Footnotes

¹Rubric by Scotus: “On the object of enjoyment two questions are asked, on the act of enjoying itself two questions are asked, and on the one who enjoys five questions are asked.”

²Master Peter Lombard, the author of the Sentences, around which the Ordinatio is organized.

³Interpolation: “Again, Ambrose [Ambrosiaster On Galatians ch.5, 22] on the verse of Galatians 5.2223: ‘But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy,’ etc     ., says that he here speaks, not of ‘works’, but of ‘fruits’, because they are to be sought for their own sake; but what is to be sought for its own sake is enjoyable;     therefore it is fitting to enjoy virtues; but the virtues are not the ultimate end; therefore etc     . And there is a confirmation of the reason, that the good is by its essence the due object of enjoyment; but the virtues are good by their essence.”

⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “Again, a power that is inclined to many objects does not rest per se in any single one of them perfectly unless that one includes all the per se objects as far as they can be most perfectly included in any single object; but the enjoying power is inclined to all being as to its per se object; therefore it does not most perfectly rest in any single being unless that being includes all other beings as far as these can be included in any single being. But they can be most perfectly included in one infinite being; therefore the power can only rest there in the supreme being.”

⁵Text cancelled by Scotus: “Again, I reduce [Avicenna’s] reason [n.9] to the opposite, because the second intelligence causes a third intelligence - supposing one concede to him that it does cause it -only in virtue of the first intelligence;     therefore it does not complete it by its own virtue but by a foreign virtue. But what completes something by reason of another thing does not bring that something to rest, nor does that something rest save in that other thing; therefore etc     .”

⁶E.g. Bonaventure.

⁷Interpolation: “because within the power of any agent whatever is acting and the mode of acting.”

⁸Interpolation: “just as any being whatever for an end, however finite it may, is yet never referred to the ultimate end unless that ultimate end is infinite. Or in another way, and it comes back to the same, one should say that although the appetite of a creature is, in its subject, finite, yet it is not so in its object, because it is for an infinite end. - And if an argument is made about adequacy, namely that an adequate object satisfies, one should say that adequacy is twofold, namely in entity, and this requires a likeness in the nature of the things that are made adequate, and there is no such adequacy between the created power of enjoyment and the enjoyable object; the other adequacy is according to proportion and correspondence, which necessarily requires a diversity in the natures that are made adequate, and such adequacy does exist between the power of enjoyment and the enjoyable object. An example about adequacy between matter and form” [n.21].

⁹Text cancelled by Scotus: “as was argued in the second article against Avicenna [n.10: canceled text in footnote 3].”

¹⁰Interpolation: “To the sixth [footnote to n.5] one must say that ‘to seek for its own sake’ is double, either formally, and in this way the virtues of which Ambrose speaks are to be sought after, or finally, and in this way only God is to be sought after. And to the confirmation one should say that being by its essence, or being such by its essence, in one way is distinguished from ‘accidentally’, and in this way any thing is what it is by its essence; in another way existing by its essence is distinguished from that which exists by another, and thus only God exists by his essence; for he is not reduced to any other prior being that might be more perfect than he or be his measure, and thus too only God is good by his essence.”

¹¹Interpolation: “as it seems.”

¹²Text cancelled by Scotus: “Again, in our soul there is by nature the image of the Trinity; therefore the soul cannot be made to rest except in the Trinity; therefore it cannot enjoy anything in an ordered way except the Triune God.”

¹³Text cancelled by Scotus: “The Father is in origin perfectly blessed before he generates the Son, because he gets from the person produced no perfection intrinsic to himself. Blessedness is a perfection intrinsic to the blessed person. But if in the prior stage the Father is perfectly blessed, then in the prior stage he has the object as making perfectly blessed; but he does not seem in that prior stage to have an essence communicated as object to the three persons, but an essence absolutely, or an essence as it is in one person only; per se then it is not of the idea of the essence as it is the beatific object that it beatify insofar as it is communicated to the three persons, and so there seems to be no contradiction, either as to enjoyment or as to vision.

Response: the Father has the essence for object as it is in the three persons, and yet he has it first according to origin, because he has it of himself as an object for himself, and this is to be first in origin; but there is no other priority there according to which his essence, as it exists in one person and not as it exists in another, is an object for himself, just as neither in any prior stage of nature is it an object for one person and not for another, but it is an object only for one person from himself and an object for another person not from himself.

On the contrary: any of the persons whatever understands formally with the intellect as it exists in that person, not as it exists in another person, nor as it exists in all three, from Augustine On the Trinity XV ch.7 n.12; therefore in this way it seems that each person understands by perfectly understanding the essence as it exists formally in that person; therefore perfect understanding, which is beatific understanding, does not necessarily of itself require that the essence is understood as it exists in the three persons.

Proof of the consequence: the intelligible thing is required for understanding no less than the intellect; therefore in one who understands perfectly of himself there is required no less that he have in himself the object as it is formally intelligible than that he have in himself the intellect whereby he understands.

The reason is confirmed because if the Father were by the beatific vision to understand the essence as it is in the Son, therefore he would as it were receive something from the Son, or from something as it exists in the Son. The consequence is proved by the argument of the Philosopher in Metaphysics 12.9.1074b28-35, where he proves that God does not understand something other than himself, because then his understanding would be cheapened since it would receive perfection from the intelligible thing; therefore it is so here, nay rather, what is more discordant, the Father would as it were receive perfection simply, which is the beatific vision, from the three persons as from three objects, or from something as it exists in the three. And then two absurdities seem to follow: first that the Father does not have all perfection from himself, because of the fact that the whole and essential perfection simply is not in any person prior to the properties, but some part of it is as it were posterior to the persons themselves, namely the part that is from the object as it exists in the three.

Again, if the intellect as it exists in something produced were the principle of the Father’s beatitude, the Father would not be blessed of himself, Augustine On the Trinity XV ch.7 n.12; therefore if the essence as it exists in the thing produced were the per se object of beatitude, the Father will not be blessed of himself. The proof of the consequence is that the object as object is no less required for beatitude than is the intellect.

Response: it is required as present but not as existent within; the intellect is required as existent within, because by it one formally understands; not so by the object. An example: [the Archangel] Michael is not blessed except by his intellect existing within him; but he is blessed by an object that does not exist within him, and he would be naturally blessed if he naturally had the object present to him although not existent in him; not so with the intellect.

On the contrary: of whatever sort something is of itself, it would be of that sort even if, per impossibile, any other thing whatever did not exist.

Again, the Father would receive something from the Son, or from something as it exists in the Son, as from the object of his beatitude; that which exists of itself does not necessarily require for its being anything which is not of itself, and this with a necessity as great as the necessity with which a dependent thing requires what it depends on.

This reason very well concludes that the Father has of himself, not only on the part of the intellect but also on the part of the object, the source whereby he is blessed, and consequently that he has of himself the essence as the essence is what makes him blessed; not, however, as it exists in the three, because in this way an object present of itself is required just as an intellect of itself is required, so that he might be blessed of himself. Here is a brief enthymeme: he is blessed of himself; therefore he has of himself the object as it is the beatific object; but he does not of himself have that object as beatific object as it exists in the three, because then as it exists in the Son it would per se as it were act on the beatitude of the Father.

Response: in comparison with the Father, the essence as essence is the first beatifying object, although it at the same time necessarily beatifies in the three; thus too does it necessarily understand creatures, although it does not expect understanding from them but from the essence which it has of itself; thus the first object can, in comparison with the created intellect, be posited without the second object. The manner of positing it is as follows: etc. [as in the body of the text].

¹⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “To the other point about the image [in footnote 7 above] the response is clear from what has just been said.”

¹⁵Text cancelled by Scotus: “But about the absolute power of the will there is more doubt. However it can be said there that it is not in the power of the will to enjoy in this way and not to enjoy in this way, because although it is in the power of the will that some act be brought to be or not be brought to be, yet it is not in its power that the act once brought to be should or should not have the condition that naturally belongs to the act from the nature of its object. An example: although it is in the power of the will to elicit or not to elicit a sinful act, yet if the act, once brought to be, is disordered, it is not in the power of the will that the act so brought to be should or should not be disordered; now the act of enjoyment, as far as the nature of its first object is concerned, is naturally of the three persons in the essence, because on the part of the object - barring some miracle - it will of itself be of the three persons; therefore it does not seem to be in the power of the will that an act brought to be should or should not be of the essence as it exists in the three persons.

