Disputationes metaphysicae

1. Before we speak of the end's notion of causing, it seems we should treat of its effects, so that we may proceed from those things which are better known to us. And since, as I said above, we are now considering the final cause with respect to the created will, through which intellectual agents operate for the sake of an end, we can consider a twofold set of effects of this cause: some are within the will itself, and are the acts or affections elicited by it; others are outside the will, and are effects which go forth outside it from the efficacy or command or motion of the will through its proper acts.

2. It is, then, first of all certain that the final cause, as we are now considering it, per se primo and most of all causes some act or affection in the will itself. This is received by the consent of all, and can be sufficiently shown by the reasons by which in sect. 1 we showed that there is a final cause; for we arrive at the knowledge of causes through effects; but through no effects do we so know the causality of the end as through those which it has about the human will, which by its metaphorical motion it allures both to love it and to seek it through fitting means, until it attains it and rests in it.

The first difficulty, about the causality of the end regarding the internal acts of the will

3. But the difficulty is whether all the acts which intervene in this progress are from the end as from their proper cause in its genus, or not all, but some of them, and which. In order that the reason of the difficulty be perceived, it is necessary to distinguish several acts which intervene in this business. Some tend directly to the end, either according to itself absolutely, as simple willing of it or love, or as to be attained through means, as intention; and these acts precede not only the attainment of the end but also the election of means. Others are acts which are proximately concerned with means, although by reason of the end, and of this kind properly is election, which consultation and inquiry about means precede, which, inasmuch as it is necessary or useful for seeking the end, is reduced to the means, and inasmuch as it is voluntary, falls in some way under election or is brought back to it. And these two genera of acts are said to pertain to the order of intention, because they precede not only the attainment of the end but also the execution of the means. But after the order of intention follows the order of execution, in which similarly two other genera of acts can be distinguished: for some are concerned with the execution of means, through their use, which they call active; others are concerned with the end as already attained and possessed, namely fruition or joy, which is also called rest of the mind, and in that state love too can last.

4. There is, then, about these acts a first general difficulty, because the end is only the cause of means; but none of these acts is truly and properly a means for obtaining the end; therefore none of them is caused by the end. The major is established from the definition of the end; for it is that for the sake of which something is made, which properly belongs to means alone. Next there is a special and greater difficulty about the acts which are concerned with the end; for they are in no way for the sake of the end; therefore they are not effects of the end. The antecedent is evident, because that is for the sake of the end which proceeds from the love or intention of the end; for that to be for the sake of says an ordination to the end arising from some prior act; but the intention of the end does not arise from another intention, nor love from love, otherwise there would be a process to infinity; therefore. Hence, just as the assent to the conclusion is from the principles, but the assent to the principle is not from a principle, so the willing of the means can be from the end and for the sake of the end; but the willing of the end not so. Thirdly, the difficulty is increased in those acts which are concerned with the end already attained; for the end does not cause after it has been obtained; for its causality consists in motion; but, the end being attained, the mind now rests; all motion ceases, therefore; and therefore the causality of the end too. Hence Aristotle, I De Generat., text 55, says that, the end being attained, action ceases; but, action ceasing, the causality of the end too ceases, because where there is no efficient cause, neither can there be a final one, as we shall teach below.

Resolution of the first difficulty

5. In order that we may begin from clearer things, it must be said, first, that the use or execution of means is per se and properly an effect of the final cause. About this conclusion there is no controversy nor reason for doubting, because this act not only proceeds from the affection and intention of the end, but can also truly and properly be called a means to the end. For, although by the name of use and execution of the end we here understand not only the external use or execution, but also the internal act by which the will applies the members or instruments to executing the means, yet that whole action, as it includes both the commanding and the commanded act, is truly and properly called a means to the end; therefore it is also most properly an effect of the end. And it is confirmed, for election is of means; but when the means are such that they must be exercised through the active use of the will, the active use itself also falls under election; for that whole human action which coalesces from the internal and external act is chosen as a means; therefore the internal act of the will too, by which the execution of the external means proximately takes place, has the notion of means to the end; therefore it is also an effect of the end itself.

