet at the same time we shall declare those which pertain to being in so far as it is good in itself.

The division into the honest, the useful and the pleasant good is expounded

3. Thirdly and chiefly the good is wont to be divided into the honest, the delightful and the useful. St. Thomas hands down this division, I, q. 5, a. 6, and II-II, q. 145, a. 3, and adduces it from Ambrose, De officiis I, cc. 9 and 10, where he indicates it obscurely enough; Aristotle taught it more clearly, Ethics II, c. 3, and Book VIII, c. 2, where he calls the honest absolutely good, distinguishing it from the pleasant and the useful. But St. Thomas notices there that this division was chiefly handed down of the human good, yet that it can be accommodated to the good in common or according to itself. We shall first, then, declare it in the human good, in which those notions of good are found properly and without metaphor; afterwards we shall see how it can be applied to the good as such. But it is to be supposed that the discussion is of man in so far as he is man, that is, in so far as he uses reason; both because reason is the supreme rule of every good fitting to man—reason (I say) either natural, if man is considered only philosophically, or illumined by divine light, if he is considered theologically—and also because the proper and formal notions of these goods, especially of the honest and the useful, cannot be discerned except through reason.

4. In how many ways something is fitting to another.—Since, then, the good is the same as the fitting, something can be fitting to man in two ways: in one way through itself, namely because that perfection which it has in itself is of itself consonant and fitting to man. Which can still happen in two ways: first, that it be fitting in order to the delight which such a good brings with it, and this is the delightful good. Secondly, without order to delight, but only because it of itself becomes or is fitting to man as such, and this is the honest good. But in another way something is fitting not through itself, but only by reason of another good which can be obtained through it or by means of it, namely because, although regarded of itself it brings no delight nor of itself becomes or is fitting to man, nevertheless, as it can contribute to obtaining another good, it is thought fitting; and this is the useful good. And so it is evident both that those three members are contained under the notion of good and that they are in some way distinct among themselves, at least by formal notion conceived or by relationship; for it is not always necessary that they be distinguished in the thing or in the subject; for it is evident that the same thing, for example love or devotion toward God, is honest and pleasant and useful.

5. Finally, from the said declaration it is easily understood that those members exhaust the thing divided, because neither can a medium be found between the good per se or in order to another, since these are opposed immediately and as it were by contradiction; nor besides the good fitting on account of delight or without it, but only on account of itself, can another member be thought out, since these members too are distinguished as it were by contradiction or immediate negation, because every good which is per se fitting, the reason of delight being prescinded, is reputed honest. I say, however, delight being prescinded, because these members are to be distinguished by prescissive rather than negative abstraction, if they are compared to the thing which is denominated good, because in order that a thing be honest it is not necessary that it be pleasant or useful, but only that it have some notion of fittingness on account of which it is lovable, even if it is neither pleasant nor useful; and so of the rest. Whence formally and as it were conditionally these members can be distinguished even by negative abstraction; for it is of the notion of the honest as honest that for its notion and fittingness sufficient to move right appetite it does not require delight or utility, whether in the thing it has them conjoined or not; for even if it did not have them, it would be sufficiently good and fitting and in its order; and the same holds proportionally of the rest. And in this way the aforesaid division seems sufficiently expounded.

Various difficulties about the aforesaid division

6. The first difficulty, about the honest good.—But in order that it may be more exactly declared, some difficulties arising must briefly be treated. The first is how the honest good is said to be per se fitting. For either it is said to be per se fitting as a form almost agreeing with the nature of man as he is rational, in the way in which heat is per se fitting to fire; and so it follows that the very powers of intellect and will are honest goods, which is against Augustine, De libero arbitrio II, c. 19, where, distinguishing all the goods of man into greatest, middle and least, he places the powers of the soul in the middle order, because we can use them badly, whereas those seem to be the greatest goods which are honest. Next it follows that God is not the honest good of man, because he is not per se fitting to him after the manner of a form. It follows also that the action of giving alms is not an honest good, because it is not some form per se fitting to man. Or the honest good is said to be per se fitting not as a form, but as an operation becoming to man; and so first of all the same inconvenience follows concerning God. And further it follows that the virtues, especially infused ones, are not honest goods, because they are not operations of man, which is plainly false and against Augustine in the place cited. Or the honest good is said to be per se fitting objectively, namely because it is a good per se lovable, which notion is more universal; for it can belong both to operation, both internal and external, and to any form whatever, and to God himself. But not even in this way are all the difficulties touched upon avoided, because it follows that the powers of the soul are to be reckoned among honest goods; indeed also health and the other goods of the body, which are per se lovable. And moreover another difficulty arises, because this notion, namely that some object is per se lovable without order to delight, cannot be the first notion of good which is found in such an object, because it supposes the notion of good on account of which such an object is per se lovable. As in the preceding section we were saying that the notion of the desirable supposes the notion of the good and fitting; for the thing is desirable because it is good and fitting; but it is the same to be a good per se lovable as to be per se desirable; this, therefore, cannot be the first notion in which the honest good consists.

7. The second difficulty, about the delightful good.—The second difficulty is about the delightful good, how it has a peculiar and proper notion of good in itself and per se desirable; for by the delightful good is to be understood either the object about which delight is concerned, or the delight which arises from such an object. If the first is said, it follows that this good is no more per se and in itself good than the useful good. It is proved, because it is not good because it has delight in itself, which is a thing distinct from it, but because it is apt to generate delight, which seems to be a certain utility consisting in a relationship to delight itself, by reason of which such an object is lovable. As food, for example, if it is loved because it confers health, is said to be loved as a good useful for health; therefore, if it is loved in so far as it brings delight, it will be loved as useful for delight; therefore the delightful good taken in this way is not per se and in itself good, nor does it differ formally from the useful good, but only materially, or as the particular from the common. But if delight itself is said to be the delightful good, as St. Thomas indicates in the cited place of the First Part, it is indeed true that delight is a certain act per se fitting and consonant to the nature or appetite which delights; yet no reason appears why this peculiar fittingness of such an act is distinguished from others and constitutes its peculiar notion of good more than the fittingness which any other act has with the faculty of operating, as the understanding of truth with the intellect and the vision of a beautiful object with sight. And moreover the notion of the delightful good does not seem able to consist primarily in delight itself; for delight is concerned with some good as good, since it is the rest of the appetite, which does not rest except in good attained; therefore delight supposes in the object a notion of good prior to delight and which is such in itself and not through order to delight; for the good in which we delight is not therefore good because it delights, but rather therefore delights because it is good; delight, therefore, supposes in the object a fittingness and goodness distinct from delight itself. Of that, then, I inquire whether it constitutes the delightful good or not; for, if it constitutes it, then delight itself is not the first delightful good; indeed it does not even seem to have a similar fittingness or notion of good, because when we delight, for example, in the vision of a beautiful thing, the fittingness of the vision is of a far other notion than the fittingness of the delight, although the vision is the object of that delight. But if that goodness or fittingness which is in the object of delight does not constitute the delightful good, there will now be another good distinct from the three enumerated.

8. The third difficulty, about the useful good.—A third difficulty can be about the useful good, how it is denied to be good in itself and in this is distinguished from the rest; for the useful good, although it is useful to another distinct from itself, nevertheless has in itself its utility, which consists in some power or efficacy of providing that thing to which it is useful. It will perhaps be said that the goodness of the useful thing does not consist in the utility itself, but in the fittingness and desirability which such utility has with respect to man, and consequently it will be said that the useful good does not have this fittingness of itself, but from the end to which it is useful. Against this, however, is the fact that, although the fittingness of the useful good supposes the fittingness of that thing to which it is useful, and is perhaps derived from it, nevertheless, that being supposed, in truth the useful good itself, in so far as it has a relationship to such a thing, has in itself a proper fittingness, by reason of which it is good and lovable; therefore in this there is no formal difference between the useful good and other goods; for the honest or delightful good too can sometimes receive its notion from a relationship to something extrinsic. Indeed the honest good is sometimes such from conformity to an extrinsic law, or at least from the fittingness which results in it, such a law being supposed. Whence it also comes about that some useful good has no other fittingness or goodness except that of honesty; as, for example, the affliction of the body, in so far as it is useful for satisfying God, has no other goodness except honest; and by the same reason a means which is only useful for taking delight has no fittingness or goodness except a certain participation of that delight; therefore the useful good is not rightly distinguished from the others.

9. The fourth, about the same.—And hence arises a fourth difficulty, why the useful good is not divided into two; for the useful good is such as is that to which it is ordered; therefore, just as of the good per se lovable one is honest and another delightful, so of the good from utility to another, one is honest, another delightful.

