Twenty Ninth Distinction

Single Question Whether Principle is Said Univocally of Principles Inwardly and Outwardly in God

1. About the twenty ninth distinction I ask whether principle is said in one way of principle when taken personally and notionally and taken essentially.

That it is not:

Because if principle were of one idea when taken in this triple way, then things from the principle would be of one idea; this is false, because neither the Son nor the Holy Spirit are from a principle in a single way, nor are creatures from a principle in the same way as they are.

2. On the contrary:

This inference holds ‘creating, therefore being a principle’, and ‘generating, therefore being a principle’, and ‘inspiriting, therefore being a principle’, - and not conversely; therefore the consequent is common to all the antecedents.

I. To the Question

3. To this question I say that principle is not said univocally of principle taken essentially and notionally, - and this when speaking of the relation that is per se signified by this name ‘principle’, and taking principle as it is a principle, for ‘that which is actually principle of something’ (or for the principle ‘which’ not ‘by which’). And the reason is that principle essentially taken only states a relation of reason (not a real relation, because there is no real relation of God to creatures, as will be plain from the following question [d.30 nn.48-51]), but as it is taken inwardly, notionally or personally, it does state a real relation; but to a real relation and a relation of reason there is nothing common that is the same, something that is common really in the one case and in reason in the other, because to that which is such in a certain respect and to that which is simply such, insofar as it is such, what is taken in them in a certain respect and simply is not a common univocal; but a real relation is simply a relation, and a relation of reason is a relation in a certain respect, because just as ‘to be in reason’ is to be in a certain respect, so to be referred in reason or to be compared by reason is to be referred or compared in a certain respect; therefore there is no principle univocal to them.

4. Now if we speak of principle inwardly, as it is personal and notional, it does seem that there could for them be the idea of a common principle univocally; in the way it is possible for what it means to be ‘a relation of origin’ to be univocally common to paternity and filiation, and in the way it is possible for what it means to be ‘production’ to be univocally common to generation and inspiriting, as was touched on above in distinction 23 n.9 about what is univocally common to the persons insofar as they are persons.

II. To the Arguments

5. To the arguments [nn.1-2].

The first [n.1] proves that there is no principle there of a single idea for the notional and the personal.

I reply that in creatures two things ‘distinct in species’ are said to be of different idea, and yet there can be abstracted from them one common thing of one idea, as the genus. So it is in the issue at hand: these productions - generation and inspiriting - are of different idea, speaking of their proper ideas, and yet some single common thing can be abstracted from them; and in the same way about the common term ‘principle’, that it can be a common thing of one idea, although the things of which it is said are of different idea, speaking of their proper ideas.

6. And if you object to this that then there is a universal in divine reality - this was touched on in distinction 23 nn.12-13.

7. To the argument for the opposite [n.2], it proves the commonness of what it means to be ‘principle’ as to a principle of this sort and of that sort - just as it proves univocity as to principle inwardly and outwardly.

Therefore one can respond that these inferences do not follow ‘creating, therefore being a principle’ and ‘generating, therefore being a principle’, taking the being a principle, which is the conclusion inferred, for some common univocal simply - because the being a principle that is inferred for what it is to be ‘creating’ (as it is said of God), states only a relation of reason, but the being a principle that is inferred from ‘generating’, states a real relation.