6. I say secondly: the election of means is truly and properly an effect of the final cause. It is proved, first, because that act is most properly for the sake of the end; but by these words the causality of the end is most declared; therefore that act is from the causality of the end. Secondly, that act proceeds from the intention of the end and from reason ordering the means to the end; but in these the causality of the end seems chiefly to consist; therefore. Thirdly, such act depends essentially on the end, because it would not be concerned with means except by reason of the end; indeed rather the chosen means themselves are not effects of the end except by means of election; therefore it is much more necessary that election itself be an effect of the end. And these reasons confirm almost equally the preceding assertion.

7. Nor does the first reason for doubting posited at the beginning stand against these assertions. First, because not only means are for the sake of the end, but whatever depends essentially on the end and proceeds from its love. Next, because election itself can not unfittingly be called a means to the end. Which can be explained from what we said above in treating of the formally free power, namely, that the act elicited by it is intrinsically voluntary or willed by way of act; election itself, therefore, since it is an act elicited by the will, is also intrinsically willed; but it is not willed except for the sake of attaining the end, because, just as the thing which is chosen is chosen for the sake of the end, so election itself is exercised for the sake of the end. As he who chooses almsgiving to satisfy for sins refers to that end not only the almsgiving itself which he chooses, but also the very volition by which he chooses it; for for that end that election is necessary, and in it is found that goodness and utility which is found in the means compared to the intended end. And it is confirmed, first, for consultation is of means to the end, and if it happens that the will by a direct and formal act wills to consult, which often happens, that volition is in truth of the same means to the end, because no one wills to consult for any other reason than to prepare for himself the way to obtaining the end; therefore similarly, if by a proper and reflex will he wills here and now to choose, as he also can, by that act he wills election as a certain means, because he also wills it for the sake of the end, as consultation; therefore also when he does not do this by a distinct and reflex act, election itself, in the way in which it is intrinsically willed, is intrinsically a certain means to the end, by reason of which it is willed; it is, therefore, truly and properly an effect of the end.

8. I say thirdly: the acts which are concerned with the end itself, and precede or can precede in the order of intention its attainment, are truly and properly effects of the end. About this conclusion I find some diversity among authors; for some admit it of the act of intention or desire, but not of the first act of love or simple willing. And the reason can be that desire or intention suppose love of the end and proceed from it, and therefore can be caused by the end by means of the love of itself, and will most properly be said to be for the sake of the end or for the end's sake, and therefore can be effects of the end. But love does not suppose another act or love of the end from which it proceeds, and therefore is not from the love of the end; nor yet is it formally for the sake of the end, so far as concerns the direction of the will itself; it is not, therefore, an effect of the end in the genus of final cause, but only in the genus of object, efficient or specifying, according to various opinions. And Ferrariensis seems to hold this opinion, I Cont. Gent., c. 75; for he says that, although the thing which is the end can be loved by ordering nothing to it, yet it does not exercise the causality of the end until something is loved for its sake, and he relies on the words of St. Thomas there, saying that the causality of the end consists in this, that other things are desired for its sake. Yet St. Thomas there does not say that this is the adequate causality of the end, but that this pertains to the causality of the end. Others, however, admit the conclusion of all these acts, with a certain moderation, namely, that these acts are in truth effects of the end, yet not so properly or not so perfectly as the former, which can be taken from Gabriel, In II, dist. 38, note 2; and Gregory, whom he cites there, a. 1.

9. Others nevertheless simply affirm that the end is properly the final cause of these acts, as Henry, II p. of the Summa, a. 46, q. 6. And in this sense the assertion is posited, which I take from St. Thomas, I-II, q. 1, a. 1, where he says simply that all human acts are for the sake of the end and consequently are effects of the end; for these two are convertible, as to be from the agent and to be the effect of the agent, comprehending the action itself under effect. But these acts of which we are now treating are truly human acts; for they proceed from man as he is rational; indeed they are also free, at least for the state of this life, as was proved above, disp. XVIII, sect. 3; therefore.

10. And hence the first reason can be constructed; for man, inasmuch as he exercises these actions, even the first love of the end, operates for the sake of the end, and does not operate as moved by another to the end, but as proximately and immediately moved by the end itself, according to its proper and formal notion; therefore these acts are for the sake of the end, as caused by the proper motion of the end as end; therefore they are effects of the end as causing finally. The consequences are evident, because the causality of the end is most proper through the said motion. The major is also evident, because that action does not take place rashly and by chance, but tends by design to a definite goal; but hence we gather that some action is for the sake of the end. The minor too is sufficiently clear, because in each of those acts man operates allured and attracted by the known end, not in any way whatever, but inasmuch as it is a certain good lovable for its own sake, which is a certain proper relation and formal notion of the end, and by virtue of this cognition man so operates in that action that he directs and moves himself to such end and to its formal goodness. And this reason is taken from St. Thomas, in the said a. 1, where he proves that a human act is for the sake of the end in no other way than because it is from the object of the will under the notion of end, that is, as it exercises the proper causality of the end; and III Cont. Gent., c. 2, reason 5, he says thus: Of agents through intellect there is no doubt that they act for the sake of an end, for they act preconceiving through the intellect that which they attain through the action, and from such preconception they act. And these words can also be applied to the simple love of the end itself.

