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.