1. About the Connection of any Virtue with its own Prudence

a. Opinion of Henry of Ghent

α. Exposition of the Opinion

43. As to the first doubt [n.42], it seems that the connection is necessary, from the Philosopher Ethics 7.10.1151a10-14, where his opinion is, “If the will chooses badly, the intellect commands badly.”

44. The same Philosopher in the same place says something else for the same opinion [sc. to the vicious man things contrary to the final end seem good].

45. He says in Ethics 6.5.1140b19-20, 13.1144a33-36 that “malice makes one lie and err about practical principles,” and so it destroys prudence.

46. Again [1144a36-b1], “It is impossible for a prudent man to be not-good,” and conversely.

47. Again 1144b30-32, 45a1-6 [“It is impossible to be good without prudence, or prudent without moral virtue.” “All the virtues will be present in the one prudence; there will be no right choice without prudence and moral virtue.”].

48. Again 7.5.1147a25-b5 [“One proposition is universal, the other about singulars...; when a single idea from them arises, the conclusion must follow and at once action.”].

49. Again, I suppose two things: one that the intellect cannot understand several different things at once [n.23]; second that the will can will nothing under the idea of evil. I then argue: when there is only a judgment about fleeing some evil, the will either will flee it or will not. If it does flee, then the will along with right judgment cannot be bad (with abiding malice); if it can will evil [by not fleeing it], then it can pursue evil under the idea of evil, or pursue something unknown.

50. I reply that the first supposition [n.49] is false as concerns two altogether disparate things opposed to each other. The fact is plain from particulars. For a relative cannot exist or be understood without its correlative, nor an accident without a substance, nor much less can privation without its fitting natural subject, which privation necessarily presupposes a subject and an aptitude in the subject for the form that it lacks. So the intellect cannot understand privation on its own, as the argument [n.49] supposes, but only in a subject and in something ultimately naturally apt for it; just as neither can it understand one relative without its correlative, nor an accident without a substance. When the intellect, then, understands that evil is to be fled from and presents this to the will, the will can elicit an act that is material substrate for malice and that is even necessarily accompanied by malice in some way. Although therefore the intellect could understand a subject without privation, it cannot understand privation without a subject, for privations are immediate opposites in a subject naturally apt for them [III d.3 n.36].

51. Again in Movement of Animals 7.701a11-23, if the major premise is proposed by the practical intellect and the minor is assumed by the senses or imagination, the conclusion will be an action, so that action in accordance with it must follow, unless impeded. So never, according to Aristotle, is action altogether contrary to the command of reason.

52. And this is confirmed by Augustine on Psalm 2.5 “He will speak to them in his anger,” when he says Enarrationes in Psalmos 2 n.4, “The turning aside and blinding of the mind follows those who transgress the law of God.”

53. To the same effect is the statement of Dionysius Divine Names ch.4, “No one does anything looking to what is bad.” And that in Ethics 3.2.1110b28-30, “Everyone evil is ignorant what he should do,” with which Wisdom 2.21 agrees “Their malice has blinded them.”

54. The manner posited by Henry, Quodlibet 5 q.17.

55. If objection is made to these points on the base of the article condemned [by Archbishop Tempier in 1277], which says that “when there is universal and particular knowledge about anything, the will cannot will the opposite - error,” Henry replies in Quodlibet 10 q.10 that this proposition “when there is.. .knowledge... the will cannot will the opposite” is to be distinguished as to composition and division. In the sense of division it is false, for it signifies that the will never has power to will the opposite (which is false). But in the sense of composition it must again be distinguished because the ablative absolute [sc. the clause “when there is.’] can be explained by ‘if’ or ‘because’ or ‘while’.

56. If it is explained by ‘because’ or ‘if’ it is false, and it is true that this is an error; for it signifies that rightness in knowledge or the intellect is cause of rightness in the will.

