First Distinction. Third Part. On the Enjoyer

Question 1 Whether enjoying belongs to God

159. Lastly in regard to this first distinction I ask about the enjoyer, namely to whom as subject enjoyment belongs, and first whether enjoying belongs to God.

It seems that it does not:

Because enjoyment is with respect to the end; but God does not have an end; therefore enjoying does not belong to God.

160. On the contrary:

God loves himself; and he does not love himself because of something else, because then he would be using himself; therefore he enjoys himself. The consequence is plain, because if he loves himself, either by using or enjoying himself.

Question 2. Whether the wayfarer enjoys

161. Second I ask whether the wayfarer enjoys.

It seems that he does not:

Because the wayfarer has only an act of desire in respect of the absent good; but an act of desire is not an act of enjoyment. The proof of this is that desire is an act of concupiscence, but enjoyment is an act of friendship; therefore etc.

162. On the contrary:

“To enjoy is to adhere by love to something for its own sake,” as Augustine says, and it is contained in the text [On Christian Doctrine 1 ch.4 n.4; Lombard Sentences 1 d.1 ch.2]; but the wayfarer thus adheres to God; therefore he can enjoy God.

Question 3. Whether the sinner enjoys

163. Third the question is asked whether the sinner enjoys.

And it seems he does not:

Because what does not rely on something immovable does not enjoy nor rest; but the sinner does not rely on any immovable good; the proof is that he relies on a creature, which is not immovable, for “every creature is subject to vanity” [Romans 8.20, Ecclesiastes 3.19]; therefore he does not rest nor enjoy.

164. Again, he who wants another to use his act does not enjoy him; but the sinner wants God to use his act; therefore he does not enjoy him. The major is clear because he who wants another to use his act does not value him as the supreme good; therefore he does not enjoy him. The minor is clear because the sinner wishes to be his own act; therefore he wishes it to be from God, since nothing can exist except from God; therefore he wishes God to use it, because God uses everything that is from him.

165. On the contrary:

Augustine 83 Diverse Questions q.30: “All perversity, which is named vice, is to use things which are to be enjoyed and to enjoy things which are to be used” [n.70]; therefore it is possible for the sinner to enjoy things he should use.

Question 4. Whether the brutes enjoy

166. Fourth the question is asked whether the brutes enjoy.

And it seems that they do, from Augustine, where as before, 83 Diverse Questions q.30, he says that: “to enjoy any corporal pleasure the beasts too are not absurdly judged to do.”

167. On the contrary:

“To enjoy is to adhere by love to something for its own sake” [nn.70, 162]; but the brutes do not have love, because neither do they have will nor do they adhere to anything for its own sake but for their own good; therefore they do not enjoy.

Question 5. Whether all things enjoy

168. Fifth the question is asked whether all things enjoy.

It seems that they do:

Because all things desire the good with natural love, Ethics 1.1.1094a2-3; and they desire some good not for the sake of something else [Ethics 1.4.1096b13-14]; therefore they enjoy.

169. On the contrary:

“We enjoy things known” [n72; Augustine On the Trinity X ch.10 n.13]; but not all things have cognition; therefore etc.

I. To all the Questions Together

170. To solve these questions I put first a certain example, namely about how bodies are made to rest in diverse ways [cf. Prol. nn.170-178]. For the ultimate terminus of rest for heavy bodies is the center. But to this center, as to the ultimate terminus, a heavy body adheres per se and first, for example earth, which does not by the nature of some other body adhere to that by which it participates in heaviness and in the adhering in question.

171. Now a body adheres to the center immovably and per se, but not first, because it adheres by the heaviness and the adhering that it has received from earth. However it does adhere per se, because it adheres by an intrinsic form and firmly and immovably, because it does so as it were through what is intrinsic to earth, which is what rests first, as stones and metals in the bosom of the earth; and such things, although they do not rest first, do yet perfectly rest, because they are perfectly conjoined to the center through the medium of the first rester, with which they are, as it were, perfectly united.

172. In a third way, a body adheres to the center through the medium of the earth with which it is united, but movably and not firmly, as a heavy object existing on the surface of the earth; and such a thing, although it truly rests for a time, is yet not as determined in rest as a body that is resting in the second way.

173. In a fourth way, a body can adhere uniformly to a body next to it and rest with respect to it, and not rest with respect to the universe if the body next to it, to which it adheres, is not uniformly adhering to the center, for example in the case of a man lying on a ship; although it would be in the power of a body to be itself at rest, that heavy body, which would be finally at rest itself in some such movable thing but not in the center, whether mediately or immediately, would be disorderedly at rest, because although, as far as depends on itself, it would be at rest because of its firm adhesion to such a movable body, yet it would not adhere to that to which it should, according to its own nature, adhere in order to be at rest.

