Disputationes metaphysicae

1. Reasons for doubting.—First indeed it can seem that they do not so depend, because before a thing receives being it is no wonder if it depends on another in becoming; because, since of itself it does not have being, it cannot have it until it receives it from another, which is for the thing to be made; but after a thing has once received being, there is no reason why it should continually depend on the actual influx of another, because this actual influx is as it were a certain continuous, or rather repeated, conferring of being itself; but this not only does not seem necessary, but even superfluous; for any thing will retain the being once given to it, even if it is no longer given, provided it is not taken away. For no thing deprives itself of its being; therefore, if it is once given, it will, so far as concerns itself, retain it perpetually, even if it is no longer actually conferred, provided it is not taken away positively or through some contrary action. And this is confirmed most of all in incorruptible beings, which are necessary beings and of themselves, and to which being belongs per se; therefore they do not need actual conservation in order to be, because, although conservation ceases, no cause, at least outside God, can exercise an action about them by which it deprives them of their being; nor will they deprive themselves, since this is repugnant to their proper nature. And the same reason proceeds of corruptible beings, at least when they are not corrupted by contrary agents.

2. Secondly, it can at least seem that nothing else can be proved by natural reason, because this cannot be sufficiently shown either from the power of God or from the need of the creature. The former part is proved, for it rather seems to pertain to the power of God that He can make such effects as, after they have been made, remain in their being even if the operation of the agent ceases; just as it pertains to the industry and power of a human artificer that he make a building so firm that it can remain perpetually after the action of the artificer is finished; this is not, therefore, repugnant to the omnipotence of God, nor can the opposite be gathered from it. But the other part was proved from the prior argument; for the need of the creature seems to consist only in this, that it cannot have being unless given by another; not in this, that it cannot retain it unless it is continually given. And it is confirmed, for if there were any universal imperfection of the creature on account of which it needed this conservation, it would most of all be because it does not participate being from God with equality or with the same perfection with which it is in God; but this reason is of no weight, both because, even if the being of the creature were independent in this way, it would not on that account be equal, for it would still be inferior by infinite other titles; and also because neither does it follow conversely that, if the being of the effect is inferior in perfection to the being of the cause, it must also be actually dependent; for in secondary causes we see the opposite happen; for gold is made by the sun with a certain less perfect being, in which, however, it does not depend in being conserved on the sun itself. And heat is conserved when the action of fire ceases, even though it does not reach the perfection of the heat of fire. And a house outside is of a far diverse and inferior notion from the idea of the house which the artificer has, and nevertheless remains when the influx of the artificer ceases; why, then, can the same not be said of the effects of the first cause? or what singular reason can be assigned in them?

3. On this question there is among theologians no variety of opinions on this matter. Although those who deny that God operates immediately in every action of the creature will without doubt be compelled to deny that every created thing, or every being by participation, depends immediately on the actual influx of God, because what does not depend in becoming will not depend in being either. But of the false foundation of that opinion we must speak in the following disputation. Now, then, although we chiefly treat of the effects which are immediately created and made by God, yet, in order that the disputation may be universal, since the reason of all is the same, we suppose that all things are made immediately by God, even if they are not always made by Him alone. Again, those who deny that the creation of things can be proved by natural reason will much more deny that the necessity of conservation can be proved. But that foundation has already been disproved by us. Yet, even the demonstration of the necessity of creation being supposed, the necessity of conservation is not easy to prove.

Resolution of the question

4. It must be said, however, that all beings outside God depend in their being on divine conservation. This assertion under these terms is most certain and of faith. And it is frequently handed down by the Fathers of the Church, especially by Augustine, bk. IV Genes. ad litter., c. 12, where, treating those words of Genes. 2, And God rested on the seventh day from all the work which He had done, he says that they are to be understood of rest from new works to be founded from nothing, not from governing and conserving the things founded. Otherwise (he says) they would continually fall apart. For the power of the Creator, and the might of the Omnipotent and All-holding, is the cause of subsisting to every creature. Which power, if it ever ceased from ruling the things which have been created, at once their species too would cease, and all nature would collapse. For it is not as with a structure of buildings, which when someone has built he departs, and when he ceases and departs his work stands; so not even in the twinkling of an eye could the world stand, if God withdrew from it His rule. Which, however, he does not prove by reason, but confirms by testimonies of Scripture, Acts 17: In Him we live, and move, and are; Wisdom 7: Wisdom is more active than all active things; and reacheth everywhere; and c. 8: She reacheth from end to end mightily, and ordereth all things sweetly; John 5: My Father worketh until now. Expounding which words the same Augustine, bk. V Genes., c. 20: Thus (he says) let us believe, or, if we can, also understand, that God works until now, so that, if His operation is withdrawn from the things founded by Him, they perish; and bk. IX, c. 15, he repeats the same.

5. Gregory Nazianzen teaches the same truth, oration II On Theology, q. 36, where, solving the sixth objection, he expounds the words of John 5 cited above as said by reason of the government and conservation of things; and Damascene, bk. I, c. 3: The very (he says) structure and conservation and government of created things teaches us that it is God who has fitted together this whole mass of things and guards and conserves it, and perpetually provides for it; and Gregory, XVI Moral., c. 18: It is one thing (he says) to be, another to be principally, another mutably, and another immutably to be. For all these things are, but they are not principally, because in themselves they by no means subsist. And unless they are held by the hand of the governor, they can by no means be. And below: For all things were made from nothing, and their essence would tend again to nothing, unless the author of all held it by the hand of His rule. And in this way they seem to understand those words of Job 23: God alone is, namely, principally and without dependence on another. In which sense he thinks it was said in Exodus 3: I am who am. Hence in homily 17 on Ezekiel: God (he says) incomprehensibly rules what He incomprehensibly created. And below: He Himself is interior and exterior, He inferior and superior, superior by ruling, inferior by bearing, interior by filling, exterior by surrounding; so He surrounds that He penetrates; so He presides that He bears, and so is within that He bears, so bears that He presides. In which words he seems to allude to that of Hebr. 1: Bearing all things by the word of His power; for that bearing seems to be the same as conserving. Which is said more openly in Wisdom 11: How could anything endure, if Thou wouldst not? or be preserved, if not called by Thee? Finally Anselm, Monologion, c. 12: It can be doubtful (he says) only to an irrational mind that all things which have been made flourish by the sustaining of the same one, and persevere in being as long as they are, by whose making they have from nothing the being which they are. And below: As nothing has been made except through the creative present essence, so nothing flourishes except through His conserving power; which he pursues in c. 13, and tacitly so expounds that of Rom. 11: of Him, and by Him, and in Him, are all things, and that of Col. 1: All things consist in Him. For by these and similar expressions of Scripture it is signified that the conservation of things rests on God, that is, on the divine power and efficacy.

6. The conclusion can be demonstrated by natural reason.—From these things, then, it is sufficiently established that this truth is certain and infallible; but it must be added that it can be proved by sufficient reason, or even demonstrated; which, among the said Fathers, Damascene and Anselm more openly taught, and they think that by the reason by which it is proved that God is the creator of all things, it is also proved that He is conserver; which consecution, however, seems neither evident from the terms nor wholly easy. St. Thomas, however, tacitly proves it, I, q. 8, a. 1, and more at length q. 104, a. 1, where he has a long and very metaphysical discourse, which suffers several difficulties, which Cajetan diligently treats there. The sum of the whole discourse is that God is the cause of creatures not only as to becoming, but also as to being, directly and per se primo; but when an effect depends on its cause as to being directly and per se primo, it depends not only in becoming but also in being conserved; so, therefore, all depend on God.

