II. To the First Question

79. To the first question: first as to the thing, second as to the name.

A. About the Thing of Beatitude

1. First Conclusion

80. Let this be the first conclusion as to the thing [of beatitude]: among all that is desirable to intellectual nature there is something essentially and simply supreme.

81. The proof of this is that there is an essential order in desirable things, and in such an order it is impossible to proceed to infinity (as was proved in Ord. I d.2 nn.52-53); therefore, the proposed conclusion [sc. something in the order is first or supreme, n.80] follows.

82. If there is not an essential order there, the proposed conclusion again follows, because whichever [member] is given it is essentially supreme, in the sense that nothing is essentially superior to it.

83. But this hypothesis is false because, as was shown there, Ord. I d.2 n.54, no process in things ordered accidentally can proceed to infinity, or can proceed through a continuing diversity [of things], save in virtue of something essentially superior to the whole diversity.

84. Corollary: that thing [sc. the thing essentially superior to the whole diversity] is infinite, because whatever infinity is not repugnant to is not simply supreme unless it is formally infinite; infinity is not repugnant to the desirable or wantable, since this is either perfection simply, or it convertibly accompanies some perfection simply, because it belongs to the whole of being, and whatever so belongs is perfection simply. Now infinity is not repugnant to perfection simply, because [if it were], then in the case of something, that is, something simply infinite, not-it would be simply better than it, which is against the idea of perfection simply (as is plain from Anselm Monologion 14-15).

85. From this corollary too the first conclusion [n.80] can, conversely, be inferred, because if something desirable or wantable can be infinite, and the infinite cannot be exceeded, then something can be a simply supreme wantable; and if it can be then it is, because if it were not and could be, it could only be by something different in essence, and so it would not be simply supreme in some perfection simply.

2. Second Conclusion

86. Second conclusion: the supreme desirable or wantable, and only it, is to be wanted by any intellectual nature simply because of itself.

87. My exposition of ‘simply because of itself’ is, namely: that to which it is repugnant, by its nature, to be wanted because of something else. Hence if the sensitive appetite desires anything because of itself (so as not to will it because of something else), this holds ‘in a certain respect’, because it comes from an imperfection in the power, which is not able to desire it because of something else, and not from an imperfection in the object to which being desired because of something else is repugnant.

88. My exposition of the other part is: ‘to be wanted by any intellectual nature’ and ‘by any will’ are convertible relative to the issue at hand, because ‘to have will’ and ‘to be an intellectual nature’ are convertible.

89. For the proof then of this second conclusion I argue as follows: anything for which the supreme wantable thing is a wantable object is something for which that object is alone to be wanted simply because of itself; but for any will the supreme wantable thing is a wantable object; therefore etc.

90. The proof of the major is that among wantable things there is something that is to be wanted because of itself, for if everything is because of something else there will be an infinite regress and nothing will be supreme; for a thing that is to be wanted because of something else is to be wanted less than that because of which it is to be wanted (from Posterior Analytics 1.2.72a29-20). Therefore, if there is something that is a simply supreme to-be-wanted (from the first [conclusion, n.80]), it is to be wanted simply because of itself (speaking on the part of the objects). And from this follows that it is to be wanted because of itself by any [subject] for which it is a wantable object; for [it is to be wanted] either by none, or by all, or by one and not another. But not the first [‘by none’], from what has been proved [sc. n.90 init., that the supremely wantable is to be supremely wanted by whatever has it as a wantable]; nor the third [sc. ‘by one and not another’], because there is no greater reason for it to be so by one rather than by another; [sc. therefore the second].

91. The same [major] is proved a priori, because although it be in the power of the will to will this or that, yet that which is to be wanted, and especially that which is to be supremely wanted, is not in the will’s power (for this precedes every determination of any will); therefore whatever will it is compared to, it always remains something that is to be wanted because of itself, and hence it is that it is to be wanted also by this will, because it is wantable by this will.

92. And this is proved in brief by application [of the argument] to wills, as also about willing in itself; because for any will there is something that is to be willed, since any will could will something rightly, and only that which is for it something to be willed, and no will can will something that is to be willed by it because of another thing and another thing and so on infinitely.

93. It is also proved from precision [of terms], namely that it alone is to be willed because of itself, for it is not repugnant to anything else that it be desired because of another thing (since nothing else is a simply supreme desirable thing); and a lesser good could rightly be desired because of a greater good.