If you say that this reason concludes that it is not in the power of God that an act be of the essence and not of the three persons, I say that the conclusion does not follow, for the elicited act is in the power of God as to any condition that might naturally from the object be within his competence, and yet the act as to that condition is not within created power. An example: it is in the power of God that an act elicited by a sinful will be referred back to God because God refers it back to himself, but it is not in the power of the will, once the act has been brought to be, that the will use that act for God because the creature is enjoying the act; but it cannot at the same time enjoy a thing other than God and use that same thing for God. - The example does not, however, seem to be a good one, because that act of the sinner is referred back by one power and not by another. Let the example be dismissed then, and let the reason be held onto, because an accident necessarily consequent to an act once it has been brought to be cannot not be in the act as long as the act persists, and this accident is something subject to the divine will, though not to the created will which elicits it; so let it be said of a condition which, in respect of a secondary object, the act is of a nature necessarily, as far as depends on itself, to have, though not essentially to have; therefore that the condition not be present in the act is something subject to the divine will.”

¹⁶No reply by Scotus to this argument is given in the Ordinatio. Replies are, however, given in the following interpolations: “Therefore there is another response, that it is necessary for the object of enjoyment to be some quidditative good and not some perfection of a supposit, because the perfection of a supposit, as it is distinguished from quidditative perfection, is not the formal idea of acting, nor is it the formal idea of the term of any action; but quidditative perfection is only a perfection abstracted from a supposit, which of itself indifferently states or regards any supposit. And therefore it is necessary that goodness, as it terminates the act of enjoying, be only a quidditative perfection; but unity can be both the quidditative idea and the idea of the supposit, because it does not of itself state the idea of the principle of an act nor the formal idea of the term of any act. The good, then, is not the term of enjoyment when taken in any way at all but when taken quidditatively, because it is a quidditative perfection, which is an essential feature and not the idea of the supposit. But unity is in one way the essential idea and is in another way the idea of the supposit; in the second way it is not the formal idea nor the formal term of the act of enjoyment.”

An interpolation in place of this interpolation (from Appendix A): “But relation is not another thing or another goodness than the essence, therefore [the argument] is not valid. Therefore it can in another way be said that in the consequent of the first consequence only one sense can, by the force of the words, be held to, namely that this predicate, which is the being another thing than the essence, is present in the property; and thus the sense is false, because in this way a false thing, that which is inferred in the second consequence, well follows. And therefore I likewise deny the first consequence, since the two propositions in the antecedent are false and the consequent is false.

To the proof of the consequence I say that ‘the same’ and ‘other’ are not immediate in any predicate as said per se of a subject, nay not even contradictories are as it were immediates; for man is not per se white nor per se not-white. Yet between contradictories said absolutely of anything there is no middle; thus if a property is a thing, it is ‘the same’ or ‘other’, it is true that it is the same, but with ‘per se’ it is not valid that it is ‘per se the same’ or ‘per se other’.”

Two further interpolations follow on these interpolations (from Appendix A). The first interpolation: “Therefore I say that being in its first division is divided into quidditative being and into being have quiddity, which is subsistent being. But now whatever is a formal perfection is quidditative being and quidditative entity; for formal perfection is what in any being is better existing than not existing. But nothing is such unless it is a quidditative entity insofar as it abstracts from subsistence. But subsistent being that possesses quiddity is what contracts that perfection, and it is not formally that quidditative perfection. But now it is such that one, which converts with being, is both quidditative being and subsistent being; and so it is both essential and notional. But good - as we are here speaking of it - in the way it states the formal idea of terminating an act of will, is quidditative essence; and     therefore it is only essential. Etc     .”

The second interpolation: “To the third it can be said that, although necessarily an act of will follows an act of intellect, yet the mode of the will does not necessarily follow the mode of the intellect, because the intellect can make many formations about things that are not in the things, because it can divide what is united and unite what is divided, and thus it can form diverse ideas. But the will is borne toward the thing not according to the mode the thing has in the intellect but according to the mode of the thing. However, after a preceding showing by the intellect, only enjoyment states an act will that is terminated in some object, beyond which act it is not appropriate to proceed.

But in the terminating of something there are two things to consider, that which terminates and the idea of terminating, - just as light does not terminate but is the reason for terminating, while color terminates. In the same way the reason for terminating in respect of the act of enjoyment is the divine essence as it is a certain absolute form, on which the ideas of true and good follow, because on the idea by which it terminates the intellect the idea of truth follows, and on the idea by which it terminates the will the idea of good follows; but that which terminates is the essence existing in the three persons.

Then to the remark ‘we enjoy God under one idea’ [nn.34, 30]: that idea is the divine essence, what terminates is the essence existing in the three persons; one person cannot terminate without another - and he is speaking about ordered enjoyment.

Responses to the arguments are plain from what has been said.

The concept of essence is other than the concept of relation. The mode of the will does not follow the mode of the intellect, as has been said. Hence the intellect can form many ideas, and the will does not have to follow them. Hence the respect of an idea is a respect of reason, but it is not the object of enjoyment.

That ‘God can make a creature see the essence and not the person’ [nn.51, 30], the proof is that the vision of the essence and of the person, and of the attributes and of the creatures or the ideas, in the essence, whether they are two acts or one, come freely from God, and both, each, namely per se, are the same. Because, once the first has been produced, the other is producible freely and not by any necessity,     therefore one is producible without the other. The consequence is plain.

The proof of the antecedent is that it is not repugnant by way of contradiction for the vision of the essence to be created and no vision with respect to the persons or with respect to the creatures in the essence to be created; the proof is that since the essence is an absolute and first and distinct object, different from creature or relation or person (On the Trinity VII ch.1 n.2: ‘everything that is said relatively is something’, etc     .), it can, as taken precisely and distinct from all the aforesaid objects, none of which it includes quidditatively as an essential or integral part, be the total object of an act of a created and limited intellect, whether intuitively or abstractly, although not of a created and unlimited intellect (but that is because of the infinity of the intellection, not because of the distinction of the object from other things). Thus it is plain that the intellect can distinguish this object from all others, and can therefore have an act only about it. Again, the intellect can abstractively understand it taken precisely, and therefore it can likewise do so intuitively. Again if, once the essence is seen, it cannot not see the attributes, then it cannot not see the infinite perfections glittering within it and so comprehend them, which is false.

Through this is made plain the solution to the argument ‘he who sees something white sees all the parts of it’ [n.36], because those parts are something in that white object, because they are integral parts, - just as, when seeing a man, perhaps animal that is included in him is seen, but not risibility.

On the contrary: the essence as distinct from the will presents itself to the blessed intellect, therefore it does so naturally; therefore as to the persons and the glittering creatables.

¹⁷ Interpolation: “Thirdly, Augustine On the Trinity X ch.10 n.13: ‘We enjoy things known, in which the very will in itself rests delighted’. So delight either is the same as enjoyment, and the proposition is gained, or it is something consequent and posterior (as a certain property), and thus the definition given of enjoying [n.62] is not appropriate, because the posterior is not put in the definition of the prior nor a property in the definition of the subject” [n.72].

¹⁸Text cancelled by Scotus: “Likewise ‘inhesion in something for its own sake’ does not seem to be through delight, because the efficient cause of delight seems to be the delightful object and not the end, and thus the one who delights does not seem to tend to the object for its own sake. But this reason does not entail the conclusion - for it proceeds as if the object could not be the efficient and final cause of delight - and it must be solved by holding that delight is of the essence of beatitude, see 4 Suppl. d.49 p.1 q.7 nn.2-7.”

¹⁹Text cancelled by Scotus: “But that it be the more proper signification of the word is difficult to prove, yet it can in some way be conjectured from the use of the word: for the word ‘to enjoy’ is construed with the ablative case to signify the object in transitive sense, such as is the construal appropriate to verbs signifying activity, but it is not construed with the object in the ablative case in causal sense, as is the construal due to passions signified by verbs that are primarily passive; for one does not say ‘I am joyed by God’ as one says ‘I am delighted by God’ or ‘God delights me’, but I am said ‘to enjoy God’ transitively in the way I am said ‘to love God’, and that seems to be the more proper signification of the word.” Scotus is here commenting on a peculiarity of Latin grammar, that the phrase ‘I enjoy God’ has a verb in passive form and an object in indirect or causal form (‘fruor Deo’), but in meaning it is active and the object is direct, as in ‘I love God’ (‘amo Deum’).

²⁰Interpolation (from Appendix A): “Now some say that love and delight are the same really but differ in reason.

The first point is proved in four ways. Firstly, because in the case of one power about one object there is one act. The proof is that the distinction of an act is only from the power or the object. - Secondly thus: on something the same there follows immediately only something the same; but, once the object possessed, love and delight immediately follow. - Again: things whose opposites are the same are themselves the same; but hatred and sadness are the same. The fact is plain because each introduces a certain inquietude. - Fourth thus: for they have the same effects and the same consequences. The fact is plain because each has to perfect an operation of the intellect.