10. The last difficulty, about the sufficiency of the division.—The last difficulty is that the aforesaid division seems insufficient; for besides the said notions of good there seems to be another which can be distinguished or prescinded from them; for there are certain goods per se lovable, not because they delight, nor because they are honest, but precisely because they perfect nature, as health, science, integrity of body, and being and living itself; for even if we prescind in the mind every delight, these are goods and lovable, as is self-evident; and similarly, although we prescind all notions of virtue, these are lovable as connatural goods, and on account of them other things can be loved as useful, honesty being prescinded. A sign of which is that sometimes they are sought through honest means, sometimes through base ones, not for delight but only for natural fittingness; there is, therefore, some notion of good distinct from those three.

The first difficulty is dispatched

11. In order to satisfy the first difficulty and to declare what properly the honest good is, it is to be noticed that the honest good can be said or taken in two ways. In one way, in order to human and moral actions as they can be regulated by right and prudent reason; and in this way that is called the honest good which per se and of itself becomes a man or a person using reason, as is taken from St. Thomas, II-II, q. 145, a. 1 and following. In which fittingness no advantage is considered which would accrue through such a good to that person with respect to whom it is said to be a good of this kind; for this, although it often intervenes, is nevertheless per se and formally not necessary for honesty, but that becomingness and proportion suffices which is found between such a good and the nature which directs its operations by right reason. As to give alms is honest because it is per se consonant to rational nature, even if per impossibile the man so operating took no utility or advantage thence besides the right operating itself. In which way too with respect to God it is said to be fitting and honest to communicate himself, to do good and to show mercy, not because it is advantageous to him, but because it is per se becoming and proportioned to his goodness. The honest good, then, explained by this reason, expresses a peculiar notion of fittingness, and on the side of the thing which is called honest it includes its perfection with all the conditions, either physical or moral, necessary for the aforesaid fittingness with rational nature.

12. But this good is wont to be declared through fittingness to the dictate of right reason; for that good is honest which right reason dictates is to be done or loved, etc. Yet, if this saying is understood of right reason as it expresses the judgement or knowledge of that which it is expedient to do, then honesty does not consist in conformity to the dictate of reason, nor is that the first rule or first reason of such honesty. For the good is not therefore honest because right reason judges it to be such, but conversely, because the good itself is truly and in the thing such, therefore it is judged to be such by right and true reason. And therefore as regards us right judgement is the rule of the honest good, because it manifests it to us; yet according to itself that judgement supposes the proper fittingness from which the honest good has it that it is such; but this we say is to rational nature in so far as it is such and has such properties or attributes. But if the dictate of reason is taken not formally but as it were radically, then it is well and a priori said that the honest good is that which is conformed to reason, that is, which is conformed to rational nature, which for that reason is apt by nature to judge that this is to be done or desired by it.

13. But the honest good taken in this way can be distinguished into honest act, habit and object; for there are acts formally good and honest, as are the acts of the virtues, especially of the will; and to these correspond the habits of the virtues, which are deservedly reckoned among the greatest goods and honest ones, because they most of all become a man using reason; and to these acts or habits honest objects are supposed; for from these the acts and habits take their honesty, as St. Thomas indicates, I-II, q. 19, a. 1, ad 3, where this matter is disputed more fully, and q. 20, a. 1, ad 2, and De malo, q. 2, a. 3, in the body and ad 8. For the honest act as such is not concerned except with the honest good; whence it is necessary that it suppose such goodness in it, for the act of the will does not confer goodness on its object, but rather is founded in it, and therefore St. Thomas above calls this honesty primordial goodness.

14. And from these things the answer has been given to that whole first difficulty, in so far as it pertains to the honest good taken in this rigour and propriety. For we concede that this good is not limited to operation, or habit, or form, but belongs to every thing which is honestly and according to right reason desirable by man. We concede next that this good is not therefore such because it is per se fitting to the will or appetite of man in the notion of desirable object; for, as the argument made there rightly proves, this notion of per se desirable formally taken supposes fittingness with rational nature, by reason of which such a good is per se desirable to it.

15. But in another way the honest good can be taken, not in order to morals but in order to nature, and it is that which per se perfects nature and is advantageous to it even when the notion of virtue is set aside, as is health, integrity and life itself, which sometimes it is base to love or protect, even if of itself it seems most fitting to nature. And this good the ancient philosophers seem to have called the good of nature, which they distinguished from the honest good, which they called per se becoming, as is gathered from Cicero, De finibus III and IV. Yet, because this good of nature is per se fitting and lovable, therefore the appetite of nature is thought to be so compared to this good as the rational appetite to the per se becoming good; and by this reason, in order to nature, this good is comprehended under the honest good. To this is added also that this notion of good is sufficient for it to be honestly desired, if from elsewhere some impediment does not intervene; because, since right reason is that by which man ought to be ruled or governed, to it pertains also to propose the things which are advantageous and consonant to nature, unless from elsewhere something stands in the way or some greater disadvantage follows. Speaking in this way, then, of the honest good, it must be conceded that the powers of the soul are certain honest goods, not indeed in the way in which the virtues are, which we cannot use badly as we can the powers themselves, on account of which the latter are called by Augustine middle goods, the former the greatest; but by that reason by which goods pertaining to the integrity and completion of nature are per se fitting and, as far as depends on themselves, rightly lovable. And in this way being itself, living and knowing are honest. And not only inhering goods, but also extrinsic things which are sometimes per se fitting, at least as objects of vital acts, are reckoned among these honest goods; and so the first difficulty too has been dispatched as far as can pertain to this good, of which we shall say more in the solution of the last difficulty.

The second difficulty is treated

16. Concerning the second difficulty two things are to be distinguished which are touched upon there, namely delight and the object of delight; and of each it must be said that it is a good of itself in some way fitting and per se desirable. And indeed of delight itself this is self-evident; for it is an act which of itself greatly invites and draws the appetite, which is a sign that of itself it has great proportion with it. But of the object of delight it is proved, because the object of delight is good; therefore delight supposes goodness in that object, because the acts of the soul do not constitute their objects but suppose them; the object of delight, therefore, is not good and fitting because it is the object of delight, but conversely, because it is good and fitting, therefore it can be the object of delight. It is therefore of itself good and desirable, and not through mere denomination or relationship to delight, although perhaps the etymology or imposition of the name was taken thence. Hence, then, it is evident that, whether the delightful good is taken for delight itself, or for the object or that good which delights, or (which is probable) for both after the manner of one, namely for rest in such a thing—as beatitude is sometimes taken for objective, sometimes for formal, sometimes for the whole beatitude which after the manner of one embraces both—in whichever (I say) of these ways the delightful good is taken, it is deservedly called per se good and not only by extrinsic relationship or denomination, in which it is rightly distinguished from the useful good.

17. Again, the goodness or fittingness of delight itself is easily distinguished from the goodness or fittingness of honesty, either moral or natural; for the fittingness of delight consists only in that sweetness and vital rest (so to speak) which the appetite has in the good attained, whether it has other conformity with reason or rational nature or not; for these are accidental to the notion of delight as such. And for this cause the delightful good, at least by reason of delight, is deservedly distinguished from the honest good, both moral and natural; both because it has a peculiar fittingness, as I said; and also because it has a peculiar power of moving the appetite, from which it comes about that sometimes it moves not only against reason but also against the advantage of nature.

18. But of the goodness of the delightful object which is supposed in it in order that it cause delight, it is not easy to judge what it is and how it is distinguished from honesty either moral or natural. And the reason of the difficulty is that delight is of the fitting good attained or present, as is taken from Aristotle, Rhetoric I, c. 10; and St. Thomas at length, I-II, q. 31, a. 1 and following. But the fitting good, whose attainment is supposed to delight, is nothing other than the good fitting to nature, either to spiritual nature, if the delight is spiritual, or to corporeal, if it is sensible; but the good fitting to nature is nothing other than the honest good, either moral, if it is so fitting to rational nature as such that it is per se becoming, or natural, if it is only per se advantageous to nature, as pertaining to its perfection; therefore delight does not suppose the delightful good as delightful; indeed this rather seems to be an extrinsic denomination from delight itself in potency, as the visible from vision; but it supposes only the good fitting to the one desiring, in whose attainment he delights. And this is confirmed by examples; for when a sick man delights in health attained, he considers no other notion of good in order to delight except that advantage which health brings to his nature; therefore in health, as it is the object of delight, there is no other goodness besides the natural fittingness of health with the nature of man. In a similar way the beatific vision, or God clearly seen and possessed, is the object of perfect joy by no other reason than because it is a good supremely proportioned and fitting to the nature of man; therefore universally the delightful good fundamentally (so to speak) and in so far as it is intrinsically supposed to delight itself on the side of the object, is nothing other than the good per se fitting to nature, and so honest, either moral or natural.