174. Applying the example to the intended proposition, the will corresponds in spiritual things to weight in the body, because “as the body by weight, so the spirit by love is borne wherever it is borne,” according to Augustine On the City of God 11 ch.28. The center which of its own nature gives ultimate rest is the ultimate end; hence the wise man says that “God is the intellectual sphere, whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere” [Ps.-Hermes Trismegistus Book of 24 Philosophers prop.2] -it accords with truth. To this center the divine will first and per se immovably and necessarily adheres,Interpolation: “Hence the Commentator Physics II com.88 says that the disposition of a simply necessary being is that it not exist because of its action but its action because of it, and this mode is found in simply eternal things.” ⁴⁴ because not by participation in anything other than itself, for this will, not by habit nor by a deferring act nor in virtue of any superior cause, most perfectly and necessarily loves the supreme good.

175. In second rank is a blessed created will, which not first, but by participating in God, yet per se, because by its own intrinsic form, adheres firmly to this good, and that because it is made to be as it were intrinsic to the will that is first at rest, because it always abides in that will’s good pleasure.

176. In third rank is the will of a just wayfarer, who although it relies on the divine will and relies, by its mediation, on the supreme good in which the will itself rests, yet it does not firmly and immovably adhere to the good pleasure of that very will; hence now it adheres to that good and now it turns away from that good. - But here there is a certain unlikeness to the third member in the case of bodies [n.172]; because there the body is able not to be at rest while the form remains by which it rests, but here the form, by which the will rests, is posited to be destroyed at the same time along with aversion of the will from the center.

177. In the fourth rank is the mortal sinner, who although, as far as depends on the act of the will that is making itself rest, adheres vehemently to something other than God, so that neither by its mediation nor immediately is it adhering to God, yet on the part of the object it cannot be simply at rest; nay rather, just as someone at rest with respect to a ship, and not with respect to the center, is not simply at rest, because not at rest with respect to what in the universe makes ultimately to rest, so the will, which is making itself rest, as far as it can, in some object other than God, is not simply at rest, because not at rest with respect to what in the universe makes the will ultimately and most perfectly to rest. The fact is also plain, because the will is there never satisfied, however firmly it immerses itself in the thing by loving it for its own sake.

178. On the basis of these points I say to the questions posed that to enjoy either means delight or it means the act of adhering to the object for its own sake, to which act the rest of delight is concomitant, or which act is itself the delight or the rest, that is, the act that ultimately terminates the power to the extent that a power terminates itself in its act; so that about the idea of enjoyment, if it means the act, it does not seem to be the case that it itself makes the power to rest as far as depends on the part of the object, but as far as depends on the part of the power adhering to some object for its own sake; so that the divine will enjoys simply and necessarily and per se and first; but the blessed created will enjoys simply and perpetually and per se but not first; the just will of the wayfarer enjoys simply and per se but not immovably nor first. The will of the mortal sinner enjoys simply because, as far as depends on the part of the will, it would make itself to rest, and does rest, in the object which it loves for its own sake; but it does not simply rest as far as depends on the part of the object, nor does that object require enjoyment, but because the object does not make it to rest as a power makes itself, by its act, to rest in its act, therefore its enjoyment is disordered.

179. But in that case there is a doubt as to what object the mortal sinner enjoys, namely whether his own act or the object of his act.

My reply: I say that in general he enjoys himself, because he loves the object of his act with the love of concupiscence. Because all love of concupiscence is preceded by an act of love, and consequently he loves something else with the love of friendship, and that something else is himself, for whom, as loved with love of friendship, he loves the object with love of concupiscence. He does not then enjoy the object of his act, nor consequently the act itself, on which there is no need that he first reflect back. This opinion is that of Augustine On the City of God 14 ch.28: “The two loves have made two cities: the love of oneself to contempt of God has made the city of the devil, the love of God to contempt of oneself the city of God,” and On Genesis to the Letter 11 ch.15 n.20. Therefore the first root is in this, that the sinner enjoys himself.

180. To the penultimate question [n.166] it can be said that although the sensitive appetite in some way adheres to something for its own sake, that is, not because of another negatively, because it does not have the feature of referring to another, nor yet by contrariety, because the object is not valued as not referable to another; therefore it is said in an abusive sense to enjoy, because of lack of relation, but not properly, because it does not adhere in a non-referring way. Likewise neither does it adhere with love, because it does not properly have the feature of loving. Likewise neither does it properly adhere, because it does not apply itself to the object but is as it were fixed by the force of the object, because it does not lead but is led, according to Damascene On the Orthodox Faith 2 ch.22. And by following the said simile about the resting of bodies [n.173], one could say that the sensitive appetite is likened to iron that is fixed to adamant by the force of the attracting adamant, and thus is made to rest in the center neither mediately nor immediately, nor in anything else, by the force which would give it rest in the center, or by any intrinsic force making it rest in something as if in the center, but only by force of something extrinsic making it rest. So here, the force of the object makes it to rest, but not the intrinsic force of making to rest in the center or as if in the center, which force as freedom alone, and this does not belong to the sensitive appetite.