The second is shown thus, that love is asserted on the basis of what comes from the power to the object, but delight on the basis of the reverse. Also, delight implies rest, which is the privation of motion; but love states union, which is the privation of division. Now these two privations differ only in reason.

But to the contrary. Firstly, that the opposites of them are not the same. The proof is that hatred is a certain refusal to will, but refusal to will does not require an existing object, while sadness does. - Secondly, that a very intense refusal to will precedes the event of a thing, but from the event such sadness arises. - Thirdly, because delight is per se the object of enjoyment, but love is not. -Fourthly, because a bad angel can love himself supremely. The thing is plain from Augustine On the City of God XIV ch.28: “Two loves” etc. - Fifthly, because in Ethics 10 [no such reference is found, though there is something close in Eudemian Ethics 7.2.1237b35ff.] it is said that one loves old friends more, but finds more delight in new ones. - Again, the definition of love and that of delight differ. The thing is plain from Rhetoric 2.4.1380b35-81a2. - Again, where sometimes the love is more intense, there the delight is less. The thing is plain in the devoted.

To the first of these: the major is false. - To the second: the minor is false. - To the third: it has been shown that the minor is false. - To the fourth I say that they do not perfect in the same way, but delight is as it were an accidental perfection of it, as beauty in youth, from Ethics 10.4.1174b31-33, but love is as it were a commanded act or an act joining the parent with the offspring.”

Interpolation: “Note the reasons that the same John [Duns Scotus], in d.1 q.3 in the Parisian Lectura [Rep. IA d.1 p.2 q.2], gives against this conclusion, that enjoyment and love and delight are the same really.

The first reason is founded on this that hatred and sadness, which are the opposites of love and delight, are really distinct.

His proof for this is that to hate something is not to want it; now not to want and to be sad are not the same thing, because the act of not wanting does not require an object apprehended under the idea of existing, which is what makes one sad, according to Augustine On the City of God XIV ch.6.

He also proves the same because it happens that the will changes from not being sad to being said when there is a not wanting equally in place, because a thing intensely not wanted can precede the happening of that not wanted thing itself. Therefore, when the not wanted thing is posited as existing, the not wanting will not be more intense and it is then necessarily sad but before not.

Third, because the will freely elicits the act of not wanting as of wanting, but it is not voluntarily saddened;     therefore not wanting is not being saddened. A confirmation is that when the will turns itself back on an act voluntarily elicited it has pleasure in itself, and so a will willing itself freely not to want has pleasure in itself; but a will that turns itself back on being sad does not have pleasure in itself but is displeased; therefore etc     

The second reason: in God there is properly found the act of not wanting, but not the act of being sad. The assumption is plain, because just as God is by his willing the cause of things that come to be, so by his not willing he is a cause preventative of bad things.

The third reason: delight can be the per se object of some love of which love cannot be the per se object. The proof of this is that the will can choose to be delighted in the delightful thing itself when that delightful thing is absent, and of that choice delight is the per se object, but choice or love is not, because then the will would be turning itself back on its own act; but it is not necessary that the will turn itself back on its own act when it desires to be conjoined to its delightful object, or when it desires to be delighted in the delightful object when it will have become present; therefore when by an act of love it chooses the delightful thing or chooses to be delighted, it is not necessary that it be turned back, therefore delight can be the object of a love of which it is not the love.

Again, a bad angel can love itself supremely, and yet does not have delight. The thing is plain in Augustine On the City of God ibid. ch.28.

Again, a more intense love is compatible with a less intense delight, as in the case of the devoted/infatuated.

²¹Interpolation: “because the act of using is per se one act, therefor it is of one power, respecting per se each extreme.”

²²Interpolation: “Again, Augustine On the Trinity XIII ch.3 n.6, says that a certain mimic actor said that he knew what the many people present in the theatre wanted, meaning to understand this of happiness; but all those people would not want happiness or their ultimate end if they contingently wanted it; therefore they necessarily want it.”

²³Text cancelled by Scotus: “Confirmation for the reason [n.93]: wherever there is a necessary connection of extremes, there is also a necessary connection of the intermediates necessarily required for the union of the extremes, otherwise the necessary would depend on the contingent; but if the will necessarily enjoys an end shown to it, there will be a necessary connection of the terms among themselves and by the nature of those very extremes,     therefore also of all the intermediates; but the one intermediate necessarily required for the union of those extremes is understanding of the end, therefore etc     . Proof of the minor: if there is a necessary connection of the will to the end, it is a connection of the principal agent to the object about which it is acting; but necessity for acting can only exist in the principal agent through that by which it formally acts; but the will acts of its very self, therefore in itself will that necessity to the object exist. Therefore the first minor is plain. - The minor of the prosyllogism is proved in this way: a principal agent acts as a principal by no necessity save by that by which it acts as a principle, otherwise it would act by that necessity by which it is impossible for it to act; but it does not act as a principle save by that which is its formal idea of acting.

This confirmation seems to exclude a certain response that might be given to the principal reason, about necessity simply and conditioned necessity; for it proves that if the will also necessarily enjoys the end shown to it, then it does so on account of the proper reasons of those extremes, which reasons have of themselves a necessary connection; therefore the will does not depend on anything other than the extremes, and so it is absolute, although there will be a necessary connection of the extremes between themselves and therefore of all the intermediates in their order.

Response: the first minor is false unless it is understood of conditioned necessity, that is that, once understanding is presupposed, the necessity of enjoying which follows - which is a necessity in a certain respect, because it depends on the showing of the thing - that necessity, I say, is from the nature of the extremes; which is to say briefly: there is a necessary connection of the extremes if the showing precedes. But the minor is proved of absolute necessity by the nature of the extremes, therefore, in order to prove this, I reply to the minor and say that in a principal agent acting simply necessarily there is nothing by which it necessarily acts, and there is nothing required either for its acting necessarily, save only that by which it principally acts, because in a simply necessary agent the whole nature of its necessity is in it by that by which it is an agent. But in an something principally acting necessarily in a certain respect or conditionally the reason of its acting is not a sufficient reason for its acting necessarily but something else is required on which that necessity depends, because it is not from the idea of the agent alone. The second minor is therefore denied, because the conditioned necessity in something’s acting is not from that alone by which it principally acts but from that along with the presupposition of something else. - To the proof of the second minor I say that in that ‘act necessarily’ two things are included, both that with respect to ‘act’ there exists one ‘by which’, namely the formal reason of acting in the principal agent, with respect to ‘necessity’ there does not exist that reason alone but along with it the presupposition of something else. To the form [sc. of the argument], therefore, I say that one should not concede that there is something by which it necessarily acts, but that for that necessity there is required both that by which it acts and something else by which it does not act. But because in the intended proposition that on which the necessity depends is the same as that on which the action also depends, and that by which it acts is that by which it acts with some mode of acting (either necessarily therefore or contingently), therefore in order to prove the second minor one can say in another way that that by which it is active is not that by which it itself acts except on the presupposition of something else, but when the other thing is presupposed then there exists that by which it necessarily acts. [The preceding paragraphs of this cancelled text are marked by Scotus with the letters: c—c.]

On the contrary: in the first instant of nature there is the preceding action, in the second the principal action. I ask how the principal acts in the second instant. If contingently, we have the intended proposition; if necessarily, then since it acts precisely through its proper form, both because it is acting principally and because what precedes is in no way its reason of acting, it follows that the form is then the reason for necessarily acting; but this is only possible from the determination of the form to the object and to action on the object; therefore the extremes have of their nature a necessary connection, and so to the necessary intermediates. - Again, nothing makes one do that which is placed under a condition, therefore neither to make one do it necessarily; therefore if there is necessity from that condition, it will also equally be necessity simply.

Response to the first [objection on the contrary]: it acts in the second ‘now’ of nature necessarily, that is necessarily in a certain respect, because in the second ‘now’, namely as presupposing another ‘now’.

On the contrary: that which, when it acts, necessarily acts, simply necessarily acts, because ‘necessarily’ and ‘contingently’ determine action for the time when the cause acts; for the generator necessarily generates, although on the presupposition of alteration, as much as is in its active form. And then further: so it is determined simply necessarily, as much as in its form, to every necessary intermediate; it tends to this necessarily when it can, therefore it tends to every intermediate necessarily as much as or when it can.

Perhaps it is not in proximate potency save to operating about the object. - On the contrary: therefore it necessarily wills the understanding of the end if the end is presented to it as an understood object.

²⁴The preceding paragraphs, nn.94-95, are marked by Scotus with the letters: a—a.

²⁵Here Scotus gives as a superscript the letter: k.