19. To this it can be answered in two ways. First, by conceding the whole discourse made, and consequently saying that the delightful good is not distinguished from the good per se fitting to nature except as it includes delight, which is considered in such a good as the proper reason moving to its desire. Which seems to be the opinion of St. Thomas, I, q. 5, a. 6, and I-II, q. 32, a. 1, ad 3, where he says that operations are delightful in so far as they are connatural and proportioned to the operator; and in that whole question he indicates the same; and Cajetan signifies the same in the things which he notes about that first article. From which it must further consequently be said that the delightful good, in so far as it is called per se good and lovable, intrinsically includes delight itself, whether delight alone is apprehended as such a good per se fitting on account of what it is, that is, on account of that sweetness which it formally confers, or this whole, namely such an object as it has delight adjoined with it, is apprehended after the manner of one object which is called the delightful good, of which delight itself is as it were the form. Whence Aristotle, Ethics X, c. 2, says that pleasure is desirable for itself, and makes any good more desirable if it is added to it. In which words he indicates that delight indeed supposes a good; but that it itself, added to it, makes it more desirable, because, namely, it constitutes it pleasant and delightful; therefore such a good is completed and as it were formally constituted by delight itself. And St. Thomas signified this very thing, I, q. 5, a. 6, when he teaches that the delightful good terminates the appetite by reason of the delight, which is rest in the thing desired.

20. And he adds there, in the solution ad 2, that those things are properly called delightful goods which have no other notion of desirability, although otherwise they are both harmful and dishonest. Which words favour the said opinion, in so far as it is said in them that delight is the whole reason of desiring the delightful good as such; but in this, that it is said in them that there can be a thing in which there is altogether no other notion of the desirable besides delight, they seem to contradict what was said above; whence they seem false on account of the reason made above, that delight results from good attained and therefore it is necessary that it suppose another prior notion of good by reason of which it is desirable; there cannot, therefore, be a thing which brings delight and yet has no other notion of the desirable besides delight. But it can be said that St. Thomas did not intend to exclude from a thing of this kind every notion of fittingness prior to delight in which delight is founded, but wished to indicate that sometimes it happens that this fittingness is such that, delight being set aside, it does not make the thing simply desirable, because it is harmful or dishonest. According to this mode of speaking, then, to the second difficulty it must be conceded that that thing or operation which is the object of delight, although it has another prior notion of good, is nevertheless not a delightful good except only by that reason by which it has delight adjoined. Nor does it come about thence that this good is confused with the useful good, or has only an extrinsic notion of good in the way the useful good has, because the thing is compared to the delight which follows from it as its object, and therefore from both one delightful good, intrinsically and per se desirable, is thought to be constituted.

21. Another mode of answering can be that in the object of delight there is always found a certain special fittingness, by reason of which it can be the object of delight and from it be properly and intrinsically denominated a delightful good; and that that fittingness is distinct and can be separated or prescinded from the proper fittingness of honesty, both moral and natural. For, as Cajetan treats well, I-II, q. 32, a. 1, the object of delight is a thing or operation apprehended as fitting; but it is not necessary that this fittingness be in some way honest or advantageous to nature, but it is enough that it be proportioned to taste, for example, or to another sense or power. There seems, then, to be in these delightful objects a certain special mode of fittingness sufficient to constitute a special notion of good, which seems to be comprehended under delight, whenever delight is said to be the whole reason of the desirable in the delightful good as such. And so St. Thomas favours this mode of speaking, in the words cited above from I, q. 3 [recte q. 5], a. 6, ad 2.

22. But (to confess the truth) this latter mode of speaking can be neither sufficiently founded nor declared, because it cannot be understood what that special fittingness is besides that which is in the good constitution of nature, or in being or operating proportioned to nature. Which is taken from Aristotle, Ethics VII, cc. 12 and 13, and Book X, cc. 4 and 5, and Rhetoric I, c. 10, at the end, where in this sense he says that pleasure is an affection proceeding into nature all at once and sensibly, as St. Thomas expounds and treats, I-II, q. 31, a. 1, and q. 32, a. 1, and Cajetan there. Likewise, because delight tends into the same good and fitting thing into which love or desire tends; for it only differs from them because it tends into that good as present and attained; but with respect to love or desire, delight being set aside, no other notion of fittingness is understood besides that which pertains to moral or natural honesty, or at least it is most certain that love and desire can be directly borne into fittingness of this kind, or into the good under such a notion; therefore it is equally certain that delight does not require in its object another notion of fittingness; therefore to think out or feign it as prior to delight itself neither has foundation nor can be sufficiently explained. For that some delights arise from a peculiar fittingness of the object with some faculty, as with taste or touch, is only either because that quality which is perceived by the sense and produces delight is the connatural and per se fitting object of such a faculty, or because the operation upon which such a delight follows is similarly a natural perfection proportioned to the power. And so always a notion of good of this kind which is supposed on the side of the object to delight is reduced to the good per se fitting to nature. The former answer, therefore, is more solid, and through it satisfaction is sufficiently made to the second difficulty posited above.

The third difficulty is dispatched together with the fourth

23. To the third difficulty, about the good and the useful, some concede that the useful good has its proper and intrinsic goodness by reason of which it is in itself desirable, although not for its own sake. For these two are diverse; for the means is truly loved in itself, that is, it terminates in itself the movement of love; whence it is necessary that it have in itself a useful goodness distinct from the goodness of the end, by reason of which it can terminate the affection of love or election; yet it is not loved for its own sake, because that goodness is not absolute, but respective to the end, or for the sake of the end, and because the end is the first cause of loving the means or useful good. Whence it comes about that according to this opinion the useful good is not distinguished from the rest by this, that it is only good with the extrinsic goodness of the end, but because it has its whole goodness in order to the end. And this opinion can be confirmed, because it is repugnant to be good and to be good with another’s goodness; for good is the same as perfect; but no thing is perfected by mere extrinsic denomination from another’s perfection; but the useful good is truly good; therefore it is not good by mere denomination from the goodness of the end, but has in itself its proper goodness. But this opinion is false, as we shall say more fully below in disputing about the final cause. And it is against St. Thomas, I, q. 5, a. 6, especially in the solution ad 2, where he speaks thus: Those things are called useful which have in themselves nothing whence they are desired, but are desired only as they lead to another, as the taking of bitter medicine.

24. Rightly, then, in proposing the third difficulty, it was answered that it is one thing to speak of utility as it signifies the power which is in the useful good for the effect to which it is called useful, another to speak of that utility in order to the one desiring, to whom such a good is useful. In the former way it is true that utility can be some power and perfection intrinsic to the useful good itself, which perfection, compared to the very good which is denominated useful, is fitting to it, not as a useful good, but as a good per se proportioned and connatural to it; as in medicine, for example, which is useful for health because it has the power of expelling some humour, it is clear that that power is some intrinsic property of such medicine, which with respect to it is not useful but per se fitting and desirable to it; but with respect to man that power can be called the utility which is in such a thing in order to such an end. But this whole utility, compared to man and considered per se alone, will not be found good, fitting or desirable to him, but is only thought fitting in so far as health itself, the diminution or expulsion of such a humour, is fitting. Whence, if man now does not need such a purgation for health, that power of the medicine is not fitting to man; but if he needs it, it is thought fitting only on account of health. Therefore the whole power, although intrinsic to the medicine, is not of itself fitting to man nor desirable to him, but only in so far as it is in a certain way informed and denominated by the goodness of the end; therefore the goodness and fittingness which is in the useful good formally taken, as it is useful, is not intrinsically in it completely and formally; but there is in it as it were materially the utility itself or active power of another thing; but formally the fittingness and the whole notion of desirability is the goodness of the end. An argument of which too is that the useful good as useful does not excite nor draw nor move the appetite to itself; otherwise the means as means would have the causality of the end, which is false; but it is the end which moves the will to desire the means or useful good; whence, although the will tends into the useful thing as into the material object, and in this way the useful good is said to terminate in itself the movement of the will, nevertheless formally that movement too is terminated at the end, because it is the whole reason of tending into the means, and therefore in the useful good an intrinsic and formal goodness is not required for determining such an act.

25. To the fourth difficulty, then, the answer is by denying that the useful good as such has of itself a proper fittingness with respect to the one desiring, by reason of which it is good and desirable to him; but it has it from the end not only as from a radical and remote cause, but as from a formal and proximate one, because it not only has its fittingness and goodness through a relationship to the end, but has it from the end itself as from an extrinsic form and reason on account of which it is lovable. And in this the useful good properly differs from the honest and the delightful. Wherefore, if sometimes there is some useful good which of itself has a proper fittingness with nature or right reason, under that notion it is not useful but honest and per se lovable. Whence that among useful goods some can be honest, others delightful, happens only materially, in so far as these notions of good can be conjoined in the same thing, indeed even denominate one another; for both honesty and delight can be useful for the salvation either of soul or of body, and utility itself can be honest. Formally, however, these notions are diverse, and the notion of the useful good is found in the same proportion whether the utility is to delight or to honesty or to another advantage of nature; and therefore it was not necessary to divide the useful good into various members.

