Disputationes metaphysicae

1. Matter is the principle quo of no action.—We ask at the same time about the principal and about the proximate or instrumental principle, because the one cannot be sufficiently explained without the other. It is established, first, from what has been said, that the discourse is only of a corporeal cause, because created spirits can effect no substance, as has been said. Again, since in a created substance there are matter, form and accidents, it is established, secondly, among all, that matter is not the principle of this effecting—the principle quo (I say), or formal principle; for the principle quod is the supposit, as in the other actions; the material supposit, however, although it consists of matter and form and subsistence, and moreover has accidents, yet does not have the power of acting from matter, which is not active, as we have often said. We make no mention of subsistence, however, because it is only a certain mode and terminus of the nature, naturally preceding indeed every action, yet not per se conferring power to act, as we shall say more at length below in treating of subsistence. The whole controversy, therefore, is brought back to the substantial form and its accidents or natural properties.

2. No accident is the principal cause of a substance.—Of which it is established, thirdly, that an accidental form cannot be the principal principle of producing a substance, in which almost all agree. For Major, In IV, dist. 12, is commonly cited to the contrary, but he does not contradict it, nor does anyone else whom I have seen. Nor can there be any reason for doubting, because the principal cause, as we have shown, must be either nobler than, or certainly not less noble than, the effect; for since no one gives what he does not have, how can an imperfect form have in itself, or communicate to its supposit, the principal power of effecting a more perfect form, which it can contain neither formally nor eminently? But the accidental form is more imperfect than the substantial; therefore it cannot be the principal principle of educing it. And this will be more evidently established from what is to be said, both in treating thoroughly of the first opinion and also in confirming our last assertion.

3. The substantial form is the principal principle quo by which the efficient acts.—From this it further follows that, if in a material substance there is some principal principle quo for effecting substance, it can only be the substantial form; for when the enumeration is made, nothing else remains. And this too seems to be received by the common consent of all, because, since the form is the principal act of the supposit and that which principally gives being, it must also be the principal principle of operating, since operation follows being. Finally, because the substantial form cannot be an instrumental principle; therefore it will be the principal principle. The consequence is evident, because neither is there a middle, nor can the form be wholly excluded from the notion of principle, since it is the source of all being and of all properties. The antecedent is evident, because the substantial form does not presuppose another of which it could be the instrument, since it is the first and chief of all; I speak, however, within the same supposit; for if a lower form be compared to a higher, it could be called its instrument, as was touched upon above and we shall touch upon in what follows. And hence also almost all hold it as ascertained that accidents are instruments of the substantial form for producing substance, because the substantial form does not produce a like substance by itself alone and immediately, but using accidents, as seems established by experience and as the argument made for Avicenna in the preceding section proves.

4. These things being posited, then, two things remain to be explained: first, how an accident is an instrument for producing a substance; secondly, how the substantial form is the principal principle for educing a like form. Hence there are two chief difficulties: the first is whether an accident is an instrument in such a way that it immediately attains the eduction of the substantial form itself, or whether it is called an instrument only because it operates dispositively towards the induction of the substantial form, which is the effect chiefly intended by the principal agent. The second is, supposing that the accident attains immediately, whether the substantial form also inflows proximately with it, or only remotely and as it were radically.

First opinion concerning the efficiency of accidents with respect to substance

5. Concerning the first, there is a first opinion, that accidents are instruments only in this latter way, that is, concurring only dispositively; which can be understood either of the accidents which are received in the patient and are themselves the formal dispositions of matter—in which way Philoponus seems to have understood it, II Phys., text 27, and therefore he reduces these instruments to the material cause. In which he speaks both against Aristotle and against reason. For Aristotle reduces seed and similar instruments to the efficient cause, and deservedly, because nothing is called an instrument except what inflows into the effect through some action; and therefore things are properly called instruments of no cause except the efficient. It must be understood otherwise, therefore, of the accidents which are in the agent itself and are the faculties through which it proximately operates, and effectively induces dispositions into the patient, through which it gradually prepares the matter until it becomes proximately capable of the substantial form; and in this way they are instruments for inducing the substantial form, not because they immediately attain or effect it—for their action stops and is terminated in the effecting of accidents perfectly like themselves—but because, as they are subordinated to their proper form, their action tends to the production of a like substantial form. This opinion was held by Scotus, In I, dist. 37, and In II, dist. 17, and more at length In IV, dist. 12, q. 3, whom Ockham follows, In II, q. 23. The chief foundation is that an accident, since it is a being more imperfect than the substantial form, cannot in any way effect it. Some answer that, although an accident is more imperfect in the notion of being, nevertheless in the notion of active principle it can be more apt, and in that sense can be called more perfect in acting. But this is not rightly said, because the power of acting, especially in an accident, is nothing other than its entity; or if it is distinguished in some way, at least by reason, it follows upon it and is commensurate with it; therefore an accident cannot be nobler in acting than it is in being. Otherwise, under the same distinction, someone could say that an accident is the principal principle of producing substance, because, although it is not nobler in being, it can be nobler in action, which is absurd. Moreover, we could never gather from the nobility of the action the nobility of the efficient cause as to its being. And (as Scotus argues) one could say of God Himself that He is nobler in action, although not in being.

6. The more frequent reply of the Thomists is examined.—The more frequent reply, therefore, is that an accident, although it is less noble and therefore cannot by its own power attain the production of substance, can nevertheless, in the power of its substantial form, of which it is the property and power of acting, immediately attain its eduction. But Scotus presses, asking what that power is in whose force and efficacy the accident is said to attain. For it is either something distinct from the accident or not. If it is not distinct, then substance can no more be made in its power than in the power of the accident. If it is distinct, it is either an accident or a substance; if an accident, the same argument proceeds, whether it be called absolute or respective; indeed it will be much less active if it is respective than if absolute. If, however, it is a substance, it will be none other than the substantial form; and thus the form itself will rather be the power of acting and the principle by which the accident attains the eduction of the accidental form¹, than conversely. The Thomists commonly answer, from Cajetan, I, q. 53, a. 3, and q. 77, a. 1, that when the accident is said to make substance in the power of the substance, that in the power is not to be taken transitively, but intransitively, because the sense is not that some power is added to the accident by which it produces substance, but that the accident, by its entity, because this is a certain power of the substance, can attain substance. But this reply does not seem to weaken the force of the argument, because, since heat by its nature is the power and faculty of the substance, when it is said to act in the power of the substance nothing else is said than that heat by its nature has such activity; but this seems naturally repugnant, for an ignoble form cannot be a natural power sufficient to produce a better form.

7. And, lest we seem to stop at words, in order to explain the difficulty which is in the thing itself, I ask whether that action by which the substantial form is educed from the potency of matter proceeds immediately from heat alone, for example, and from the substantial form only remotely and radically, inasmuch as the heat flows from it; or whether it is an action immediately from both forms, from the one as principal and from the other as instrumental. If this latter sense is asserted, the difficulty touched upon in the argument ceases indeed; for in this way there is no drawback in a more imperfect form concurring instrumentally to a more perfect effect; and then that in the power is very well expounded, for it signifies: that is, actually inflowing as aided by a superior power. But then other difficulties arise no less grave. The first, because the experiences which seem to prove that accidents attain the effecting of substance prove that accidents alone effect it, because either the substance does not exist, as when the accidents of consecrated wine generate wine—and the same argument, although less efficacious, is commonly made of red-hot iron generating fire—or certainly because the substance is not applied, as in the sun inducing the substantial forms of mineral things in the bowels of the earth, from which it is very far distant. The second, because according to that interpretation the substantial form is now posited as the immediate principle of some action, which exceeds its perfection. For, because it is disproportioned to this, it therefore received from nature accidental forms through which to act. Whence arises a third argument, which Scotus and Ockham indicated; for if this immediate influx must necessarily be granted to the substantial form, the immediate influx of the accidental form is superfluous. For if the generation is univocal, the substantial form, which is supposed to inflow immediately, has the perfection and proportion required to be a sufficient proximate principle for producing a form like itself; for since heat is in this way sufficient to effect like heat, why will not the substantial form be so for a like form, since it is now supposed that immediate influx is not repugnant to it? But if the generation is equivocal, since the form of the generator is more eminent, with greater reason will it be sufficient for a like action.

