C. Scotus’ own Response

30. [To the first doubt] [n.10] - I say in another way that the will can be a principle of communicating nature, - and not the will as commonly taken for created and uncreated will, but will whereby it is infinite; for infinity is the proper mode of the divine will, just as it is of any other essential perfection.

31. This is plain from the reason posited above, to the solution of the question [n.9], that the will is a principle of a love adequate to itself, that is, of as much love as the will is of a nature to love the object with; but it is of a nature to love an infinite object with infinite love, therefore it is also productive of infinite love; anything that is infinite formally is the divine essence, - therefore the will itself is a principle of communicating the divine essence to the produced love.

32. And if you ask me about the co-assistance in any way of nature, I say that for the will, as it is a principle of communicating nature, there is no need to posit that nature co-assists it in some special mode of assistance (supposing nature could be the principle of communicating nature), unless some lesser perfection were posited for the will than for nature; but there is no such imperfection, because an infinite will is simply as perfect as an infinite nature.

33. There is a threefold argument against this answer [n.30].

First as follows: infinity is, of itself, of the same idea in the intellect and in the will; therefore there is no formal idea of distinct products, but they have to be distinguished by the formal principles.

34. Again, I argue thus: what does not belong to something - or what is repugnant to something - in its absolute idea, does not belong to it if it is infinite either; for infinity does not give to an active virtue the idea of another active virtue, but gives it intensity, both in itself and in its action; to this add this minor: but to the action of the will, as it is such an active principle, there does not belong - but there is repugnant to it - the communicating of nature; therefore etc.

35. Further, whence does the will get infinity? If from itself, then it is infinite everywhere, - if from the essence, then the will is infinite as having the assistance of nature or of essence, which is what the other opinion says [Henry’s opinon, n.21].

36. To the first [n.33] I say that the two things in the act, namely liberty and infinity (which is a mode intrinsic to a thing), have two things corresponding to them in the principle ‘by which’, namely liberty and infinity, as the mode of that principle (look in the final Parisian collation);Collat.20: “Whether everything intrinsic to God is altogether the same as the divine essence, after all consideration of the intellect has been removed.” ¹¹² whence I do not say that infinity is the formal idea of inspiriting, but that infinite will is, - nor do I say in this respect that there are two formal principles, because ‘infinite’ is a mode intrinsic to both principles, namely the free and the non-free. - In another way it can be said that the will, whereby it is will, is altogether simple (that is, not combinable with the nature of which it is the power, nor with its act); for from this it follows that it is productive of an act, because this belongs to it as it is will, - and further, the act is the same as the nature, and this because it is altogether simple; therefore it is communicative of nature.

37. To the other [n.34]. If ‘repugnance’ is taken for the middle term, the major is true and the minor is false, for the transcendent idea of the will (which idea abstracts from finite and infinite) is not a reason for repugnance, but the limitation supervening on it. But if ‘does not belong’ is taken for the middle term, I say that to an active infinite principle there only belongs an infinite action, of the transcendent sort that belongs to something transcendent; but now, just as a ‘to will’ belongs transcendentally to a transcendent will, so also belongs to it the producing of a ‘to will’; therefore to an infinite will there belongs the producing of an infinite ‘to will’, not so much per se but concomitantly (the deity is an infinite ‘to will’, but the finite ‘to will’ of an angel is not the essence of the angel). - Then to the minor I say that to communicate nature is not the transcendent action of the will generally, but that the producing of a ‘to will’ is that is proportionate to itself and to the object, - and therefore an infinite will produces something infinite, and consequently it produces nature.

38. To the third [n.35] the answer is plain in distinction 8 [I d.8 nn.209-222], that it gets it from what it is fundamentally - because it gets it from the essence, from which it formally is; I concede that the essence is required as foundation and as really the same, but it is in its own moment of nature - in which it is formally infinite - a precise ‘by which’ principle (along with the object) of thus producing as it is also of operating.