The fifth difficulty is dispatched

26. The fifth difficulty has been dispatched from what has been said. For we distinguished the honest good in order to virtue or the rule of right reason, which is the same as per se becoming and consonant to right reason, and the good in order to nature, which is per se fitting and advantageous to it. If, therefore, the honest good is taken in the former way, we confess that it is not an adequate member of this division, not only with respect to inferior things which do not use reason, but not even with respect to man himself, who (as the argument convinces) can love some good as per se fitting to himself not on account of honesty nor on account of delight, but only on account of the preservation or advantage of his nature. But the honest good taken in the latter way is thus an adequate member of that division, which St. Thomas declared in this way above, where he says that everything is called honest good which is desired as ultimately terminating the movement of appetite, as a certain thing into which the appetite tends per se.

27. The natural honest good is diffused through all beings.—The useful good is found in all things.—Only knowing things are properly capable of the delightful good.—And hence it is understood, first, in what way this division has place in the good in common as it abstracts from the human good, and in what way its members are found in other things than man. For the natural honest good is properly found in inferior things, not only sentient but also inanimate; for in all is found some perfection which per se terminates animal or natural appetite, as is being itself or being preserved, which any thing whatever desires. Whence it comes about that in any thing whatever too the useful good can properly be found through a relationship to this good of nature; for so the swallow gathers straws to build a nest, which action is good by no other reason except because it is useful; and downward motion with respect to the stone is compared as a useful good, because per se it does not pertain to its perfection, but only that it be constituted in its proper place. But the delightful good is properly found in knowing things, more perfectly indeed in those using reason than in those only sensing; yet truly and properly in both; but to things lacking knowledge it can be attributed only through metaphor and a certain analogy, in so far as each thing has rest in its proper good attained; yet, because that rest is not through a proper act but through the mere lack of motion, therefore it cannot have a proper and special notion of good. Wherefore, when this division is given of the good in common, the sense is not that all these three goods are found in each thing, but that simply there are given in things or beings such notions of goods; and conversely that all notions of goods found in any beings whatever are sufficiently comprehended under the three aforesaid. But whether these three notions of good can be apprehended and discerned only by the intellect, or can also be known by sense, and how, does not pertain to this place, but is to be treated in the science of the soul. Let St. Thomas be read, I, q. 78, a. 4, q. 81, a. 2; and Cajetan there, and I-II, q. 40, a. 3.

28. Whether the division of the good into the aforesaid members is analogical, and by what analogy.—Secondly it is gathered from what has been said of what kind the aforesaid division is; for St. Thomas, in the cited place, ad 3, absolutely says that the good is not divided into these three as univocal but as analogous, which is said first of the honest good, then of the delightful, lastly of the useful. But if we speak of proper and rigorous analogy, by which one thing is said to be such through denomination from another, then there is true analogy between the useful good and the rest, because the useful good is not good except through denomination from another which is per se good and fitting. And this is proved by a certain argument made above, that no thing is good through extrinsic denomination; for that is true of the good simply, yet not of the good in a certain respect and analogically; for nothing forbids a good of this kind to be constituted through denomination from extrinsic goodness. But in this way there does not seem to be proper analogy between the delightful good and the honest; for the delightful good of itself and per se is simply good, not through denomination from the honest good, but from its own extrinsic [recte intrinsic] conformity and goodness, a sign of which is: for, all honesty, true or supposed, being taken away, if some delight remains, it is per se good and lovable; therefore it is not denominated good through analogy to the honest.

29. Wherefore it can be said, first, that this analogy is not equal in each good, but that in the useful good it is proper, but in the delightful it is taken more broadly, to indicate that it is an imperfect good in comparison with the honest good, not that it is not absolutely and simply good, since of itself and without relationship to another it has whence it is desired; just as conversely pain, which is opposed to delight, is simply evil, although it is not the greatest evil; and so in Scripture the evil of punishment is called simply evil. Or otherwise it can be said that in each good, the useful and the delightful, there is analogy, yet not of the same mode; for in the useful good there is the analogy of attribution, taken from an extrinsic form, such as is in healthy as it is said of medicine; for so medicine is called good or useful as it is called healthy. But in the delightful good analogy can be saved, not indeed through extrinsic denomination, as the reason made above proves, but through the intrinsic relationship of one to another, such as is found in accident with respect to substance. For so the delightful good intrinsically supposes another good per se fitting, in which the appetite rests through delight; and by its nature delight was instituted only for this, that it be as it were a certain grace and as it were a certain seasoning of another superior good. And therefore it is an imperfect order to desire operation for the sake of delight, stopping in it, since rather delight is to be loved for the sake of operation, as it was instituted. But especially with respect to man, the delightful good which does not have honesty adjoined cannot be thought simply good, because it both deprives of a greater good and does not conduce to the good simply of man, which is to live according to reason, as St. Thomas said in a similar case. And in this sense the Fathers sometimes say that nothing is good but virtue, as is evident from Jerome, on Isaiah 11; and Ambrose, De officiis I, c. 9.

30. What the natural good and what the moral good is.—Thirdly it is understood from what has been said another division of the good into natural good and moral good, which, although it can be understood of the good in common, because the delightful and useful good too can be either natural or moral, is nevertheless properly wont to be given of the honest good, generally taken, which can be the ultimate term of appetite as per se fitting. The moral good, then, is the same as the honest good more strictly taken for that which per se becomes and is consonant to rational nature as such; but the natural good is that which is per se fitting to any nature whatever. You will say that according to this description the moral good too is a natural good, because rational nature is a certain nature, and the moral good is consonant to it after the manner of a form or operation. The answer is, first, that nature can be taken as it signifies only the essence of the thing, and in this sense it is true that every good can be called natural in so far as it is fitting to some nature, or in so far as it has the perfection which its nature postulates; and in this way the objection made proceeds. But otherwise nature is taken as it expresses not only the essence of the thing but also the mode of operating or desiring from the mere impulse of nature and a certain necessity; and in order to nature taken in this way natural operation is wont to be distinguished from free or moral; and in the same sense the division of the good into moral and natural is given; for the goodness and perfection of a thing is chiefly discerned from operation, or sometimes is even consummated through it, and therefore according to the diverse modes of operating the division of the good into natural and moral has been taken. That, therefore, is called natural good which is consonant to any nature whatever according to that which it naturally is or can naturally operate; but that is moral good which is consonant to a thing as it operates freely; for custom, whence the moral is named, consists in free operation, as is evident.

31. Although, then, the natural and the moral good agree in this, that each is per se fitting to some thing or nature (for this notion cannot be excluded from that good which is per se and simply such), they nevertheless differ because the natural good precisely regards nature as such, or as operating naturally; but the moral good regards it as it is elevated to the mode of operating freely, which belongs to it most properly as it is rational; and therefore the moral good is said to be consonant to rational nature as such, both in grade and in mode of operating. Whence it comes about that the moral good chiefly consists in free operation; but it belongs in its own way also to its proper object in so far as it is honest, and to the virtue which is its principle. In which way Aristotle said, Ethics II, c. 6, that virtue is that which makes the one having it good, and renders his work good. But what in all these moral goodness as moral is, or what this denomination adds to goodness itself, does not pertain to this place but to moral philosophy, and is treated by the theologians on I-II, q. 18.

32. Fourthly, from what has been said other divisions of the good can easily be declared, which are material rather on the side of the things which are denominated good than formal on the side of goodness or fittingness itself. So the good is divided into transcendent good and good of the genus of quality by St. Thomas, De potentia, q. 9, a. 7, ad 5. For this division is not given according to diverse formal notions of the good, but according to the same more or less contracted. For the transcendent good expresses in common the fitting perfection of the thing, especially that which each thing has through its entity, as will be declared in the following section. But the good of the genus of quality expresses the perfection which the thing has through some quality fitting to its nature, in which way the good of the genus of quantity could also be distinguished; but it is wont to be attributed rather to quality, because the greatest perfection of the creature is wont to be consummated by qualities.

33. Goods of body, of soul and of fortune, what they are.—The praiseworthy and honourable good, what it is.—Again the good is wont to be divided into the good of the body and of the soul and the extrinsic, which is wont to be called the good of fortune, as is evident from Aristotle, Ethics I, c. 8, who again, c. 12, distinguishes the good into praiseworthy and honourable. Which division seems to be taken a posteriori from the effect and as it were the reward of goodness, and does not seem to exhaust all goods; for the delightful good of itself is neither honourable nor praiseworthy, except in so far as it is either useful, or is conjoined with honesty or accompanies it and helps it. The honest good, then, is properly honourable in so far as it is desirable for its own sake; but that is called praiseworthy, as Aristotle wishes above, which is good as it is referred to another. Whence it is commonly wont to be said that useful goods are praiseworthy, which seems to be understood with a certain prescission; for those as such are only praiseworthy; but others are also honourable; for the honest good too is worthy of praise, yet not of praise alone, but also of honour; each good, therefore, is praiseworthy, but the one also honourable; and so the division is to be understood.