94. The proof of the minor is that any will regards as its object the wantable thing under its most common idea; for the will is an immaterial power and consequently a power that regards the whole of being, or something of equal extent as being. This can be called the ultimate end with respect to such will, because any other to-be-willed thing is willed because of that.

3. Third Conclusion

95. Third conclusion: no intellectual nature is ultimately and completely perfected save in possessing the supreme desirable thing, and possessing it perfectly according to the way it can possess it.

96. This is proved from the second conclusion [n.86], because an intellectual nature is of a nature to be ultimately and maximally perfected in that alone which is for it something to be willed for its own sake; therefore, it can only be ultimately perfected in that thing when possessed by it in the way it can be possessed by it.

97. The third conclusion is also proved by the fact that the nature remains ultimately imperfect when what is supremely to be wanted is not possessed.

98. The conclusion is proved, third, by a more universal middle term, that in things possessing any appetite (whether animal or natural) the ultimate perfection is not had unless that is had which is desired because of itself by such an appetite. Hence a heavy object has some imperfection when away from the center [of the earth], and so does a sense appetite when lacking the highest agreeable thing.

99. However, one must understand about this conclusion that there is in beings a first perfection, a second perfection, or as it were a second perfection. The first perfection is when nothing is lacking that belongs to the first being, namely the essential being, of the thing; the second perfection is when nothing is lacking that belongs to the thing’s second being. Also, this second perfection is a certain intrinsic perfection and is not conjoint with the extrinsic perfective thing. But there is thus a certain second perfection, because it makes perfect by the fact that it is conjoint with the extrinsic perfective thing. Nor is it surprising that something be perfected in what is extrinsic, because by attaining what is extrinsic (and especially if this be more perfect than itself), it has a further perfection than it could have in itself or for itself or from itself.

For in this way are more ignoble things perfected by nobler things - not by being these things really, nor by having them formally inherent, but by attaining them, and so by having them in the way possible for them to have them. Hence a thing whose appetite is in relation to something more ignoble than is its nature itself, is not perfected by something extrinsic save in a certain respect.

100. In the case of a nobler thing, too, although there be some perfection for a more ignoble appetite of it, yet this is not its supreme extrinsic perfection. But if some nature be perfected in something non-supreme nobler than itself, there must be some nature that is immediately perfected by the supreme perfective extrinsic thing; for there is no infinite regress in things perfect and perfectible. Therefore, at least the supreme perfectible thing is not perfected save in the supreme extrinsic perfective thing.

101. Now the whole of intellectual nature is supreme according to this idea, as is plain from the second conclusion.

102. Nor is it necessary, according to the order of natures, that there are extrinsic perfective things that perfect completively, but it is enough that second extrinsic perfections, joining with the extrinsic perfective, correspond the same with the degrees of first perfections. Now although the first perfection in substances is simply more perfect than any intrinsic second perfection yet it is not the ultimate perfection because, when it is obtained, there is still expected and desired a further perfection. The second perfection, even if it conjoin with the more perfect thing not formally in itself but as more immediate to it, is in a way a more desirable perfection than the first perfection, to the extent that it is more immediately conjoint with the extrinsic desirable thing, which is more desired than its proper intrinsic being.

103. This however is especially true of the will, for any other extrinsic appetite desires the extrinsic thing because of the nature of that of which it is the desire, and therefore it does not join with anything simply more desirable than is the being of the nature it belongs to. But the will loves something more desirable than itself, and more than the nature it belongs to, and therefore it conjoins with something more desirable, both in itself and for the will, than is the nature it belongs to.