57. But if it is expounded by ‘because’ or ‘while’, so that it indicates consequence or concomitance and not causality, then (according to him) the said proposition can possess truth, and is not an error and not condemned, but this in such a way that error of the intellect not be understood to be prior in nature to error of the will. For both are simultaneously concomitant with each other in time.

58. Still, the error of the will is by nature prior, so that if one considers the intellect as to its priority in nature to the act of will the intellect is right; but when the will freely errs, the intellect is blinded, and simultaneously in time but later in nature.

59. For this position the argument is as follows: If the first choice does not blind the intellect, then neither does any other, because the first can be as bad as any other. And if it does not blind when it is bad, it never blinds. And so, whatever actual malice there is in the will would never blind the intellect, and so someone could be as bad as you wish without any error of the intellect, which seems to be against many authorities.

β. Rejection of the Opinion

60. Argument against this is first from authorities.

One is from Augustine on Psalm 123.3, “Perhaps they would have drowned us...” where he says On the Psalm 123 n.5, “Thus are the living, he says, absorbed, who know evil and consent to it, or perhaps they die.”

61. The same on Psalm 68.23, “Let their table be a trap before them [sc. persecutors who would have taken us alive],” where he says On the Psalms 68 sermon 2 n.7, “What is it for them to be alive, that is, to be consenting, unless they know they should not consent to vice? Behold they know the trap and put their foot in it.”

62. Again he says on Psalm 118.20, “My soul has desired your justifications at all times,” where he says, 118 sermon 8 n.4, “The intellect went before, affection followed late or not at all.”

63. In support of this seem also to be the reasoning and authority of the Philosopher, Ethics 2.3.1105b2-3, where he says that “to know (or reason) is worth little or nothing for virtue.” But if rightness of the intellect in its consideration had right volition as concomitant, then since knowledge does much for consideration, it would consequently do much for right volition. Indeed something else follows, that it would not be necessary for anyone to be persuaded not to be vicious but only to consider according to the habit of virtue, for (according to you) by rightly considering according to the habit of knowledge the will cannot at the same time not be right; and so there is no need to persuade anyone about right willing but only about right consideration.

64. Again by reason:

When the intellect is commanding rightly, it is possible for the will not to choose, just as it is possible for it not to choose what is commanded by the intellect, for reason is not moved at the same time by this understanding and by that. Now when the will does no choosing, virtue is not generated in it; but from right command prudence is generated, according to you; therefore prudence without any moral virtue will be generated.

65. Again, that bad choice cannot blind the intellect so that it err about things to be done I prove as follows: the terms are the total cause of the knowledge of a first principle in practical matters as in speculative ones [cf. Ord. II d.7 n.88], from Posterior Analytics 1.3.72b24-25, and the syllogistic form is evident of itself to any intellect (as is plain from the definition of a perfect syllogism, Prior Analytics 1.1.24b22-24 [Ord. III d.14 nn.38-39]). Therefore when the terms are apprehended and put together and the syllogistic deduction is made, the intellect must rest in the conclusion, the knowledge of which depends precisely on the knowledge of the terms of the principles and the knowledge of syllogistic deduction. Therefore, when the intellect is considering the principles through syllogistic deduction, it is impossible for the will to make it err about the conclusion, and much less to make it err about the principles. And so, in no way will the intellect blind the intellect so that it err.

66. If you concede the conclusion and say that therefore the will blinds the intellect, because it turns the intellect away from right consideration - on the contrary:

67. Thus to turn away is not to blind, for one could thus turn away while prudence still remains; for it is possible for a prudent man not to consider what belongs to prudence, but sometimes voluntarily to consider other things.

68. Again, the will has its wanting to turn the intellect away either while right command remains or while it does not.

If while it does remain, the will therefore wants to turn the intellect away when the will is not then sinning, according to you (because right command remains), and so the turning away of the intellect is not a blinding consequent upon sin, because there is not yet sin.