34. What the good simply and what in a certain respect is.—Moreover the good is wont to be divided into good simply and good in a certain respect. Which division can be understood in various ways; for, first, it can be applied to the three members posited above; of which the honest good, as we have said, is good simply, but the others only in a certain respect. Secondly it can be attributed to the transcendent good, in so far as it is said absolutely of being as it is good in itself. And this in two ways; one is that those members be referred to the whole breadth of being and of the good as such, in which sense that will be called good simply which contains in itself the whole goodness and perfection of being; but that is good in a certain respect which is good only in part. And in this way God alone is good simply; but every creature is only good in a certain respect. In which way that of Mark 10 can be understood: No one is good but God alone, who also alone by this reason is called the supreme good. And in this sense this division coincides with another which the theologians use, from Dionysius, On the Divine Names, cc. 1 and 4, and Augustine, De Trinitate VIII, c. 3, and Boethius, De hebdomadibus I, c. 2, dividing the good into good by essence and by participation. For the good by essence is the good simply; for it is the very essence of goodness, which sends forth the rays of goodness into all other things according to the capacity of each, as Dionysius says; whence it essentially includes in itself whatever can pertain to the notion of good and perfect, which is proper to God; and therefore he alone both is good by essence and good simply and supreme, but the others are goods in a certain respect and by participation.

35. The other sense of that division is that the members be referred not to the whole breadth of being, but to a determinate genus or species; and in this way the division can be applied to all genera or species of beings; and that will be called good simply which is a being having every perfection due to it in its order; but that will be good in a certain respect which has something of due perfection and lacks something. And in this way created substance is not good simply unless it is affected by its due accidents; nor is accident good simply unless it has due intension, or another similar perfection. And in this way Dionysius said above: The good is from an integral cause, but evil from any defect whatever.

36. What perfection is simply simple, what in a certain respect.—Thirdly it can be understood that in that partition the good is divided as it is fitting to another, and it can also be referred either to being as such or to determinate being. In the former sense that division almost coincides with another which the theologians hand down, dividing perfection into perfection simply simple and perfection in a certain respect, with Anselm, in the Monologion, c. 14. That good or perfection, then, is called simply such which in each being is better than not it, that is, which in the genus of being expresses such a perfection that it excludes no greater or equal one. But perfection in a certain respect, or in a certain genus, is that which, although it brings some goodness, nevertheless is repugnant with another greater or equal one, or has some imperfection admixed, as are all the perfections of creatures as they are in them. But in the latter sense the division can be applied in almost the same proportion to any genus of being; for to each thing that is good simply which brings some goodness to it and does not exclude a greater or equal one; so it is good for fire to be hot and for man to be temperate; but if it brings some goodness, yet excludes a greater of which that thing would be capable, it will not be good simply but in a certain respect; so to be black, although in itself it is some good to the man having it, is nevertheless not simply good, because it excludes being white, which is better for man. But in this sense simply and in a certain respect are only distinguished as more and less perfect, in which sense also sensible goods are called goods in a certain respect with respect to spiritual ones, and temporal with respect to eternal.

1. Reasons for doubting.—The reason of the difficulty is that the good is taken either for that which has goodness or perfection in itself, or for that which is fitting to another; but in neither way does the good seem to be convertible with being as its attribute; therefore. The minor is proved as regards the former part, about the good absolutely taken: first, because real relations are beings, and yet by the opinion of many they are not good, because they have no perfection. Secondly, because mathematical things are true things, and yet, on the testimony of Aristotle, Metaphysics III, they are not good. Thirdly, because prime matter is in some way being, and yet is not good, because, as it does not have actuality, so neither perfection. Fourthly, the essences of created things are in some way real beings, since they are not nothing, and yet they are not good, because, existence being set aside, they do not have perfection; whence neither are they desirable except in order to being. Fifthly, we can add that there are many things which lack the mode and order due to their nature, which accordingly cannot be called good, since the good consists in mode, species and order, as Augustine says, De natura boni, cc. 3 and 4. But the other part of the minor is proved, first, from all the things adduced, because what does not have perfection in itself cannot be good to another either; as a relation, for example, if in itself it does not express perfection, will be able to contribute nothing to the goodness of that in which it is. Secondly, conversely, we can object that the good, as it is called fitting in this way, can be said not only of beings but also of non-beings, in which way it is said of Judas, Matthew 26: It were good for that man if he had not been born; not being itself, therefore, or not being born, in so far as it can be fitting for impeding greater evils, is called good by Christ. And in moral things not only to fulfil a precept, but also not to do what is forbidden, is thought good and fitting to man; therefore the good under this notion cannot be an attribute of being, since it extends more widely than being. And it is confirmed finally, for the goodness which is an attribute of being is only one in one being; but the fittingness of one being to another is not one but manifold and of diverse notions; therefore this goodness is not convertible with being as its attribute.

2. The opinion of some.—The distinction handed down above about the good is to be supposed, as it is said absolutely of a thing in so far as it is good in itself, or in so far as it is called good to another or with respect to another. For about these there are various opinions. For some think that the transcendent good, as it is an attribute of being, is taken in the latter way, under the notion of what is fitting to another, which Hervaeus, Capreolus and Durandus above think, yet they do not declare how the good as such is convertible with being. And therefore others reject this opinion on account of the arguments indicated above, who consequently think that the good under the latter acceptation is more than transcendent, because it transcends not only beings but also non-beings. Whence it comes about that according to this opinion there is a twofold good: one which is a property of being in the fourth mode; but another which is a property in the second mode, because it belongs to every being, but not to it alone.

Resolution of the question

3. The good is always founded in being.—I think, however, that it must be said that the good properly so called always supposes or includes being, or is founded in being, and therefore that the good under none of the aforesaid notions can extend more widely than being. This conclusion is taken from Aristotle, Ethics I, c. 6, saying that the good is divided through all the categories, as being is; and from St. Thomas, I, q. 5, a. 5, where he says that the notion of being is prior to the notion of good. And he wished to signify this very thing, De veritate, q. 21, a. 2, when he said that the transcendent good is founded in being. And the reason is that the good, whether it signifies that which is good in itself or that which is good to another, intrinsically includes perfection in its concept, for the good and the perfect are the same; but true perfection cannot be understood without entity, for what does not have entity is nothing. But how can what is nothing express or include perfection? Moreover, of that which is good in itself no one doubts, on account of the reason given, that it must be being; but hence it is rightly gathered that that too which is a true good to another must be being; therefore the good under each notion includes the notion of being and cannot belong to anything which is not being. The minor is declared, first, because what does not have perfection in itself cannot be the perfection of anything. Secondly, because the good as fitting expresses order to existence; for nothing is thought fitting except as existing or in order to existing; but what exists or can exist is being; therefore the good as fitting includes or supposes being. Thirdly, because those things which are reputed fitting to something, although they are not beings but rather privations or negations of beings, are in truth not good, and in the way in which they are sometimes called good, in so far as they are desirable, they are also called in some way beings; therefore the reason of each is equal. The minor is declared as regards the former part, because that which is called fitting as a privation is in truth not good, but the lack of some evil, if one stops precisely at the privation; but the lack of evil as such is not goodness unless something else is added. As in moral things too it is one thing to decline from evil, another to do good, and not to do evil is not virtue or good unless it includes a positive will of not doing evil. So, then, it is in natural things; for to lack heat is not properly a good of water, but is the lack of an evil or of something unfitting, and a certain condition necessary in order that it may have its goodness and perfection. Wherefore, if fittingness is taken in this amplitude, goodness and fittingness are not the same, even as goodness is said of that which is good to another; but goodness expresses entity or perfection as fitting to something; and therefore that which is fitting only after the manner of privation is in truth not good; or (to prove the other part of the minor), if privations of this kind fitting to things can be denominated good, in the same way they can be called beings. For, as we noted above from the doctrine of Aristotle and St. Thomas, that is sometimes called being which truly has being, but sometimes that which can truly be predicated after the manner of being, in which way a man is said to be blind or blindness to be in a man. On account of this shadow of being, then, it comes about that such a being, if it is fitting to something, is called good to it; the good, therefore, always keeps proportion to being and does not extend more universally than it.

4. Good and being mutually infer each other.—I say, secondly: every true being is good in itself, or has some goodness fitting to itself; and so it comes about that the good absolutely said is convertible with being. Concerning this conclusion can be reported the error of the Manichees and Priscillianists; for they said that there are certain creatures evil of themselves and procreated by a certain supremely evil principle, as Nicephorus reports at length, Historia VI, c. 31; and Eusebius, Book VII, c. 28; and more fully Augustine, tom. VI, book De haeresibus, heresy 46, and in innumerable opuscula against the Manichees; and St. Thomas, I, qq. 48 and 49, and Contra Gentiles III, cc. 7 and 8; and Pope Leo, Epistle 93 to Turibius, specially defines against the Priscillianists. The same the First Council of Braga, cc. 7 and 8; and it can easily be convinced from divine Scripture; for, Genesis 1, of the individual divine works it is said: And God saw that it was good; but of all together it is subjoined: He saw all things that he had made, and they were very good. Ecclesiastes 3: He has made all things good in their time. 1 Timothy 4: Every creature of God is good. The reason of the conclusion is that every real being necessarily has some perfection by which it is constituted in its being, which in the thing is nothing other than the very entity by which it is perfected; for the very entity of the thing, or the form, matter or nature by which the thing is constituted in its being, are called the perfections of the thing, because by them it is perfected in its being. Just as, therefore, real being cannot be understood which does not consist or is not constituted by its entity, so it cannot be understood without the real perfection by which it is perfected; but perfection and the goodness by which a thing is called good in itself are the same.

