5. What One should Think about the Four Ways

53. Thus then it is plain how, once the two first ways ‘about habit’ are abandoned as unfitting, the two last ways, namely the third and fourth, can be sustained as probable, by attributing, in line with the third way, some activity to the habit and not only ‘the idea of active principle’ to the power [n.32], - and, in line with the fourth way, by denying to the habit the idea of active principle and saying that it is as it were a form giving inclination to receive some further form, although it not be the idea of receiving with respect to it (as heaviness gives inclination downwards, although it is not the idea of that which receives what is downwards, but ‘a bodily magnitude’ is, insofar as it is receptive of some ‘where’ n.46]).

54. To the arguments that are against these two last ways, each of which ways can be sustained with probability, a response will be given later [nn.71-86], according to one of these two ways by maintaining it about the act either as to the substance of the act or as to the intrinsic degree.