If while it does not remain, then the will has its wanting to turn away while some other act remains. Whence, I ask, does this other act come? Either from chance, and then the chance act is not a making blind consequent upon sin. Or it is necessary to posit, through an act of will (at a tangent to right command), another act of intellect, prior to the wanting to turn away; and then there is a process to infinity where, after the act of the intellect is in place, another ‘willing’ was present just as before. For it will always be necessary that the will turn first to this before it turn to that; and thus, if this willing was a sin, it was a willing that was bad while right command remained; or if this willing was not a sin but there was always some not-right command preceding the ‘turning away’, then some command precedes every sin of the will, and so the proposed conclusion is gained.a

a.a [Text cancelled by Scotus]. Again, ‘to will to turn away’ requires some act of understanding that is simultaneous in time or nature.

     This command is either an abiding command of right reason, from which the will wants to turn away, and then it follows that ‘to want to turn away’ is not for you a sin, because it stands along with right command.

     Or the act previous to the wanting to turn away is different from right command; and if that previous act is right, the same follows as before, namely that the wanting to turn away is not a sin, and so no making blind follows upon it. But if the act previous to the ‘wanting’ is not right, there will not be a blinding of the intellect following the wanting to turn away because the blinding precedes that wanting.

69. Again, either the will chooses badly while right command remains, and so the intended conclusion is gained; or, if it chooses badly, and therefore, while right command does not remain, it chooses on the basis of some act of intellect that is not right, therefore, because for you it would not then sin, this other and non-right act will be previous to the bad ‘wanting’; therefore there will not be a non-right act through another bad ‘wanting’. And so the intended conclusion is gained, for there is no circle on account of some process to infinity in causes and caused involved. Consequently, the will is not a cause of blinding for the bad command which, according to you, follows upon the bad ‘wanting’.

70. Again, no wayfarer is entirely incorrigible; therefore no one can err entirely about the practical first principles. Proof of the consequence: he who errs about the practical first principles has nothing through which he could be called back to the good; for whatever premises one tries to persuade him through, he will deny what is assumed, for nothing can be more known than a practical first principle.

71. Again, the damned do not rest in this proposition as something true ‘God is to be hated’, because then they would not have the worm of which Isaiah speaks 66.24, “Their worm will not die,” for they would simply delightfully hate God without remorse;     therefore etc     .

b. Scotus’ own Opinion

72. As to this article [nn.10, 42] one can say that right command can stand simply in the intellect without the will rightly choosing what is commanded. And so, since one right act of commanding may generate prudence, prudence will be generated there without any habit of moral virtue in the will.

73. And if so, it is then asked: how does malice, according to the above authorities [nn.52-53], blind the intellect?

74. It can be said to blind in two ways: in one way by privation and in another way positively.

By privation: because it turns one away from right consideration. For the will, when choosing the opposite of something rightly commanded, does not allow the intellect to abide in that right command, but turns it away to consider reasons for the opposite (if any sophistical or probable reasons can be found for the opposite); or at any rate the will turns the intellect away to consider something else that is unrelated, so as to stop the actual displeasure that lingers in remorse, the remorse that comes from choosing the opposite of what was commanded.

75. Positively it blinds in the following way: for just as the will, when rightly choosing the end, bids the intellect consider what is necessary for the end, and the intellect (by thus investigating the means ordered to that right end) generates a habit of prudence in itself, so the will, when it chooses a bad end for itself (it can indeed set up a bad end for itself, as said in Ord. I d.1 nn.16, 67), orders the intellect to consider the means necessary for attaining that bad end. Augustine well speaks of this in City of God 14 ch.28 [“Two loves have made two cities”], that the will has virtues in the way there dealt with; that is, the will by its virtue [or power] sets up a bad end for itself and bids the intellect find or bring forward the means necessary for attaining pleasurable things and for fleeing the opposed terrible things. And just as the habit of inquiring into the means for a well-chosen end (which habit is generated by order of the will eliciting it in an intellect giving commands) is prudence so, in the case of a badly choosing will, the habit acquired by command about things directed to the evil end is error, and is a habit directly opposed to the habit of prudence and can be called imprudence or folly. And this folly is not only a privation but also a positive contrariety, because just as a prudent man has a habit whereby he chooses things ordered to the due end, so the foolish man has a habit for rightly and promptly choosing means ordered to the end set up by an evil will. And because such a habit is generated by command of a badly choosing will, so to this extent it is true that a bad will blinds - not indeed by causing an error about some proposition, but by making the intellect have an act or habit of considering other means, means to a bad end. And this whole error is in things to be done, albeit it is not an error deceptive as to matters of speculation.