8. But if on account of these difficulties the former member is chosen, as seems also to be more frequently received, there remains in the first place, in its force, the difficulty touched upon; for it cannot be understood how a less noble instrument, by itself alone and through the power connatural to it, without the partnership of a nobler agent, should effect a nobler effect. For what does it matter that that instrument is the power of another? For it has from this only either that it is cut off from another, as seed from an animal—and from this the power does not grow, which is as great as the perfection which it receives in itself, not as great as the perfection of that from which it receives it—or certainly it has that it is substituted in place of another for acting, as gravity in place of the generator; and this is what appears wonderful and repugnant, namely, that nature should substitute an imperfect power so that by itself alone and without the actual help of a superior power it should, in place of the principal agent, effect a nobler effect. And moreover there are other difficulties against that way of speaking. The chief is that it follows that substantial forms have no proper activity, but concur only as it were per accidens to every action. For if God, for example, only produced and conserved heat, and afterwards did not immediately inflow into the action proceeding from the heat, He would not be a cause per se, but per accidens, of that action; therefore similarly, if the substantial form is so related to every action of heat, it cannot truly be called the efficient principle per se of the action, but at most will be called the remote principal principle, and by extrinsic denomination, namely, because the proximate principle of acting takes its place, or (to speak more truly) supplies its impotence; for in truth the form itself has of itself no activity. But this seems absurd; otherwise substance would never be per se active or generative of what is like it, nor would there be any action from a created substantial supposit except by reason of the accidents; but this is repugnant to the perfection of substance. For, as Scotus argues, In II, dist. 16, if some accidental form is immediately productive of what is like it, why will not some substantial form be so too? It seems also to be against Aristotle, II Phys., c. 7; for there he attributes a threefold causality to the form: formal, final and efficient; therefore, just as the first and the second belong properly and per se to the form, so also the third.

Second, opposed opinion concerning the activity of accidents with respect to substance

9. The second opinion affirms that accidents are instruments of substance for producing substance in such a way that they proximately and per se attain the production of the substantial form in the power of the other forms whose instruments they are. This is the opinion of St. Thomas, I, q. 45, a. 8, ad 2 and 3, and q. 77, a. 1, ad 3 and 4, and q. 115, a. 1, ad 5; and III, q. 77, a. 3; of Cajetan above; Ferrariensis, IV Cont. Gent., c. 66; and Capreolus, In I, dist. 3, q. 3, a. 2, and In IV, dist. 12, q. 1, a. 3; Giles, Quodl. III, q. 1, ad 2, and in the Hexaemeron, p. II, c. 11; Henry, Quodl. XIV, q. 1; Hervaeus, Quodl. III, q. 12. And this seems to be the common opinion of the Peripatetics. For Aristotle everywhere signifies that natural action and generation take place by means of accidents; whence, I De Generat., c. 7, he says that action, at any rate corruptive action, is only between contraries; but contrariety properly is only between qualities; and in the book On Sense and the Sensible he says that nothing acts or suffers inasmuch as it is fire or water or anything similar, but inasmuch as it undergoes contrariety, that is, inasmuch as it is affected by contrary qualities. Where Alexander observes that, according to the Peripatetic opinion, fire does not put forth action inasmuch as it is fire, but inasmuch as it is hot, that is, not through the form of fire, but through heat. Likewise, II De Anima, text 10, and VII Metaph., text 31, and bk. III De Generat. Animal., Aristotle teaches that seed is the instrument by which one animal effectively generates another. The Commentator too, bk. VII Metaph., comm. 22 and 31, and XII Metaph., comm. 18, says that it belongs to the same power to prepare matter and to induce form; since, therefore, it is established that substance uses accidents to prepare matter, it must be said that through the same it induces the form.

10. Reasons for the second opinion.—The reasons by which this opinion is confirmed are chiefly these: first, because the substantial form is not per se immediately active, but through a power which is a quality distinct from it; therefore neither does it induce the substantial form except by means of an accidental power. The antecedent is evident, first, by induction; for we see that each substance uses accidents for all its other actions, which is true not only of material, but also of created spiritual substances; therefore it is a sign that it exceeds the perfection and limitation of a created substance to be at once the principal and the proximate principle of its actions. Likewise, because the substantial form of itself is determined only to giving being formally; but to actions it is an undetermined principle, because it can almost always effect several actions, to which it is determined through accidents; and therefore it is not the proximate principle of action through itself, but through accidents; therefore the same must be said of the action by which it produces substance.

11. The second reason, which confirms the last inference of the preceding, is that the action through which the substantial form is educed is not properly an action co-distinct from the motion of alteration, which is ordered and tends to it, but is as it were its terminus; and therefore they are not counted as two actions, but as one and the same; but the whole alteration which tends to generation takes place by means of accidents, as is evident per se; therefore the substantial generation itself also takes place by means of accidents. The major is evident, because the substantial form, which is educed from the potency of matter by means of motion, results in the matter by virtue of the motion itself; therefore, speaking physically, it is made by the same action and by means of the same instrument. And it is confirmed, for accidents are the instruments for expelling the substantial form of the thing corrupted; therefore also for effecting the form of the thing generated.

12. The third reason: because proper action takes place only between contraries; therefore only that is the proper principle of such action which properly has a contrary; but such is a quality, and not a substantial form; therefore.

13. Various experiences for the second opinion.—Fourthly and chiefly, this opinion is founded on experiences; for substances are often generated by means of accidents when there is no substantial form from which the action could be, because it is either far distant or does not exist at all. Scotus answers that the fact that a form is sometimes distant does not prevent it from inflowing into the eduction of a form, because by its force and efficacy it can attain distant places. And in this way he thinks that the forms of mineral things are immediately educed by the form of the sun. But when no form is found proportioned or applied within the sphere of its activity, then he says that the eduction of the form is made immediately by the first cause, to which it belongs to supply the defects of lower agents. And in this way he says animals are more frequently generated, not only those which come from putrefaction, but also those which come from seed, in which the power is imperfect and insufficient to educe the soul from the potency of matter. But the former part of this reply is repugnant to the Aristotelian principle that agent and patient must be together, of which a little below. The latter part, however, savours of the opinion of Plato, who says that substantial forms are induced by separated ideas; for if it is true that Plato posited ideas only in the divine mind, it was the same as saying that substantial forms are effected by the first cause. Which also Philoponus taught, I Phys., at the end, where he says that substantial forms come from the universal artificer of nature. Themistius, however, in his bk. I De Anima, c. 24, and bk. III, c. 52, says that they come from the soul of the world. Avicenna, as we cited above, says that they come from the lowest intelligence. From whom Scotus differs in that he says not all forms, but several and the more perfect even of the material ones, are made by a separated agent; which also seems a greater drawback; for since all these forms are educed from the potency of matter, infinite power is not required for their effecting; why then do some of the forms have the power to effect forms like themselves, and not others, and especially those which are more perfect? Wherefore this experience is what most seems to confirm this opinion; for the reasons are certainly not so efficacious, as we shall soon see.

