A. To the Principal Arguments

66. To the arguments. First to the principal ones [nn.1-5]. - First, as to Augustine [n.1], I say that he understands the ‘by the fact that’ formally, not foundationally or causally; an example: we say that Socrates is similar by similarity formally, but he is said to be similar by whiteness foundationally or causally. So in the proposal, the Father generates by generation formally, but we are not asking in this way by what he generates, but we are asking by what the generation is elicited as by formal elicitive principle, namely what is the proximate foundation of this relation. Therefore Augustine intends that ‘he is Father by the fact he has a Son’, that is, by that notion, - this is to say that the Father is not called Father in relation to himself but in relation to the Son; but Augustine does not there understand that by which the Father is Father - or that by which he generates - as the elicitive principle of generation, as is plain there from his text.

67. To the second [n.3] I say that from a form common in the first modeAn interpolated text is here worth quoting: “community of form can be understood in a double way: one is the universal, which is by identity to many particulars under it, each of which is ‘it’ (in the way a universal is communicated to singulars), the other is by relation to many things each of which is ‘by it’ (in the way a form is communicated to matter) but is not ‘it’, - as was said above [I d.2 nn.379-380].” See also below, n.71, where it is pointed out that the second mode does not exist in creatures without the first mode. ³³ there is a common operation, because if some form taken universally is followed by some operation taken universally, any singular form under it will be followed by a singular operation of the same idea, unless some singular form is imperfect. But if we are speaking of the second kind of community, which is of the form with respect to what participates it, I say that it is not necessary that the common form be the principle of a common operation, and especially when it is possessed by many supposits in order, such that it is communicated to one by another, and this by adequate communication, as was made clear in the example adduced in the first reason to the affirmative part of the solution [n.41].

68. To the proposal I say that the major ‘the operation proper is from the proper form’ [n.3] is false, when speaking of appropriation in the second mode [n.67], which is the sort of appropriation - or at least no other one - that can be understood in the proposal.

69. And when the first proposition is proved, first because “it is the proper form, therefore, because it gives being, it gives acting” [n.3], - I deny the consequence; for there are many forms giving being which yet are not active and which in no way give second act; the such is paternity, just as also filiation.

70. But what is the reason for some forms being active and others not?

It is difficult to assign a common reason, because some substantial forms are active, and some qualities are active, but some substantial forms and some qualities are not active, - and yet qualities and qualities agree more in some common concept than do qualities and substances. Likewise, some of the more imperfect substantial forms are active, such as the elementary ones, and some of the more perfect ones are not active, as the forms of mixed things, as of stone and other inanimate objects, - some forms too of the mixed and perfect things are active, as the forms of animate things; however some of the more perfect forms are not communicative of themselves, as the forms of celestial bodies and angelic forms. There does not then seem to be a reason why some forms in general are active and some not - just as, in a specific case, there does not seem to be any reason why heat heats save that heat is heat; and thus it seems that this proposition is immediate ‘heat is effective of heat’. Thus too it seems that all forms of the genus of quantity, and all relations (about which the discussion now is), are not active, and about such it is not valid that ‘if they give first act therefore they give second act’.

71. When the second consequence is proved through the Philosopher in the Physics and Metaphysics [n.3], - I say that he is speaking of universal and particular speaking in the first mode of ‘common’, but not taking it in the second mode, namely insofar as the same form in number is common to the things that participate it; for this commonness is not in creatures, nor a ‘universal’ commonness to the things that participate without a ‘universal’ commonness said in the first way [n.67].

72. When the argument is given, third, about potency and act [n.5], I say that there is an equivocation about potency. For the major is true as potency is a difference of being, dividing it jointly against act, because thus not only is being in general divided into act and potency, but also thus divided is any genus of being and any species and any individual, because thus is the same whiteness first in potency and later in act, - and in this way act and potency belong to the same genus; and in this way, properly speaking, there is no potency of generating in divine reality, namely a potency which may be opposed to act, because that generation is simply necessary and in act, and therefore it is not in potency as potency is repugnant to act. But here the discussion is about potency or power as it is a principle, and in this way the proposition is false which says that ‘power is of the same genus as act’; for a substantial form can be a principle of action in the genus of action and of action in the genus of quality - as was touched on above in distinction 3 question on ‘generated knowledge’ [I d.3 n.518], and this subject [sc. substantial form] is the per se cause of its proper passion.

73. When the argument is made ‘about the middle and the extremes’ [n.4], I say that there is a thing which is a middle by participation in each extreme, as grey is a middle between white and black, which middle is from the nature of the thing, and of such a middle it is true that it is in the same genus as the extremes, as the Philosopher proves Metaphysics 10.7.1057a18-26. Another middle is in a way taken accidentally, as is operation between the operator and the term; this middle need not be of the same genus as the extremes because, when the soul understands itself, its understanding is a quality, and yet the operator and the object are substances; such a middle is what is taken -namely in the intended proposition - as the ‘by which’ between the generating supposit and the generated supposit. Or one can in another way say that the ‘by which’ is not properly a middle but keeps itself to the side of one of the extremes, namely of the generator; but the proper middle, if it be granted, can be said to be generation, and about this it is true that is of the same idea as the extremes, because it is a relation, just as the extremes are relatives.