76. There could be another doubt here: If the right habit of the intellect and the good habit of appetite are not necessarily generated together (because it is possible to command well about something while not acting well about it), then is the intellectual habit generated without moral virtue prudence, or conversely is the habit generated in the appetite without the intellect moral virtue?

77. As to the first option about prudence, one can say that, strictly speaking, prudence is not without moral virtue, because it is ‘right reason about things doable in accord with right appetite’ from Ethics 6.2.1139a22-31, and appetite is not right without moral virtue. And if this be true, then the first commands about the principles of things doable would be right, and yet they would not be prudence but certain seeds of prudence. Still there would also be some rightly commanding habit about the means necessary for the end set up by the will, and yet it would not be prudence.

78. One could then posit a double intellectual habit about things doable, a neutral one and a right one, prudence. The one, indeed, which would precede right choice of the particular end, would not be prudence, because prudence is about the means ordered to the end, for it is a deliberative habit [Ethics 6.5.1140a30-31]: “deliberation is not about the end but about what is for the end” [Ethics 3.5.1112b11-12]. Prudence is also discursive (because deliberative), and so is about what one runs through in thought. But when the good end has been chosen, not only in general but also in particular, as that ‘one should live chastely’, there could be some deliberative habit of the intellect, giving commands about things for the end but not having right choice concomitant with it. And, as far as concerns the object, it would be prudence, for it would be right choice about things for the end. But the other condition would be lacking to it, namely that it be in agreement with and conformed to right appetite about the same objects [n.77].

79. In this way [nn.77-78] one should say that any habit generated in the intellect, though it be practical and right (whether about a particular or universal end, or whether about the means necessary for pursuing the chosen particular end), is not prudence if it is not accompanied by right choice of the will about the same things.

80. And if it be argued against this [n.79], as was argued against the previous article about the connection of the moral virtues [nn.26-30], that “in this agreement it would follow that prudence constitutes moral virtue and conversely, and so both habits (namely prudence and moral virtue) would ultimately be generated through one act, and that one act could not be of the intellect and will but only of one or the other, so it could not generate both” - to this one could say that the conformity of one moral virtue with another is not necessary, because no virtue is the rule for another virtue. But conformity with prudence is necessary for any virtue, because included within the definition of virtue is that it be ‘a habit of choice according to right reason’. And so for this reason there could, by way of concomitance, be constitution of a habit in moral being by prudence, and conversely; but there could not be constitution of the moral virtues among each other in this way.

81. Then it would be conceded that some habit in the nature of prudence was generated at the same time as another habit in the nature of moral virtue was generated; and they would be generated by the single habit and act that ultimately generates either moral virtue or prudence. For it is unacceptable in morals that one act ultimately generate two moral virtues.

82. But it is not unacceptable in the case of prudence and temperance, for the act that generates prudence in the nature of regulative principle also generates temperance in the nature of regulated principle. But this act only has the nature of virtue from the idea of being regulated, and for this reason it generates temperance in the nature of virtue. This cannot be said of temperance in relation to fortitude, because fortitude is not the rule of temperance.

83. One should say, therefore, that the two do not establish themselves in the being of virtue by any priority, as if one of them is a virtue before it makes the other to be a virtue; rather the intellectual habit of prudence and the moral virtue corresponding to it are simultaneous in nature.