14. But before we settle this point, it is necessary to propose the second, which we touched upon in the reason made above in favour of the former opinion, and which matters much for understanding and rightly defending the latter opinion, although it seems to have been almost wholly passed over by its authors, namely: supposing that accidents are instruments attaining immediately and per se the eduction of the substantial form, whether they are instruments separated from the forms themselves as to causality, or conjoined. And consequently, whether the substantial form is said to be the principal principle of this action only remotely and radically, or also proximately and per se, actually inflowing. And indeed all the authors of the latter opinion seem to judge that accidents are separated instruments; for the reasons and experiences adduced, if they prove anything, most persuade this, for accidents seem to generate substance even when there is no substance concurring with them. And so think, besides the authors cited, Paludanus, In IV, dist. 12, q. 4, a. 1, concl. 3; and there Richard, a. 3, q. 2; and Thomas of Strasbourg, q. 1; Major, q. 1; Hispalensis, q. 1, a. 3, notab. 3; Albert, a. 16. All of whom speak of the sacramental species, which remain without substance; and they attribute to them that they have the same efficiency in the power of the substance which they can have when they are conjoined; which Giles also declares at length, theor. 48 on the Eucharist; Zimara too, theor. 114, treating copiously of that proposition of Averroes, that the agent disposing the matter and introducing the form is the same, thinks that the whole action is immediately from the qualities, and from the form only inasmuch as it communicates its power of acting to the quality. The same at length Cajetan, I, q. 53, a. 3. Nevertheless this opinion has the difficulties touched on above in confirming the opinion of Scotus in the preceding point, because it does not appear how the substantial form can transfuse (so to speak) its whole power of acting into the accidental form, so that even when the substantial form perishes (if need be), and the accidental alone is conserved, the latter alone could effect a substantial form more perfect than itself, since it neither actually has so perfect a being, nor is actually helped by a superior form.

First assertion, for the resolution of the question

15. On account of these difficulties I judge it difficult to pass judgment between these opinions; yet I shall briefly propose what I think. I say first, therefore, that it is not to be denied that accidents are instruments for producing substance in such a way that they proximately and per se attain the eduction of the substantial form. It is proved, first, from the common opinion of so many philosophers, which is not easily to be rejected where no evident reason to the contrary occurs. Secondly, because experience, on which philosophy chiefly relies, confirms this much, and there is nothing that is repugnant, as will be evident in solving the objections to the contrary. Thirdly, because otherwise it will often be necessary to attribute the whole efficiency of substance to universal causes, or even to the first, which in philosophy is to be avoided so far as can be done, because the right disposition of the universe demands that whatever can conveniently and connaturally be done through secondary causes be done through them. Fourthly and finally, because this mode of efficiency is consonant with the nature of the accidental form, which is given to substance not only for ornament and beauty, but also for exercising its actions, as is established of other actions by induction.

16. You will say that the account is different for this action and for the others; for the other actions are accidental, as intellection, vision, heating, etc. But this action is substantial, that is, per se primo terminated to a substantial terminus; and therefore, although accidents are apt instruments for the other actions, they are not for this one, because the proximate principle of acting must be proportioned to the action, and therefore, if the action is of a superior order, the principle must be so too. As, for example, because intellection is a spiritual action, nature would not have given an apt principle for it if it had conferred a material potency or instrument, even though the soul, which is the principal principle, is spiritual; thus, then, for a substantial action an accident will not be an accommodated instrument, even though the form is substantial. To this it can be answered from Cajetan, I, q. 54, a. 3, that substantial generation is not a proper operation or action, but is the terminus of the preceding motion or alteration, and therefore the principle of the alteration is a most apt instrument or principle of the generation. Some moderns so embrace this reply that they found on it almost the whole probability of the opinion of St. Thomas about this efficiency of accidents; and they think that before Scotus no one posited this action as distinct from alteration. I wonder, however, that they could be induced into this opinion, which seems to me contrary both to the doctrine of Aristotle and to their own principles and to evident reason. For Aristotle, in the whole of I Phys. and I De Generat., chiefly aims at distinguishing substantial generation from alteration; and in V Phys., when he says that there is motion properly so called per se in three predicaments, he says that towards substance there is not motion but change, because it is not from subject to subject, but from being in potency to being simply. Hence in the same places he distinguishes the principles of generation from the principles of the other motions, which are proper matter, as it is pure potency, and substantial form, and privation.

17. Whether and how generation is the terminus of alteration.—Next, other authors use words equivocally when they say that generation is the terminus of motion or alteration; for it can be called terminus intrinsically and properly, and thus it is plainly false; for such a terminus of alteration is nothing but the quality which is made through it; indeed, universally it is impossible that an action be the terminus of some motion, because it is of the intrinsic notion of action that it be a way, and that it be made not through another action, but through itself. In another way it can be called the terminus of successive motion as an instantaneous change extrinsically terminating the motion. Which can be understood in two ways. First, that it be a certain indivisible change, or a certain mutatum esse, which reductively pertains to the same motion and in reality is of the same notion as the mutata esse which continue the motion. And this cannot be said of generation with respect to the preceding alteration, because it is neither of the same order as the alteration nor in any way reduced to it. And moreover, because the change terminating a motion within its notion or latitude contributes something to consummating the terminus of the motion within its proper notion and entity; as the mutatum esse in which local motion first is not, consummates that Ubi which is made by such motion, and in that instant begins to be, whereas before it was not yet; and the same holds proportionally in alteration, because in that instant some terminus of the quality is made which before was not. But through generation there is not made some terminus of a quality intrinsically and within its proper genus pertaining to its consummation, but a new form of a higher notion is made. Therefore generation cannot in this way be called the terminus of motion or alteration. In another way, therefore, it can be called a terminus only extrinsically, on account of immediate consecution or concomitance. And this sense is true; yet this does not prevent generation from being a distinct action; for thus illumination is the terminus of a motion, and is a proper action. And the creation of the rational soul can in this way be called the terminus of generation with respect to the preceding alteration, which no one will deny to be a distinct action; and a fortiori the same holds of the union of that soul to the body, since this is an action posterior to the creation of the soul. If, therefore, the generation of a man is an action distinct from alteration, although it is its terminus in that way, the same a fortiori will hold in the rest. And this is most necessary if we suppose (as the said authors suppose) that in the instant of generation the whole preceding alteration and its intrinsic terminus cease to be; for thus generation cannot be called its terminus except because it immediately follows after that alteration; therefore it cannot but be a new action, because the immediate consecution of one thing after another does not take away the newness and distinction of the action.

18. Hence finally I argue a priori, because generation is really and essentially distinct from the whole preceding alteration; therefore it is per se a proper and new action. The antecedent is evident, because it is the eduction of a new form really distinct from the preceding, and it takes place in a distinct subject, namely, immediately in prime matter; whereas alteration takes place either in the whole composite or at least in the matter by means of quantity. Finally, because the whole alteration precedes in duration, and according to a probable opinion its intrinsic terminus too does not remain. The consequence is proved, because that action is the eduction of a new form, which per se primo tends to a new composite one per se; therefore it is per se a new action. They will perhaps say that it is not a proper action, but a certain resultance from the prior alteration. But this cannot be said, especially if we suppose that the accidents which preceded in the thing corrupted do not remain in the thing generated; for a form is not said to result from some action except inasmuch as it results from its terminus, because each action proximately stops in its terminus. Hence nothing results from it mediately except inasmuch as it results from its terminus; if, therefore, in the instant of generation neither the alteration nor its terminus remains, how can the substantial form result from it? They will perhaps say: because it naturally succeeds to it. But this is not to result, for resultance implies some mode of efficiency through natural emanation, which cannot be between things which proximately succeed one another, when to one perishing another succeeds; otherwise the form of the thing generated could also be said to result from the form of the thing corrupted. Wherefore this succession does not take away the necessity of a new action, but most requires it, so that by virtue of it a form may be introduced by which the other is expelled, and consequently the accidents, if they depended on it.