104. This conclusion, therefore, at least as to the will, is not only true as to what is meant by ‘to be ultimately perfected’, but also as to what is meant by ‘to be perfected with the most desirable perfection, and even with the greatest perfection’ [nn.95-96] -speaking of the extrinsic perfective thing and, by participation, of the intrinsic perfective thing insofar as it conjoins with the extrinsic one. The way the perfect is distinguished is also how the good is distinguished; hence although any being is, in its own goodness, good with first goodness, yet not with second goodness. And on this does Boethius especially seem to touch in his book De Hebdomadibus, where he maintains that goodness is an accident, and that things are not good by the fact that they are.“Hence, I observe that it is one thing in them that they are good, another thing that they are. For let one and the same substance be posited to be good, white, heavy, round. Then the substance itself would be one thing, its roundness another, its color another, its goodness another; for if these were individually the same as the substance itself, heaviness would be the same as color, color the same as good, and good the same as heavy, which nature does not allow to happen.” ⁴²

105. Now these facts (second goodness) we thus significantly express: ‘things are going well for it’. Hence, according to the third conclusion, this is plain, that for no will do things ultimately and completely go well save when that is had which is to be wanted because of itself, and had perfectly, in the way in which it can be had.

B. About the Name of Beatitude

106. About the second point, that is, the name of beatitude [n.79], this is taken as something known among philosophers and those who speak about beatitude [e.g. Aristotle, Ethics 1.5-6.1097a15-8a20]: that beatitude is the sufficient good, namely excluding defect and need; it is the perfect or complete good, excluding imperfection or diminution; it is the ultimate good excluding tending or orderability to another more complete good; it is the good that, when completely possessed, things go well with the possessor. In this way complete misery is need that is fixed; it is also lack of second perfection, and in this regard the diminution of the second good; it is also the exclusion of that which one would love because of itself if it were possessed; finally, things go completely badly for the person in misery.

107. Now although sufficiency, perfection, completeness, and goodness could belong to the first or second being of the thing, they could also include the things that belong as well to first or to second being yet, because what is sufficient is sufficient for someone and thereby supposes that for which it is sufficient, completion too completes what has already preceded and would, without it, be as it were a full or half full vacuum [sc. an absurdity].

108. The perfect also excludes defect, which is lack of what is of a nature to be present. ‘Things going well’ also only belongs to something already existent through something superadded to it as it were.

109. Therefore all these things belong more to second perfection than to first.

110. Also that a thing is only ultimately and completely perfected in an extrinsic perfective thing, because it is of a nature to be thus perfected; so these belong more to second perfection to the extent it is conjoint with the extrinsic perfective thing.

111. On the basis of these things beatitude could be distinguished into beatitude simply and in a certain respect, so that that would be beatitude simply which is second perfection immediately conjoining to the noblest extrinsic perfective object; but beatitude in a certain respect would conjoin with a less noble perfective object, and if indeed to an object more noble than the nature that is conjoined it comes closer to the idea of beatitude simply, but if to a less noble object it departs further from it.

112. The name ‘beatitude’ could also be distinguished in another way, because it can be taken for the conjunction with the extrinsic perfective object or for the proximate foundation of that conjunction - for indeed many denominations can be made in a certain order from relations, and abstractions made from those denominations.

C. Response to the Question

113. To the question I say, therefore, that beatitude consists in operation: either essentially, if beatitude be taken for the perfection that is the idea of conjunction with the beatific object, or proximately fundamentally, if beatitude be taken for the conjunction itself, so that, with the exception of the relation to the beatific object, the ultimate perfection intrinsic to the blessed and proximate to the beatific object is operation.

114. The proof of this: no intrinsic perfection is beatitude save insofar as it conjoins immediately to the extrinsic perfective object, which is the beatific object; but, with the exception of the relation, what immediately conjoins to the beatific object is operation; therefore etc.

115. The major is plain from the first article [nn.80-85; cf. nn.95-58, 104-105], because things cannot go completely and ultimately well for anything save when it possesses that which is for it supremely to be wanted; this is the extrinsic or quasi-extrinsic perfective thing, which is my statement for God, where the beatific object is the same as the Blessed One himself. But this supremely to-be-wanted thing is not possessed most perfectly unless it is conjoined immediately to the possessor. To be blessed is for things to go supremely well for oneself, from the second article [nn.86-94]; therefore no one’s beatitude consists in anything save in that by which he is more perfectly and more immediately conjoined with the supremely to-be-wanted thing.

116. The proof of the minor [n.114] is that neither essence nor power is conjoined with the extrinsic perfective object save through operation, which is the intrinsic such perfection. However, this operation does not abide in itself or for itself, but tends per se and immediately to the object, to the exclusion of any intermediary absolute form [nn.95-99].