5. But this perfection in creatures can be either essential or intrinsic (under which I comprehend being itself), or accidental. The former is inseparable from each being, if it is preserved in its actual being. But the latter can often be separated. The denomination of good, therefore, which necessarily belongs to every being is that which is taken from intrinsic and essential perfection; but as it can be taken from accidental perfection (including under this notion whatever is distinguished from the nature of the thing from the essence of the thing and its actual entity), then it is not necessary that every created being be good, that is, affected by every perfection possible or due to it. And so it comes about that the good taken in the former notion is convertible with being; for we have shown that every being is good, and that nothing is truly good except what truly is. It follows next that the good taken under the same notion is in some way an attribute or property of being, because it both is convertible with it and according to reason supposes it, and is in some way distinguished from it according to the formal notion conceived and signified by us. And therefore I said that it is in some way an attribute, because it is not an attribute in that rigour in which an attribute requires some distinction from the nature of the thing from its subject, but only as it is said of any attribute whatever distinct according to reason from that to which it is attributed, as was declared above in treating of the attributes.

6. Every being is fitting to another.—Induction in all grades of beings.—I say, thirdly: every being is also good with respect to something, that is, fitting to something; wherefore the good taken under the notion of the fitting too is convertible with being and is its attribute or property. The former part is proved, first, by induction; for first of all every accidental being is good to some substance. Because, although sometimes it is not fitting to some subject, as heat to water, nevertheless an accident can never not express a relationship and aptitude to some subject which it affects well and fittingly according to some notion, either proper or common; for so heat, although it is not good to water, is nevertheless good to fire; and although it is not good to water as water, it is nevertheless good to water as it is a natural or material being. And an erroneous judgement of the intellect, although as erroneous it is not fitting to the intellect, nevertheless as it is a judgement or a certain representation of such an object is fitting to the intellect as it is in potency to second act and to intellectual representation; and the same holds of the acts of the will, however much some of them seem intrinsically evil. Again, created substances composed of matter and form are so related that both matter is fitting to form and form to matter, and their union similarly is fitting to each, and consequently the whole itself is not only fitting to itself but also to the individual parts. Whence it comes about that any part naturally desires the preservation of the whole more than the preservation of itself, as St. Thomas noted, II-II, q. 26, a. 1. And this mode of fittingness can be extended to every created substance, in so far as it is in some way composite, either of nature and some mode or substantial term, or of itself and its accidents, for which it is good and fitting.

7. But in the most simple substance, which is God, there is not properly found within it this mode of fittingness which is understood to be of one thing to another in some way distinct in the thing; but through supreme identity and simplicity God is fitting to himself, and his nature is fitting to his person, and personality to the nature itself; but this fittingness is rather according to that notion by which he is rendered good and perfect in himself than according to that by which he is said to be fitting to something. Although a theologian could doubt whether, the Trinity of persons with unity in essence being supposed in God, one person can truly be called the good of another or fitting to another, not only by reason of the essence, in which they are most simply one, but also by reason of the properties in which they are distinguished. For it does not seem inconvenient to concede that one person is a thing fitting to another, not as its formal perfection, but as principle to what is from the principle; or as the term can be called fitting to the relation; or the existence of one relative can be called fitting to the other correlative; and the society of several persons can be thought fitting to each; in all of which no imperfection is denoted nor dependence, but only the necessary coexistence of three persons in one essence. But let us leave this to the theologians.

8. But with respect to creatures God is the supreme good supremely fitting to them, not as their formal goodness. In which way some erred, thinking that all created things are good with the divine goodness, which is manifestly false, because the divine goodness cannot be a form inhering in creatures or come into composition with them so as to constitute them formally good. Nor can creatures be or be called good by mere extrinsic denomination from the goodness of God, because, as they have in themselves their proper being distinct from the being of God, although participated from him, so they have in themselves their proper goodness and perfection distinct from the divine goodness, but flowing from it and participated. God, therefore, is a good fitting to all creatures in the genus of efficient and of end; for from that good all the goodness of the creature flows and depends, and in the attainment of that good, or some imitation of it, the supreme perfection of the creature consists. And in this way Augustine said, De Trinitate VIII, c. 3, that God is the good of every good. But conversely creatures cannot be called fitting to God in the way in which he is fitting to them, namely as a good advantageous to them and communicating goodness to them; but nevertheless they can be called fitting to God as works becoming him and consonant with his goodness and wisdom; for so we say that the heavens are a work worthy of God and fitting to him, as we say that a rightly painted image is a work fitting to such an artificer. In which sense that of Genesis could be expounded: God saw that it was good, that is, fittingly disposed and fabricated as became such a maker.

9. And in this way it can easily be understood that one thing or substance, even distinct in supposit, is a good fitting to another, which can also be observed in creatures; for one creature is fitting to another either because it in some way contributes to its being, or to its perfection or beauty, or to communicating its goodness which it has participated from God, or to exercising its actions. No true and real being, therefore, can be thought out which is not in some way fitting to something. Whence a general reason can be given, because every being is in some way good and perfect in itself; but every good is not only fitting to itself but is also fitting to something, either so that it communicates itself to it in some way, or at least so that it is made by it and is ordered to the advantage of others, or at least to the beauty and some completion of the universe. And by this reason there is no being which cannot fall under the object of the will as fitting to something or to some end. So, then, it is evident that the good, also as it expresses the notion of the fitting, is convertible with being, because we have shown that everything which is truly and positively fitting is being, and conversely that every true being is in some way fitting. And hence finally it is concluded that the good also under this notion can be numbered among the attributes of being, in so far as it is a certain general attribute of being, which is not altogether synonymous with it, but connotes or includes something beyond the entity of the thing, as was declared in sect. 1.

10. Natural honest goodness chiefly constitutes the transcendent good.—I say, fourthly: the transcendent good seems to be taken chiefly from honest goodness, not in the genus of morals but of nature; although it can also be said abstractly and generally of goodness as it abstracts from all. It is declared, for if a being is called good in itself, that denomination is taken from this, that it has in itself perfection fitting to itself; but this fittingness pertains to natural honesty, in so far as every good of this kind is per se desirable at least by that whose good and perfection it is. Whence arose that axiom: The good is lovable, but to each his own. But it is sufficiently likely that the transcendent good was primarily taken from the relationship or denomination by which each being has in itself some perfection fitting to itself. So, then, goodness in some way honest in the order of nature is the universal property of being from which the transcendent good has been denominated. But if being is called good in so far as it is fitting to another, then every being seems to be per se fitting to something with which it has some natural proportion, either as cause with effect, or as effect with cause, or as part with whole, or whole with part, or in some other similar way; and so in every being there can be found some fittingness on account of which it is per se desirable with respect to something, which under that notion is reduced to the honesty of nature. And therefore from this goodness the denomination of good and fitting, in so far as it is common to every being, seems to have been taken, for it is most intrinsic and universal; but useful goodness properly taken is more extrinsic and only in a certain respect; but delightful goodness is not so common to every being, but seems to be particular, if the discussion is of delight properly and not metaphorically. From these things, then, the former part of the conclusion is sufficiently evident. But the latter is most easy, because, if the good is taken abstractly when it is said of every being, the sense is not that every notion of good, namely of the honest, useful and delightful, is found in any being whatever, but simply the notion of good; which will be true if at least some notion of good is found in each being. The transcendent good, therefore, taken in that abstraction, can be assigned as a property of being, although in particular it is to be attributed to each being according to the proper mode and determinate notion of goodness and fittingness.

Whether relation expresses perfection

11. The opinion of some.—The view of others.—To the reason for doubting posited at the beginning the answer is by denying that the good is not convertible with being. But to the proof about the former part, about the good absolutely said, it must be answered one by one. In the first is touched upon the common difficulty about real relation, whether it expresses perfection, which the theologians are wont to dispute on the occasion of the mystery of the Trinity, because, if relation as such expresses perfection, the divine relations too will express it; whence it will come about that some perfection is in one person which is not in another, and more perfections in many persons than in one, and in the Trinity than in the essence, all of which are repugnant to the equality of the divine persons. On account of this cause, then, many deny that relation, as it is relation, expresses perfection or imperfection, but say that it is related in neither way. So holds Cajetan, De ente et essentia, c. 2, around the middle, where he supposes this as commonly received in the school of St. Thomas and of Scotus. And St. Thomas indeed favours it, I, q. 42, a. 4, ad 2, where he thinks that perfection as such expresses something absolute. Of Scotus I shall speak below; the same is held by Cajetan, I, q. 28, a. 2, around ad 3; Capreolus, In I, dist. 1, q. 7, ad 3; Aureolus, Contra 1 conclus.; Durandus, In III, dist. 1, q. 3, n. 12; and Marsilius, In I, q. 32, a. 3. And, the theological reason being omitted, this opinion can be founded, because it seems incredible that from this alone, that another becomes white or black or changes place, I acquire or lose some perfection because I lose or acquire a relation of likeness, nearness and similar ones. But others use a distinction, because relation can be considered as regards being in the subject, and as such they say that relation expresses perfection; or according to being toward the term, and as regards this they deny that it expresses perfection, because being toward, as toward, posits nothing in the subject; whence of itself it is common to relations of reason; and Capreolus signified this, saying that relation in so far as it is such does not express perfection, because as such it posits nothing in that to which it is attributed.