84. And if one asks through what these two habits are generated in perfect being, I admit that it is through a single act, whether the act is a right choice (for without right choice of the end the intellectual habit is not in agreement with right reason and so is not prudence either), or whether the act is one of the intellect (for without right command of the intellect choice is not in agreement with right reason, and so is not virtuous nor can it generate moral virtue). Both the act of the intellect, therefore, and the act of will are able, by generating something per se in the being of nature, to generate it in relative being concomitantly and further to generate its correlative concomitantly; and so one act would generate both moral virtue and its prudence in nature simultaneously.

85. Accordingly, one could say that each habit, preceding right choice, would indeed be a habit of moral science or a certain moral science. For just as in things to be made the artisan differs from the man of experience, for the artisan knows the ‘why’ and the man of experience only the ‘that’, Metaphysics 1.1.981a28-30, and the artisan is not ready in acting but the man of experience is, as is said ibid., so in the same way in morals, he who has the right habit of the principle of things doable or of the conclusion but is not skilled in acting or directing himself about things doable, though he may have a remote directive habit (which habit can be called intellect or moral science), yet he does not have a proximate directive habit of the sort that prudence is, and of the sort that the habit of the experienced man is in things makeable.

86. Although these remarks seem probable applied to the distinction between practical science and prudence, yet prudence is not only about the means ordained to gaining the ultimate end but also gives commands about the ultimate end, at least in the particular case (as in the case of chastity).

87. The first proof is as follows: for moral virtue always follows prudence in a certain order of nature. Now from the choice of a particular end (as chastity) moral virtue is generated, so some prudence precedes the choice. Therefore it does not seem that prudence must properly be restricted to being only a habit about determinate and commanded means that are ordered to a chosen particular end, but also to being per se and properly about the end.

88. A second proof is that then there would not be one prudence corresponding to one moral virtue, for a moral virtue is one from the unity of the end to the choosing of which it principally inclines. But if there were no prudence giving commands about that end but only about the means to the end, there would be no object which would give unity to commanding prudence, but there would be many prudences about many means commanded for the end, although however there would, from the unity of the end, be one moral virtue.

89. So both because of the priority of natural prudence to moral virtue [n.87], and because of the unity of prudence as regard one moral virtue [n.88], it seems one must admit that the practical act which gives right commands about a particular end is properly prudence.

90. Nor is it a problem that prudence is said to be a deliberative habit and so is for the end and discursive [n.78]. For it gives commands about the proper ends of the moral virtues by proceeding from the practical principle (which is taken from a universal, particular, political end); and this discursive process is the first deliberation, though it is more commonly called deliberation about the means of the virtues.

91. As to the other point added there [n.78], that prudence is agreement with right appetite, it does not impress, for what is ‘naturally prior’ does not seem to have anything of its nature dependent on what is posterior; but prudence as prudence seems to be naturally prior to moral virtue, because it defines it. So what is there called ‘agreement’, as was touched on in the first question about practical and speculative theology [Prol. nn.236-237, 265-269], should be understood as the agreement that conforms right action to it, that is, that knowledge ought to be such that, as concerns itself, right action should be conformed to it; but such is knowledge, whether right choice follows in the one giving command or not.

92. One can say differently then that the habit generated from commands, whether about the ends (at any rate certain particular ones, which are properly the ends of the moral virtues), or whether about the means ordered to those ends (about which means there are perhaps no habits other than those about the ends), is properly prudence, even though right choice not follow in the one commanding. And thus altogether there will be no necessary connection of any moral virtue with the prudence that gives commands about its material. Yet, conversely, no choice can be morally right unless it is in agreement with its rule and its measure, which is right command. But right command is of a nature to generate also a single prudence; therefore conversely the connection can be conceded, that moral virtue cannot be without prudence about its matter.

93. To the arguments and authorities brought from Augustine [nn43-59], see the responses in Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 9 q.5.