19. Hence they also speak less consistently who, while they otherwise think that the accidents which were in the thing generated do not remain in the thing corrupted, say that the substantial form results in matter by the instrumental power of the accidents which are introduced through motion, as soon as they arrive at a certain terminus; for if those no longer exist, how can they be an instrumental power? Likewise, those which arrive at a certain intrinsic terminus are not the same as those which were before, and according to that terminus they follow upon the form, according to that opinion; therefore they cannot be instruments for it. And moreover, as we touched upon above in disputing on the matter of accidents, even if the same accidents remain, they cannot be instruments for the substantial form, because they have no proper preliminary action by means of which they might be elevated to the effect of the principal agent. Wherefore this instrumental efficiency is to be attributed not to the accidents which are made in the patient and dispose the matter, but to the accidents which are in the agent, from which those others proceed. From which it also follows that it cannot truly be said that the substantial form results from the accidents disposing the matter. Finally, whatever be the case about the name of resultance, and whatever be the case as to whether the accidents of the patient also have efficiency in the eduction of the form, it cannot be denied that that eduction is a new action and one most per se intended, because it is the proper action which is done in the power of the substance; for alteration is the proper action of the accident according to itself, and is as it were a means ordered to generation, which is the action per se primo intended. Just as nutrition too is properly and per se an action, and augmentation, on the testimony of Aristotle, is per se a motion, although neither takes place except with preceding alteration and by means of dispositions with which partial substance can be generated in addition.

20. Otherwise, therefore, must the proposed objection be answered, by granting that the action by which the substantial form is educed is substantial on the part of the terminus, and is nobler than any action or alteration which the accident can perform by its own power, which not Scotus alone discovered, but before him Aristotle taught, bk. II Phys., text 14, and bk. VIII, text 62; Averroes, IV Phys., comm. 129; Simplicius, V Phys., text 8. And after Scotus many of the Thomists followed the same, as may be seen in Capreolus, In I, dist. 13, a. 3, ad argum. contra 1 conclus.; Soncinas, VII Metaph., q. 22; Ferrariensis, II Cont. Gent., c. 17. And nevertheless these authors say, and rightly, that an accident proportioned to the substantial form can of its nature be an instrument accommodated to such an action; because, although in the notion of being the accidental form is of a lower order compared to the substantial, yet in the mode of being they have a proportion, if each depends on matter; and similarly they are commensurate in the notion of disposition and form, and for the same reason they can be proportioned in the notion of instrumental power and of action or terminus; for, just as it is connatural to substance to operate through accidents proportioned to it, so it is connatural to it to be made through accidental dispositions proportioned to it as through an accommodated instrument. Wherefore what was objected about the material potency with respect to spiritual intellection is not similar, because there there would be no proportion, neither in the notion of subject nor in the notion of disposition nor in another genus; and therefore it would not be an accommodated principle. Especially since the intellect is not only an instrument, but in its own way also the principal principle of the intellection connatural to it, as I shall say in the following section.

21. Whether accidents effectively attain the generation of man.—But someone may press that, at least in the generation of man, accidents are not apt instruments such that they could immediately attain the action by which man is generated, because that action is the union of the rational soul to matter, through which proximately the mode of union of the same soul is made, which mode is immaterial, since it is really the same as the soul itself; therefore that unitive action too is spiritual, for it is the same as its proximate and formal terminus; therefore a material accident cannot be the instrument for such an action. It is answered, first, by granting the whole; for in the conclusion we did not say that accidents are instruments for uniting every substantial form with matter, but for educing a form which is, namely, educible; but for uniting the rational form it is enough that the accidents of the seed concur effectively to disposing and organizing the body, while the dispositions themselves only materially cause and demand that union; which is enough for a man to be said to generate a man, although God alone, who creates the soul, also effectively unites it, as Scotus held, In IV, dist. 43, q. 3, a. 3; and Richard thinks the same probable there, a. 3, q. 2. Henry also supposes the same, Quodl. XI, q. 14, when he says that the rational soul, created by God alone in a body disposed by a natural agent, unites itself without new efficiency of an extrinsic agent, but as it were through natural resultance of the union from the soul itself; for from that opinion it also follows that the proximate agent in human generation does not immediately attain by its efficiency the union of the soul to the body, but only remotely by reason of the dispositions; which opinion the Conimbricenses also hold, bk. I Phys., q. 11, a. 3. Secondly, if anyone wishes to defend that accidents instrumentally attain this union, which Capreolus holds, In II, dist. 15, q. unic., a. 3, and more clearly In IV, dist. 43, a. 3, ad argument. Henrici et Aureoli contra 2 concl., it can be answered that that union, although in itself immaterial, yet participates certain properties of a material thing, especially that it depends on matter in becoming and in being on account of its essential and actual relation to it; whence it also has a certain extension on its part; and for this reason it can come about that material accidents are elevated as instruments to make that union, which will not seem difficult to those who believe that the material phantasm is the instrument for effecting the spiritual species.

Second assertion

22. The instrumental form is not a sufficient notion of acting unless the form which is the principal notion is joined to it.—I say secondly: it is not to be denied that the substantial form has its own proper and principal efficiency in the eduction of a like form from the potency of matter, immediately through itself, inflowing together with the accidental and instrumental principle, if in reality it is conjoined and sufficiently brought near; whence it comes about that the accident in this efficiency behaves as an instrument conjoined to the form, and not as wholly separated as to causality. This whole conclusion, and its intent and sense, have been sufficiently declared, I think, in what precedes. And they are made more manifest; for when fire, for example, is generated from tow near to it, we say that the generating fire inflows into the action which is intrinsically terminated at the eduction of the substantial form not only instrumentally through its heat, but also principally through its substantial form; not only mediately and remotely, inasmuch as it gives to its heat that being and that power through which it causes, but also because it proximately inflows in its own genus together with its heat. And we say that this very thing holds in every eduction of a substantial form, if from elsewhere there is no impediment on the part of the agent, either through lack of existence or through distance of place. The foundation of this assertion so expounded has also been intimated above, and consists in two principles. One is that the instrumental form, by itself alone and as it were destitute of the actual influx of the principal agent, cannot be sufficient in the notion of proximate cause for effecting a form nobler than itself. This principle seems to me almost known from its terms, because if that form is not then actually helped by a superior, it inflows only through what it actually has in itself; since, therefore, that is something imperfect, it cannot by itself alone effect something more perfect. Likewise, it is repugnant that heat should effect a substantial form by its own power alone; but when it operates by itself alone without the influx of the superior form, it operates only by its own power, because it has no other, except that which is connatural to its entity or which it has by virtue of its own being. That it has this being from the form of fire, or that by its nature it is its faculty, or that it is substituted in its place so as to act as it were in its name—all these things (I say), since they add to heat only certain relations or denominations, cannot be enough for heat alone, destitute (so to speak) of all superior help, to be the sufficient proximate and immediate principle of such an action. Likewise, because otherwise heat would be the power of producing substance in the same way as it is the power of producing heat, which from the very excess of substance is established to be quite absurd. The sequel is evident, because heat has both inasmuch as it is a certain power of the substance and participates its being from it. Finally, since the power of acting of heat, under whatever notion, is nothing else than its entity and perfection, and this is far less than in the substantial form, it cannot be sufficiently understood how the whole power which by itself alone would be sufficient for the eduction of the substantial form is transfused into heat; therefore heat alone cannot be substituted in place of the whole principal principle.