7. But in order that the sense of the whole antecedent may be understood, it can at once be objected that in the major the question seems to be begged and what is to be proved assumed; for what else can it be for an effect to depend in being on a cause except to depend in being conserved? It is the same, therefore, to say that God is the cause of becoming and of being as to say that God is the cause in becoming and in being conserved; therefore what is to be proved is assumed. Otherwise the division of causes is vain, that some are causes of the becoming of their effects, others causes of their very being. For there is no cause which properly per se and directly makes becoming itself which is not per se and directly the cause of being itself; for becoming itself is per se terminated at that; indeed being itself cannot be first caused otherwise than through becoming. God, therefore, in the first instant in which He creates a thing, is the cause of its being because He is the cause of its becoming; and similarly fire, in the instant in which it generates fire by causing generation, gives being to the generated fire, whence it is the cause of its being. Therefore, in order that the cause in becoming can be distinguished from the cause of being itself, it is necessary that by being permanence in being be understood, and under becoming being itself be comprehended as it exists together with becoming; but in this way to be the cause of being itself, or of permanence in being, is to be the cause in being conserved; what is to be proved, therefore, is assumed.

8. It is answered that that distinction is not to be understood in that sense, as the argument proves and as St. Thomas himself and Cajetan declare, although somewhat obscurely. I think the matter is to be understood so, that that effect is said to be from a cause in becoming which does not demand such cause simply and absolutely in order to be, but only in order to be through such action or effecting; but that effect is said to be from a cause directly according to being which, in order to be absolutely and simply, demands such cause. As, for example, Adam will be said to be from God according to becoming and being, because he necessarily demands such cause in order to be; but Abel will be said to be from Adam according to becoming, because absolutely he does not need that cause in order to be, for he could have been from God alone, but only in order to be made in such a way, namely, through natural generation. You will say: by the same reason Adam will be said to be from God only as to becoming, because he could have been from another parent through natural generation. It is answered by denying the sequel, because he could not have been from another without being from God. And in this sense St. Thomas rightly says there that no effect which receives from the agent form and being according to the same notion in which it is in the cause is and depends on such cause according to its being, but only according to becoming, because otherwise that effect, by reason of its form, would essentially demand such cause; but this cannot be, because otherwise, since the form of the agent is supposed to be of the same species, it would essentially demand the same cause; therefore it would demand to be caused by itself, which is a repugnance. It is rightly concluded, therefore, from this that only that agent which is of a superior notion, and which does not communicate to the effect form or nature or being of the same notion, but a certain inferior participation of it, can be the cause of its effects not only as to becoming but also as to being.

9. According to this interpretation, then, the sense of the major proposition assumed is easy, and its truth most known, because God is so the cause of His effects that from their intrinsic nature and intrinsic necessity they demand such cause in order to be, because, as we said above, they depend on it essentially. And the a priori reason is that only the first cause is being itself by essence; but every other being is a participation of that being, and therefore from intrinsic necessity demands the influx of being itself by essence in order to be. Which reason seems to prove not only that God is the cause of His effects directly according to their being, but also that God alone is in this way the cause of the other beings, because no being is so made by another created cause that absolutely and simply it needs it in order to receive being; for it could be from the influx of God alone without another cause, although not conversely.

10. And this indeed is true, speaking simply and of absolute necessity; yet according to a certain participation and according to a certain order of nature, some equivocal causes are said to be per se causes of effects directly according to their being, because the form of such effect according to its whole latitude depends per se primo on such cause, and can be made by it according to its whole species, and according to the order of nature demands so to be made. And in this way the sun is the cause of light, comprehending under the sun whatever participates its nature as to the property of light; for so Aristotle said, II De Anima, that fire illuminates as it participates the nature of the heaven. And conversely light as such by its nature demands such cause in order to be, according to the natural order of causes, although absolutely it can be made by God. God, therefore, either alone or most of all is the cause of His effects not only as to becoming, but also as to being, directly and per se primo.

11. Again, hence the sense of the minor proposition assumed is also easily established, namely, that the cause of an effect not only according to becoming but also according to being is its cause also as to being conserved; for the sense is that, whenever an effect so proceeds from a cause that by simple and absolute necessity it demands it in order to be, it depends on its actual influx not only in order first to receive being, but also in order to endure and persevere in it, which is to depend in being conserved. Of this proposition so declared, however, I elicit two proofs from St. Thomas above. The first is that, when something is the cause of an effect in becoming, the becoming itself cannot remain when the action of such cause ceases; therefore, when something is the cause of an effect directly and per se primo according to its being, the being itself of such effect cannot remain when the action of the cause ceases, which is to depend on it in being conserved. Which consequence relies only on a certain parity and proportion, and therefore is not so evident. For someone could say that the dependence of becoming itself on the action of the cause is greater or more immediate than that of being itself; because being always depends by means of action, but becoming immediately through itself, because it is not distinguished from the action. But nevertheless the consequence is excellent; for it matters little that the dependence is equally immediate in the said sense, that is, through another action or through itself, provided it is equally essential. But participated being depends as essentially on being by essence as any becoming depends on its agent, and therefore it cannot remain without actual dependence or action.¹

12. And it is confirmed and declared; for, if such being, by reason of itself alone, demands the influx of the first agent in order to be at some time in the nature of things, then whenever it is it demands the same influx, because it is always the same, and what belongs to it per se primo always belongs to it. Finally I confirm it: either permanence in being is something over being itself, as some hold, or it is nothing besides being itself behaving in the same way. The first, although it is false, yet from it it necessarily follows that that permanence must be from God, because nothing, in whatever way it is, can be without Him. But if the second, which is true, is supposed, the other reason made proceeds, that whatever demands that being from intrinsic and absolute necessity in order first to be, demands it in order to remain in being as long as it is, because it is always the same and behaving in the same way.

13. Another proof of the assertion from St. Thomas.—Another proof from St. Thomas is indeed a posteriori and from a sign, but, as I think, most evident to an intellect well disposed; for we see that light depends on the sun in becoming and in being conserved, because the sun is a cause of a superior notion, and according to a certain participation is the cause of light not only according to becoming but also according to being, as has been declared. But any created being depends much more essentially on God than light on the sun, and much more inferior is the participation of the divine being than light is of the light of the sun; therefore much more does it depend on Him in being conserved.

14. The last proof of the conclusion.—We can construct the last reason in this way, for we can understand in two ways that all things, in order to remain in being, depend on God: first, permissively (so to speak), because namely they remain in being as long as they are permitted by God to remain, that is, are not deprived of their being by Him by whom they could be deprived; secondly, positively, that is, through actual influx into them. Now, then, I argue: it is evident that all things depend or are conserved by God at least in the first way; but they cannot so depend in that way unless they depend also in the latter way; therefore. The major is proved, because it pertains to the omnipotence of God that He can reduce to nothing the things which He has founded, if He wills; therefore, in order that they be conserved in being, at least His permission is necessary, which can consist only in this, that He does not will to reduce them to nothing, although He can. The consequence is clear, and the antecedent is evident from the very terms; because God would not be perfect lord of all things if He could not dispose of them as He willed. But the minor is proved, both because there are many things which cannot be deprived of being through contrary action, as an angel and other simple things, and also because every positive action necessarily tends to some being; hence, if God always needed action to destroy things, He could not annihilate them; therefore, in order that He can do this, it is necessary that by the sole withdrawal of action or influx He can annihilate them. But this cannot take place except inasmuch as they depend in their being and being conserved on such influx and action; therefore.