D. To the Initial Arguments of the First Question

1. To the First Argument

117. As to the first argument [n.3] I say that it is not a definition of the blessed but a description, and truer than the rejected others, because it is given through what is necessarily concomitant to the blessed, unlike the other descriptions that are rejected by Augustine. An abstract [formulation] then, cannot be inferred about an abstract, because such a consequence holds only when in the antecedent there is predication of a concrete about a concrete in the first mode per se [n.68].In the first mode per se the predicate falls into the definition of the subject (as in ‘man is a rational animal’), and here the abstract formulation (‘humanity is rational animality’) does follow the concrete one. But not so in the case, say, of the description ‘man is capable of laughter’, which does not entail the abstract formulation ‘humanity is capability of laughter’. So, just because the blessed has everything he wants and wants nothing badly [n.3], it does not follow that blessedness is the having everything that is willed or wanted well. Some things wanted well (e.g. a blessed body) are not part of the definition or essence of beatitude but do accompany the blessed in fact. ⁴³

118. It can be said in another way that ‘everything that he wants’ is not taken divisively there for the things formally wanted, but for some one thing in which exist unitively all things that are rightly wanted, so that the sense is: the blessed is he who has perfectly, in the way possible for him, some object willed because of itself, in which object he has unitively and eminently whatever he can rightly will. And from this understanding the proposed conclusion follows, because in this way he has through operation whatever he wants.

119. As to the authority from Boethius [n.3], one must give as exposition either (1) that the name of ‘beatitude’ is equivocal, either (1a) for final or completive perfection taken extensively or (1b) taken intensively; and the former description (1a) is of beatitude taken according to its extensive totality, or one must say, if it is taken for its intensive totality (1b), that it is a state perfect by aggregation of all goods within one good eminently and unitively containing them. Or (2) if there is no aggregation in it because of its simplicity, then (in a third way) ‘by aggregation’ must be understood as what precedes or is concomitant to the perfect state but is not part of the essence of it.

2. To the Second Argument

120. To the second [n.4] the answer is plain from the distinction set down in the second article [n.112], that the name of ‘beatitude’ can be taken for the relation of conjoining, or for the proximate foundation of that conjoining. And as to the confirmation [n.4], I concede that any second perfection in a creature (which perfection however is an absolute form), can, without contradiction, exist without a relation of conjunction to the beatific object.

121. If, however, that sort of idea of intrinsic beatitude be posited here, since it could not exist without conjunction to the beatific object, it follows that beatitude is either a relation or includes an absolute and a relation. For if ‘to be blessed quidditatively’ is to have the beatific object, then beatitude is such a having of the object; but such a having of the object either includes the absolute and relative together, or it essentially states the relative and necessarily connotes the absolute; for if it were essentially to state the absolute, it would not necessarily connote the relative, which is something posterior to the absolute.

3. To the Third and Fourth

122. Answer to the third [n.6] will be stated below [question 6, nn.310, 327, 329].

123. As to the fourth [n.7], I concede that beatitude does not consist in an action of the category of action, because it is not simply the perfection of the agent, as is proved [there, n.7]; now operation is not such action but is action taken equivocally, as said in Ord. I d.3 n.604.

124. As to the first confirmation [n.7], the answer is plain through the same point, that the change from non-blessed to blessed is not from non-agent to agent, but is from non-operating to operating.

125. As to the second confirmation [n.7], a certain person says [Aquinas, Sent. IV d.49 q.1 a.2] that “in an act are two things, namely the substance of the act and the form by which it has its perfection; according to substance the principle is the natural power, but according to form the principle of it is the habit. If therefore the habit is acquired, we will be totally cause of our act; if it is infused, the perfection will be from the exterior cause that causes the habit. Now our act is not posited to be beatitude save by reason of its perfection; therefore, we are not cause of our beatitude but God is.”

126. Against this: the essentially prior cannot depend on any cause that the essentially posterior does not depend on; an act is essentially prior to its form, otherwise the form would not necessarily require the act for its being;The act of a habit, or the form here, falls into the definition of the habit, since a habit is the habit of such and such an act. But what falls into the definition of a thing is essentially prior to it. ⁴⁴ therefore if we are the cause of the substance [of the act], the form will depend on us, and only in some class of cause, because nothing seems to depend essentially on what is not a cause of it, speaking of any first act.