39. [To the second doubt] - To the second doubt ‘about necessity’ [n.11], the answer is plain through the same fact [through the will whereby it is infinite, n.30], that a perfect productive principle can give to a perfect product all the perfection which is not repugnant to itself; and an infinite will is a perfect productive principle, therefore it can give to its perfect product the perfection that is fitting to itself; but necessity is not repugnant to it (nay necessity necessarily belongs to it, because no infinite can be a possible, a non-necessary, thing), therefore that principle, which is infinite will, will be a sufficient principle of giving necessity to this product. If it is a principle by which necessity can be given to the product, then necessity is given, because to nothing which is not necessary can necessity of itself be given, - and further, if it is a principle by which necessity is given to the product, therefore also to the production; for the product gets being by the production, - nothing can get necessary existence through a non-necessary production.Note by Scotus: “On the contrary: love for the creature is infinite in the divine will and yet contingent (and this is contained here immediately after ‘I prove the first etc.’ [n.41]). Response (as there ‘It does not seem’ [see footnote to n.49] and here [see footnote to n.41]): the love is necessary, but it does not necessarily pass to the secondary object, on which it does not depend, but it does necessarily pass to the first object, on which it quasi-depends; it is also really infinite, from the will and from the first object. - On the contrary: at least as it passes to the second object it is contingent; therefore it will not in this way be infinite. Response: it is not necessarily of this object, nor is it infinitely of this object, - in the way the mode of the relation is noted on both sides as the mode of the act founding the opposed relation. - On the contrary: ‘as it passes to...it is contingent’ is denied, because contingency is present in the act under no mode or relation, although the relation is contingent. If this is understood in the antecedent, let it be said in the consequent.” ¹¹³

40. This as it were a posteriori argument [n.39] seems to deduce the necessity of the production from the necessity of the product. If an a priori reason, or a reason from the cause, is sought, what it is by which the will gives necessity to the production, I reply that neither does a will infinite of itself alone give necessity to the produced love, comparing it to any object whatever, nor does the loved object alone - which is the end -, compared to any will whatever, give necessity to the act of willing or to the production of love.

41. I prove the first point [n.40] by the fact that the will is not a necessary principle of producing love of any object unless it is a necessary principle of loving that object; but an infinite will is not a necessary principle of loving an object save an infinite one, because then God would necessarily love any creature at all, nay also any lovable thing at all; therefore it is not a necessary principle of producing its love, comparing it to any object whatever.An extended note is added here by Scotus. See appendix. ¹¹⁴

42. The second point [n.40] was proved in distinction 1 ‘On enjoying’, that the will, by reason of will in general, does not tend necessarily to the end [I d.1 nn.91-133, 136-140].

43. And if you reply that the will can be considered as will or as nature [nn.19, 22-24], or as by comparing it to the end or to what is for the end; but as it is compared to the end it is nature, and thus there is merely necessity, - this is refuted by both authority and reason.

44. The reason is that there are not opposite modes of acting of the same active power, and especially not these modes ‘naturally’ and ‘freely’, which first distinguish active power; because if the will is compared to the end by way of nature and to ‘things for the end’ by way of freedom, it will not be one active power with respect to them, and then there will be no power that chooses ‘a thing for the end’ for the sake of the end; for no power chooses this because of that save by willing both extremes, just as no cognitive power knows a conclusion because of the principles unless it knows in the same cognition both the principles and the conclusion, as the Philosopher argued about the common sense in On the Soul 3.2.426b15-29.

45. The authority is from Augustine, Handbook of the Faith ch.105 n.28 (and it is placed by Master Lombard in II d.25 ch.4 n.218): “Nor must it not be called will - nor said not to be free - because we so wish ourselves to be blessed that not only do we not wish to be miserable but we altogether cannot wish to be miserable;” therefore he intends to say that the will whereby we wish for beatitude is free; the will has a respect for no end more necessarily than for beatitude in general, therefore it has a respect for no end necessarily.

46. Again, this response [n.43] would posit that the Holy Spirit is not inspirited freely but by way of nature, because his principle would be will not as free but as nature.

47. Therefore I say [n.40] that the necessity of this production of adequate love -just as also the necessity of the love by which what possesses the will formally loves - is from the infinity of the will and from the infinity of the goodness of the object, because neither suffices for necessity without the other.

48. Now these two [n.47] suffice in this way, that an infinite will cannot not be right; nor can it not be in act, because then it would be potential; therefore necessarily it is in right act. But not every ‘to will’ is right precisely because it is from that will only, as if nothing is to be willed of itself but only because it is willed by that will; for the divine essence, which is the first object of that will, is to be willed of itself; therefore that will is of necessity in right act of willing the object which is of itself to be rightly willed, and just as it is of necessity a principle of willing, so it is of necessity a principle of producing love of that object.