15. The ancient philosophers knew the dependence of creatures on God in conservation.—This truth, then, is sufficiently known by the light of nature, which therefore Justin Martyr signifies the philosophers also acknowledged, in the Hortatory Oration to the Gentiles, and Eugubinus confirms it more at length, bk. I De Peren. Philos., from c. 26, and bk. III almost throughout; and it is taken from Plato in the Timaeus, and from Aristotle, or under his name, in the book On the World to Alexander, and bk. XII On the Divine Wisdom according to the Egyptians, c. 19, where it is said: From Him are perpetuity, place and time, and by His benefit they remain; and as the centre of a circle is in itself, but the lines drawn from it to the circumference and the circumference itself with its points exist in the same centre, so too all natures, both those which pertain to the intellect and those which pertain to sense, consist and are confirmed in the first agent. But below, inquiring how all things are said to remain in the first artificer, since the form remains in matter, and matter in form, and the affection in the subject, he answers that besides these modes there is another in which a thing is said to remain in another as in the agent, for example, light in the luminous thing, and the ray in that from which it emanates, and finally any simple essence in the efficient; Trismegistus too, in the Asclepius, calls God the Mind conserving all things, in which all things live and subsist. Seneca too, in the book On Consolation to Polybius, calls God the cause of causes, guarding and ruling all things; who also has much on this matter in the book On Providence. Finally the theologians so think of this natural truth, and persuade it by other reasons and declare it by examples, as may be seen in Bonaventure, In I, dist. 37, a. 1, q. 1; Gregory, In II, dist. 3, q. 1, a. 3; Alexander of Hales, I, q. 10, membra 2 and 3; Hervaeus, in the treatise On the Eternity of the World, q. 6; and others, whom I shall report in the following section.

The reasons for doubting are solved

16. To the first reason for doubting the reply is evident from what has been said; for the same need which is in the being of the creature in the first instant in which it is made, that without the action of another it cannot be, is in it as long as it remains in being. Because, since by reason of its being precisely and inasmuch as it is such the creature needs the divine influx in order to be, as long as it is it needs the same influx. Nor can that conservation properly be called a repeated conferring of the same being, but, just as being itself is not repeated being but one being which remains the same, so too the influx by which the thing is conserved is the same, or the same conferring of the same being, as we shall explain more in the following section. Nor yet is this influx superfluous, because without it created things would not suffice to themselves to be sustained in being. Wherefore, this influx failing, they would at once be reduced to nothing, not because created things themselves would deprive themselves of their being, for that is repugnant, but because they would be deprived of it by the author of their being, not through contrary action, but through the suspension of the action necessary in order that they might be. And as to this the reason is the same of incorruptible beings; for these, although according to intrinsic potency and in order to natural agents they are called necessary beings, are not so in order to the extrinsic power of God, on which they always and continuously depend in their being. Hence, although they are said to be per se in order to the intrinsic cause, because they have being in which they subsist not through a distinct form but per se, which is most of all true of immaterial substances, yet in order to the extrinsic cause it does not belong to them to be per se, but through a superior cause and dependently on it.

17. The second.—To the second it is answered that this truth is sufficiently gathered from both heads proposed there. For in the first place it pertains to the amplitude of the divine power that nothing be or be able to be at any moment without its influx. To the same likewise pertains full dominion over all created things and the intrinsic power of annihilating them through the suspension of its influx. Wherefore in a human artificer, or even in univocal natural agents, that they can effect effects which remain in being when their action ceases is not a perfection simply, but one supposing some imperfection, namely in the artificer, that he cannot effect any thing according to its proper being and entity, but only according to some form and figure arising from the situation and order of such things; which imperfection being supposed, it pertains to the industry of the artificer to compose things from such things, in such order and disposition, that they cohere firmly and are stable. But in a natural agent it is supposed, for example, that it is of itself a univocal agent, which does not pertain to perfection simply; for, other things being equal, an agent which of itself is of a more eminent order than the effect and contains it eminently is much more excellent. Yet, that imperfection being supposed, that the cause is of the same notion and order with the effect, it will pertain to perfection not simply, but of that order, that it can effect an effect equally perfect and permanent. Again, the necessity of conservation is also sufficiently gathered from the imperfection of created being; for if of itself it were such that it could remain even for a moment without the actual influx of the first cause, it could also in the first moment or in eternity itself be without such influx, nor would it from its intrinsic notion demand dependence on another, which is proper to infinitely perfect being.

18. To the examples which are brought there, it is answered first that, although not every inequality of the effect to the cause suffices for the effect to depend in being conserved, yet this inequality which is between being by essence and by participation, or between independent being and that which is essentially dependent, suffices for this not to be able to be conserved without the influx of that. But in those examples it is asked that we explain when an effect depends in being conserved on a created cause. But we shall declare this more conveniently in sect. III.

1. In this matter there is first the opinion of Henry, Quodl. I, q. 7, asserting that in every production and conservation of things two actions intervene: one by which the thing acquires being; the other by which it is conserved in being; of which the former precedes, the latter follows. The same in Quodl. IX, q. 1; Aureolus and Gregory, to be cited below. The foundation seems to be that the action by which being is conferred on a thing is sudden and indivisible and lacking duration or permanence, and therefore at once passes, and to it succeeds the action by which the thing is conserved in being; for conservation is a permanent action. And it is confirmed, first, because, if a thing were conserved by the same action by which it is made, it would always, as long as it is, be in a certain continuous becoming, because the first becoming would continuously last. But the consequent seems very absurd, namely, that a substantial and permanent thing be in continuous flux. It is confirmed, secondly, because we often see a thing produced by one cause and conserved by another; therefore then it is necessary that conservation be distinguished from production; therefore they are always distinguished. Finally he confirms it from Augustine, book On the Immortality of the Soul, c. 8, where he writes thus of God: This incorporeal force and nature, effective of the whole body, holds the universe by present power; for it did not make and depart and abandon what it had effected; and below: That effecting force cannot be idle without guarding that which has been made by it, and not letting it lack the species by which it is in so far as it is; for what is not per se, if it is deserted by that through which it is, assuredly will not be, etc. Capreolus reports other arguments for this opinion from Aureolus, In II, dist. 1, q. 2, a. 2, in the argument against the third conclusion. Gregory too brings others, In II, dist. 1, q. 6, concl. 4. But I omit them, because they have no special difficulty.

2. The second opinion is that conservation is not another action from creation according to the thing or a real mode, but only by a certain connotation or included negation, or is distinguished in reason; for creation says the effecting of a thing, connoting that it was not before, but conservation says the same effecting, connoting that the thing was already before. This is the opinion of St. Thomas, I, q. 104, a. 1, ad 4; De Potent., q. 3, a. 3, ad 6, and q. 5, a. 1, ad 2; and the Thomists commonly follow it; Hervaeus, treatise On the Eternity of the World, q. 1; Giles, On Being and Essence, q. 7; Ferrariensis, III Cont. Gent., c. 65; Capreolus, above, who specially reports, against Henry, Bernard of Gannat, Quodl. I, q. 7. And this opinion, per se speaking, is true; in order, however, that it be explained more fully, a certain distinction must be applied.

Resolution of the question

3. The first assertion.—For it sometimes happens that a thing is conserved by wholly the same cause by which it is made, but sometimes by diverse ones, either because the effecting takes place by one with the help or concurrence of another, but the conservation by one cause alone, or conversely, because the production takes place by one, but many concur to the conservation. I say, then, first: when conservation is from wholly the same agent and with the same concurrence of the material cause, or also with the same independence from the material cause, then conservation is not another action from production or creation except by reason only, or connotation and relation. From which it comes about that, formally and per se speaking, action and conservation are not in reality two actions. This is the mind of St. Thomas. And it is proved, because there is no sufficient principle for distinguishing those actions; therefore they would be asserted distinct without cause. For who would believe that the sun or a lamp illuminates this air by one action when it is first applied and by another afterwards? For what would have been the cause that the prior action should be interrupted or cease and another afterwards be begun? Again, the first action would have to last only for an instant of our time, because by whatever reason it lasted longer, it could last always; the subsequent action, therefore, would either last only for another similar instant, and so there would be two immediate instants, or it would last for the whole subsequent time in which the thing is conserved, and then the same can be said with the same or greater reason of the prior action, and that superfluous multiplication of actions will be avoided. Add that that second action would have to be begun through a last non-being, which is beyond the nature of such actions. Likewise in the beatific vision, for example, there would be one action by which the blessed first sees God and another by which he afterwards perseveres in the vision of God. And so the first action would not be beatitude, nor of itself perpetual, which is absurd. Indeed, to admit this in any corporeal vision or in every intellection and volition is beyond all reason and beyond experience, so far as it can intervene in this matter. Indeed, it is scarcely possible for a man to persevere only for an instant in the vital action which he exercises. It would also be wonderful that in a natural agent, for example sight, the action should be varied without the principle, or the object, or the patient, or the effect being changed. And similarly that in a free agent the action should be multiplied without a new use of freedom. Finally, action has its unity from the terminus and the principle, or also from the patient, if it is concerned with it; but production and conservation have wholly the same terminus; therefore, if the principle is the same, as we suppose, the action of which we have treated will be the same, because creation has no subject; but the same holds, due proportion being kept, in the action and conservation which takes place from a subject, if the patient is the same.

