VI. To the Principal Arguments of the Second Question

371. To the arguments. - When it is argued ‘they are equally noble, therefore they are equally many [n.197]’, there is figure of speech, by change of ‘what’ or ‘what sort’ to ‘how many’. And the reason for the failure of the consequence is: for it is not because of nobility or ignobility of the relation of principle or of what is from a principle that it is multiplied or not multiplied, but unity is of the idea of principle, although in things from a principle there can be plurality, because there is always reduction of plurality to unity.

And so, with equal nobility standing, there can be multiplication in the relations of the produced though not in the relations of the producers.

372. Another response is that any relation there of one idea is of itself a this, although from the several relations of the producers there can perhaps be abstracted one common thing, to wit ‘productive’, and so from the several relations of the produced there can be abstracted one common thing, to wit ‘produced’. Although therefore there is one relation in common - if there is a common abstractable - which is called in common ‘relation of producer’, yet there are two relations of the producer, in this way and in that, just as there are two relations corresponding to them.

373. To the second reason [n.198] I concede that to relations on the part of the produced there correspond relations on the part of the productive, and as many relations, but it does not follow ‘if the relations of the produced are distinguished personally, therefore so are the relations of the producer’; the reason for which is assigned as that on the part of the producer another idea of producing is sufficient,Text cancelled by Scotus: “For when it has been conceded that the distinction is only by relations of origin, the intended proposition would be quickly obtained.” ²¹² just as artificial and natural production are thus distinguished through productive principles, namely art and nature, although they come together in the same supposit. But the relations of the produced cannot so come together in the same supposit and in one person, but they are personally distinct, because the produced is per se subsistent and supposit.

374. Another response is plain from the solution of the question [nn.357, 172173], because the same thing cannot be produced by two total productions, although the same thing can produce by two total productions; and so the relations of the produced are not multiplied in the same thing, although the relations of the producer can be multiplied.

375. To the third [n.199]: a finite power cannot have at the same time two adequate terms in being produced, although it can have one in being produced and another in having been produced; but an infinite power has its term always within in being produced, and this term is adequate, and therefore it cannot have several terms.