Summa summae S. Thomae sive compendium theologiae

Note that man can be understood to refer his actions to an end, or to act for an end, in a fourfold way: 1° actually and formally, 2° virtually, 3° interpretatively, 4° habitually. Concerning actual formal intention there is no difficulty: it reveals itself from its very terms, and it is when someone intends a known end by an actual and express volition.

Virtual intention can come about in two ways. In the first way, when someone, by force of a past intention not retracted, acts and chooses means, although he does not actually think of the end, as when a doctor gathers herbs from a prior intention of medicine or health, of which he is not now thinking.

If you should ask what that force of the first intention is,

I answer that it is a certain determination left behind by the first intention. Now that determination is a certain dictate arisen from the first; for one thing arises from another.

If you should again ask how long that force or virtual intention lasts,

I answer more probably, that it lasts of itself until it is removed by a contrary intention, because no other thing seems assignable by which it might be destroyed: not mere non-use, even over the passage of a long time, for since it is something spiritual, it does not depend on time; not the cessation of the first intention itself, for it does not depend on its continuation, otherwise, when the actual thought or recollection of that first intention ceases, that virtual intention would at once cease, which no one admits, and the contrary of which is evident from experience itself: thus in one who intends to go to Rome, it is not necessary that he remember Rome at each single step, and yet by force of the intention of arriving at Rome he continues the journey. Therefore it remains that it ceases and is destroyed of itself only by a contrary intention. Per accidens, however, it can be destroyed by non-use over a long time; because, since the very instability of our mind rushes headlong into such varied intentions, as experience shows, from this very long non-use room is given for other contrary intentions to arise and destroy the first, as St. Thomas teaches concerning habits, below q. 53, a. 3. But be that as it may, and although this virtual intention lasts, it is nevertheless not necessary that it flow into all deliberate works, either because perhaps they are not referable to its end, as is clear in the just man sinning venially, or because they come about from a motive contrary to this intention, as in the infidel giving alms from the motive of the honesty of mercy, not thinking of the idol; just as, for example, although the intention of going to Rome remains virtually in one who has set out on the way for this end, if nevertheless at some point he turns aside from the way for the sake of curiosity, this is not from the influence of this virtually remaining intention, but apart from it. Then, however, it is recognized in practice that this virtual intention influences the work, when someone, being in possession of himself and acting morally, indeed thinks nothing actually of the prior intention, but is in that disposition of mind, that reflecting upon himself, or asked what or why he does something, he would at once allege his prior intention, and would answer: « I do this for this. »

Virtual intention of the end is had in a second way, when someone does something ordered and tending by its own nature to some end, as something less perfect to its perfection, or as a participation and inchoation of a good to its complement and consummation, whether he knows the end or not, unless perhaps he violently and against the nature of his work twists it toward another end; because, says the Author¹, the inchoation of anything is always ordered to its own consummation, as is clear both in things that come about by nature and in things that come about by art: thus nature, forming an embryo, virtually intends man; thus a lower craftsman, constructing by order of a higher craftsman a work according to the rules of his lower art, virtually intends the end of the higher craftsman, which perhaps he does not know; thus one who lays the foundations of a house intends the house; one who casts seed into the ground intends the fruit which perhaps he does not know. From which principle the Holy Doctor proves that, since every inchoation of perfection is ordered to the consummated perfection, which comes about through the ultimate end, whoever acts deliberately intends the ultimate end, if not explicitly in itself, at least implicitly and in its inchoation. Some call this second virtual intention interpretative, but improperly; for there is another, strictly and properly interpretative, which follows. This second virtual intention, therefore, is better called virtual implicit; but the first, which is by force of the prior explicit intention, is called virtual explicit.

Interpretative intention, insofar as it is distinguished from the virtual in the second way, is said to be, not one that exists or existed in fact, but one that provides a foundation for judging what would be, if the end were thought of, insofar namely as from the disposition and manner of acting of the subject it is judged and presumed that someone would so will, if he noticed, or if the case occurred: e.g., one who gives alms to a poor man whom, under a foreign garment, he believes to be a stranger, and who is nevertheless a relative, is said interpretatively to have wished to give to a relative, if he had known.

Habitual intention or relation expresses a pure concomitance of some habit with the act, without any influence, whether actual or virtual, upon the act; as if a just man sleeping were to recite prayers, or being in possession of himself were to sin venially, this is said to be referred habitually to God, on account of the concomitance of the habit of charity. Whence habitual intention differs, as is clear, from the actual and the virtual. It also differs from the interpretative; because habit, precisely as informing a power, is only an inclination in first act, and only with respect to the specification of the act, needing intention and dictate in order to issue into act, and of itself is compatible with an intention and dictate to the opposite, as is clear in the just man sinning venially. Whence, precisely as such, it does not induce a presumption that the agent would act in such a way or with such an intention, unless from elsewhere, in the acquisition of a habit of this kind through acts elicited from a first intention, some force or determination remains, by force of which he acts. But then it falls back into the virtual in the first way, and is not purely habitual.

It has pleased us to dwell a little on these points, because they run through almost the whole of Theology. Let them therefore be said once for all, and be firmly held in memory.

I say: Whatever things man wills deliberately, he wills them in act or in virtue for the sake of the ultimate end².

Proof 1°. Whatever man desires, he desires under the note of good. Therefore whatever things he wills deliberately, he wills them in act or in virtue for the sake of the ultimate end. — Proof of the consequence. That which is desired under the note of good, either is desired as the highest and perfect, fully satisfying, and thus is the ultimate end; or is desired as something less perfect tending toward the perfect good, because the inchoation of anything is always ordered to its own consummation, and thus every inchoation of perfection is ordered to the consummated perfection, which is the ultimate end. Therefore. — See the preliminary notes.

Proof 2°. The ultimate end is related to the moving of the appetite, just as the first efficient cause is related to the moving of other causes to act³. But secondary causes do not move, unless they are moved by the first. Therefore secondary ends, or secondary desirable things, do not move the appetite, except dependently on the first desirable thing, which is the ultimate end.

But you will ask, what this ultimate end is that man intends in every deliberate act: whether material, or formal?

I answer that sometimes it is material and in the concrete, sometimes it is formal, namely beatitude in general; nor do the arguments of St. Thomas prove more. So Sylvius, Serra, Contenson, and others, against John of St. Thomas and Gonet: and by this answer the difficulties, otherwise much entangled, are more easily resolved.

Thus, in order that we may return to the difficulties of the preceding article, the just man sinning venially has for his proximate end a creature or some particular pleasure; the infidel, or sinner, doing some good moral work, has likewise for his proximate end the honesty of that work: but each has for his ultimate end to be happy, or beatitude as such, satisfying the appetite. And from this the difficulties are resolved. For

It follows 1° that the venial sin of the just man does not turn into mortal, because that most common end of beatitude as such, inasmuch as it is necessarily loved and of itself indifferent to being applied to an honest or a base object, confers on the act no honesty or malice.

It follows 2° that neither the just man sinning venially, nor the infidel or sinner doing some good moral work, has two total ultimate ends; because that common end does not enter into number with the particular one, namely God or a creature, but they stand as quo and as quod, like the abstract and the concrete, which do not enter into number, nor are reckoned as absolutely several.

It follows 3° that neither the sinner nor the infidel sins in his morally good works; because, as has been said, this common end of itself confers no goodness or malice on the act, but is indifferent and can be determined by some particular honest end or object, to which, if no evil circumstance is mixed in, the act will be morally good.