11. Secondly this is declared more fully in love itself; for it can be considered in two ways: first, as it directly tends to the object; secondly, as by virtual reflection it falls upon itself, in that way, namely, in which I said above that acts of this kind are intrinsically voluntary. In the former consideration it is caused by the goodness of the object, as known and moving the appetite to love such thing for the sake of its goodness, and so it is truly caused by the object as by the end, not indeed as by an end extrinsic to the thing willed, but as by the proper and intrinsic end of the very act of love, which tends to it. And for the same reason such act is said truly and properly to be for the sake of the end, not as for the sake of an extrinsic reason of willing, but because it is for the sake of its intrinsic goodness, and from its proper motion. In which (whatever others say) the reason is the same of love and of intention; for intention too is not for the sake of an end which is an extrinsic reason of willing, but because it tends to the end for its own sake and for its intrinsic goodness; but that difference, that intention supposes a prior act of love, matters nothing to the present matter, as we shall at once declare. Finally, from the common mode of speaking it is established that we are truly and properly said to love the end for its own sake, or for its goodness, for so we love God; but this particle for the sake of, attributed with propriety to the end, declares its causality; therefore these expressions are true on account of the causality of the end about such act. Hence for this reason too, when we love God above all things, we are said to love Him as the ultimate end, because in truth He exercises about our love the proper causality of the ultimate end, and such act does not tend to another end, nor is it aroused except by the supreme goodness of such end proposed to the will.

12. In the latter consideration too, including virtual reflection, it is most openly established that such act is for the sake of the end, because, although it can be loved for its honesty (which is not outside the notion of causing finally), yet in truth it is loved for the sake of the object to which it directly tends as for the sake of the end, in almost the same way as we said above of election. Although in election a certain notion of means to the end appears more than in love, because love is not so ordered to attaining the end as election. In which there also seems to be some difference between desire or intention and love of the end; for desire, since from its notion it supposes the lack of the attained end, is in some way a means to attaining it, indeed is as it were a certain beginning of the search for it, which is true by the same or greater reason of intention; but love from its notion does not suppose the lack of attainment of the end, and from this side can participate the notion of means less. But this difference in no way prevents love itself from being truly caused by the end, because, as I said above, this causality is not limited to means alone, but extends to every act which is truly for the sake of the end and from its proper motion. Especially since love too, when it precedes the attainment of the end, inasmuch as it arouses and moves to seek it, can be called a most useful means for attaining it. I add finally that love from its notion, abstracting from this or that state of the lover, tends to the end so as to unite and conjoin the lover; hence, inasmuch as love itself is virtually or formally loved, it is loved for the sake of this end; therefore it is loved for the sake of the end which it has for object; therefore it is caused by the same end.

13. Which can be excellently confirmed from the doctrine of St. Thomas, In IV, dist. 49, q. 1, a. 1, quaestiunc. 2, where he says that, since the object of the will is the end, this very thing which is to will, and any other act of the will, is nothing else than for something to be ordered to the end, and therefore necessarily supposes some objective end to which it is ordered. It can also be added from Capreolus, In I, dist. 1, q. 1, ad 1 against the third conclusion, that this love, because it precedes the attainment of the end, is ordered as to an end to the attainment and fruition of the thing loved itself, and in this way too can be an effect of the final cause. And in the course of that article and of the solutions of the arguments he says and heaps up many things from the doctrine of St. Thomas which can contribute to confirming this opinion. Finally this love too can be ordered to the lover himself as to the end to which, inasmuch as it perfects him and unites him in some way to his objective end; therefore from this head too it can be an effect of the final cause.