²⁶The preceding paragraph, n.96, is marked by Scotus with the letters: e—e. Then there is some text cancelled by Scotus: “It is proved [note q. n.112] in another way, that what necessarily rests in a thing when present, necessarily as far as depends on itself moves toward it when absent, at any rate it is apt to do so, although it may be impeded by something; therefore just as it would by that necessity be actually moved if it were not impeded, so if it is a superior mover it moves anything inferior to itself by which it can take away the impediments; such a movable inferior to the will is in the present case an intellect movable to the consideration of the end” [this cancelled text is marked by Scotus with the letter: q].

²⁷This paragraph, n.97, is marked by Scotus with the letters: b—b.

²⁸The preceding paragraphs, nn.98-99, are marked by Scotus with the letters: c—c.

²⁹For these propositions [from here to n.110] a note is added by Scotus: “And they are against the first article of the opinion.”

³⁰In place of nn.100-114 there is this interpolated text: “Against the first article [n.83] there is first the following argument: any power about a most perfect object presented to it, and it does not necessarily operate about anything else, necessarily continues its operation about that object as much as it can [n.100]; but the will necessarily operates about the ultimate end, which is the most perfect object, therefore it necessarily continues its operation as much as it can; the opposite of which we experience, because the will turns the intellect away from consideration of the ultimate end just as it turns it away from the consideration of other things. - There is proof of the major, and first in this way: the reason for necessarily operating is the same as for necessarily continuing the operation, if simply, simply, if when it can, when it can. Secondly, because if the power principally necessarily operates about the object when present, there is in the power itself a reason for always necessarily acting about it as far as depends on itself, or whenever it can if it can. Thirdly, because we see this in the sensitive appetite, and in the sense and the intellect. But it seems to be particularly true in the will, because the will does not cease to act of itself about any object save by turning itself away to some other object, whether a more agreeable or a more perfect one, or one to which it is more determined or inclined, which prevents it operating at the same time about the first object; but the end is the most perfect and the most agreeable object; to it alone is it necessitated, to it most of all is it inclined, in it does it most rest, and in it is it most pleased; the willing of it is compatible with the willing of any other thing.

Again, any appetite that necessarily tends to the supremely most perfect apprehended object alone, necessarily determines itself if it can to the continued apprehension of it once it is in place. The virtue of this argument depends immediately on the preceding reason. But will necessarily tends to the apprehended end that is the most perfect object,     therefore etc     .

Again, anything that necessarily acts once some previous action is in place, necessarily determines itself to that previous action if it can; but once the previous action of the intellect about the ultimate end is in place, the will necessarily tends to the ultimate end; therefore it necessarily determines itself to the action of the intellect as to the apprehension of it. The virtue of this reason is that necessity for an intermediate thing is the same as necessity for the extreme.

Again, anything that necessarily acts when some previous action is in place necessarily determines itself to that previous action if it can [n.105]; but when a previous action of the intellect about the ultimate end is in place, the will tends necessarily to the ultimate end; therefore it necessarily determines itself to the action of the intellect as to the apprehension of the end. The power of this reason is that there is the same necessity for the end means as for the extremes.

Again, whatever acts necessarily about a present object necessarily determines itself to the presence of it if it can [n.107].

Again, any appetite that necessarily tends to a known object, necessarily determines itself to the knowledge of it if it can [n.108].

To what is adduced against the first article, when it is said ‘any power about, etc.’ [at the beginning of this note], because the reason...” [continue as at n.114 below].

In place of this interpolated text there is, for nn.100-110, the following alternative interpolated text [from Appendix A]:

“a. Anything that, when not impeded, necessarily acts, necessarily takes away the impediment if it can.

b. Anything that necessarily acts when some previous action is in place, necessarily determines itself to that previous action if it can.

c. A principal agent that necessarily acts when anything is in place in a secondary agent, is necessitated by the principal active principle.

d. Anything that necessarily acts in the presence of the object necessarily determines itself, if it can, to the presence of it.

e. If a power necessarily principally operates in the presence of the object, there is in that power the idea, as far as depends on itself, of necessarily acting on the object always, or whenever it can if it can.

f. Any appetite that necessarily tends toward the object when it is known, necessarily determines itself to the knowledge of it if it can.

g. Any power that necessarily tends toward the sole supreme and most perfect object when it is apprehended, necessarily determines itself to the apprehension of it if it can.

h. Any power that necessarily operates in the presence to it of the most perfect object, necessarily continues the action as much as it can.

i. Any power that necessarily operates-rests in the presence of the object, is necessarily moved, as far as depends on itself, toward that object when it is absent; agreement is a common cause.

k. If there is a necessity in one extreme, simply or as far as depends on itself, to the other extreme, there will be a like necessity in it to any simply necessary intermediate between them.”

³¹Interpolated text [from Appendix A]: “From c, when the major is given, follows a, and follows b and d and f, each of which can be a major for the negative conclusion of the first article. - From i follows e. - g implies that the willing and understanding already in place are continued; the first from k, the second from i imply that things not in place necessarily must be put in place.

h appears truer among these, because universally there seems to be the same reason for necessarily operating and necessarily continuing, if simply simply, if when it can when it can. - g is plain because we see this in sensitive appetite, in sense and, in intellect. Yet it seems most true in the will, because the will does not cease of itself to act about any object save by turning itself to some other thing, whether to a thing more agreeable or more perfect or to which it is more determined or inclined, which thing prevents the will operating about something else at the same time; but the end is the most perfect and most agreeable object; to it alone is the will necessitated, to it is it most inclined, in it does it most rest and in it is it most delighted; volition of the end is compatible with volition of anything else whatever.”

³²Interpolation: “if the reasoning is valid, no habit will be posited in the intellect. - I say that one should not posit an inclining habit but habit of showing is very well required, which habit should not be posited in the will but only the inclining one; therefore the reasoning is good about the will but not about the intellect. I hold therefore that the will is able not to will the end in whatever way it is apprehended, whether obscurely or clearly, whether universally or in particular.”

³³Interpolation: “On the contrary: ‘naturally’ and ‘contingently’ do not imply ‘freely’ in the way inferiors imply their superior; therefore they are not special modes contained under the first mode which is ‘freely’. - It is said that they are so as compared with the will, although simply speaking ‘necessarily’ and ‘freely’ are related as things exceeding to things exceeded.”

³⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “Again, against the first article [n.83], every agent acting necessarily acts of necessity according to the ultimate of its power, because just as its action is not in its power, so neither its mode of acting, namely to act intensely or not intensely; therefore the will of necessity wills the end always very intensely and as much as it can, the opposite of which we experience. - The conclusion is conceded when the apprehension is equal and there is nothing to distract it.”

³⁵Interpolation: “which I concede to be true, but”

³⁶Interpolation: “nor consequently for acting.”

³⁷Text cancelled by Scotus: “and it does not have a difference on the part of the object except that of greater or lesser proximity.”

³⁸Interpolation [from Appendix A]: “Besides, diverse proximity of the passive thing to the agent does not cause necessity but only a more intense action, as is plain in the case of heat with respect to heatable things that are in greater or lesser proximity; but the diverse presence of the known object, namely seen and not seen, seems only to be as it were the diverse proximity to the will of that which the act of will should be about; therefore it does not diversify necessity and non-necessity, but will only make a more and a less intense act.”

³⁹Interpolation: “or the argument goes like this: whatever is essentially prior to another can be made to exist by that agent by which neither are both necessarily produced nor is the later necessarily produced if the prior is.”

⁴⁰Note added by Scotus: “Note, ‘absolute’ excludes the following instance: ‘God is able not to cause a white thing, and thus not to cause a similar thing, therefore he can cause a white thing without causing a similar thing’; and this instance: ‘he is able not to cause a body, therefore to cause a body without a shape’, if shape only means the many respects of lines bounding a surface or of surfaces bounding a body as health means many proportions.”

⁴¹Interpolation: “When you prove ‘they are good by participation’, I say that there is equivocation over the term participation, namely effectively, and thus it is true, or formally, and thus it is not true.”

⁴²Interpolation: “Augustine On the Trinity XIII ch.3 n.6, everyone wants to be happy; therefore everyone necessarily wants the ultimate end wherein is beatitude.”

⁴³Text cancelled by Scotus: “Against this response I prove that if the will is able not to will, it can refuse to will, because if it cannot refuse to will, this is because it necessarily has in itself something to which that refusing to will is opposed. But this something can only be actual willing; the proof is that no habitual or aptitudinal inclination to willing is opposed to a very refusing to will. Even if it be granted that it is a not-refusing to will, this does not avoid the problem, because a negation agrees necessarily to no positive thing save on account of some affirmation necessarily agreeing with that positive thing on which the negation follows; and then that affirmation in the proposed case cannot be an habitual or aptitudinal inclination, because not-refusing to will does not follow on it, just as neither is refusing to will opposed to it, because the affirmation necessarily agreeing with the will, on account of which refusing to will is opposed to it, will be actual willing. If therefore it cannot refuse to will, it necessarily wills. - And this reason generally shows that to nothing susceptible of contraries and of intermediates, if it has intermediates, is any form of that genus opposed, or it shows that it is impossible for a form to be present in it unless some form of that genus is necessarily present in the same thing, or something else is, to which that which cannot be present in it is virtually opposed. Such a positive that is virtually opposed to a very refusing to will cannot be found in the proposed case.