4. An objection is satisfied.—You will say that actions are commonly distinguished also from diversity of time; for this is why Aristotle requires for the unity of motion the unity of time; but creation and conservation take place at diverse times, or at least the former takes place in the first instant, but the latter in the whole subsequent time. I answer that, according to the opinion of Aristotle, the same continuous time is enough for the motion to be the same, and consequently for the action to be the same; but in the present case the instant in which creation takes place is continuously conjoined to the subsequent time in which conservation lasts; continuously (I say) in the way in which an indivisible terminus can be immediately joined to a divisible thing; this, then, would be enough for that action to be one, and therefore St. Thomas often says that conservation is as it were continued creation. Which is not to be understood of proper continuation, but according to our way of understanding, or through coexistence with true continuous succession. For continuation properly so called is only in a divisible thing, but creation and conservation are one indivisible action; hence its unity is greater, and its duration is not through succession nor through true continuation, but through the permanence of the same indivisible action. For, when there is no succession in the terminus or in the acquisition of the terminus, neither can there be in the action; but here there is no succession in the terminus, because it is indivisible substantial being, nor in its acquisition, because it is acquired whole at once and conserved whole at once. From which it comes about that, when production and conservation are said to last in one continuous time, this is to be understood of the extrinsic time with which that action coexists; for if the discourse is of intrinsic duration, it is rather one instant or indivisible aevum, which begins whole at once in the first instant and perseveres whole in the whole following time and in each of its parts and instants.

5. And hence the reason made above is confirmed, for conservation is one action, as it lasts in the whole time after the first instant and in all the continuative instants of such time; therefore it is also one action with production itself or creation which takes place in the first instant. The consequence is evident, because there is no greater reason of distinction between the first instant and the time immediately following than between any continuative instant and the part of time which succeeds after it. Unless perhaps someone imagines in conservation itself a real intrinsic succession, which is both false and to me improbable, and still the same argument remains, that in the way in which conservation in itself is called one action, namely, by continuation, it must also be called one with creation, because a part is no less conjoined to the last terminus than to the continuative ones, as in a line the terminative point is truly united and in its way constitutes with the parts one whole, as does the continuative point.

6. An objection is dissolved.—Hence, by the way, an argument is solved, if someone objects thus: if God annihilated an angel and afterwards created the same one, the action of creating would be diverse only because it takes place at a diverse time; therefore creation and conservation, which take place at diverse times, will be diverse actions. For it is answered that the same argument can be made of conservation, which corresponds to prior and posterior time or instant, namely, that it is not the same action, but infinite ones are multiplied in the succession of all the instants or parts of time. The consequence, then, can be denied, because in that case the actions would be interrupted and discrete; but here there is one continuous one. It is better said, however, that the antecedent is not necessary, for God could reproduce the angel by the same numerical action by which He had created it; for it is not more difficult to effect again the same numerical action than the same numerical effect, as I have said more at length elsewhere. Yet He could also, if He willed, use a diverse action to reproduce the same numerical effect, as I noted in the foregoing. And therefore I did not say the antecedent is false, but uncertain, because it depends on the free will of God. Hence too I do not deny that God can, if He wills, vary the action in the creation and conservation of a thing, and indeed in conservation itself, as it takes place in diverse parts of our time; I say, however, that this is superfluous and not connatural, identity of terminus and principle being supposed, especially when the action is not interrupted.

7. What and how great is the distinction of creation from conservation.—Hence, moreover, the distinction of reason between creation and conservation is easily understood; for that at least this intervenes the diverse mode of speaking itself shows; because a thing is not said to be conserved in the first instant in which it is created, nor to be created after the first instant in the remaining time in which it is conserved; there intervenes, therefore, some discrimination at least of reason between those two, which is none other than that touched upon above, that creation under this word connotes the negation of being previously had, but conservation conversely connotes the possession of the same being previously had. But that this is only a diversity of reason seems known per se. And it is easily evident by likeness from the terminus itself, for the created effect itself, as existing in the first instant, or as existing in the whole following time, can be distinguished only in reason; therefore the same holds in the indivisible action, and so diverse names have been imposed by which the action may be signified under those diverse respects and connotations. But sometimes the action is conceived or signified without those respects, but indifferently, and then it is also said indifferently of production and of conservation, in which way the sun is said to illuminate the air both in the first instant and in the whole time in which the light lasts. In which sense too God is said to work until now, John 5, as Augustine expounds, IV Genes. ad litter., c. 12, and the other Fathers cited above. From these things, then, the whole conclusion is sufficiently evident. But why I added its last part will be established from the following conclusion.

8. The second assertion.—I say secondly: sometimes conservation is an action distinct from production on account of the diversity of the efficient or of the material cause; but then the distinction between production and conservation is material rather than formal. The first part is declared and proved, for quantity, for example, in the mystery of the Eucharist is conserved numerically the same both in the matter of bread and separated from the bread. And therefore it was produced by one action from the matter of bread, and is conserved separated by another. And the reason is that the prior action was eduction from the potency of matter, or concreation with matter, or coproduction with the bread, according to the various opinions. But the posterior action is from no subject; and in reality is the same as creation; it is only not so called because that thing already pre-existed. Hence, by the way, it is understood that this mode of distinction between production and conservation, namely, that one be by way of eduction and the other by way of creation, or conversely, cannot intervene naturally except through a miracle or supernatural work; for a form which is made through action dependent on a subject cannot naturally be made or conserved independently of a subject. And by the same reason, if an accident produced in one subject were transmuted into another and conserved in it, the action by which it would be conserved in the other subject would be distinct from that by which it was produced in the prior one; because it would be as it were a new eduction and a new dependence on a distinct cause; yet that diversity cannot be natural, because an accident cannot naturally migrate from subject to subject.

9. The distinction of creation from conservation on account of the variation of the efficient.—In another way conservation can be distinguished from production on the part of the principle, as when fire is produced by fire and afterwards conserved by God alone, or when water is heated by the sun or by fire, and, the sun or fire being removed, retains the heat; for then it is necessary that the conservation be a new distinct action. Which is easily evident, because the prior action and dependence has ceased; for now the fire does not act on the water, for example, or on the other generated fire, and consequently the prior action, as it was from God, has also ceased; for in reality it was wholly the same with the action of the fire, as will be declared in the following question; therefore there is a new action by which God by Himself alone conserves that effect. Indeed it happens that the prior action is successive, but the conservation indivisible and permanent, because through this nothing new is acquired by parts, but what was acquired gradually is conserved at once and indivisibly; for I speak of pure conservation, which takes place without increase. Finally, the reason is that action, since by itself it depends on the agent, cannot vary the dependence or relation to the agent without the action being varied. And therefore, if light is produced by one lamp and conserved by another, the conservation is an action distinct from the production; and universally the same holds whenever the conserver is distinct from the producer.