12. But because of the nature of relation it is to be disputed below in its proper place, it must now briefly be supposed that this question proceeds of true and real relations, which are true things or real modes of beings, not now disputing which relations are of this kind or how they are, which will be done in the aforesaid place. This, then, being supposed, I do not see how according to the above opinions satisfaction can be made to the difficulty proposed, except by limiting the conclusion posited above, namely that the good is convertible with absolute being, but not with being as it is common to absolute and respective; or certainly that, although every being as it is distinguished from a mode of a thing expresses perfection, nevertheless the mode of the thing does not add a special goodness or perfection. But these limitations can have neither foundation nor truth. And the former indeed is repugnant to Aristotle, Ethics I, c. 6, saying that the good is divided equally with being, and wanders through all the predicaments; and he expressly says: The good is said both in substance and in quality and in that which is toward something, etc.; where St. Thomas says that the good is convertible with being, which is divided into ten predicaments; and this is the sense of all who say that the transcendent good is an attribute of being and convertible with it; that, therefore, is not a limitation but a destruction of the received opinion.

13. Moreover, that real being expresses some perfection does not belong to it only because it is absolute being, but simply because it has true entity, which constitutes such a being as it ought to be; and in this consists its being its perfection; and therefore Augustine said, Eighty-three Questions, q. 24: Everything which is, in so far as it is, is good; and De libero arbitrio III, c. 15, he said: Whatever is as it ought to be, is good; and De doctrina Christiana I, c. 32, when he had said that God is he who supremely is, he says: But the other things which are cannot be except from him, and they are good in so far as they have received that they are; and Boethius, De hebdomadibus, c. 2: Whatever is (he says), in that it is, is good; therefore goodness does not follow upon this or that mode of entity, but upon the entity due to the thing; but relation is supposed to have proper entity, through which it has such being as it ought to have; therefore also goodness.

14. Moreover, how can real being be understood without some real perfection? For, by whatever reason someone may have feigned that this can be understood in relative entity, although it is not found in absolute, someone will be able to feign the same in any accidental entity whatever, or also in any real mode whatever, namely that it expresses no perfection, even though it is something real; which nevertheless universally to concede of all accidents or real modes is altogether false. Nor can a sufficient reason of difference be assigned between relation and other modes, if we suppose that relation is a true thing or a real mode; for, although relation expresses order to the term, nevertheless according to the whole of what it is it affects the subject and is in it. Whence that distinction of relation according to being in or according to being toward helps nothing; for, if being toward is true and real, it is necessary that it affect the subject which it refers to the term; whence, just as relation, even according to being toward, posits in the subject something real, so also it posits something of goodness or perfection. Nor is it true that relation according to being toward prescinds from being in, as it does not prescind from the being of being or of accident, because that being in is transcendent to all accidents and their modes, as being itself is to all beings and modes of beings. Nor is it true either that being toward abstracts from real and of reason except in word only; for a relation of reason, as it is not a true relation, so neither does it have being toward, but is feigned to have it, or is conceived as if it had it.

15. True and real relation as such includes goodness and perfection.—It must be said, then, that relation as it is relation, as it expresses proper entity or a mode of entity, so also expresses proper goodness or perfection, as Ockham and Gabriel rightly taught, In I, dist. 19, q. 1; and Gregory, q. 1, a. 1; and Durandus indicates it, In II, dist. 34, q. 1, ad 3; nor does Scotus dissent, in the said Quodlibet V, for in his last words he leaves the matter doubtful and undecided; and In I, dist. 1, q. 2, first argument, he proves from the testimony of Aristotle, from Ethics I, adduced above, that relation has proper goodness, and in the solution he concedes that it has goodness speaking in common, yet not perfect goodness which would constitute a special notion of an object to be enjoyed, of which elsewhere. And certainly, if anyone considers the testimonies of Scripture and of the Saints by which we proved that every created being is good, and the reason and mode by which we declared that goodness belongs adequately to being, he will plainly understand that it proceeds equally of any being whatever which has some entity in itself, so that it is necessary that it have so much perfection in itself and be some good in itself, whatever may be the case whether it is fitting to some other besides itself or the thing constituted through it in so far as it is such. It is confirmed and declared, for on account of the same general expressions and reasons the entity of the act of sin cannot be excepted, nor any real mode or difference of it, from being, in so far as it is such, made by God and good; therefore the same holds of any other positive notion of being whatever, however respective it is.

16. Whether the divine relations express perfection from their proper concept.—The opinion of some is rejected.—But to the theological difficulty some answer that, although created relation expresses perfection from its proper concept and notion, nevertheless divine relation from its proper concept expresses no perfection. Which they say chiefly in order to avoid that inconvenience, that some perfection is in one person which is not in another. But they give the reason of the difference, because created relation expresses finite perfection; but uncreated relation cannot express finite perfection, because this is repugnant to the divine perfection; nor can it from its proper notion express infinite perfection, because this infinity can belong only by reason of the essence. But it is wonderful that they think it inconvenient that some divine thing express of itself finite perfection, and do not reckon it a disadvantage that the same divine thing express of itself no perfection, although nevertheless of its genus it is better to express some perfection than none. I add that it can easily be understood that relation from its proper concept is infinite in the genus of paternity or filiation, etc., yet is not infinite in the genus of being except by reason of the essence which it includes.

17. The view of others is refuted.—Others give the reason of the difference, because created relation is distinguished from the nature of the thing from every absolute thing and perfection, and therefore it is necessary that it bring with it its perfection. But divine relation is not distinguished from the nature of the thing from the absolute perfection of the divine nature, but includes it in itself with perfect identity and simplicity, and therefore it is not necessary that it bring perfection with it; and Gregory indicates this answer above. Nevertheless neither does that reason satisfy me; for, although it rightly concludes that divine relation cannot express perfection distinct from the nature of the thing from the essence, it does not conclude that it does not express perfection distinct by reason, namely in the way in which it expresses entity. And as regards this no sufficient reason of difference can be assigned why it is of the notion of created entity that according to every positive notion of its own it express some perfection, and not with greater reason belong to uncreated entity, since this of its genus is better, indeed necessary by virtue of the common concept of real being as such. Whence the reason made about the convertibility between being and good urges equally in the divine relations as in created ones. For if, as Aristotle said, the good is divided equally with being, just as in God there are absolute and respective being, although distinct not in reality but by reason, so there will be absolute and respective goodness and perfection, distinct not in reality but by reason; therefore divine relation too from its proper concept will express perfection. And it is declared in this way, for, if to regard a son by a created relation is formally some perfection, how can it be understood that in the eternal Father to regard the Son is no perfection? But if it is formally a perfection, it is necessary that it be relative, because it consists in a relationship to the term; therefore that as such comes formally from the relation and not from the essence as essence, although these are not distinguished in reality.

18. Since uncreated relation expresses perfection, how the divine persons are equally perfect.—I think, therefore, that it must be conceded that every real relation expresses proper goodness or perfection. Nor does it come about thence that the divine persons are unequal in perfection, nor, absolutely speaking, that some perfection is in one which is not in the others, because in each person there is the same perfection infinite in the genus of being, formally or eminently including every perfection of all, both absolute and respective, both personal and essential. But of this more fully on I, qq. 28 and 42. To the other reason, that it seems incredible that a man is rendered more perfect because another becomes white, I answer that this is incredible in so far as it is incredible that a man acquires in himself something of entity or some real mode distinct from the nature of the thing from all which he had before, from this alone, that another becomes white. Whoever, therefore, believes this of entity, why will he say it is incredible of goodness or perfection? But whoever says that there are some relative denominations which, besides all the absolute things which are in one term or subject, connote nothing but the coexistence of the other extreme with these or those absolute conditions—whoever (I say) thinks so, will rightly and consistently say that relations of this kind express no perfection besides the absolute things with some mutual denomination. But we are not speaking of these relations or denominations, but of true respective entities or modes, which truly and intrinsically are in some subject or supposit regarding another term; and this concerning the first difficulty.