127. Again, the form is only a condition of the act; now the power that elicits the act does not elicit it bare, but with such and such a condition or circumstance; therefore, it is cause not only of the substance of the act but also of the form of the act.

128. Again, that the habit be a cause distinct from the power and a cause of something distinct (namely distinct from the power) does not seem probable; first because it is only a second cause in respect of the power (now second and first cause do not have distinct acts proper to them, because then with respect to neither would the former be first cause and the latter second); second because the effect, proper to the habit, would necessarily be an absolute form, if relation is not per se the term of an agent or an action; and it is not probable that the action is formed in this way, because then the action that reaches the beatific object would have to include two absolutes.

129. There is, then, another response, that the blessed is the second active cause of his beatitude as far as concerns the absolute that is in beatitude, and this if the will is the active cause of its beatific volition (about which later [in Rep. IVA d.49 q.10 nn.7-9, q.11 nn.3-9]).

4. To the Fifth

130. To the fifth [n.8] I say that the act is simply more perfect than the habit, both in idea of final perfection, because it more immediately attains the final object, and in idea of formal perfection, because there could not belong to the habit at its peak as great a perfection as belongs to such act at its peak.

131. To the Philosopher in the Topics [n.8], therefore, I say, in one way, that the consideration in question must be understood ‘other things being equal’. Hence he himself maintains (at the beginning of the book [Topics 3.1.116a4-6]) that he is not considering it “in things far apart,” that is, “in things having many differences,” but in things that have only that difference for which his considerations hold universally. And then the minor is false ‘habit and act are distinct in this alone’, namely ‘according to being more permanent or lasting and less lasting’.

But there is another response in the issue at hand, that this act is as equally lasting as the habit - on the part of the power and on the part of the object and on the part of the nature of this one and of that.

132. As to the second proof [n.8 “second because habit is a cause of act”], the answer is plain elsewhere, Ord. I d.17 n.32 (on charity), that a habit is only a partial cause of an act; and it is not unacceptable for a partial equivocal cause to be less noble than its effect, and especially as concerns a partial secondary cause, though the total or partial principal equivocal cause is nobler than its effect.

133. Briefly as follows:

Things go simply perfectly well for the blessed; things do not go thus well for anyone save in the simply perfect good, perfectly possessed, in the way possible for him; things cannot, from that good, go well for anyone else in that good save in his immediately attaining it; but he cannot attain it save by operation. Therefore, in this immediate attaining of that good, or in immediate conjoining with that good, does beatitude in its completion consist, and in the operation as in the proximate foundation.

134. The first proposition [n.133] is plain, because beatitude is the second perfection of a thing. For it is not the first perfection, because a thing is more perfect according to its first perfection (and by that first perfection alone can it be more wretched than others); now second perfection is properly expressed by the fact that ‘things go well’, for ‘things going well’ presupposes the first perfection of anything for which things go well. Further, there is an order in second perfections as in first perfections, because there is a correspondence of the latter to the former. And again, in the second perfections of any same thing there is an order such that some perfection is ultimate, short of which the thing is imperfect by way of privation, because it is of a nature to receive a further perfection; but when its ultimate perfection is obtained, if it is not simply perfect, its ultimate perfection remains something imperfect negatively, because lacking a perfection, though not a perfection of a nature to be received by it. To exclude further second perfection of the same thing, ‘perfectly’ is added to ‘well’; but to exclude further second perfection simply, at least in its kind, to ‘perfectly’ is added ‘simply well’, such that beatitude states a second perfection that excludes imperfection (both of privation and of negation), as being a supreme second perfection, at least in its kind.

135. The second proposition [n.133] is plain, because things do not go perfectly well for what can have that good if it does not have it, but go imperfectly for it by way of privation; and if it cannot have it, then things do not go perfectly well for it but imperfectly, at least negatively.

136. The third proposition is proved by the three conclusions of the first article [nn.80, 86, 95], that the whole of intellectual nature is of a nature thus to have that good, and it is imperfect unless it thus have it; but non-intellectual nature, as being inferior, if it is not of a nature to have it, then it remains imperfect, but not privatively so but negatively, that is, from the imperfection of its nature.

137. The fourth proposition is proved because there is no second perfection by which the perfect good may be more immediately attained than by operation, which of itself seems to be not for its own sake but for the sake of the object; and first perfection does not attain it save through the mediation of second perfection.