14. I say fourthly: the acts of the will which are concerned with the end already attained can and must also be numbered among the effects of the final cause. It is proved, for these acts can only be either love or joy, about which it is controverted whether they are distinct acts as they are concerned with the end already obtained, which Capreolus treats at length, in the cited place; now let us speak of them as distinct, whether they differ in reality or in reason. The act of love, then, as such, is of the same notion about the end which is loved for its own sake, whether that end is already possessed or not; therefore, if love according to itself, or that which precedes the attainment of the end, is an effect of the final cause, that love too which remains when the end is already attained is an effect of the same end. The consequence is evident, because in the same way love in each state is caused by the known object alluring the will to love it for its own sake and for its goodness. And so St. Thomas, I-II, q. 23, a. 4, and q. 26, a. 2, attributes in the same way to the causality of the end or of the good object its love in each state, indeed also delight, as I shall at once say. Hence too all the reasons by which we proved that the first willing or love towards the end is an effect of the final cause prove the same of the last love, especially since it is probable that it is always the same and can persevere.

15. About joy, however, inasmuch as it is something distinct from love, there seems to be some reason for doubting, both because it is as it were a certain passion necessarily consequent upon the possession of the loved end, and also because it is as it were the last rest of the mind to which the other things are ordered, even love itself, but it itself is not ordered to another, and so does not seem to have an end by which it could be caused. But nevertheless the assertion posited is proved also of this act; for in truth joy is not a mere passion, but is a vital act elicited by the will itself and caused in its genus by the object per se good, and proposed by reason, and inviting the will to rest in it and in its possession and to rejoice on account of its goodness; but this causality of the object is none other than final, as regards this mode of motion, whatever be the case as to whether from elsewhere effective causality too intervenes between those acts, which matters nothing to the present question. And it is confirmed, first, for delight itself is by the nature of the thing ordered as to an end to the very action upon which it follows, as a certain perfection and beauty of it, and to contribute to its constancy and facility; therefore delight too which follows from the attained end is ordered to the very attainment of the end, as to the end which in its way it perfects and strengthens; therefore, if delight is intellectual and follows from that end perfectly known and proposed to the will, it will be caused by it in the genus of end. Hence, although delight is said to be something last in the way of generation, yet in the order of ends according to itself it is not simply last, although sometimes it can be taken by the appetent as the ultimate end of which. And then too delight itself is ordered to him who takes the delight as to the end to which, and from this side can be an effect of the final cause.

16. Nor do the reasons made before press against this and the preceding conclusion. For to the first it has already been answered that not only means are effects of the final cause, but every act which contributes to the end or is ordered to it, either as means, or as perfection of its possession; and finally whatever is from the proper motion of the end preconceived and proposed according to its proper notion of good lovable for its own sake. To the second, we deny that these acts are not for the sake of the end, for in truth we love God for His own sake, and we delight in God for His own sake. Nor for this is it necessary that the act, because it is caused by the end or said to be for the sake of the end, be caused from a prior love of the end, but it is enough that it be caused by the goodness of the end itself alluring the will. Although delight, inasmuch as it is an act distinct from love, is in truth caused by love; for someone delights in the possessed end because he loves it; but that causality, inasmuch as it is between acts, pertains more to a certain mode of efficiency or natural resultance than to the final causality which we are now seeking. This, then, is to be considered more from the relation of the act to the object or end and from the peculiar mode in which an intellectual thing is moved by the end to acts of this kind. To the third it is answered that, although delight is called rest, yet it is not in a dead mode (so to speak), as is natural rest, which consists in the sole lack of motion, but it is a vital rest, which is not without internal action; yet, because that is not for obtaining and seeking the end, but for enjoying the end already possessed, therefore it is called rest of the mind. Inasmuch, then, as it is a proper act and true action, it can be an effect of the end. But what Aristotle says, that, the end being attained, motion or action ceases, is to be understood of the motion by which one tends to the attainment of the end, not of the internal action by which one rests in the end. Indeed St. Thomas adds, In IV, dist. 48, q. 2, a. 2, to the first reason in the opposite, that motion then ceases when the end is had, when such motion does not accompany the end itself or its attainment; as the heaven attains its end by means of its motion, yet does not cease, because for that end that motion is necessary; so, then, the internal action of love or delight does not cease when the end is attained, because it accompanies such end and is necessary for its perfection, and therefore with respect to such action the causality of the end does not cease.