181. To the final question [n.168] the answer is clear from what has been said. Because, if enjoying proper by sensitive appetite be denied, which appetite however more agrees with the will, where enjoyment is, than natural appetite agrees with it, because the act of the sensitive appetite follows an act of knowing just as does the act of the will - not thus, however, the act of natural appetite, if it has any act - then the conclusion follows that enjoying proper does not belong to what has natural appetite alone, nay nor does it thus belong abusively either in the way it belongs to sensitive appetite.

II. To the Principal Arguments

182. To the arguments. To the argument of the first question [n.159] I say just as was said to the first question of this distinction in the fourth article [n.17], that the idea of end is not the proper idea of the enjoyable, but the idea of the absolute good is to which the idea of end belongs. Although, therefore, God is not the end of himself, yet with respect to his will he is that absolute object to whom naturally belongs the idea of end, because he is the supreme good; but the idea of end cannot belong to him with respect to himself (just as neither is he the end with respect to himself) but with respect to all enjoyable things, of which sort are all the goods that can be ordered to another.

If the objection is raised how God then is said to act for an end, and also that a superior agent has a superior end, I reply: with respect to nothing is there any final cause unless with respect to it there is an efficient cause, because the causality of the final cause is to move the efficient cause to act; God then, as not being something that can be effected, has no final cause. But the first common saying [God acts for an end] must be understood to mean that he acts for the end of the effect; but not for the end of himself, because he is not an agent of himself. Likewise the second common saying [a superior agent has a superior end] must be understood of the end of the effect, because a superior agent orders, not himself, but the effect to a more universal end; and so the superior end is the agent’s, not as its end, but as that to which it orders what it does.

183. To the argument of the second question [n.161] I say that, besides the act of desire which is with respect to something not possessed, by which the just wayfarer desires God for himself with an act of concupiscence, the just wayfarer has another act, one of friendship, by wanting well being for God in himself, and this act of friendship is enjoyment, but not that act which is of desire; and this second act is properly the act of charity, but not the first, which is the act of one desiring, as will be said in 3 Suppl. d.26 q. un n.17. The major then is false.

184. To the first argument of the third question [n.163] an exposition of the minor can be given, that what adheres to a movable thing does not rest simply, although as far as depends on its own part it makes itself rest in it, and so the conclusion is to be conceded, because the mortal sinner does not simply rest, although as far as depends on his own part, by his own act of ultimate rest, he makes himself rest in a movable thing. If it be added that nothing enjoys a thing unless it makes itself rest simply in that thing, this must be denied, but one must add: ‘unless it makes itself rest as far as depends on the part of the act itself,’ namely the act by which he adheres to the object; and also: ‘as far as depends on the part of the object’, in disordered enjoyment. Nor ought supreme rest to be what is understood here, because to all rest on the way there follows the greater rest of the fatherland, but because of an act accepting the object that cannot be referred to another.

185. As to the second [n.164], the major can be denied, because although by ordered love no one enjoys anything save what he does not wish anyone to use but to enjoy, yet with disordered love someone can very well enjoy what he does not wish another to enjoy but only to use, or not to love in any way, as is evident with disordered jealousy. - To the proof of the major one can say that although the enjoyer values the enjoyable as the supreme good, yet he does not wish it to be thus valued by everyone when he is enjoying it in disordered way; therefore the conclusion does not follow: ‘he wishes it to be the supreme good or he loves it as the supreme good, therefore he wishes others thus to love it’.

One can reply in another way by denying the minor. - For the proof, when it is said ‘he wishes the enjoyable to be, therefore he wishes it to be from God’, the conclusion does not follow. Nor does this follow either: ‘he wishes it to be from God, therefore he wishes God to use that act’. And the cause of the defect of each consequence is that he who wills the antecedent need not will the consequent when the consequent is not per se included in the antecedent but only follows through an extrinsic topic. So it is in the proposed case.

186. As to the authority of Augustine for the fourth question [n.166], it is clear that his authority is to be expounded of abusive enjoyment, or of the term ‘enjoyment’ in an extended sense, because the sensitive appetite does not refer by understanding negatively, nor by contrariety, because it does not adhere to the object as to something that cannot be referred, because, although the thing cannot be referred by it, this results from its natural impotency, not from the goodness in the object or in the acceptation of the power. About the difference between these, namely not being referred in negatively, by contrariety and by privation, there will be discussion at 2 d.41 q. un n.3.

187. As to the argument of the final question [n.168], it is plain that although the natural appetite adheres to something for its own sake negatively, not however by contrariety for the most part, and if it does do so by contrariety, yet it does not adhere by love; nor does it properly adhere either, but by itself giving the nature it is fixed as it were in the object itself, not indeed by an elicited act other than nature, as is the case with the sensitive appetite, but by nature’s habitual inclination. Hence as was said [n.181], enjoyment belongs less to it than to the sensitive appetite which by an elicited act adheres as to an object already known, though not freely; but natural appetite is perpetually inclined without any cognition.

From what has been said about enjoying, and especially in the third question of this distinction (namely ‘whether enjoying is an act elicited by the will or a passion received in the will, to wit delight’ [nn.62-76]), one can be clear about use, which is a more imperfect act of the will ordered to enjoying as to a more perfect act of the same power.