23. The material substantial form constitutes a supposit able to effect.—The other principle on which the assertion laid down relies is that this mode of activity, speaking per se, can belong to the material substantial form, if from elsewhere the general conditions required for acting are not lacking. This principle, however, seems sufficiently proved in the reasons made last in favour of the opinion of Scotus, which Aristotle confirms not a little, II De Gener., texts 54 and 55, where, reproving those who denied the efficiency of forms, he says: To this it is added that they attribute to bodies, in various ways, the instrumental faculties through which things are generated, and meanwhile they take away the cause which pertains to the form. Nor is it enough to say that efficiency is attributed to forms because from them flow the qualities through which alone they exercise all their actions, because, as we said above, this is not proper and per se efficiency, but only remote and radical; for the action which immediately arises from the accidental form alone also depends per se essentially on it alone as on its proximate principle, to omit the concurrence of the universal cause. A sign of which is that if God conserves heat, for example, every action which proceeds proximately from it alone can also be conserved, as even the authors of the contrary opinion confess; therefore it is a sign that the substantial form is not the principle per se of such an action; therefore, if the form can never actually inflow with the accidental faculty, it never has true and proper efficiency, which Aristotle reproved above, and which derogates not a little from the perfection of the substantial form. Moreover, no repugnance can be shown in this mode of effecting; therefore there is no reason why it should be denied; for by a similar consecution we proved above that secondary causes have the power of effecting, because it pertains to the perfection of creatures and to the efficacy of the Creator that they have the power of communicating themselves, so far as is consonant with their natures; therefore the same must be said of substantial forms, as regards this efficiency, if from elsewhere it is not repugnant to them; but no repugnance can be shown, speaking per se, either on the part of the form which is educed or on the part of the educing form. The first is evident, because that form both is finite and is made (so to speak) in a finite mode, that is, by eduction, without any admixture of creation. The second is evident, because that form is not less perfect, nor is it disproportioned, since it is of the same order; for it is an act of matter nobler or equally noble; and by its nature it is instituted for, and most inclined to, generating what is like itself.

24. The reasons of the second opinion are answered.—The first.—Finally, the reasons of the second opinion either do not militate, or do not press very hard, against this activity. For the first reason proves at most that the instrumental activity of accidents is not to be excluded, but does not prove that this influence of the form is impossible or not necessary. Thus the substantial form can be understood to be the proximate principle of some action in two ways: in one way, exclusively (so to speak), that is, without the partnership of another proximate and instrumental principle. And in this way it does not follow that the substantial form is the proximate principle of any proper action. And this at most is what the reasons made in that argument prove. In another way it can be understood that the substantial form is the proximate principle, that is, immediately inflowing through its substance into the action or effect, yet not alone, but as elevating or aiding the instrumental power, and as determined by it to such an action. And in this way we deny that it exceeds the perfection of the substantial form to be the proximate principal principle of acting of some action; which we shall show to be true not only in substantial generation, of which we are now treating, but also in some accidental operations, in the following section. Nor do the reasons touched upon in that argument proceed against this, because this mode of effecting does not exclude the accidental faculty or instrument.

25. The second.—The third.—The second reason, however, proceeds from a false foundation, as is established from what has been said, namely, that generation is not properly an action distinct from alteration. The third is of little weight, both because for efficiency in strictness contrariety or privative opposition suffices, especially where the effecting is not through proper successive motion, but through instantaneous change, such as substantial generation is; and also because, although formal contrariety is between qualities, yet radical (so to speak) contrariety is in substantial forms; and therefore the quality alone is not always the principle of action, but sometimes the form too, especially when through the action not only the contrary quality, but also the form repugnant to the other form, is to be introduced. Finally, although corruptive action is only between contraries, nevertheless the qualities themselves effect not only formally contrary qualities, but also forms, in which is the root of the contrariety and repugnance. It is a sign, therefore, that, although the action begins from proper contrariety, yet it does not stop in it, but extends as far as its root; what wonder, then, that the form itself can, in its own genus, be the principle of such efficiency, at least as it attains the substantial form and the root of the contrariety? The experiences, however, which were adduced last, do not proceed against this conclusion, which is laid down only on a hypothesis, namely, if the form is sufficiently present; what must be said of them, however, will be established from the following assertions.

26. It is shown that the first conclusion is not opposed to the second.—Only Scotus's objection can be brought against these two conclusions; for this second seems to be repugnant to the first, because if the substantial form by itself proximately inflows to effect a like form, the immediate activity of accidents is superfluous; for if heat by itself alone suffices, in the notion of proximate principle, to effect like heat, why will not the form of fire alone suffice to educe a like form, since we now suppose that it can immediately inflow into it? But if that suffices, another principle is superfluous. It is answered, first, that it was necessary for accidents to have instrumental activity because, as we shall say at once, they are given for acting not only in the presence of the form, but also in its absence; for this is often necessary for natural generations. Next, from this we elicit that the proper power of disposing and preparing the matter and the instrumental power of educing the form, when it is educible, are conjoined by the nature of the thing; and therefore, although we should grant that, on the part of the form, when it is sufficiently present, another active power is not absolutely necessary, yet because this one is otherwise per se necessary and connatural, it therefore concurs then too and helps the action much. Finally, it can perhaps be added that even then that power is necessary, because the substantial form by itself alone is never a sufficient principle of action, since of itself it is indifferent and as it were a general principle of action; and because, just as the substantial form, on the part of the matter, requires accidental dispositions, although the accidental form does not require them, so on the part of the principle it requires the partnership of an accidental instrument in order to be educed from the potency of matter.

Third assertion

27. I say thirdly: accidents are not so conjoined instruments of substance for educing the substantial form that they cannot exercise their whole activity with respect to substance, even when they are disjoined from or distant from the substantial form. This is the clear opinion of St. Thomas, which all the authors cited above follow, both in the second opinion of the first point and in the second point. And it is proved by the natural experiences adduced above, and by that which, supposing the mystery of the Eucharist, is taken from the action of the species of wine. The a priori reason, however, is that in these accidents, by whatever reason their entity is conserved distinct from their proper substantial form, there remains the whole power of acting connatural to them, because this is not distinguished in reality from their entity; therefore, if they are applied in a fitting way to some patient, they will have with respect to it the connatural action by which they dispose its matter to the form proportioned to them; but with this action, if it reaches the required terminus, there is conjoined by the nature of the thing the instrumental action by which the substantial form is educed, because this cannot naturally be separated from the ultimate disposition; therefore accidents of this kind can also have this action, even when they are distant from their proper form, provided they have the whole intrinsic perfection or intensity necessary for acting and for sufficiently disposing the matter.

Fourth assertion

28. I say fourthly: when accidents disjoined from their form so effect a substantial form that they cannot be helped by their proper form, it is necessary that the influx of the proper form, which is lacking there, be supplied by the concurrence of some superior cause, which cannot be some created intelligence, but must be some corporeal cause, such as the sun or another similar one; or, if this too is lacking or is found insufficient, that whole defect is to be supplied by the concurrence of the first cause. This conclusion, as to its former part, follows by necessary consecution from the preceding; for the accidental form alone and destitute of the help of the substantial form is not a sufficient principle in the notion of proximate cause of the substantial form, as was proved in the second assertion; therefore, when the influx of the substantial form is lacking, it cannot consummate the effect of the principal agent unless that influx is supplied from elsewhere, because an effect can never be produced without a sufficient cause. But it often happens that accidents without the influx of their proper form reach by their action as far as the substantial effect; therefore then that influx is supplied by the concurrence of some superior cause, because there is no other principle to which such action could be referred, since a lower cause does not suffice, for the same reason often repeated, and no equal one intervenes. This assertion is declared, next, from a certain common opinion of all philosophers; for all think that some substantial effects are to be attributed to some superior or heavenly cause as the proximate principal cause, on account of the defect of the particular or univocal cause; thus they say that animals which are generated from putrefaction are made by heavenly power; likewise of minerals; and many think the same of the form of the cadaver. But if accidents alone sufficed to effect the substantial form without the help of a superior cause, it would never be necessary to have recourse to a superior cause in these effects, but it would always have to be said that each thing is made by what is like it, either formally or in a power existing in its accidents, without other influx of the heaven or of another universal cause besides that which it has with the other causes. As, for example, if it were true that in red-hot iron there is no formal fire, but only intense heat sufficient to dispose the matter of the tow to the substantial form of fire, then, although such iron would generate fire, neither the heaven nor God would concur with greater concurrence than if fire generated fire, and consequently that generation of fire would be attributed to the universal cause no more than if fire generated it; therefore, by parity of reasoning, when gold is generated in the bowels of the earth, the sun does not concur there by some special influx to the substantial form of gold, but the accidents which sufficiently dispose the matter to the form of gold (for these are always necessary in the eduction of any form whatever) will induce, in the power of the form of gold, a like form; therefore gold is not generated by the heaven, but by gold, and the cadaver by a cadaver, and so of all others; but this is foreign to the sense of all philosophers, who say that in those events the universal cause supplies the defect of the particular; therefore the same must be said whenever a similar defect intervenes. And this will be declared more by running through some effects in particular.