10. From which, by the way, it is understood that this mode of distinction has no place naturally in creation and the corresponding conservation, because naturally a thing cannot be created, nor when created be conserved, except by God alone; but it is otherwise supernaturally, for if God created a thing through a created instrument and afterwards conserved it by Himself alone, or conversely, then too the action would be distinct for the same reason. I said, however, that the comparison is to be made between conservation corresponding to creation; because so the comparison is to be made formally and per se, whenever it is asked about the distinction between production and conservation. For if someone compares the conservation of fire in matter with any creation whatever, it is clear that they are diverse actions. Likewise one must stop at the action and causality of the efficient cause; for if someone compares the creation of matter, for example, to its conservation as it is in its way from the form actuating it, so the causality of the form is other than the action of the agent; yet this is not formally to compare active conservation with production.

11. Hence, finally, it is understood why in this assertion I said that this distinction between conservation and production is per accidens and material, but in the preceding I said that the identity is per se and formal. Because namely the distinction which we have explained is not between conservation and production from the fact that one is conservation and the other production, but from the fact that one is from one cause and the other from another. Which distinction will be the same between two productions, or also between two conservations, if the same diversity of principles intervenes; therefore production and conservation per se do not have this diversity, but rather identity, if they are compared formally and precisely.

The arguments are satisfied

12. The arguments of the former opinion almost do not need solution. For it is denied that creation of necessity lasts only for an instant of our time, speaking according to the thing; for it lasts as long as conservation remains; but according to the name or connotation it is said to last only for an instant, because only for that instant does it connote the negation of prior existence. We are speaking always, however, of creation which is with newness of being; for that which would be from eternity would not last for an instant of our time, but would be in the now of eternity, and in it creation and conservation would be distinguished in a proportional mode, as we declared in the preceding disputation. To the first confirmation it is answered that, when a permanent thing is said to be in a certain continuous becoming, the expression is equivocal; for to be always in becoming, from the strictness of the words, signifies to be in a certain continuous passage and succession; but in this sense the proposition is false, yet it does not follow from the aforesaid opinion, as is known per se. But another sense can be that the creature, as long as it is, actually depends on the first cause, from which it always receives being through the same actual influx by which it was created. And in this sense the proposition is true, yet it is improper, because becoming in strictness connotes a certain newness of being. The second confirmation proves the second conclusion laid down by us. But the words of St. Augustine either do nothing to the matter or at most confirm the same conclusion.

1. We have said that it pertains to the efficacy of the first cause to conserve all things in being; it follows that we declare whether this is proper to it, and consequently we shall explain the common division of causes into those on which effects depend only in becoming, or also in being conserved. And we shall investigate the root of this diversity, namely, whether it is sufficient that the cause be univocal or equivocal, or, if this is not enough, what it is.

The sense of the question is expounded

2. By various titles one thing can depend on another in its conservation.—First of all, however, it must be noted from St. Thomas, I, q. 104, aa. 1 and 2, that one thing can be understood to be conserved by another in various ways, namely, per se or per accidens. Those things are said to conserve a thing per accidens which protect it from contraries, either by resisting them or by removing them. And in this way it is certain that God conserves one creature by means of another; for an angel can easily conserve a man by turning away a stone, fire, etc.; about which there is no question, because this is not so much conservation as another local change, or alteration, upon which it follows by accident that a thing which already was is not corrupted, and so is conserved. But conservation per se can be subdivided; for one is direct and immediate, which consists in the persevering influx of the very being which was communicated through production; but the other is only mediate or remote conservation, which consists in the influx of some dispositions or forms which are necessary in order that the thing be conserved in being. And St. Thomas above, ad 1, seems to call the former principal conservation, but the latter secondary. Of this latter mode of conservation, then, there is no question, because it is certain that in this way some creatures are conserved by others; for so Aristotle said, XII Metaph., text 34, that the heaven and the sun by their divine motion conserve these lower things. And the reason is that this mode of conservation consists only in the production of some qualities or forms. Hence, just as one creature acts on another, so too it can act on qualities consonant with its nature, by which it may be fittingly conserved.

3. Where two things are to be considered: one is that conservation is properly said of that which is through efficiency, as we are now speaking of it, but is yet extended to the other genera of causes, especially the material and formal, in which way the form is conserved by matter, and matter in its way by the form, and the composite by material dispositions. For this reason, then, matter can be said to be conserved by means of secondary causes, because, although they do not inflow being into it mediately, yet they induce into it forms by means of which it is conserved. And by similar reason he who produces connatural dispositions will be said to conserve the subject, in which way the sun conserves living things by fostering their natural heat. The other thing to be observed is that conservation is sometimes attributed to the individual, sometimes to the species, in which way the species is said to be conserved through the continuous generation of individuals, which is also improper conservation, for it is rather a succession of generations. Hence neither is the discourse about this, because it is established that these generations take place by means of secondary causes. The discourse, then, is of most proper conservation through the direct and immediate continuous influx of being itself in the same singular thing.

Resolution of the question

4. I say, then, first: no created substance depends in being conserved as to its substantial being on a created cause. Capreolus noted this, In II, dist. 1, q. 2, a. 3, ad 4 against the third conclusion, from St. Thomas, q. 5 De Potent., a. 1, ad 7. And it can be shown thus by induction and reason; for in incorruptible things which are made through creation the matter is most clear, as St. Thomas noted, III, q. 13, a. 2, because the conservation of these things takes place through the same persevering action by which they are created. Likewise, because that action by which they are conserved is not from matter, because either the things which are conserved through it do not have matter, but are simple, or, if they have it, such influx is at the same time terminated immediately at the being of the matter itself; and therefore, by the reason by which the creation of these things is proper to God Himself, by the same also their conservation. Which is also true of the prime matter of generable things; for of the conservation which is through the form we have already said that it is mediate and improper. Especially if it is true that the form does not concur properly and a priori to the conservation of matter, but only a posteriori and as it were dispositively, as was touched upon in the foregoing.

5. Moreover, corruptible substances in the first place do not depend in being conserved on created immaterial substances; for these cannot per se effect the eduction of forms from the potency of matter; therefore neither conservation; for the reason of conservation is the same. Likewise they do not depend in being conserved on univocal generators, as is established by experience. And the reason is that they receive their forms perfectly according to species. Likewise, because otherwise one individual of one species according to its being would say an essential or at least connatural relation of dependence in its very being on another individual of the same species, and so either one would have to proceed to infinity, or one would necessarily have to stop in some one or some which would not be conserved in a connatural mode; but both are plainly false, as is established. Again, neither on an equivocal generator, if that too is a generated substance, as is also established by experience; for, although a horse generates a mule, the thing generated does not depend in being conserved on the generator. And in these and similar cases perhaps the reason is that these generations are in some way per accidens, and therefore the effect by reason of its being does not say intrinsic dependence on such cause, but only by reason of such becoming. Another general reason we shall treat at once.

6. The reason of St. Thomas for the conclusion is explained.—Finally these generable substances can be compared to the heavenly and incorruptible composite substances. And so some think that lower substances depend in being conserved on the heaven, which Fonseca indicates without proof as likely, c. 2, q. 9, sect. 2, bk. V Metaph. But St. Thomas denies it above. He gives, however, a rather obscure reason in these words: The action of a corporeal agent does not extend beyond motion, and therefore it is an instrument of the first agent in the eduction of forms from potency into act, which is through motion; but not in their conservation, except inasmuch as through some motion dispositions are retained in matter, by which the matter becomes proper to the form. For thus through the motion of the heavenly bodies lower things are conserved in being. Which reason can be explained in two ways: first, that corporeal agents do not attain the eduction of forms immediately but only dispositively, and therefore cannot be the proper cause of conservation. But this sense is against the principles of St. Thomas and against his mind in that place. For according to that sense the form would depend in conservation in the same way as in eduction on the heavenly body, which however St. Thomas denies. But then it remains difficult why, in that instrumental mode in which a corporeal agent by means of motion is the cause of the eduction of a substantial form, it cannot also be the cause of its conservation. The second sense, then, seems to be that the heaven, because it does not act on the lower except by means of accidents, attains the effecting of the substantial form only instrumentally, and therefore has this efficiency only as long as the previous alteration lasts, because the instrument acts towards the effect of the principal agent only with its own action preceding; when, therefore, the motion of alteration ceases, the action of the heaven about the substance itself ceases. But things of this kind are conserved when the alteration ceases, although they are not generated except by means of it; and therefore they do not depend in being conserved on the heaven as they depend in becoming.

