III. To the Principal Arguments

122. To the first principal argument, from Boethius [n.67], I concede that variety of accidents makes a numerical difference in a substance in the way that the form is said to make a difference, because all distinct forms thus make some difference in the things they are in; but accidents cannot make a specific difference in the substance they are in (from Metaphysics 10.9.1058a29-b25); so they do make a difference in substances and that a numerical one; but they do not make the first difference (but there is another, prior, numerical difference), nor do they alone make the numerical difference. And the authority [from Boethius] says neither of these two things, and unless one of them is got from it the conclusion intended is not got from it.

123. But what about Boethius’ intention?

I say that Boethius intends to prove that there is no numerical difference in the divine persons. And although at the beginning of his little book On the Trinity such propositions could be got scattered about, yet he seems to argue as follows: ‘a variety of accidents makes a difference in number; but in the divine persons there is no such variety of accidents, because a simple form cannot be a subject; therefore there is in them no numerical difference’.

124. The argument, it seems, unless Boethius meant that only accidents could make a numerical distinction, is not valid; for if a numerical distinction could exist through something else, then the negation of numerical distinction would not follow from the negation of accident. I say that a distinction of accidents is concomitant to every numerical distinction, and so there can be no numerical distinction where there can be no variety of accidents; and on this basis the argument of Boethius can hold up, because since there cannot be any accident in divine reality (nor any variety of accidents), there cannot be there a numerical distinction or difference - not as from the denial precisely of the cause there follows the denial of that of which it is the cause, but as from the denial of a necessary concomitant there follows the negation of that which it is necessarily concomitant to.

125. But how, relative to this intention, is it true that a variety of accidents makes a numerical difference?

I say that it makes some difference but not the first difference, and some difference that necessarily follows every difference; and thus does the statement ‘they make a numerical difference’ have to be understood. Nor does this gloss seem to be forced from the words, but the words themselves make it to be understood so, since they [sc. Godfrey and his followers who quote Boethius, n.67] must necessarily expound what he himself subjoins there about place. For place is not the first thing that distinguishes individuals from each other, either when speaking of place as it is the property of the containing thing or when speaking of place as it is the property of the thing contained (namely the ‘where’ that remains in the thing contained). So if they must expound ‘place’ as ‘quantity’ (according to their opinion [n.71]), what is wrong with expounding ‘make a difference’ as ‘make not the first difference but some difference and it is concomitant to the first’?

126. To the second argument, from Damascene [n.68], the response is plain from himself at the end of the chapter, where he expounds how he there understands ‘accident’. He speaks thus: “Whatever is a hypostasis in some of the things that are of one species, but in others of them is not, is an accident and added from without.” I concede therefore that whatever is outside the idea per se of a specific nature itself, and is not a per se consequent of that nature, is accidental to such nature; and in this way whatever is posited to be the individuating principle is an accident; but it is not properly an accident the way others understand this [n.128].

127. And indeed that Damascene himself does not understand accident properly is plain from what he says in On the Orthodox Faith ch.8: “For we mean that Peter and Paul are of the same idea.” Later, “Hypostases have in themselves several things that separate them; they are divided in mind and in strength and in form (that is, in figure) and in habit and in complexion and in dignity and in invention and in all characteristic properties;” and he notably adds to ‘in all characteristic properties’, “to the extent that these do not exist in themselves in relation to each other but exist separately; hence they are called two men and three men and many men. And so on in every case.” - Note well: he says that, rather than by characteristic properties, all created hypostases whatever differ by ‘not existing in relation to each other but separately’; and this is said by way of an opposition in the same place, “the holy hypostases of the Trinity are in relation to each other”, the reason for which is unity of nature, personal distinction being presupposed (Ord. 1 d.2 nn.376-87). Division of nature, then, in created supposits is the first and greatest reason for distinction.

128. To the third argument, from Avicenna [n.69], I say that he is most principally considering quiddity insofar as it includes nothing that does not pertain to its per se idea, and in this way horseness is ‘just horseness, and is neither one nor many’. To whatever extent its unity is not something else added but is a necessary consequent of the entity (just as every being, according to any entity whatever, has also its own unity consequent to it), that unity is nevertheless not within the formal idea of the quiddity (as the quiddity is quiddity), but is a sort of property consequent to quiddity [nn.31, 34] - and everything of this sort is called by Avicenna an ‘accident’. And in this way too the Philosopher (who named the ‘fallacy of the accident’) sometimes takes accident for everything that is outside the formal idea of another (for everything such, in comparison to the other, is extraneous to that other); and in this way does a fallacy of the accident come about, and in this way too is genus accidental to difference; and whatever is the individuating principle is an accident of the specific nature, but not in the way they [Godfrey and others] understand accident. And so there is here an equivocation over the term ‘accident’.