17. But here a theological difficulty arose, especially from the last conclusion, for hence it follows that the beatific love and fruition itself are truly and properly caused by God seen, or by His vision, in the genus of final cause, and consequently that those acts are truly and properly for the sake of the end, which seems unfitting, since the acts are simply necessary. But because the matter is theological, I answer briefly by granting that those acts are from the causality of the end; for all the reasons made above prove this equally. Nor does it stand in the way that they are necessary; rather in the foregoing I said that the necessity of that love comes from God clearly seen as ultimate end, whose supreme goodness is so powerful in causing even in that genus as wholly to subject the will to itself. Finally, that necessity does not come from imperfection or from an irrational mode of operating, but rather from the supreme perfection both of the ultimate end itself and of the mode of applying it through rational or most perfect intellectual cognition to moving the will, and therefore nothing prevents that motion of the will, however necessary, from being from the proper causality of the end. But whether this suffices for that necessary love to be called a human act or not is treated by the theologians, and pertains more to moral philosophy than to metaphysics.

On the external effects of the final cause

18. We have spoken so far of the effects which the final cause has within the will itself of the cause acting from purpose; now it remains to speak of the effects which go forth outwardly from such cause, that is, outside the human will itself, so that under these effects are comprehended both the acts of all the other faculties of man himself, namely, intellect, senses, etc., and also external effects, if there are any, which result through these actions. In which matter two things are certain and beyond controversy. One is that all the natural actions which man exercises without the command or motion of the will are not effects of the final cause in that special mode in which we now speak; of this kind are all the actions of the vegetative soul, inasmuch as they are merely natural, and the acts of the senses or also of the intellect, inasmuch as they sometimes precede the motion of the will. And the reason is that the causality of the end, inasmuch as it is properly concerned with agents from purpose, which move themselves to the end, is first per se about the will, and supposes the sufficient application of such cause through the intellect; but in these actions which do not proceed from the motion of the will, man is not so moved by the end, but acts after the manner of other natural agents; therefore. Hence such mode of acting per se does not require proper and rational cognition of the end itself. Indeed even in the intellect itself the cognition or apprehension of the end itself, if it is natural and in no way from the will, does not proceed from the cognition of the end, but is the very cognition of the end, and therefore does not proceed from the causality of the end as such, as it is proper to agents from purpose. Which I therefore always add, because in these natural acts man operates for the sake of the end as other natural agents do, of which we shall afterwards see what it is in them to operate for the sake of the end, and what causality of the end can be in them. And in this assertion so expounded no difficulty remains.

19. Secondly, it is certain that all the actions, and their effects, which proceed from the command and motion of the created will operating for the sake of an end are effects of the final cause. It is proved, first, from the mode of speaking and thinking of all, for when a man walks for the sake of attaining health, such walking is thought to be an effect of the health preconceived and intended, and therefore is said to be most properly for the sake of the end, not from the direction of some extrinsic agent, but of the operator himself, who for this reason is called an agent from purpose; and the same holds of all similar cases. And when through these actions some permanent terminus is made in having been made, that too is thought to be an effect of the preconceived end, either in becoming while it is actually being made, or in having been made when afterwards it remains; in which way Aristotle said that instruments are for the sake of the end, and similarly a house and other artificial things are effects of some preconceived end. But the reason is that the end moves to all these actions; therefore all are its effects. Likewise such actions, as they are made by man, depend essentially on the end as causing, because they cannot otherwise be made by man; therefore they are effects of the end. Likewise those actions are means by which the intended end is procured; but the end causes not only intention or election, but also the execution of means; indeed in this its causality seems most to shine forth.

20. You will say: sometimes an action commanded by the will is not a means, but the intended end itself, according to a certain division given above, that the end is sometimes a thing done, sometimes the action itself, as citharizing or contemplation; therefore then at least the action will not be for the sake of the end, even if it proceeds from the will; therefore it will not be caused by the end. It is answered, as we already noted above, that there is no action which, if it is taken properly as it is action, does not have some intrinsic terminus for the sake of which it is made, as citharizing itself, inasmuch as it is a certain motion, effects a certain proportioned sound, which is a certain quality artfully composed, and in this way every action is in some way a means to its terminus, and for that reason can be caused by it as by the end. But if we speak of the terminus itself, or it is comprehended under the action by way of one, then it is not properly a means, supposing that it is the ultimate end in its series; yet nevertheless, although it is the end of which, it can have an end to which; for citharizing as it is made by man is for the sake of the operator himself; or if such act is a formal end, it can be for the sake of an objective one, as contemplation is for the sake of truth itself. And so always every action which is commanded by the will is an effect of some preconceived end.