7. And in this sense this reason is probable, and can be declared and confirmed further in this way, because a created substance does not effect another except by means of accidents as instruments; but no substance by its nature depends in its being and being conserved on the efficiency of accidents; indeed universally no effect nobler than the instrument seems per se to depend in being conserved on the action of the instrument, granted that sometimes it depends in becoming, because such agent is not apt to effect such effect except by means of the instrument; as, although the intelligible species is made by means of the phantasm as instrument, it does not depend on it in being conserved, and so of others. And the reason seems to be that the relation to a less noble instrument cannot be founded in the intrinsic nature and need of the effect itself, but at most in the nature or will of the agent, because either it is not sufficient or does not will to act without such instrument. Hence the distinction of St. Thomas, as explained by us above, of the cause of becoming only or also of being itself, fits excellently here. For whenever a cause by means of an imperfect instrument acts a perfect effect, it is the cause of its becoming, not of its being, because it is not likely that such effect by virtue of its being absolutely considered demands such cause in order to be, but at most in order to be made by such genus of production. And therefore such effect never depends on such cause in being conserved. Since, then, the heaven effects no lower substance except in this way, namely through accidents, which are less noble instruments than the substantial effects, therefore, although these substances are sometimes made by the heavens, they do not depend on them in being conserved.

8. Which can be shown thirdly in this way, because the elements, according to their substances, do not depend in being conserved on the heavens; therefore neither can mixed bodies so depend; therefore no corruptible substances so depend on the heaven, because these are only either simple or mixed. The antecedent is proved, both by experience, for fire or water, per se speaking, is equally conserved in the absence or presence of the sun, and however the influence of the heaven is changed; and from the origin, because the heavens and the elements were equally created first; hence the elements per se and by their nature do not depend in becoming on the heaven, but either are first made through creation, or afterwards one is apt to generate another like itself; therefore neither do they depend in being conserved. But the first consequence is proved by parity of reasoning, or even a fortiori, because the forms of mixed bodies are more perfect and of themselves equally permanent. Which experience also confirms, because, although gold is generated by the sun, it is conserved without the presence or actual influence of the sun, and so of others. No substance, therefore, is found which immediately and directly depends in its being on another created substance. Nor do I find a reason which even probably persuades the opposite, which must be answered.

9. Which accidents depend in being conserved on their causes, which not.—I say secondly: accidents do not always depend in being conserved on their causes, even equivocal ones. In univocal causes, indeed, the matter is manifest, both by experience and by the reason made above, which universally proves that an effect never depends on a univocal cause, or one of the same notion, in being, but only in becoming. Of an effect made by an equivocal cause, however, it is evident in heat made by the sun; for it remains when its influx ceases, and the same holds of the other primary qualities which are made by the moon and the other stars. The reason, however, we shall at once inquire.

10. I say thirdly: some accidents depend in becoming and in being conserved on created equivocal causes. This conclusion too is established by experience; for so light depends on the sun or another luminous thing, the intentional species of the external senses on the objects, vital acts on the powers, and universally motion on something actually moving. And so it comes about that only these effects do not depend on God alone in being conserved. I say, however, on God alone, because they also depend on Him immediately in being conserved; for, in the way in which every operation of a creature is also immediately from God, as we shall say below, this conservation too which is made through a creature is also immediately from God; for the reason is the same, since this conservation is a certain operation or efficiency. And so in this there is no difficulty.

11. But there is great difficulty in giving the reason of this dependence; for it is not sufficiently given from the fact that the cause is equivocal and the effect imperfectly participates the power of the cause; for it is established from the preceding assertion that this reason does not suffice in other equivocal effects. Hence it is also difficult to assign a reason why some equivocal effects of created causes do not depend on others in being conserved, but others do depend. Which difficulty St. Thomas touched upon, I, q. 84, a. 1, where he tacitly asks why water heated retains heat when the action of fire ceases, but air does not retain light when the action of the sun ceases. And he only answers: Because the matter of water is receptive of the heat of fire according to the same notion in which it is in fire; but air is not receptive of light according to the same notion in which it is in the sun. This reason, however, does not seem sufficient, because the argument can be turned round; for light caused by fire in the air is not conserved when the action of fire ceases, but heat caused by the sun is conserved; and yet air is receptive of light according to the same notion in which it is in fire, and is not receptive of heat according to the same notion in which it is in the sun. Next I ask what it is for some quality to be received in the patient according to the same notion in which it is in the agent; for it can have two senses: the former is that to be received according to the same notion is the same as to be of the same species; and so the reason does not conclude, both because the heat made by the sun is not of the same species, and also because it is probable that air is receptive of light according to the same notion in which it is in the sun; especially according to the same St. Thomas, who in I, q. 67, a. 3, proves from this that the light of the sun is not a substantial form, because in the air it is an accident. Which reason would not be efficacious unless he supposed that the light of the air and the light of the sun are of the same notion.

12. The other sense is that for a quality to be received according to the same notion is the same as to be produced in the patient conjoined to the same radical principle, that is, to the same substantial form as it was in the agent; which sense St. Thomas rather indicates, when he says: Air is not apt to receive light according to the same notion according to which it is in the sun, and expounds: So, namely, that it receive the form of the sun, which is the principle of light; whence he concludes: And therefore, because it does not have root in the air, the light at once ceases when the action of the sun ceases. And he explains the same sense more in the said q. 67, a. 3, ad 1, where he says that the quality follows the substantial form, and therefore, as the subject is disposed to the reception of the substantial form, so it is disposed to the reception and retention of the quality. Hence he concludes that, if together with the quality the substantial form is received, then it is received firmly and without dependence in being conserved on the created agent; but if it is received imperfectly, that is, by disposing and preparing the matter for such form, then it is also conserved for some time when the action of the agent ceases, yet is easily thrown off; but if the quality is neither received with the form nor disposes to the form, it does not remain at all when the action of the extrinsic agent ceases. From this sense, then, such a reason is concluded; for because heat, whether produced by fire or by the sun, always disposes to the form of fire, therefore it does not wholly depend in being conserved on such agent; but the light of the air formally and of itself does not dispose to any substantial form, whether it is made by the sun or by fire; for air illuminated by anything, if it were not heated, would not be disposed to the form of fire, and therefore it wholly depends in being conserved.

13. But neither does that discourse, explained in this way, seem efficacious. First, because it is not universal; for the act of knowledge depends in becoming and being conserved on the agent, but the habit does not so depend; but neither disposes to a substantial form. Next, intelligible species made by the agent intellect do not depend in being conserved on it, and yet they do not dispose to a substantial form. Moreover, figure, heat, and other similar qualities do not dispose to a substantial form and are permanent qualities, which do not depend on some cause conserving them effectively. Finally, whether a quality disposes to a form or does not dispose seems irrelevant to its depending in being conserved on its agent.