Response: the thing opposed to the refusing to will is the will, because the will only has a capacity for possible willing and refusing to will; but to refuse to will the end includes a contradiction, because it is not a possible object of this act. An example: to see a sound includes a contradiction by reason of the act and of the object, therefore the object is opposed to sight and sight is opposed to it and determines for itself not to see this, because sight is of a sight. So here. Nor is it discordant to deny that the end can be the object of hatred and beatitude of flight, but neither can misery be the object of concupiscence, because according to Augustine in Handbook of the Faith ch.105 n.28: “nor can we will to be wretched” [Lombard, Sentences 2 d.25 ch.3-5; Scotus 1 d.10 q. un n.10] [n.81].”

⁴⁴Interpolation: “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.”

⁴⁵Interpolation: “This therefore is to be held by true and pious faith. About this second distinction, wherein the Master deals with the existence and unity of God and the plurality of the persons, there are seven questions [nn.1, 10, 157, 191, 197, 201, 212]; for there are three questions about the first part, two about God’s essence and one about his unity. The first is.”

⁴⁶Interpolation: “Whether there is some being simply first. That there is not: beings are related to themselves as numbers, and there is no number first in perfection because neither is there a greatest number. On the contrary: Metaphysics 2.2.994a11-19, there is a first efficient cause, therefore a first actuality; there is a first end, therefore a first good. - Second, whether priority could simply belong to essences of different nature. That it could: posteriority so belongs, and as one correlative is multiplied so is the other. On the contrary: every multitude is reduced to a unity. - Third, whether a being simply first is infinite in intensity. Here below [nn.1-9]. - Solution: first, as to what the order of questions is, because in a ‘demonstration-that’ existence is proved first of relatives; from the second will be got priority with respect to all causable things, from this the solution of the third, to the first as below [nn.41-73].”

⁴⁷Interpolation: “Again, Avicenna Metaphysics 1 ch.1 (70rb): ‘That God exists is not known per se, nor is it beyond hope for him to be known.”

⁴⁸Interpolation: “that is, from no other propositional truth but from itself alone does ‘every whole is greater than its part’ get its evidence.”

⁴⁹Interpolation: “some are to be taken for the thing defined and others for the definition.”

⁵⁰Interpolation: “A reason also of this sort can be formed: it is impossible for the same concept to be prior and posterior and to be had and not had about the same thing; but the same thing can be conceived, and is conceived, according to the name before it is so according to the definition, Averroes Physics 1 com.5;     therefore the concepts introduced by the name and by the definition are not the same.”

⁵¹Interpolation: “just as having three angles [equal to two right angles] is demonstrated of a triangle when there is knowledge of its definition, which is: ‘plain figure’ etc     .”

⁵²Interpolation: “That proposition is known per se which gets its evidence, not from another proposition whose truth is more known, but from its own intrinsic terms.”

Interpolation to the interpolation: “...as these terms are its own. And I say, as they are its own: either they are confused concepts as confused, or distinct concepts as distinct; for definition and thing defined are not the same terms, because the thing defined is known before the definition is, by the fact that the confused thing or things are known first, Physics 1.1.184a21-22; hence the name of the defined thing involves the intelligible thing in a confused way and in a confused concept, but by the definition is introduced a discrete concept about the same thing; and therefore something can be known per se as to one term, namely the defined term, which is not known as to the definition.

Again, a definition is the middle term in demonstration, and the defined thing is the conclusion; and therefore did I say ‘as the terms are its own’, namely confusedly if they are confused and distinctly if the concepts are distinct. Hence the definition as it is the middle is not as it is declarative or more evident to us than the thing defined, but the major proposition or the minor is more evident than the conclusion.”

⁵³Interpolation: “as is plain in the case of the perfect syllogism, which needs nothing for its necessity to be evident, Prior Analytics 1.1.24b22-24, and Reportatio IA d.3 n.62. But this evidence is from the relation of the principles or the suppositions to the conclusion, which is the relation of necessity.”

⁵⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “For the same reason the distinction is not valid that something is self-evidently known to the wise and the unwise, because this only pertains to the conception of the terms, which are presupposed to the understanding of a self-evidently known proposition, although Boethius, On the Seven Days PL 64, 1311, does thus distinguish the common conception; but either the self-evidently known proposition and the common conception are not the same, or Boethius is understanding a proposition that is conceived, not a proposition that is conceivable, or he is understanding one distinctly conceived by reason of the terms.”

⁵⁵Interpolation: “whether in a superior or inferior, or of a passion.”

⁵⁶Interpolation: “about the superior particularly or about the particular universally.”

⁵⁷Interpolation: “Or let the reason be given in briefer form thus: what belongs to something first does not belong to another save by the nature of what to which it belongs first; but existence belongs first to this divine essence, therefore it will not belong to any other property or any other thing save by the nature of the essence. Therefore no proposition in which existence is asserted of any property of this essence that we conceive about God is true first, but is true by something else, and consequently it is not first and not known per se.”

⁵⁸Note by Scotus: “This minor is set down on the basis of the opinion about the univocity of the concept that is common to God and creatures, but if this opinion is changed let this minor be taken: ‘many concepts in which we conceive God are not simply simple’, and a particular conclusion follows, not a universal one as from the two reasons [nn.27-28]. The minor might be taken in another way thus: ‘no concept of ours that is proper to God and that we perceive to be proper to God is simply simple’, because although the concept of being taken from creatures is simply simple and proper to God according to another opinion [sc. the opinion that being is analogical, not univocal, to God and creatures], yet it is not a proper percept, because according to Henry [of Ghent] it seems that in that concept, because of its likeness and simplicity, we do not distinguish God from other things, -understand: we do not distinguish in a perceptible way, because although the concept is distinct, yet it is not perceived by us as a distinct concept.”

⁵⁹Damascene derived the Greek for ‘God’ (Theos) from Greek words signifying these operations.

⁶⁰Text cancelled by Scotus: “It is said that this proposition ‘the one who is actually operating is’ the ‘is’ can be predicated as an additional third thing, or as a second thing, and thus that the ‘is’ is predicated as present being or as habitual being [sc. the difference between ‘a just man is’ - where ‘is’ is second thing, namely a predicate of existence - and ‘a man is just’ - where ‘is’ is a third thing, namely the copula joining subject and predicate]; in the first way the proposition is not self-evidently known, in the second way it is self-evidently known. But this is not logically said, because according to the Philosopher On Interpretation 10.19b19-22, ‘is’ is not predicated as additional third except when the third is additional as a predicate; but, when no third is additional, it predicates existence proper, which is to be predicated as second thing; but here nothing is additional; therefore it predicates precisely what exists in itself, and so it is predicated as second thing.”

⁶¹Text cancelled by Scotus: “Against this: if the opposite of the predicate is repugnant to the subject, then the consequence is good of putting the subject in some antecedent and the predicate in some consequent, inferring the consequent from an antecedent of that kind, to wit ‘a is necessarily existent, therefore a exists’, because the opposite of the consequent is repugnant to the antecedent. But every necessary consequence holds by virtue of some necessary categorical proposition, and thus the categorical is what unites the extremes, by reason of which the consequence holds; therefore such a proposition is necessary, to wit this one ‘necessary existence exists’ and ‘the one who is actually operating exists’.

I reply: when in the antecedent are included two opposites and a consequent is inferred, it is not inferred by reason of the whole antecedent extreme, because the whole extreme does not make any single concept, but only by reason of one part of the extreme, to wit the inference ‘an irrational man exists, therefore an animal exists’. The reason for the consequence is not ‘irrational man’, because it does not make any concept, but ‘man’ in the antecedent and ‘animal’ in the consequent; and therefore a categorical proposition that is per se true must be formed from those extremes, namely these: ‘man’ is ‘animal’. So in the proposed case: if the proposition has an extreme that is not simply simple, whose parts are not self-evidently known to be united, and something is inferred by reason of such non-simply simple extreme, it is inferred by reason of a part of it which includes what is inferred in the consequent; and therefore it holds by virtue of a categorical proposition which conjoins these two things, namely one part of the antecedent extreme and one part of the consequent extreme. This categorical is ‘existence exists’, but not ‘necessary existence exists’. The same response is made to ‘if it does not actually exist, it is not operating,’ and to the reverse ‘if it is operating, it is a being in actuality’: for in the subject several things are included, one of which is precisely the reason for the consequence, but the whole subject is not; and therefore there is no necessary proposition uniting the whole extreme of the antecedent with the extreme of the consequent.”