29. Various modes in which accidents can be separated from their connatural or principal substances.—For it can happen in various ways that accidents are separated from their substantial form. In the first way, because by divine power they are conserved outside all substance, as happens in the mystery of the Eucharist. And then the separated accidents—for example, the species of wine—by their own power and the general concurrence of God dispose a drop of water, for example, mixed with them, so as to convert it into wine; when, however, they reach the instant of substantial transmutation, the same accidents apply indeed the whole instrumental efficiency which of their nature they can apply to the eduction of the form; yet because the influx of the substantial form is lacking, it is necessary that, besides the general concurrence, God apply greater efficacy, by which He supplies the influx of that form. Of which matter I have spoken in tome III of the III Part, disp. LVII, sect. 1, where I reported the authors who philosophize thus, and nevertheless call that action natural, because that whole concurrence is due, the prior miracle being supposed; in all other respects the action takes place by natural power and mode.

30. Whether red-hot iron is truly fiery in some part.—In another way it happens that an accident is separated from its proper substantial form because it is in an extraneous subject, as intense heat is in water or iron, or as light is in the air; for we call a subject extraneous not only that which is repugnant, but also that which by virtue of its form does not have such an accident, unless it receives it from an extrinsic agent. An accident, however, so existing in an extraneous subject, if it is of the same species as the dispositions required for introducing the form, is rarely able to effect a sufficient disposition for the connatural form; hence either it must have the form conjoined in the notion of active principle, or the generation will follow wholly per accidens from the disposition of the matter, and then the power of a superior cause will be more necessary. And the reason is that heat, for example, separated from fire or from an animal, speaking per se, does not suffice to dispose the matter sufficiently for the form of fire, because, existing in an extraneous subject, it never has the intensity necessary for the form of fire; nor does it suffice to generate flesh or to introduce a soul, because in an extraneous subject it is not so tempered as the disposition of the soul requires. Which reason proceeds generally of any similar accident, for in an extraneous subject either it does not reach the grade which the other form requires, or it does not have conjoined the other qualities required for the temperament of such a form; and therefore, speaking per se, it cannot sufficiently dispose to that form, and consequently cannot introduce it instrumentally into prime matter. Hence, in that common example of fiery iron, the heat which inheres in the iron does not in truth suffice to generate fire, but it has conjoined some true fire intimately entered into the pores of the iron, by which fire is generated; the heat of the iron, however, helps the speed and vehemence of the action. It sometimes also happens, from the disposition of the patient, that, although the proximate agent introduces only heat in some grade, there results per accidens a disposition to a very diverse form; as, if the matter is moist and is heated by fire, there easily results a temperament of hot and moist, and some form of a mixed body requiring that disposition. And in this way very many mixed bodies are generated, especially imperfect ones; perhaps minerals too are often made in this way. For sometimes it is probable that they are made per se, through the action of what is like them, as it were by accretion and increase, not indeed vital, but by juxtaposition. Animals likewise, which are generated from putrefaction or from rain falling on warm earth, seem to be made in this way per accidens. And in generations of this kind per accidens it is not difficult to believe that the power of a superior agent is required, by which such forms are introduced; because the proximate agent not only does not have a like or equal substantial form, but also does not have a quality or temperament per se sufficient to dispose and prepare the matter, and consequently not for a sufficient instrumental action either. The dispositions, however, which are received in the patient, as I have often said, do not concur actively, even instrumentally, to introducing their form, because either in that instant they no longer exist, but others resulting from the form, or, if they are the same, they have no proper action there, and therefore neither can they have an instrumental one; therefore in all these generations which take place as it were per accidens, some superior cause which introduces the form is rightly demanded. And the account is almost the same of the introduction of the form of the cadaver, which is made as it were per accidens, lest matter remain without form, and is made not so much according to the action of the agent killing the animal, for example, which is often only a division of the continuum, but according to the material disposition which remains or was previously in the patient. The same holds when from the vehement motion of collision or percussion of bodies fire is kindled, by means of vehement heat which that motion causes in some particle of matter well disposed to it. And finally, the account is the same of all generations which happen to take place per accidens.

31. But if the accident existing in an extraneous subject is not of the same notion, but of a superior one, with respect to the dispositions by which the lower matter is prepared for the form of the thing to be generated, it can come about that by means of that accident the generation of some lower substance takes place, not only per accidens by reason of the dispositions of the matter, but also per se from the intention of the superior agent. Which happens when the principal agent, because it is distant in place, by mediation (as they say) of supposit diffuses some power through the medium, so that through it it may be conjoined to the patient by immediacy of power; in which way the heaven acts on these lower things through light or other influences, which are qualities of a superior order and notion to the elemental qualities by which matter is proximately disposed. And of this kind of action it can be said that, although the principal agent seems to be distant in place, yet it does not cease from actual influx, because it is within the sphere of activity and touches the patient by means of the diffused power. And thus it could be understood that the action is not from the accident alone as from a wholly separated instrument, but as from one conjoined in the notion of causing to its principal agent. But this depends on a difficulty to be treated below about the proximity necessary between agent and patient, and therefore let it be deferred to that place.

32. Finally, an accident, although it is not in an extraneous subject, can be separated from the principal generator, because both the accident itself and its subject are cut off from the generator and constituted so as to take its place in acting. And this happens most of all in the generation of animals by means of seed, which is most properly a separated instrument, not only in subject, but also in place, and sometimes also in time; for it happens that seed effects generation when the generator no longer exists. From which it is also clearly established that such an instrument is separated in causality from the animal from which it was cut off, and therefore in this instrument the necessity of some influx of a superior cause appears more clearly; otherwise, since seed is a very imperfect thing, it does not appear how it could by itself alone effect a far more perfect thing as a sufficient proximate cause. For that it is a power cut off from a more perfect thing and left in its stead, although it suffices for some instrumental action, as Aristotle too thinks, II De Generat. Animal., c. 1², yet cannot be enough for it to be absolutely the total proximate agent. Nor is it enough if someone says that seed is an instrument not only by reason of the accidents, but also by reason of the substantial form, which is in the spirit enclosed in the grosser part of the seed, in which is the seminal and instrumental power. For although this is probable, yet it does not suffice, because that whole substance and its form is much less perfect than the soul which is introduced through its action; it needs, therefore, greater concurrence and help of a superior cause, especially in the generation of animals and perfect living things.