Whether mathematical things as such are perfect

19. The second and briefer difficulty was about mathematical things, which Aristotle denies are good. Which St. Thomas dissolves, I, q. 5, a. 3, ad 4, and De veritate, q. 21, a. 2, ad 4, asserting that mathematical things indeed have goodness in themselves, but that through mathematical science they are not considered in so far as they are good or fitting, but precisely and abstractly in so far as they have magnitude and according to it obtain some properties. Aristotle, therefore, who says of mathematical things that there is no goodness in them, speaks formally and precisely of them as they are under mathematical prescission or abstraction. Whence it is the same as if he said that the mathematician does not consider in quantity the notion of good or fitting; for quantity does not have the notion of good or fitting except as it exists or can exist in the nature of things or in sensible matter; and therefore it also prescinds from the notion of good and from the notion of end and the desirable, which Aristotle intends there. And, although Aristotle does not say that mathematical things are not good, but that in immobile things the nature of the good is not found, and thence concludes that in mathematics nothing is demonstrated through the final cause, nevertheless by immobile things he understands whatever are abstracted from all motion and action, such as are mathematical beings.

20. Some objections are proposed.—But you will object: for magnitudes too, as they are under mathematical abstraction, are beings; for they are not abstracted from being, otherwise the mathematicians would treat of beings of reason; therefore as such too it is necessary that they have goodness. Likewise, if abstraction from sensible matter alone were enough for things so abstracted not to be called good, then universal things abstracted from singulars would not be good either. The consequence is evident, because, just as mathematical things do not subsist so abstracted, so neither do the other universal things; and so it will come about that all things, in so far as they fall under science, are not good. Likewise, if mathematical things are not good because they are abstracted from motion, immaterial things too and all those which are considered in metaphysics would not as such be good, because they are much more abstracted from motion.

21. The objections proposed are satisfied.—To the first some answer that mathematical things as such, that is, as they are considered and abstracted in that science, are not true beings, because as such they cannot be. But this is not rightly said, because whatever is considered by the mathematician is true and absolute being and is considered as such. Nor is it necessary that it can be in the way in which it is considered; otherwise neither would universals be true beings. It is enough, then, that the things which are abstractly considered can truly be. Especially because, although quantity cannot naturally be except in sensible matter, nevertheless absolutely it does not involve a contradiction that it be separated; through that abstraction, therefore, the true notion of being is not excluded, neither from the thing considered according to itself, nor as it falls under such consideration. But it is otherwise of the notion of good; for although this is not excluded from the things themselves, it is nevertheless prescinded by such a science or such a consideration under such abstraction. Rightly, therefore, St. Thomas above answers in form by denying the consequence, because the notion of being is the first of all; but the notion of good, in the way in which it is distinct, is posterior, and therefore the mathematical sciences, although they do not abstract from entity, can prescind from goodness.

22. To the second the answer is that the reason of the abstraction of universals is not equal or similar; for mathematical things are not said to abstract from goodness because they are abstracted from inferiors, nor because they cannot be so abstracted, but because they are prescinded from every order to motion or action, and consequently from every notion of the fitting or desirable; but other universal natures, although they are considered abstracted from singulars, are nevertheless considered with order to motion or action, which takes its first origin from the end, on the testimony of Aristotle. Whence it comes about that the things considered in other sciences have in singulars all the conditions which pertain to the notion of good or to the notion of end, which indeed are considered by such sciences, although not in the singular but in the universal. But mathematics neither in the universal nor in the singular considers in the things objected to it those conditions or relationships which pertain to the notion of good or fitting.

23. To the third the answer is, first, that, although in other things from abstraction from physical motion abstraction from goodness is not rightly inferred, nevertheless in mathematical things Aristotle inferred it, because, since these things are not capable of another motion or action, while they are abstracted from this motion they are abstracted also from every action and from the causality of the end, and so from the notion of good. Or it can be said that the intelligences and other things which are considered in metaphysics, although they are abstracted from material and physical motion, are nevertheless not abstracted from metaphorical motion, by which the end moves. Whence below, Book XII, c. 7, Aristotle said that the first mover moves the other intelligences as loved and desired, which pertains to the notion of end and good.

Whether prime matter is good

24. In what sense matter is said not to be good simply.—The third difficulty was about prime matter, of which those who think that it does not have proper being nor proper actual entity would perhaps say that it does not have proper goodness, or at least does not have it of itself, but from the form; for, since the good follows being and is founded in it, as we said above from Augustine, St. Thomas and Boethius, if matter does not have being except from form, neither will it be able to have goodness, at least in act, but at most in potency; and so St. Thomas speaks, I, q. 5, a. 3, ad 3, and De veritate, q. 21, a. 2, ad 3. But it must be said that matter of itself and by its intrinsic notion has proper goodness and perfection, as St. Thomas also noted, Contra Gentiles III, c. 20, because it has its proper entity and nature distinct from the entity of the form. Likewise because among prime matters one is more perfect than another; for the matter of the heavenly bodies is more perfect than that of these inferior ones; there is, therefore, some perfection in matter. Likewise because matter naturally desires form as the complement of its perfection, and form also desires matter; but neither is anything desired except the good, nor does anything desire the good except that which is in some part good. Finally, although matter does not have existence except dependent on form, it nevertheless has its proper and inseparable existence with intrinsic order and dependence on form; so, then, it also has its goodness, as Dionysius also taught, On the Divine Names, c. 4. But because matter of itself in the genus of being is simply imperfect and has being only after the manner of a potency receptive of form, therefore, compared to beings simply, it is said to be not simply good but in potency; which is to be understood not of potency to any goodness whatever, even incomplete and potential (so to speak), but of potency to actual or complete goodness, which is through form; but this potentiality to form is in the breadth of being some actuality, and so also some goodness, although imperfect.

Whether created essences are perfect

25. Existing created essences are good.—The fourth difficulty was about the essences of creatures, of which we can speak in two ways. First, as they are actually in the nature of things. Secondly, as they are in potency before they exist. In the former way it is certain that such essences are good with their intrinsic and essential goodness, which is especially clear if through their formal entity they are actual beings. But those who distinguish in the thing itself the entity of essence, even actual, from the entity of existence must consequently say that also in the entity of essence there is found a proper transcendental goodness and perfection distinct from the being of existence itself and separable from it, as many think of the humanity of Christ, of which matter we shall speak below. But speaking in the latter way of the essences of things not yet existing, some say that, although they are beings, they are not good, because the good is convertible with being in act, not with being in potency. Which St. Thomas indicated, I, q. 5, a. 1, saying that the good is the same as the perfect; but that each thing is perfect in so far as it is in act, because being is the actuality of every thing. He has the same in Contra Gentiles I, c. 38, where Ferrariensis adds or declares that not only being actually existing, but also that having order to existence, is good, as it is also desirable.

26. Non-existing created essences, as they are only beings in potency, so also are good.—It must be said, then, that in this too being and good are equated and reciprocated; for the essences of things not existing, as they are not actually beings, so neither are they actually good; and as they are in potency in so far as they can receive being, so also they are good in potency in so far as they can receive actual perfection and goodness. But as regards the use of words, that too is wont to be called being which does not exist, on account of the objective capacity of being; but nothing is wont to be called simply good except what actually exists, and so also nothing is desired except in order to actual existence, that is, in so far as it has it, or at least in so far as it is hoped to have it, or is in some way apprehended with it, as is taken from St. Thomas, I, q. 82, a. 3; and Cajetan noted it, I, q. 5, a. 3, at the end. Whence also the divine will is properly said to love those creatures which it wills sometime to be; but possible creatures which it has decreed never to produce it does not properly love, because it communicates to them no actual good; but that being in potency is not now in them some actual goodness. But if in some way God is said to take pleasure in them, it is either according to the being which they have in God himself, or according as they are denominated possible from the omnipotence of God, which is rather to take pleasure in his omnipotence, from which those things too which are not have it that they are possible.

Whether mode, species and order are necessary in every notion of good

27. The fifth difficulty has been dispatched from what was said above; for we said that the good, in so far as it is taken from proper entity and perfection, is convertible with being, and in this way every being is good; yet not as the good is taken in creatures from accidental perfection superadded to essence. So, then, when the good is said to consist in mode, species and order, if it is understood of accidental mode, beauty and composition or order, then it is true that not every created being has due mode, species and order; from which it only follows that not every created being is simply good, not that it is not in some way good. But if those three are taken more intrinsically and essentially, there is no thing which does not have a mode connatural to itself, as, for example, that it is substance or accident; and a species, that is, a form or species due to it; and is ordered to its proper end. And so the good too which includes these three is convertible with being. Wherefore, lest there be equivocation in the word by which something is called good simply, it is necessary to notice that simply can be taken either as adding something to the transcendent good itself, so that that is called good simply to which nothing is lacking for the consummated perfection due to it, and in this sense it is not necessary that every created being be good simply; or that word simply can be taken otherwise to signify that which absolutely and without addition can be called good; and in this sense we say that each thing is simply good as it is simply being, and in the same proportion has the mode, species and order due to its nature, as St. Thomas declares more fully, in the said q. 5, a. 5.