⁶²The argument in n.12 is of the form: it is self-evident that truth exists; this truth (namely God) exists; therefore this truth is self-evident. The argument commits the fallacy of the consequent because the premise proceeds from self-evidence to truth, and the conclusion does the reverse, proceeding from truth to self-evidence; cf. Aristotle Sophistical Refutations 1.5.167b1-13.

⁶³The conditional ‘if there is no truth, it is not true that there is any truth’, is a double negative; the conclusion ‘it is true that there is no truth’ is an affirmation of the antecedent. But to conclude to the affirmation of the antecedent of a conditional is to commit the fallacy of the consequent.

⁶⁴Interpolation: “in my intellect the proposition ‘infinite being is’ is of a nature to be evident from the terms, but.”

⁶⁵Interpolation: “with ever primacy that does not include any imperfection. For the part is more imperfect than the whole and yet is prior; for a part shares in the entity of the whole and is not itself the whole. But there are other primacies that do not include any imperfection, as the primacy of eminence and of triple causal independence, namely, efficient cause, formal or exemplar cause, and final cause. But the primacy of eminence is not the primacy of causality; for one being is not the cause of another from the fact that it is preeminent over it, for the first and the supreme in any genus is preeminent over any other posterior in that genus and yet it is not the cause of it. Also exemplar primacy is not distinguished from the primacy of efficient causality, because a principle that is the exemplar of other things in intelligible being is only an efficient principle through the intellect; for just as a natural efficient cause does not distinguish efficient causality but is contained under it, so neither is the exemplar cause distinguished from the efficient cause. So there are two causalities, distinct from each other, namely of efficient causality and final causality. And all those primacies that we attribute to God do not include any imperfection. - Hence first I will show that there exists something in fact among beings that is simply first.”

⁶⁶To deny that a thing cannot be an effect or cause an effect by virtue of another is to assert that it can be an effect and cause an effect by virtue of another.

⁶⁷Interpolation: “because then the same thing would be prior and posterior to itself.”

⁶⁸Interpolation: “because it seeks a stand in causes.”

⁶⁹Interpolation: “none of which is first but each is second, because according to them an infinite process is not discordant in the case of productions of the same nature.”

⁷⁰Interpolation: “likewise, it proceeds from contingents, because it proceeds from the ideas of producer and produced, which are only contingent terms.”

⁷¹Interpolation: “as the subject is the per se cause with respect to its own property, even in other cases, as ‘the white disperses [sight]’ and ‘the builder builds’.”

⁷²Interpolation: “as ‘Polycleitus builds’.”

⁷³Interpolation: “for although the son depends for his existence on his father, yet he does not so depend in causing, because he can act when his father is dead just as when his father is alive.”

⁷⁴Interpolation: “because any cause has its own perfect causality without any respect of its effect; for it is enough that one cause successively causes after the other.”

Interpolation: “From the three differences come three reasons: from the first, that the totality of causes is dependent in causing, therefore dependent on something that is not part of the totality; from the second, that the infinitely superior will be infinitely more perfect; from the third, that infinite things are actual all at once. There is an additional fourth reason which proves that a possible thing which does not include imperfection is already shown to be in existence. - But if an essential order is denied, because an accidental order is sufficient for the sense, on the contrary I give this proof: a is being caused by something; a nature that can be produced in one supposit can be produced in any supposit; so the reason by which it is now in this supposit is reason that it was before in that supposit and in that other supposit. No succession of things goes on continually save by virtue of something permanent; that permanent thing is no part of the succession; therefore besides the individual in the species doing the generating there is some other superior agent. - From this result I infer that that agent is the surpassing first thing, because an equivocal agent is more actual and independent and that on which the other things depend. It is the first end, because there is some end on account of which it per se acts, Physics 25.196b17-22; not on account of any of the effects other than itself, because these are less good. Likewise, nothing else does it naturally or by reason most of all love. Fourth, it is the first exemplar thing because it is a per se agent; so either it acts for an end that it knows or for an end it is directed to by something that knows; also it knows everything that can be made, because it orders them to the end and wills them for the end.

Solution to the second question: there are not two supereminent things. - Again, there are always as many essential features, hence and thence and in different species, as there are coordinate orderings, because they do not have one idea here and there, nor here to one and there to two first totalities.

Note the process of this solution, which is as follows: the first conclusion is that there is some first efficient thing; this conclusion is first proved in a confused way [n.43], second in a distinct way (through the three propositions [nn.53-55], the first of which is proved after five manners [n.53]), and two instances against it are ruled out [nn.44-46, 56]. The second conclusion is that the first thing cannot be caused [n.57]. The third conclusion: thus the first thing is actually existent [n.58]. Hence follow three similar conclusions about the first end [nn.60-62]. Hence three similar ones about the first supreme thing [nn.64-66]. Hence, that the first efficient cause is first in two other ways; two conclusions follow [nn.68-69]. Hence, that thus the first thing is one nature; which is shown in four ways, namely because it necessarily exists, because it is highest, because it is ultimate end, because it is the termination of dependency [nn.70-73].

In the second principal article the preliminaries are first proved, and there are three conclusions [nn.75, 89, 98; a fourth conclusion in n.105]; hence, that the first thing has intelligence and will, by three reasons [nn.76-79]; hence that its understanding itself is the same as its essence [n.89]; hence, that no understanding is an accident of it, by four reasons [nn.98-101]. Hence is the principal intention proved, namely infinity; first, through efficient causality, by treatment of Aristotle’s reason in Physics 8.10.266a10-24, b6-20, 267b17-26 and Metaphysics 12.7.1073a3-13, [nn.111-124]; second, through actual knowledge of infinites [nn.125-127] and, in line with this, by an argument about intuitive knowledge of effects [nn.128-129]; third, through the idea of the end [n.130]; fourth, through the idea of preeminence [nn.131-139].”

⁷⁵Interpolation: “in essentially ordered causes, where the adversary posits an infinity of them, a second cause, insofar as it causes, depends on a first (from the first difference [n.49]). So if there were an infinity of causes, things are such that not only any later cause but any cause at all depends on its own immediate cause,     therefore etc     .”

⁷⁶Interpolation: “and this thing I call the first efficient cause. So if there are infinite causes, they still depend on some other cause that is not part of the totality.”

⁷⁷Interpolation [replacing the second argument in the text]: “if an infinite number of essentially ordered causes were to come together in the production of some effect, and if, from the third difference [n.51], all essentially ordered causes exist together at once, it follows that an infinite number of things exist together at once in causing this effect.”

⁷⁸Interpolation: “because what involves no imperfection can be supposed to exist without imperfection among things.”

⁷⁹Interpolation: “and because no part of a succession can persist along with the whole succession, for then it would not be part of the succession.”

⁸⁰Interpolation: “Everything therefore that depends on a cause accidentally ordered depends more essentially on a cause per se and essentially ordered; nay rather, when an essential order is denied the accidental order will be denied, because accidents do not have an order save by means of something fixed and permanent, nor consequently are they multiplied to infinity.” [In other words, an infinite series of accidentally ordered causes must at least have an abiding matter underlying it, and this matter will underlie it as a per se and essentially ordered cause.]

⁸¹Interpolation: “when I say ‘some nature has been truly brought about, therefore something is the efficient cause of it’.”

⁸²Cf. Averroes Metaphysics 10 com.7, 12 com.6: “the formal, final, and moving principles are not three in number, but one in subject and three in idea.”

⁸³Interpolation: “For if it were to act per se for an end other than itself, then there would be something more noble than the first efficient cause, because an end which is something separate from the agent intending the end is more noble than the agent.”

⁸⁴Interpolation: “and, beside this, those two natures are formally necessary through that in which they agree.”

⁸⁵Interpolation: “through the other nature, and so there would be something necessarily existent that is no less necessarily existent when the thing through which it is so has been taken away [n.177].”

⁸⁶Interpolation: “because necessary existence includes nothing that is not necessarily existent or the reason for necessarily existing [n.177].”

⁸⁷The point seems to be that if the first being’s love of the end is natural then, first, this end cannot be something other than itself (as it is in the case of other things that naturally tend to an end, as a heavy thing tending downwards), and, second, if therefore this end is just itself and it naturally loves it, then there is in it no doubleness of end and natural love of the end (as in the case of a heavy thing tending downwards), so that its being is its very self-loving, which is a knowing and willing itself.

