3. Scotus’ own Response

a. First Conclusion

20. As to this article, then, let this conclusion be the first that, by extending the term ‘generation’ to cover all introduction of substantial form after privation into matter, there is some generation in the case of nutrition, because (as was argued [n.18]) the matter of the food does not remain under the form of food, nor under any other form than under that of the thing nourished, and it receives that form after nutrition;     therefore etc     .

21. The exposition of this conclusion is that the generation is not called generation simply, because it is not generation of a per se being insofar as what is not part of something else is said to be per se. But it can be called ‘generation-at’, because it is generation of something that becomes, by generation, the same as something pre-existent at which it is generated; or it can be called ‘generation-in’, because it is generation of a part in a whole of which it was not part.

b. Second Conclusion

22. A second conclusion is that in such sort of generation the form of the flesh which is introduced into the matter of the nutriment is new, because (as was argued against the preceding opinion [n.17]) the pre-existing form could not newly perfect that matter, for this possibility belongs only to a form that is altogether un-extended (as was illustrated there [n.17] about the intellective soul). For any form that is per accidens extended has a different part in different parts of the matter, and so, if new matter is perfected by the form, the new matter is not perfected by any part of the form that perfected another part of matter before.

23. An illustration of this is through the flowing away of a part generated in nutrition, because when it flows away then, just as the matter of the part ceases to be something of the whole flesh, so too does the form (which perfects the matter) cease to be part of the whole flesh, because it cannot remain or migrate without the matter.

c. Third Conclusion

24. A third conclusion is that a part added by nutrition is in some way like and in some way unlike the pre-existing part that was there by generation: like in specific form, not only in intellective form but in the form of corporeity that is presupposed; unlike in this, that the strength of a natural agent is the more weakened in proportion as its action on a contrary is the more continued.

25. The proof is that every such natural agent suffers reaction in its acting [Aristotle On Generation 1.7.324b9-10], and so, if it acts on a contrary, it suffers some corruptive action back from the contrary. Therefore, the more the flesh that was possessed before in generation acts on nutriment as on a contrary the more in proportion is its strength weakened, and by this is the flesh said to be more impure. Therefore, after some time, during which it has acted thus continually on its contrary, it is more impure than it was at the beginning, and consequently, since what is generated cannot be more perfect than what generates, the result is that the later the flesh generated by later flesh is itself generated, the more impure in proportion as a rule will it be, because generated by what is more impure.

26. This conclusion is confirmed by an example from Aristotle, (On Generation 1.5.322a31-33), that the more wine acts on the water mixed with it the more impure in proportion it is, so much so that at length, because of the impurity, the whole will become water. This conclusion [n.25] proves another, that not only is the flesh generated later more impure than the prior flesh, but also the same flesh remaining later in the whole is more impure than before - and this is the reason for impurity in the part of flesh generated later. The conclusion here does not assert that the form of flesh is receptive of more and less (thought if this were posited the impurity would be because of remission of the form); but the impurity can be posited precisely because of the imperfection of the natural qualities that are consequent to the form, which qualities are the principle of altering the food; because the more imperfect the food altered the more impure proportionally the flesh generated from it.

d. Fourth Conclusion

27. A fourth conclusion, about the distinction of flesh as to species and flesh as to matter, is plain from the third conclusion, because each part of flesh has a certain period of time within the whole, and it has a greater period the purer it is, and a lesser one the more impure it is. For flesh can keep its being in the whole as long as it is able, through its qualities, to resist what corrupts it. Now this period is greater in a part generated first than in one generated later, and each same part is more efficacious in acting in the prior part of a period than in the later part. And this difference must be understood to hold when other things are equal, that is: if a part of flesh was generated from the sort of food that was of a nature to be converted into flesh as equally pure as that from which the flesh was generated, then, provided a proportionate alteration of food is posited, purer flesh is of a nature to be generated from one food than from another.

28. From these points to the fourth conclusion: form bestows being and acting; therefore, a part according to form (a form-part) can be so spoken of as long as it has being according to form, or as long as it has acting according to form. And the second of these implies the first, and not conversely; for a thing more quickly loses action because of imperfection than being. In both respects, whether in this way or that, a form-part is not only a part of form, but includes matter as well as form.

29. Now in the first way [sc. as to being] any part, while it remains in the whole, is said to be a form-part, namely from the beginning to the end of its period, because, that is, it has being for that length of time.

30. In the second way [sc. as to action] it is not said to be a form-part for every part of the period, but for that part of the period for which it has power effective enough that action according to form can belong to it. I do not mean ‘belong to it’ only as it concurs with the action of the whole, nor as it is simply separate from the whole; but I mean that there is present to it in the whole a virtue for the action proper to it, which action it would be able to have as existent in the whole even though it not be considered precisely as it concurs with the action of the whole. And the efficacy of a virtue for action requires a determinate intensive and extensive virtue. For some slight part of virtue could not have its proper action in the whole in this way, but could only concur with the action of the whole, as Aristotle says [On Sense 6.445b31-6a1] about the action on the senses of a hundred thousandth part of a grain of millet.

31. Some determinate extensive quantity of virtue, therefore, is required for this efficacy of action in the whole.

32. Some intensive quantity of virtue is also required because, as was said [n.30], after active virtues decline to such an extent that they yield rather to their contraries than conquer them, the virtue cannot act with its proper action; therefore, in this second way, a species-part is of so much natural quantity and of so much active virtue that its proper action can belong to it, not indeed as it is a supposit outside the whole, but proper to it in such a way that it does merely concur with the action of the whole.

33. In the first way [as to extensive quantity, n.31], a part according to matter is not opposed to a species-part, save as a dead man is opposed to a living man; and thus is the same part said to be a species-part while it remains in the whole and a part according to matter when it is in flux, just as the same man is first said to be a living man and afterwards a dead man.

34. In the second way [as to intensive quantity, n.32], one part among the parts that remain in the whole is a species-part and another part is a part according to matter, because some slight part, to which no action can belong, even if it is at the beginning of its period, is a part according to matter; but a part of quantity sufficient for acting is a species-part - and that if it have virtue efficacious for an acting that requires a quantity of virtue. And contrariwise, a part according to matter is what does not have such efficacy of virtue, however much extensive quantity it may have.