33. By what the organization of the foetus is made.—Indeed some add, especially Scotus, In II, dist. 18, that even for the accidental disposition of the organic body that power of the seed is not sufficient, because that action is so varied and manifold that it in no way appears by what reason it could be accomplished by a simple and imperfect power acting merely naturally. Hence the Commentator, whom Scotus also cites, II De Caelo, comm. 69 and following, says that the seed acts and organizes by divine power. And VII Metaph., text 31, he says that the power of the seed is divine, artful, and like an intellectual power, and therefore (he says) Galen doubts whether that power is the creator or not. Which Galen treats in the book On the Formation of the Foetus, where he ingenuously and willingly confesses that, although he had laboured much in this matter, he had found nothing that satisfied him; he concludes, however, that the wonderful operation of the seed is not without something possessed of reason and intellect. And truly that action is so wonderful that it can scarcely, or not even scarcely, be understood. If, therefore, the very action of organizing the body can scarcely be understood in the seed without some peculiar concurrence and help of a superior cause, what wonder is it that for educing the substantial form itself from the subject matter it needs greater aid and help? For without doubt there is a great difference and a wide distinction between these; for since the organization of the body is not substantial but accidental, it can rightly be understood that for the whole of it there is as it were an eminent and universal power in the seed, whether by reason of the substantial form or by reason of some accidental faculty; for either can be understood to be an instrument of the soul sufficient to effect a temperament of the primary qualities proportioned and connatural to the members of the organic body; there seems only to be required some diverse application in order that the same power of the seed may dispose the various members in so diverse a way and by its force reduce them to the wonderful order which appears in the due disposition of the members. And for this perhaps it is helped by some natural faculty of the maternal womb or by some heavenly influx; or certainly (if need be) by some motion or direction of the author of nature. Especially because the seed does not accomplish from the beginning, by its power alone, the whole organization of the body, but that of some principal part, into which the sensitive soul is introduced, which afterwards gradually accomplishes the organization of its body, as St. Thomas declares at length, I, q. 118, a. 1, ad 4. But as regards the production of the sensitive soul itself, power is lacking in the seed not only as to the mode of action, but also as to the substance of the action (so to speak), and therefore much more for this action does it need the actual help, influx and concurrence of a superior cause, as will easily be established to one who carefully weighs this matter.

34. An objection against what has been said above.—Only this can stand in the way: that it seems to be both against the due order of nature and against the perfection of these agents that in their generations a superior or the first cause should always have to supply the defect of the proximate cause. For when, from a fortuitous concurrence of causes and per accidens, it happens that some generation takes place without a sufficient proximate cause, more from the necessity of matter than from the intention of some natural agent, then it is no wonder that in the form to be introduced the universal cause should have to supply the defect of the particular. But that in the very mode of generation instituted per se by nature the proximate cause should always be so imperfect, or should apply its power in so imperfect a way, that it is never found sufficient for the effect, seems to be both a disordered institution of nature and a great imperfection of the particular causes generating in this way. And it is confirmed, for inanimate corporeal agents have, speaking per se, sufficient power to produce things like themselves; therefore animate things, since they are far more perfect than inanimate things, must have it. It is confirmed secondly, because otherwise it could with the same ease be said that a secondary cause of this kind does nothing in the eduction of the substantial form, but that the whole is done by the first cause supplying the defect of the particular cause. But if this seems a drawback because it is not consonant with the natures of things, that too ought to seem so.

35. A little question for the solution of the objection.—Before I fully satisfy this objection, it is necessary to explain what the universal cause is which supplies this defect of the particular or helps its instrument, which we proposed in the latter part of the preceding assertion. In which we said first that this efficiency cannot be attributed to created intelligences, because we think that they have no power to effect anything in bodies besides local motion, as we shall say below in treating of them ex professo. Hence the actions of natural agents do not per se depend on the concurrence of created intelligences, just as neither do they depend on them in being; and therefore, when they need greater help and concurrence, they do not expect that concurrence or help from them, but from some other cause to which they are per se subordinated. There are not lacking, however, those who say that the intelligences, although by themselves they cannot inflow into bodies in this way, can yet do so through the heavens, as through their instruments. But how difficult this is to understand and to believe I shall say at once. It remains, therefore, that such a universal cause is either the heaven or the very author of nature, God; for besides these no other superior cause can be devised. And the heaven indeed seems of itself a proportioned agent, because, since it is corporeal and from elsewhere is of a certain superior order and perfection, it has a more eminent power of altering lower bodies, as experience itself teaches us sufficiently. And therefore it is no wonder that it should also have the power of generating substances; therefore also of helping accidents towards the generation of substances.

36. Two impediments, however, and those not to be despised, intervene, which seem to render this influence of the heavens upon the substantial forms of things to be generated difficult. The first impediment is universal, with respect to all things which are generated in the earth or in the other elements, whether they be living or inanimate; namely, because either the heaven acts towards the eduction of substantial forms through its accidents alone, or also through its substantial form immediately. If the first is said, the same difficulty arises in which we are engaged: how those accidents, without the actual influx of their own or of another substantial form, suffice per se to educe a substantial form. Unless perhaps someone answers that the heavenly accidents are more perfect beings than are the material forms of generable things, especially inanimate ones. But this is absolutely false; for, as I shall show below, the substantial form is a more perfect being than any accident whatever, not only by genus, but also universally and in each case. And in some cases it is incredible per se, as of the form of gold, of silver and of gems, etc. Especially because the heavenly bodies proximately effect these effects by means of qualities which they impress on the air and on other intermediate bodies, such as light, and any other insensible qualities there may be, which are not more perfect than the very form of air, let alone all the others. If, therefore, for this reason the proper and actual efficiency of the very form of the sun or of the other stars is necessary, excessive local distance seems to stand in the way; for how can the form of the sun, immediately through itself, effect the form of gold in the bowels of the earth, so far distant and remote from it? On account of which difficulty Scotus said that some form can act immediately on a distant thing, which the other philosophers can scarcely hear or bear; for this saying of Scotus fights with an Aristotelian dogma received by all philosophers. Nor will he satisfy this difficulty who says that, just as the efficiency of the accidents of the sun penetrates to the inmost parts of the earth, so also does the efficiency of the form of the sun. For the account is not similar on both sides; for accidents diffuse their power by means of other accidents produced by them; but the substantial form cannot diffuse its power by means of substantial forms, as is easily established per se, because it neither corrupts the intermediate bodies nor can add substantial forms to forms, as accidents can. But if the form of the sun diffuses its power only by means of accidents, we fall back into the former difficulty, because now the form of the sun does not itself immediately inflow into the eduction of the other form, but through accidents only.

37. To this difficulty it can be answered in two ways. The first is that the heaven or the sun, through its substantial form together with its accidental power, inflows immediately into these lower things by immediacy of power, even if it is not immediately conjoined to them by immediacy of supposit. This way of speaking, however, both has no small difficulty, and the probable manner of defending it cannot be explained until sect. 4, in which we shall declare how the agent must be conjoined to the patient in order to be able to act upon it; and therefore let it be deferred to that place. The second way is that these substantial forms are not effected by the principal power of the heavenly influx alone, but that it is necessary for the author of nature to apply a greater concurrence, by which He supplies the effect of the proximate cause; and that these effects are attributed to the heaven either by a general reason, according to which the sun and a man are said to generate a man, which we shall declare below in treating of essentially subordinated causes, or sometimes by a more special title, namely, because the heaven takes the place of the proximate cause and applies the whole efficiency which particular causes are accustomed to apply, either for disposing the matter or for educing the form by the instrumental action of qualities, through instrumental powers, even if they cannot inflow immediately through their proper forms. And perhaps in this way the sun effects gold or other minerals.

38. Whether the heaven can effect living things.—The second impediment, less general, concerns the forms of living things; for since the heaven is not animate, even if local distance does not prevent it from being able to inflow through its form, nevertheless its more imperfect grade seems to stand in the way of its being able to inflow into these forms of living things. Some answer that, although the heaven does not live, nevertheless its form, by reason of its specific difference, is simply more perfect than those living things which are generated by the heaven. This reply can be taken from St. Thomas, I, q. 115, a. 3, ad 3, where he says that the heavenly bodies by their universal power contain in themselves whatever is generated in lower things; and q. 105, a. 1, ad 1, he says that the effect is likened to the agent either according to species or according to virtual containment: And thus (he says) animals generated from putrefaction, and plants, and mineral bodies, are likened to the sun and the stars, by whose power they are generated. But in the first place, although with respect to imperfect living things or animals what is assumed in that reply is probable, yet with respect to perfect animals it does not seem likely, because both in their operations and in their mode of operating they seem greatly to exceed the perfection of the heaven. Next, since the grade of life, as such, is more perfect than the grade of non-living things, it seems impossible that a form which is not a soul should eminently contain some soul so as to be able to be the principal principle of causing it; for a form which eminently contains a soul also contains the grade of life, not indeed according to its whole potentiality, but according to its actual and precise perfection; but it cannot be understood that a form contained under a lower grade should eminently contain the perfection of a higher grade.