⁸⁸Interpolation: “and because just as the first cause does everything by necessity of causality (as everyone supposes, for otherwise it would be a changeable cause), so also do all other causes. -These things that he [i.e. Scotus] says do not seem to be true, one could use the same reasoning to argue that nothing exists by chance or fortune in caused things unless the first cause acts by chance or fortune, and that as everything happens determinately in respect of the first cause so also in respect of other causes. Therefore one could reply to what he says that causes moved by the first mover do not so receive motion in a uniform way that of necessity they secondarily move in like manner as they are moved by the first cause, such that the ‘in like manner’ states the manner of moving on the part of God who makes them move; for they are indeed moved in like manner as they are moved by the first cause if the ‘in like manner’ states the manner of moving on the part of the causes that are moved. For the manner of the moving cause is not always being received in the moved cause, but the motion in the latter is received according to the mode of the receiver; therefore motion exists in it in a way other than it does in the first cause.”

⁸⁹Aristotle, Metaphysics 12.9.1074b28-29: “If [the first mover] is not intelligence but potentiality, the continuing of its understanding will reasonably be laborious for it.”

⁹⁰That is, an angel’s power of knowing and loving and what it knows and loves are the same, namely itself; but its act of knowing and loving is not itself or its substance but an accident of its substance. One cannot therefore argue from identity of power and object to identity of act of power and object. One cannot therefore use this argument to prove that the first being’s knowing and loving itself is identical with its substance. Scotus seems here to be criticizing an argument found in St. Thomas Aquinas, ST Ia q.14 a.2 and ad 2; a.4.

⁹¹That is, if the will were caused, its act of willing would be caused, because that act would exist in something caused.

⁹²The point seems to be that one cannot conclude from identity of intellect in respect of all things to its identity with its act of understanding all things.

⁹³The point seems to be that one cannot infer from identity of understanding and will to identity of objects understood and willed, for objects are logically extraneous to acts, and so to infer identity of the first from an identity of the second is to commit the fallacy of the accident.

⁹⁴Interpolation: “Let us inquire, therefore, how the aforesaid reasoning of the Philosopher [n.111] is conclusive! If the way of efficient causality is preferable to the other ways (the point is plain above where the ways are compared, because this way entails the others [n.111]), and if infinity is not proved by this way, how will it proved by the others?”

⁹⁵Interpolation: “...because the agent has virtue with respect to both at the same time, provided both are of themselves compatible. Let this be the major then: whatever agent has a virtue whereby, as far as depends on itself, it has power for infinite effects at the same time, even if the incompossibility of the effects prevents them being in place at the same time, that agent possesses infinite virtue [n.117]. The first agent is of this sort;     therefore etc     . The major was already made clear before [n.117], because a plurality of effects demonstrates a greater perfection in a cause which, as far as depends on itself, has power for that plurality at the same time; therefore an infinity of the things that it has power for at the same time, as far as depends on itself, proves the infinity of its power. Proof of the minor, because.”

⁹⁶Interpolation: “although it has all the causality of the second cause more eminently than this causality exists in the second cause, yet it does not, of itself, have power for the effects of all the second causes, because this more eminent way of possessing causality does not show that without the second causes it can be the total and immediate cause of all the effects, and so the minor premise is not gained, that the first cause has of itself power for infinite effects.”

⁹⁷Interpolation: “In addition to the proof just stated, which deduces the infinite virtue of the first thing from the infinite number of effects that that first thing, as far as depends on itself, is at the same time capable of, one can take a similar proof from the infinite number of causes as follows: if the first thing were able to possess formally in itself all the secondary causalities along with the first causality, it would, as far as depends on itself, be of infinite virtue in some way; therefore much more will it be infinite if it has more eminently than formally all those secondary causalities.

But a reply can be made to these two proofs of the consequence given by Aristotle:

As to the first of them I concede that when any one of several things requires some proper formal or at least virtual perfection in its cause, a cause that is capable of more things is more perfect than what is capable of fewer [n.117], because at the very least the several formal perfections that would be proper to those several things would be contained virtually in such a cause; only what possesses several formal perfections virtually is infinite in perfection. But whether the cause is at once or successively capable of several things none of which requires a proper formal or virtual perfection in that cause, one cannot from those several things deduce a greater perfection in the cause. Such is what the philosophers would say in the proposed case, because the infinite number of things that the first thing is capable of, as far as concerns itself, would only posit an infinity of things in number but a finitude of things in specific natures [n.116]; as it is, however, only a distinction of specific nature in the effect, and not a distinction of number, requires some other formal or virtual perfection in the cause.

From this there is a response to the second proof, that second causes are not infinite in species according to Aristotle, Metaphysics 2.2.994a1-2; therefore what has virtue for all those causes is not proved by this alone to be infinite in intensity.

Against the first response: what is capable at the same time of more things is more powerful than what is capable of fewer things, whether these things are of different species or of the same species; therefore what is of itself capable at the same time of an infinity of things is infinite and possessed of infinite power.

Against the second response: if all the secondary causalities existed formally in the first cause, there would be some virtual infinity, at least in extent, in that first cause; therefore if they exist in it more eminently, it will have some infinity in it. But not an infinity in extent, because eminence, on account of which the secondary causalities are unitive, takes away extensive infinity; therefore there will be some infinity there other than extensive; therefore an intensive infinity.

To the first counter-argument [sc. against the first response]: one should deny the antecedent and say that simultaneity does nothing to prove a greater power; the case is like this fire which, if there were an infinite number of bodies in due proportion spherically surrounding it, would act on them all at the same time just as it acts now on the finite number of parts of the body spherically surrounding it.

To the second counter-argument [sc. against the second response]: it would follow from this that the sun, nay that any perpetual cause capable of an infinite number of effects in succession, would be infinite. Therefore the reasoning, although it seem probable, is nevertheless sophistical, because the proposition on which the reasoning rests seems false in itself, namely that ‘all things that posit in themselves an exensive infinity posit, so as to be possessed more eminently, some virtual infinity’. This proposition is false, because they can be possessed more eminently in a finite equivocal cause; nor is it proved by this other proposition, that when things are lacking in infinity they are lacking in eminence with respect to their infinite effects; for this proposition is false, because eminence produces unity and so takes away the material extensive infinity that was there before; yet neither does it posit an intensive formal infinity, because a finite formality sufficiently contains eminently a material and extensive infinity.”

⁹⁸The argument is found in St. Thomas Aquinas, ST Ia q.45 a.5 ad 3, and also in Henry of Ghent.

⁹⁹Interpolation: “a virtue that has power over extremes infinitely distant is infinite; but divine virtue is of this sort in the case of creation.”

¹⁰⁰Interpolation: “just as there is between something and nothing.”

¹⁰¹Interpolation: “[it is true] about creation in the real order, namely such that...”

¹⁰²Interpolation: “the real being of the creature’s existence”

¹⁰³Metaphysics 6 ch.2 (92ra): “Creation...is the giving of being to a thing after its absolute non-being; for a caused thing as far as concerns itself is that it not exist, but as far as concerns its cause it is that it should exist. But what belongs to a thing of itself in the intellect is prior in essence, not in time, because it belongs to it from something other than itself; therefore every created thing is a being after non-being by posterity of essence.”

¹⁰⁴Interpolation [after ‘not however’]: “it is [not however] less believed about creation in the order in which being follows not-being, the way Avicenna speaks of creation in Metaphysics 6 [quoted in previous footnote], but it has been sufficiently demonstrated” [Reportatio IA d.2 n.59].

¹⁰⁵Interpolation: “For if it is the first efficient cause, then anything else other than it has its whole being from it, because otherwise that other thing would, in respect of some part of itself, not depend on it, and then it would not be the first efficient cause; but what thus takes its whole being from something, such that it receives by its nature being after not-being, is created;     therefore etc     .”

¹⁰⁶Interpolation: “as in the case of the continuous, whose extremes are two points” [n.60].

¹⁰⁷Interpolation: “Therefore power over transition to that term does not demonstratively prove an active infinite virtue.”

¹⁰⁸Interpolation: “Contradiction therefore is the greatest distance and opposition, but by way of privation and indeterminately; contrariety however is the greatest distance positively, as is plain from Metaphysics 10.4.1055a9-10, 38-b4.”

¹⁰⁹Interpolation: “Response: numerical difference does not imply any other perfection.”

¹¹⁰Interpolation [in place of what follows]: “There is a supreme thinkable; the supreme thinkable is infinite; therefore there is an infinite. Proof of the major: a supreme thinkable can be thought of as existing in reality, and it cannot be thought to exist from another; therefore from itself; therefore it is from itself. Therefore that a greater than what exists only in the intellect can be thought that exists in reality must not be understood to be about the same thing [n.138]; but because the merely thinkable is merely possible, something of itself necessary is greater than any possible. - Alternatively, the highest thinkable is intuitable; not in another; therefore in itself [n.139].”