21. About this latter assertion, however, two things occur to be briefly explained. The first was touched upon above, sect. 1, because from what has been said it follows that the same thing is the cause of itself, which seems absurd. And the sequel is evident, first, because the operation commanded by the will is often a true final cause, which, apprehended, moves to its own execution, and not only to desire or intention; therefore the execution of that operation is an effect of the same operation apprehended by way of end; but that execution is not other than the operation itself; therefore. Next, because the attainment of the end (whether it consists in operation, or in the sole inherence of some form, or in another similar relation) is the last effect of the final cause, as the end of healing is health, not in any way, but as inhering in me and affecting me, and this is the last thing which is caused by virtue of that intention, and the same holds proportionally in the rest. But the first end which moves and causes up to this effect is the attainment of the end itself as apprehended; it causes, therefore, itself.

22. It is answered, first, that there is no drawback in granting this whole, because in the final cause there does not intervene that repugnance which is in the efficient cause, so that it cannot be the cause of itself, because it does not require real pre-existence in order to cause, but intentional suffices, by means of apprehension; since, therefore, the end causes before it has existence in act, it is no wonder that it can concur in its genus to its own existence. And so we grant that the same thing according to diverse conditions of existing can cause itself, for, existing intentionally, it causes itself to be really. Nor is this diverse from what is said by the common axiom, that which is first in intention is last in execution; or what Aristotle too said, that form and end coincide in the same in number, although form and efficient can coincide only in the same in species. For the form, or its formal effect, is the effect of the agent, and as such is also the effect of the end which aroused the agent to operate, and which is not other than the form itself. Next we add that there is no attainment of the end which is not in some way for the sake of the end, either objective, if it has one, or at least for the sake of the end to which, which is always supposed to final causality, and as such is not its effect; and in this way the effect of the end, even the last, is always in some way distinguished from the adequate final cause. Finally, the attainment of the end, either ultimate simply or in some series, does not cause itself immediately, but proximately causes in the intellectual agent, of which we are now speaking, the affection and intention and other acts by means of which its causality reaches up to that action by which the end itself is procured and in which it consists, and so always something distinct from it concurs to causality of this kind.

23. But then the other proposed difficulty occurs to be explained, namely, what kind this causality of the end is about the external actions or things flowing from the motion of the will. For in these there is a special reason for doubting, for the internal acts elicited by the will have a real and intrinsic relation to the end itself as to their proper object, either formal and material together, as in intention and the other acts which are proximately concerned with the end itself, or formal only, as in the election of means; and therefore it is rightly understood that the end itself per se and proximately arouses and moves to such acts, and conversely that such acts per se and intrinsically depend on the causality of such end. But acts only commanded by the will (and much more their effects) are in no way proximately aroused by the end itself, nor do they themselves say intrinsic relation to the end, but only by extrinsic denomination are they said to be ordered to the end by means of the interior acts, as exterior walking is merely extrinsically ordered to health. From which it seems to follow, first, that the end is not per se but per accidens the cause of effects of this kind, in the way in which one applying or arousing the efficient cause is said to be the cause of the effect caused by it, or in the way in which the grandfather is the cause of the grandson because he begot his father; for so the end is the cause of the external action only because it begot the internal. Next, it seems to follow that by virtue of this causality of the end nothing real is posited in actions and external effects of this kind, per se speaking, but only extrinsic denomination, which is not enough for real causality. The sequel is evident, because the exterior act has from this only that it be ordered by means of the interior to such end, which is only an extrinsic denomination in the exterior, a sign of which is that, if it happened that that exterior action were made either for the sake of another end, or by chance and without any end, it would not be changed or diminished in itself and in its entity, nor would the physical action by which it is made be other; therefore it is a sign that it is not caused per se by that end, but only remotely and per accidens. For in efficient causes, although it happens that the same effect which is made by one cause can be caused by another, yet, if it is a per se cause, it is necessary that at least the action be diverse, as was handed down in the foregoing; hence, if from the change of the cause neither the effect nor the action is changed, it is a sign that such cause neither per se nor immediately inflows into such effect; the same, therefore, due proportion being kept, will hold in the present case.

24. This difficulty requires that we explain what the causality of the final cause is, or what it posits in its effects, which we shall perform in the following section, and at its end we shall satisfy the difficulty.