Summa summae S. Thomae sive compendium theologiae

Supposing that man's objective beatitude is God, it follows that his formal beatitude is the attainment of God. We ask, therefore, here by what means man attains God, and consequently in what man's formal beatitude essentially consists. Among the various opinions on this question, three are more celebrated: some place man's formal beatitude in the acts of intellect and will together, as do many of the Society of Jesus; some in the act of the will alone, namely either in the love of friendship, as Scotus holds, or in fruition, as others hold; the Thomists, finally, with their Doctor, hic q. 3, place it in the act of the intellect alone.

Before the resolution, it must be observed that beatitude can be considered in two ways: as to state, and as to essence. As to state, it embraces all things that make a man fully blessed as to soul and body and all his powers; and thus it implies love, vision, fruition, joy, perpetuity, impeccability, the glory of the body, etc., and is defined by Boethius: « A state made perfect by the aggregation of all goods. » As to essence, it implies only that which among all these is first conceived, by which the highest good, or objective beatitude, is acquired, and which is the root from which the rest that are assigned flow: thus man, looked at as to state, expresses not only rationality but all the properties flowing from rationality — the capacity for laughter, the faculty of wondering, of speaking, a certain quantity of limbs, color, proportion, etc. But considered precisely and metaphysically as to essence, he expresses only rationality, as that which is first conceived in him as the root and cause of the rest. This question, therefore, is a metaphysical one about beatitude itself as to its quiddity and essence, and it must always be kept before one's eyes that the essence of formal beatitude is nothing other than the attainment of objective beatitude, since it is that by which the beatifying object is united to the subject capable of beatitude. And therefore that action constitutes the essence of formal beatitude which is formally attaining of the ultimate end; but those things which stand in a concomitant or consequent relation to it are its properties and adornments, and pertain to its state.

I say 1°: Formal beatitude does not consist essentially in several acts, namely of intellect and will.

Proof. Formal beatitude is essentially the first attainment of the ultimate end. But this can belong to only one operation alone. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. Several operations of different powers, namely of intellect and will, cannot proceed equally and simultaneously from their powers, but among them there necessarily intervenes an order of priority and posteriority; for the act of the will is subordinated to the act of the intellect and presupposes it, since nothing is willed unless it is first known. Therefore these two acts cannot be equally and simultaneously attaining acts of the ultimate end, but one is prior to the other, namely the act of the intellect, which is prior to and more powerful than the act of the will.

It is confirmed. The act of the will is not attaining, as I will prove in the following conclusion. Therefore.

I say 2°: Formal beatitude does not consist essentially in an act of the will¹.

Proof. Formal beatitude is essentially the attainment of the highest good. But no act of the will is the attainment of the highest good. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. 1° The act of the will is either desire, or love, or fruition and joy. But none of these acts is attaining of the ultimate end, or of the highest good: Not desire, because desire concerns a good that is absent and not yet possessed. Not love: both because love abstracts from presence and absence, for we love a good both present and absent; and because the love of the way and of the homeland are of the same species, but the love of the way is not attaining of the ultimate end. Not fruition or joy, because since fruition is a pleasant rest in a good possessed, it does not effect possession, but follows it; for the will enjoys the good and is delighted in it from the fact that it is present and that it possesses it, whether in reality, or in hope, or in memory, and not conversely does it possess it because it enjoys it and is delighted in it: thus the miser does not attain riches because he enjoys them, but on the contrary he enjoys them because he possesses them.

Proof 2° of the first minor. The will is an inclination toward the good. But an inclination toward the good is not attaining of the good: both because, otherwise, in order to obtain the good, it would suffice to will it, and by this very fact that the miser willed riches, he would have them; and because the effort of the will toward the good is of itself only affective, insofar as the good terminates its affection. But it is effective and possessive through something else: so that, if it is a sensible good, it is possessed through sense, e.g., sound through hearing, color through sight, flavor through taste; if it is a natural good, through natural union, for instance through contact or local non-distance, as a stone at the center; if it is an intelligible good, through the intellect, just as a learned man is said to possess wisdom by the intellect. Therefore. This conclusion will be confirmed still further by what follows.

I say 3°: Man's formal beatitude consists essentially in an act of the intellect, namely the clear vision of God², according to that saying of Ioann., XVII, 3: This is eternal life, that they may know thee, the true God, and that of Aug., lib. LXXXIII Quaestionum, q. 35, n. 2: « What else is it to live happily, than to possess something eternal by knowing it? »

Proof 1°, from the same principle as always. Formal beatitude is essentially the first attainment of the highest good. But this comes about through an act of the intellect, and not of the will. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. 1° The highest good is an intelligible good. But an intelligible good is acquired, not by desiring, but by understanding, just as a sensible good is acquired by sensing. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. Thus the intellective nature stands to the intelligible good, as the sensitive nature stands to the sensible good. But the sensitive nature does not attain nor possess the sensible good through appetite, but through sense, as sound through hearing, flavor through taste, etc. Therefore the intellective nature does not attain the intelligible good through the will, but through the intellect. — Proof 2° of the first minor, from the distinction that exists between the intellect and the will. The intellect is occupied with its object, apprehending it and drawing it to itself, and thus making it effectively present to itself, either through species, or immediately in itself, if it is known without species, as with God; the will, on the contrary, is borne toward an object outside itself, and is only an inclination and a weighing toward it, according to the saying of Aug., lib. XIII Conf., c. 9, n. 10: « My weight is my love; by it I am carried wherever I am carried. » Therefore it belongs to the will to seek things and to rest in them once found, but to the intellect to apprehend, acquire, and possess things. And this is established by experience. For however much the will may strive, it never of itself attains the intelligible good, but as long as it is not known, it is said to be absent, and the will remains restless; but when it is perceived by the mind, the motion of the will comes to rest.

Proof 2°. Since formal beatitude is man's ultimate perfection and the attainment of the highest good, it must be the act of the most excellent power³. But the intellect is a more excellent and nobler power than the will, both because it regards a more abstract and more immaterial object than the will, and because it is closer to the soul itself than the will, since it is the root of the will. Therefore. — But for this reasoning, consult Physicam Thomisticam.