39. The heaven with an intelligence cannot generate a living thing.—There is, therefore, another reply, that the heaven by its own power cannot effect the forms of living things; yet, because it does not act except as moved by an intelligence, therefore in the power of the intelligence, of which it is the instrument, it can effect such forms. So St. Thomas answers, I, q. 70, a. 5, ad 3; whence in the earlier places he seems to speak of the heaven as conjoined to an intelligence, or as including it. But this reply too is difficult for me to understand, because I do not think that the intelligence impresses anything on the heaven besides local motion, which does not serve to increase active power, but only to vary its application, as Aristotle sufficiently signified, bk. II De Gener., c. 9, text 55, saying: For the impulse produces continuous generation because it brings near and removes the sun, the author of things to be procreated. And it is evident by reason, for what is it that an angel impresses on the heaven besides motion, since it cannot impress any qualities on it? For corporeal matter obeys angels only as to local motion, as the same St. Thomas teaches, I, q. 110, aa. 2 and 3. But if the intelligence impresses nothing on the heaven besides motion, how can it increase its power to act for something beyond its proper perfection? For local motion per se is not active, nor does it give power of acting. Nor in this are physical agents, such as the heavens are, to be compared with the instruments of art, in which motion serves the form of the art, because this is nothing other than a mode resulting from the varied situation or place of some body and its parts, which are varied through motion; but physical agents induce proper and perfect forms, which do not per se result from motion, but only per accidens, inasmuch as the power of acting is applied through motion. Moreover, the heaven by its nature is not the instrument of an intelligence, because it neither has a natural relation to it, nor is any intelligence by its nature conjoined to the heaven or destined for its motion, but only by the choice and good pleasure of the author of nature. Nor does it become an instrument by reason of local motion alone; otherwise whoever applies fire or another acting cause would use it as a physical instrument, and for that reason the applied fire could do something more in the power of the one applying it, which is plainly false. The sequel is evident, because the heaven has nothing more from the intelligence than application, nor does the heaven have anything more or less because it is moved by a more or less perfect intelligence, or by anything else whatever, provided it receives an equal motion. Finally, when the heaven is said to effect living things in the power of a living intelligence, I ask whether the intelligence together with the heaven actually, through itself and immediately, inflows and effects the souls of living things, or only through the heaven, so that the action of the intelligence stops in the motion of the heaven, from which the rest of the efficiency immediately arises. The first is false, and against the doctrine of St. Thomas, as we have often said, and in great part coincides with the opinion of Avicenna. But if the second is said, the difficulty is not cleared, how an instrument not having in itself a sufficient form can effect an effect without the actual help of a superior and more principal cause. It will therefore be said more truly and better that the heaven by its own power indeed cannot effect an animal, as is supposed in the said second reply, yet effects such things in the power of God, as the author and general provider of nature, who by His greater concurrence supplies whatever power is lacking in the proximate causes.

40. Solution of the little question.—Into what effects God inflows as a particular cause.—It must be said, therefore, that whenever in these lower things the influx of the substantial form for educing a like one is lacking, it is supplied by the power of the heavenly causes in those effects which do not exceed their perfection and power; but in those which surpass them it is supplied by the efficiency of the first cause, to which it belongs to supply the general concurrence necessary to lower causes, according to their natural capacity and need. Hence not only in events or effects which happen per accidens, but also in those which as it were per se accompany the natures of certain things and follow from their natural mode of acting, it pertains to the author and provider of nature, God, to concur in this way with secondary causes for acting. Wherefore sometimes this concurrence of God is due by the general reason of universal nature, lest the order of the universe be perverted or matter remain without form or pass into nothing; just as for water to be moved upward to fill a vacuum is only from the cause of universal nature, and therefore it is believed to take place by the sole command and impulse of its author, unless perhaps this task has been committed by God to some intelligence, because local motion does not exceed its activity and ministry, of which elsewhere. Sometimes, however, such concurrence is due from the proper nature and condition of some particular agent which is not apt to communicate or propagate its nature in another way, as we believe happens in the generation of perfect animals, and in the generation of man is most certain, yet by a far higher and nobler reason. For, because the soul of man is not only more perfect, but also of a higher and superior order than all the rest, therefore for the generation of man not only a greater concurrence of the author of nature, but also a higher mode of effecting the soul is necessary, namely, through creation. Whence it comes about that human seed cannot operate even instrumentally towards effecting it, but only towards organizing the body. In the generation of other animals, however, even perfect ones, because the souls are material, they are educed from the potency of matter, and therefore the seed can concur at least instrumentally towards their effecting, yet not without the help of a superior cause which supplies the assistance (so to speak) and the actual influx of the principal form.

41. The objection set out above is satisfied.—Nor is there in this any imperfection or disorder of nature, as was objected above, but it is a natural condition or need which the mode of generation and propagation which such a species by its nature demands brings with it. Just as the fact that for the generation of man the infusion of the soul by creation is required is not an imperfection or disorder of nature, but a condition naturally consequent upon such a nature of man, and therefore that action is not extraordinary, but due by common law, the institution of such a nature being supposed; so, then, must it be said in the present case, not by wholly the same, but by a proportional reason. Wherefore, just as in man it is not from imperfection that one man can neither principally nor instrumentally effect a soul like his own, so in other animals it is not from imperfection that they cannot apply the whole principal power necessary for the eduction of their forms, but only the instrumental. For they hold as it were a certain middle place, and because in comparison with the rational soul they have less perfect souls, being material, they can therefore apply some efficiency, at least instrumental, to effecting them, which man cannot; but because, in comparison with inanimate things, the forms of living things are far more perfect, more things are required for their effecting and an exquisite and peculiar mode of generation; and thence it comes about that particular causes cannot apply the whole principal power, but only the instrumental, to effecting them. Nor, because sufficient principal power is not found in them, is instrumental action also to be denied them, because they are found sufficiently proportioned to this, and not to that; but nature has given to each corruptible species power and action to propagate its nature, so far as it could give according to its capacity and mode of operating; and therefore it gave to man that he should act at least by disposing, to others that they should act instrumentally, but to others also that they should act principally. Wherefore that way of speaking by which St. Thomas and others, as we saw above, call secondary causes instruments of the first, is verified with a certain greater propriety in living things, especially perfect ones.

42. I know that other ways of speaking can be devised; for, because in the more perfect animals the seed does not accomplish generation except as conjoined to the female, some have thought that the soul of the female herself has a peculiar principal influx in the substantial formation of the foetus. Of other imperfect living things, however, especially plants, some say that the form of the thing generated does not substantially exceed the form of the seed itself, as appears in wheat and other such things. But these and similar views have many difficulties, which it is not permitted to pursue in this place, because they depend much on the science of the soul; and therefore the most probable opinion of all seems to be the one we have expounded; and experience itself teaches that these living things are per se less sufficient and need greater aids, not only for inducing the substantial form, but also for disposing and organizing the matter, as is established in plants; indeed, even among inanimate things, simple bodies are generated more easily than mixed ones; there is no drawback, therefore, in confessing that living things need a superior concurrence for generating things like themselves, although they themselves are not lacking some power and action proportioned and connatural to them. And in this way we think the foundations of the first opinion have been abundantly satisfied; for they prove our second and fourth assertions, but press nothing against the first and third, as we sufficiently declared in their discussion. The second opinion, however, we do not think contrary to the doctrine handed down by us, nor can its foundations stand in the way at all, as has been shown.