14. Why motion depends on the agent in being conserved.—Others, then, think that the reason must be given only from the intrinsic nature of such qualities or effects, because namely they are such as essentially or connaturally to include dependence on such cause. Which reason needs explanation, lest the whole matter seem to be referred back to the occult nature of the thing, which is not so much to give a reason as to confess one's ignorance of it. For it is true that this dependence is founded on some special condition or nature of such effects; and I think it does not come in all from the same root, but according to the nature of each effect the reason of such dependence is to be sought in it. Thus in motion the reason is easily given why it always depends on an actual agent, because namely its being is not so much being as becoming; since, therefore, becoming cannot be without acting, so neither motion without a mover. And this reason proves of every dependence as such; for that is either a certain becoming or is conservation itself. And therefore by itself it depends essentially or intrinsically on the agent, and such dependence on such agent.

15. Why immanent acts.—And hence too the reason is easily given of immanent acts, if, as many hold, they are only actions and not qualities; for every action by itself is essential dependence on the agent. But because every action has its terminus, and every dependence is the dependence of something, therefore, as we more truly suppose, these acts are certain qualities dependent on their powers. And the reason is excellently given from the nature of such qualities; for they are essentially vital acts, which in order to inform demand a faculty inflowing into them; hence, because naturally they cannot be except by actually informing their proximate and intrinsic principle, therefore also naturally they cannot be unless they are actually from it. Which reason ceases in habits, and besides habits imitate powers; for they are with them principles of acting, and are given to dispose and help the powers themselves; and therefore by their nature they are permanent and independent of the actual efficiency of the powers themselves.

16. Which intentional species depend in being conserved on agents, which not.—Of intentional species, however, the reason cannot be given from their general nature, since we see some depend in being conserved on their proximate agents, but others not at all. And therefore the reason can be given either from the final cause, because some were instituted for knowing only in the presence of the objects, but others to be retained in memory; or further, from these diverse ends it can be understood that the species of the external senses are very imperfect, and are as it were conjoined instruments of their objects, and therefore by their nature depend on their action in being and being conserved; but other species, either sensible or intelligible, are of a more perfect notion, and therefore more independent.

17. The same question is treated of physical qualities.—Of other physical qualities, however, of which alone St. Thomas seems to have spoken in the places cited, his reasons are probable; for these qualities either dispose to the form or follow it. Those which dispose, because by their nature they precede the form, can therefore at least in remiss being precede such form, and consequently can also remain without it; but those which follow the form cannot be unless either they flow intrinsically from it or depend on an agent actually having such form. We can add, moreover, another general reason, that qualities of one species never depend in being conserved on qualities of the same species, on account of the reason made above about univocal causes. And therefore it is very probable that light and the light of the sun differ in species. But a quality which is sometimes made by another superior one distinct in species is sometimes such that, per se speaking, it can be made by another of the same species. And then, although sometimes it is made by the superior quality, it does not depend on it in being conserved. Because, since by its nature it does not demand emanation from that superior cause in order to be, there is no reason why it should depend on it in being conserved, although it is made by it, according to the doctrine given in sect. 1, in explaining the reason for doubting. And hence it is that heat, although it is made by the action of the sun, is conserved without its action, because it is apt to be made by another heat. But when a quality is such that in an extraneous subject it can never be made naturally except by a superior quality existing in a connatural mode in a superior agent, then it is a sign that it depends on the agent in being conserved, because, just as absolutely it needs that emanation in order to be, so it requires a similar influx in order to remain in being; and therefore light in the air is not conserved without the presence of the sun or of another thing which agrees with the sun in the nature of light. And Cajetan indicated this reason, although in other words, defending the reason of St. Thomas, I, q. 104, a. 1, last doubt, and it can be applied to all effects, both substantial and accidental.

The first incidental doubt

18. But two difficulties still remain: the former is that every quality depends on some proximate agent in becoming and being conserved; hence also in heat, when the action of fire ceases, God applies another action by which by Himself alone He conserves such heat, as we said above, which action is such that it is equivalent to the action which the fire had with the common concurrence of God; hence per se that action would be sufficient to produce that heat, if it were not produced, because through it alone God gives being to such heat as the sufficient cause of that being. Whenever, therefore, the action of the proximate cause ceases, the effect cannot be conserved unless God supplies the activity of such cause; therefore either every effect depends in being conserved on its proximate cause, or none, because, if in every proximate cause God wills to supply its absence, the effect will never depend in being conserved on such cause. Or finally a reason must be given why God in some effects so behaves that, the proximate causes ceasing, He Himself continues (so to speak) their conservation, but in others not. Or why the nature of the thing demands this, that one effect be said to depend on its proximate cause in being conserved, and not another.

19. It is unravelled.—To this difficulty it can be answered by denying that, in order to conserve without fire the heat produced by fire, God applies so great efficacy as would suffice to produce heat without fire if it were applied from the beginning, but that only that force which God applies to concur with fire suffices afterwards to conserve the heat produced through fire. And because similar efficacy would not suffice to conserve without the sun the light produced by the sun, therefore an excellent reason is given why, fire being removed, God continues (so to speak) the conservative concurrence of heat, but, the sun being removed, does not continue the conservative concurrence of light. For if, the proximate agent being removed, it were always necessary that God apply greater force, no reason could be given why that greater activity is due to the effect, or certainly why it is due rather more to one than to another; just as we rightly understand why the rational soul is conserved by God separated from the body, but not the soul of a horse, because namely the same activity of God which suffices to conserve the rational soul united to the body suffices to conserve it separated, which is not so in the soul of a horse. But if, to conserve the rational soul outside the body, it were necessary that God apply a greater concurrence by which He would supply the lack of the conjoined body, no reason could be given why such greater concurrence were due to the rational soul, or why it were not also due to the soul of a horse; for that too God could conserve outside the body by applying greater concurrence.

20. This reply, however, neither takes a true foundation nor satisfies even from it. For first it seems impossible that God by His power alone conserve a form in matter, whether it be heat or any other material form, and yet that there not intervene there a total dependence or action per se sufficient to give being to such form, if from the beginning and other things being equal it were to be induced into such matter. For, as has been shown, conservative action is not per se distinct from productive; but that action in the notion of conservation is total and integral, and from sufficient power; therefore it is per se sufficient for the production of that form, if it were not supposed produced. Likewise, because heat, for example, cannot have or retain being unless given by an intrinsic cause sufficient to give such being and operating as such. And as to this the reason is the same of the first instant in which being is received and of any other in which it is conserved, as is evident from the discourse made in sect. 1. But as long as the form is conserved, it retains its whole being; therefore it receives it from some cause as per se sufficient to give such being; but it receives it for that instant from God alone in the notion of efficient, for we suppose that it is effectively conserved by Him alone; therefore God then acts as a cause per se sufficient and total, no longer only in the genus of first cause, as when He concurred with the heating fire, but simply in the genus of efficient cause, even proximate; therefore He applies greater efficacy to such conservation than to the production which took place by means of fire.

21. Add that the prior concurrence and action, at least in the production of the whole heat, took place successively, but the conservation perseveres whole at once by way of indivisible action; it takes place, therefore, in another mode and from greater efficacy. Finally, if in heat we admitted that it is conserved by God alone without greater concurrence than He applied with fire, why could not light be conserved in the same way in the absence of the sun through equal concurrence? Or, if it can, why is this not due to it as to heat? The same difficulty, therefore, remains, even the other principle being admitted. And the reason which has been given in that opinion will have place also if we suppose (what is true) that God conserves each thing through its integral and total activity, in the sense expounded, when He conserves it by Himself alone.