49. And then I say that neither precisely the infinite will alone (not determining the object it has), nor the infinite good alone (not determining which will it has, as object, a respect to), is the total cause of necessarily loving, nor even of necessarily producing adequate love; but the infinite will - having such an object, which is of itself to be rightly loved, perfectly present to it - is the necessary reason both for loving that good and for inspiriting love of that good;Note by Scotus: “It does not seem that the will’s being right is to be assumed together with its being infinite, as if this other is on an equal footing, because an infinite will is not then a sufficient ‘by which’ for communicating nature - even a will having the object present - but an infinite right will; again, if this rectitude is conformity to right reason, therefore reason is the principle of the production of the Holy Spirit, at any rate as the rule, the way a rule is rule of an act of will. - So in this way: an infinite will (adding altogether nothing about the presence of the object) is necessarily in act of willing, so that to no act of willing is it in potency to contradictories, because then it would be combinable; and it has for adequate object an infinite willable thing; therefore it wills it by a necessary act, - and this holds of further production just as it does of necessary operation. The second proposition [it has for adequate object an infinite willable thing] is proved from the idea of a power that can have an object adequate to its capacity; therefore it has an infinite object, and not as contained under the first object, because then it would depend on something finite in its operating and so would be cheapened. It is proved secondly from the idea of act, because an infinite volition does not depend on a finite volition; therefore a finite thing is not its first object. Any volition that there is possible is infinite, because...” The note is left incomplete. ¹¹⁵ and such a will, having such an object present to it, is a principle of communicating divine nature, because it is a principle of producing a produced infinite love; for such a produced love is proportionate both to the power and to the object, - it is not thus when an infinite will has a respect to a finite lovable good, because although there the act is infinite as concerns the part of the divine will, yet it is not infinite as concerns the part of the object.

50. But whether the will is a principle not only of loving an infinite but also a finite good, and of producing love of such a good, - and this either with the same production in fact, though different in idea, by which the Holy Spirit is produced, or with an altogether different one, or with none, - of this matter elsewhere [I dd.18, 27], because it has a similar difficulty to the production of the Word, whether the divine intellect is the principle of producing a Word of the same essence or a word of any other intelligible thing, and then either by a production the same in fact, though different in idea, as the production of the divine Word, or by one different both in fact and in idea.

51. [To the third doubt] - There remains the third doubt [n.12].

Here the statement is made in this way, that nature acts through impression (as does the intellect), not the will. - See Henry.

52. On the contrary. This is false, and was rejected in distinctions 2 and 5 [I d.2 nn.283-289; d.5 nn.52-92]; again, it is not to the purpose, because it is asking about a distinction of the active principle in its mode of acting (or of eliciting an action), whether it acts on something or not.

53. Another response [to the same doubt, n.12]. The word is formally of the knowledge of memory; the will, when eliciting, gives to the object the first gift (because it gives love and, in this, gives itself), nor is it gift for this reason, - hence neither is it something similar to the object presented; therefore love is not generated, nor is the Holy Spirit an image as the Son is.

54. This [n.53] indeed is true, and well said about the image, but the point about how these principles can elicit is not saved, although some distinction is posited in the terms, compared to the principles in act of assimilation.

55. Third way [to solve the doubt, n.12]. That if there exists some necessity as the act tends to the object, yet not as it is elicited by the power; or in another way: if, as it is in an act already as it were elicited, it is confirmed, yet it does not as quasi-prior in act elicit that object.

56. In another way. On the part of the principle, as it quasi-precedes the act, there is a necessity to elicit, nor is will repugnant to the necessary, because a perfect will can have the condition of a perfect elicitive principle.

57. Again, conversely, necessity does not take away liberty (because of what has just been said [n.56]).

58. Again, to act necessarily is a condition of a way of acting, therefore it is not repugnant to one of the things that divide active principle, just as neither is the mode repugnant to that whose mode of positing it is; just as there is a double principle - nor is there any other reason for distinction than that this is this [sc. that the will is will, the intellect is intellect] - so there is a double fitting necessity, because this and this [sc. this is the necessity of nature, this the necessity of will]; not every necessity, then, is natural necessity. - Taking ‘natural’ strictly, how is will nature? Another difficulty: whether this is what ‘freely’ is, because of an identity between producer and the product?