B. Objection against What has been Said and its Solution

238. But argument is made against the distinction in the case of the two last items [n.236], for Aristotle in Ethics 3.1.1110b15-17 says that “the violent is that whose principle is extrinsic, with the passive thing not conferring any force;” therefore the moving principle is placed in the definition of the violent, and consequently the violent is not just taken essentially from the comparison of the violent with the passive subject [cf. Ord. IV d.29 n.22].

239. I reply (and to however many such instances) with this proposition: ‘that is per se cause on which when posited, and with anything else and any variation in it removed, the effect follows’; but now, although a form against which the receptive thing is inclined is only induced by an agent that per se inflicts violence on the passive subject, yet the per se idea of the ‘violent’ is taken from the relation of the passive subject to the form, because as long as the passive subject and the form remain in their idea (namely, that the form can be received, but against the inclination of the passive subject) then, whatever variation there is in the agent, the passive thing receives the form with violence.

240. This is plain, because not only in ‘the being induced’ but also in the ‘persisting’ is some form said to remain violently, and some form naturally, and for a long time, in the passive subject, so that, if one removes the agent (namely because it has no action after inducing the form), the naturality and the violence are there, if one compares the form precisely with the receptive subject [cf. Ord. prol. nn.58-59].

241. I concede, therefore, that in the description of the violent the agent is placed as something extrinsic, but not as per se completing or as per se constituting the idea of the violent, but this idea is completed only by “with the passive subject not conferring any force,” that is, contra-ferring.I.e. the passive subject does not cooperate with the agent in bringing action contra or against itself as passive subject. ⁷ And the violent would remain after the whole action of the agent stops (just as if a stone could rest above without the continuous action of what detains it). However, in the description of the violent is added ‘principle’ [n.238], as being for the most part the extrinsic cause.

242. Similarly, although the passive subject receive some form that is in some way supernatural (and in this respect supernaturality could be called the manner of relation of the passive subject to the form), yet it is never called supernatural save because it receives the form from such an agent. The proof of this is that if it receive from such an agent a form naturally perfective of it, still it would receive it supernaturally -not indeed because of its relation to the form (because in this way it receives it naturally), but because of its relation to the agent from which it receives it.