22. The reason of the difference, then, which is demanded in that difficulty, is to be taken from the principle laid down in sect. 1, that sometimes an effect flows from its cause by reason of its being absolutely and precisely considered, but sometimes only by reason of such becoming, which becoming, however, is not adequate to such being, either simply or according to the connatural order. When, then, an effect flows from its secondary cause in the former way, then it does not demand to be conserved by God in the absence of its cause. But when it flows in the latter way, conservation is due by reason of the being itself already received, because, since such being per se does not say order to another cause, it connaturally demands to be conserved by any, even by the first, to which it pertains to conserve whatever has been made according to the connatural mode. But it is otherwise when the order to the proximate cause is wholly per se by virtue of such being; for then to change that order would not be connatural, nor could it be due to a thing having such being. Hence heat (and the same holds of any similar form) does not demand to be made and to receive being from another heat, or another similar proximate agent, by reason of its being precisely considered, because no form which can per se be made by a univocal agent says per se dependence on another by virtue of its being, as was also proved above; but only as to becoming does this dependence intervene from the order of natural causes, which does not extend to the conservation of all things. And therefore heat of itself is indifferent to being conserved by any universal agent; and this is due to it by virtue of its being, after it has once received it. But light is such a form as by virtue of its being demands emanation from light as connatural to itself, hence it cannot be produced by a univocal agent; and therefore without any emanation it is not naturally due to it to be conserved by a superior cause alone. And in every other similar quality depending in being conserved on a proximate agent, some natural property will be found from which one may conjecture that such form by virtue of its being demands emanation from such proximate cause, as was declared above and is most evident in vital acts. And in every material form (that we may by this answer a certain example to the contrary posited above) such a mode of entity is found that by its nature it demands an efficient cause as operating from a presupposed subject, and therefore it does not demand to be conserved by God outside a subject. Which is otherwise in the rational soul, which in order to receive being does not demand action from a subject, and therefore separation from the body does not prevent it from naturally demanding to be conserved; that example, therefore, is not similar, and so the whole proposed difficulty seems to have been satisfied.

Another doubt to be noted

23. The second difficulty is whether between the dependence of an effect in becoming only and in being conserved simply there is some middle dependence, according to which the form remains indeed for some time when the action of the agent ceases, yet gradually fails and finally wholly perishes, if the action of the agent is not repeated. For St. Thomas in the places cited seems so to think of accidental forms which dispose to substantial forms and, before they reach the perfect grade in which they are conjoined to their forms, the action of the agent desists: For then (says St. Thomas) the quality remains for some time, but not always, as is evident in heated water, which returns to its nature. And he gives the reason according to the principles declared above, because an accidental form of this kind is conserved by reason of the substantial form; if, then, the action reaches as far as the production of the substantial form, the disposition will be conserved simply and always; but if the action remains only begun, the disposition can be conserved for some time, but not always. A second example can be of habits, which do not so depend in being conserved on acts that they at once perish when the act ceases; but, according to the opinion of some, they so depend that through the sole cessation from acts they are gradually diminished, and, if it is great, wholly corrupted. A third, and to me more difficult, example is of the impetus impressed on a stone thrown upwards; for it does not cease to be as soon as the activity of the thrower ceases, as is established per se; for it is impressed for this, that it may remain for some time after the contact of the impeller; and yet afterwards it gradually ceases of itself to be without any contrary action of an agent, and finally is consumed.

24. It is explained.—Nevertheless this mode of dependence is to me most difficult to understand, because, when the action of the agent ceases, the dependence of the effect on it ceases, because action and dependence are the same, and differ only in the respects connoted, as has often been said; therefore, if, the dependence being taken away, the thing made still remains in its being even for one instant, so far as concerns the force of the lack of such dependence, it will remain perpetually, if it is not destroyed from elsewhere. The consequence is evident, because there is no greater reason of one instant than of any time. Which I declare secondly thus; for if, when the action of the agent ceases, the form made is conserved for some time, then for that time that form no longer receives being from that agent by which it had been made; therefore it is necessary that it be conserved for that time through another action of a superior agent per se sufficient to inflow that being, according to what was just said in the immediate difficulty; therefore by virtue of that action, per se speaking, it will be conserved for any time whatever, nor can a reason be given why that action of the superior agent should of itself cease. Thirdly, even if someone imagines that that other conservative action, per se speaking, ought to cease, no reason can be given why it should cease by parts or gradually, because this is nothing else than that that form be corrupted successively; but of this succession no natural cause can be given. For, just as a form is not made successively as to intensity except when it is made by one contrary with the resistance of the other, so it does not cease successively except when it is corrupted through the action of a contrary agent, itself resisting; but when it is corrupted through the cessation of the acting cause, it ceases in proportion to such cessation; if, then, the agent has wholly ceased from its action about the whole form and all its grades, how can it cease successively? Or why will one grade cease before another, since the action of the agent has equally ceased in all? But if some succession is to be, the prior grades ought to cease first, because the action of the agent had ceased about them first, if it had produced them successively; but this cannot take place, since the prior are the foundation of the posterior.

25. These reasons, then, seem to convince that there is no middle between the cause in becoming only or wholly in being; for if the cause is such that, its action ceasing, the effect cannot subsist even for a moment, it is the proper cause of the effect in being and being conserved; but if the cause is such that, its action ceasing, the effect can subsist for a moment, it can also always, so far as concerns the force of such cause; and therefore it is only the cause of becoming itself. And so those two members are distinguished by immediate contradictory opposition, in which no middle can be found.

26. By what the heat left in water after the action of fire is corrupted.—Whether a habit is diminished by the cessation of the act.—Of the examples adduced to the contrary, however, the first two are very easy. For heat in water, when the action of fire ceases, is corrupted through positive action by its contrary, itself resisting, and therefore perishes gradually. But if we imagined either that in the water the natural emanation of cold from its form were impeded, or that heat as six, for example, were produced in a neutral subject, from which there would be no contrary action, when the action of fire ceased that heat would always remain in the same subject, nor would it of itself cease to be; for, although it is an imperfect disposition to the form of fire, yet, because simply it does not depend on it in being conserved, it could so always remain, if it were not corrupted from elsewhere. The second example too assumes something false; for through the sole cessation of the act a habit is not per se corrupted or diminished, but only by contrary causes which intervene on that occasion, as St. Thomas declared, I-II, q. 54, a. 3, where in the solution ad 1 he declares that heat ceases in no other way through the cessation of the heater, and tacitly expounds what we cited from I.

27. What is the cause of the diminution of impetus in projectiles.—The third example is certainly difficult, for experience itself seems to teach that that impulse is gradually diminished, because thence it comes about that the motion of the projectile is also gradually remitted and languishes. But from elsewhere the action of a contrary agent by which it is corrupted does not appear. For it would be either the intrinsic form or the gravity of the projectile, and this not, because neither is gravity active of another quality, nor is it itself intensified by emanation, as cold in water, because gravity had not been remitted by the impression of the impetus. Or it would be remitted by the medium resisting and impelling in the contrary direction, and this too cannot be said, both because before the projectile begins to be impelled in the contrary direction the impetus begins to be remitted, and also because, if one impetus were not corrupted except by a contrary, the stone could not throw off from itself all impetus; it is necessary, therefore, that it be taken away by pure privation. Wherefore many deny what this difficulty supposes, namely, that impetus is a quality impressed on the projectile, but say that it is only the contact of the thrower as it were continued through the parts of the medium, as Aristotle seems to have taught at the end of the Physics. Nor are others lacking who think that the very gravity of the projectile is the instrument which the thrower uses by means of contact to impel where he wills. But to me these too are uncertain, because I scarcely understand that motion without an impressed quality, as the philosophers now more frequently teach. Of the mode of corruption of that quality, however, the very philosophers who posit it say nothing, nor do I find anything which satisfies me. We can only say that, although impetus is not corrupted through the proper action of a contrary, yet it ceases after the manner of those qualities which are so corrupted, because it ceases with the contrary resisting or opposing. Thus, because that quality is in a contrary subject, resisting its activity, on account of which alone that quality is impressed by way of instrument, therefore it does not demand to be always conserved there, and because otherwise the subject always resists it and its action, the nature of such thing demands that its conservation gradually cease. Yet this is not on account of a middle dependence on its agent, but on account of the peculiar nature and institution of such quality.