¹¹¹Interpolation: “hence, that man is irrational is unthinkable. Hence, just as in reality nothing exists save it be simple or composed of potency and act, so in concepts; but contradictories make nothing that is one, whether simple or complex.”

¹¹²A fallacy of equivocation over the term ‘possible’ seems to lurk in Scotus’ reasoning here. The existence of an infinite being is possible intrinsically because its idea involves no contradiction (unlike, say, a round square, which does involve contradiction); but if it does not in fact exist its existence is not possible extrinsically, because nothing extrinsic could make it to exist. Yet such a non-existent infinite being, although it could never in fact exist, would still, in its idea, contain no contradiction (unlike square circle). So there is no problem in supposing that an infinite being is both able and not able to exist since the ‘able’ in each case is different.

¹¹³Interpolation: “matter is terminated by form as potency by act and perfection and the formal existence of it, and conversely.”

¹¹⁴Interpolation: “as act by potency; form”

¹¹⁵Interpolation: “of which sort is God.”

¹¹⁶This reasoning seems to be taken from St. Thomas Aquinas.

¹¹⁷The phrase ‘form is limited in relation to matter’ is really equivalent to ‘if form is in relation to matter it is limited’, so to argue ‘but some form is not in relation to matter,     therefore it is not limited’ is to argue from the denial of the antecedent to the denial of the consequent, which is a fallacy.

¹¹⁸Interpolation: “by its proper terms before it is limited in reference to something else, as in the case of the heavens, therefore .”

¹¹⁹Interpolation: “and on account of the second way there were prefaced there [four conclusions etc     .].”

¹²⁰Interpolation: “Therefore join the conclusions of the first two articles with the conclusion of the third as follows:”

¹²¹Interpolation: “God acts freely and voluntarily with respect to everything that is extrinsic to himself.”

¹²²Interpolation: “Therefore, according to them, just as efficient causes in one and the same order act necessarily, so impeding efficient causes in another order act necessarily in impeding; hence the sun acts to dissipate things with the same necessity as Saturn acts to condense them. Since therefore every defect of matter is reduced to efficient causes that are defective in virtue, then, if any efficient cause whatever acts necessarily, no defect whether of monstrosity or of malice will exist in the universe without happening necessarily.”

¹²³Interpolation: “The Philosopher argues: ‘God is possessed of infinite power; therefore he moves in non-time.’ Declaration of the consequence:”

¹²⁴Interpolation: “because the Philosopher calls virtue in a magnitude extensive virtue” [n.6].

¹²⁵The point seems to be that if ‘God’ includes the predicate ‘is’ then ‘Gods’ must include the predicate ‘are’ because the difference between singular and plural is in mode and not in thing signified. A parallel would be ‘God is masculine’ (‘Deus’ is a masculine word in Latin] therefore ‘Gods are masculine’ (i.e. each occurrence of ‘Deus’ is an occurrence of a masculine). The error here is exposed below n.185.

¹²⁶Interpolation: “The argument for this is by means of the Philosopher Metaphysics 12.8.1074a31-37: if there are two [gods], one of them would have matter. And (ibid. 1076a4): a plurality of principles is not good; therefore there is one ruler. And Damascene De Fide Orthodoxa 1.5 sets down three reasons: this god would lack that one, that one differs from this; second, neither would be everywhere; third, they would regenerate things badly - and this agrees with the second reason. The Master [Lombard, I d.3 ch.3]: one of them would be superfluous. - Again, by reason, because as he [Aristotle] says above, unity is the principle of duality and of every multitude; Proclus Institutio Theologica ch.21. - Again, how would they come together under a genus or a species? Composition follows either way. This agrees with the first reason of the Philosopher.”

¹²⁷Interpolation: “When setting down this concept of God in this question, that he necessarily exists of himself, or is independent in existence, or is an uncreated being, or the unmovable first mover, one will be able to make use of the opinion of Aristotle about the intelligences [Metaphysics 12.8.1073a14-74b14], if they are thus Gods, which is dealt with in I d.8 p.2 q. un. nn.3-11. - As to the fourth concept, there is no demonstration of the affirmative if, according to Aristotle [ ibid. 12.6-7.1072a9-23], one of them moves with a diurnal motion and the other moves the zodiac and each exists of itself. But this concept is saved by setting down this concept or description of God: a being of infinite intellectuality, will, goodness, power; a necessary being, existing of itself. Hence, in advance of this question, one must prove all the following things of God: thus, that some being is altogether first with a triple primacy was proved in the preceding question [nn.42-67], and that it necessarily exists [n.70], and is infinite [nn.111-136]; and the same about the intellect, will, and power, in the same place [nn.75-100]. Thus the question is not being begged here.”

¹²⁸Interpolation: “because it is the whole of being, for a finite intellect has this power, although not most perfectly nor all at once.”

¹²⁹Interpolation: “because a has its own essence as adequate object; therefore it does not have essence b as adequate object. But b would be the adequate object for intellection a if that intellection could understand a and b perfectly all at once.”

¹³⁰Interpolation [in place of ‘if b is another...since’]: “and with as much love as it can if it is infinite; but b is to be loved to infinity when it is set down as being another God, and consequently.”

¹³¹Interpolation: “Also it seems plausible that what is completely at rest in one adequate object could not be at rest in another object.”

¹³²Interpolation: “Let this reason be stated under another form from the idea of primacy as follows: one thing of one idea that is disposed to many things of one idea is not determinate with respect to that plurality, or to a definite determination of them; there is no instance in nature with respect to supposits nor in cause with respect to things caused, unless you make an instance in the proposed case. But deity will be one thing of one idea, and according to you it is related to many things of one idea; therefore of itself it is not determinate to a definite plurality of singulars, nor can it be made determinate from elsewhere, because that is repugnant to the first thing; therefore deity exists in infinite supposits. This reasoning seems to be founded on the fact that primacy is indeterminate of itself.”

¹³³Interpolation: “where he speaks thus: ‘Any omnipotent that was such that everything else could do nothing will be able easily to effect things’.”

¹³⁴Interpolation: “I do not wish to adduce here certain arguments of some people relative to the question, on which one should rely because they are answerable and perhaps prove just as much that there is a single angel in a single species, if an angel is simple in its essence [an implicit reference to St. Thomas Aquinas]; or if they are proofs yet they do not proceed from what is naturally known to us. Nor should they be adduced as in need of being answered, because they are not opposed to the conclusion that I maintain.”

¹³⁵Interpolation: “although that which moves [the intellect] is not anything in reality; for masculinity does not require anything masculine in reality but something corresponding to masculinity, namely active power or something of the sort.”

¹³⁶Interpolation: “the inference ‘there are several men, therefore that are several rational animals’ holds, but the inference ‘God is a generator, therefore God is of the masculine gender’ does not hold.”

¹³⁷Interpolation: “namely that ‘every being by participation is reduced to a being by essence’ which being is perfect. So that the conclusion, then, might truly follow...”

¹³⁸Interpolation: “and anything might be generated from anything, and then matters would universally be otiose.”

¹³⁹Interpolation: “as follows: this generable thing is generated equivocally, not from seed; either therefore of necessity, or for the most part, or rarely. If it is equivocally generated of necessity then it is never generated from seed, which is false. But if it is generated for the most part, it is equivocally generated from putrefaction; but things that happen for the most part happen naturally; therefore it is naturally generated equivocally, and further it follows that they are rarely propagated from seed, which seems false. But if it is generated rarely, it is generated equivocally; but what happens rarely happens by chance and fortuitously, and because they are fortuitous they are monstrous. And things that are of this sort, this thing and that thing, are not of the same species; therefore nature is communicable in only one way.”

¹⁴⁰Text cancelled by Scotus: “therefore in whatever there is this ‘intellect having an actually intelligible object present to itself’, in that there will be a productive principle of generated knowledge, and this according to the proportion of its own perfection. But in God this exists according to the true nature of itself; therefore in God there is production of generated knowledge.” Interpolation [following on]: “Or one can argue in this way: any supposit that has of itself a sufficient and formal principle of producing can produce a supposit or product adequate to that principle, namely, the most perfect supposit that can be produced for such a principle; but not a product adequate in nature, because this would be a begging of the question, but a product adequate to the active virtue of the producer, just as the sun, when it produces a most perfect effect, is said to produce an effect most perfect not in nature but in its active virtue. The following is the minor: some divine supposit has of itself a principle of producing, which principle is perfect memory;     therefore etc     . The major and minor are made plain in what follows.”

¹⁴¹The reference may, however, be to part of the interpolated text following on from the cancelled text in the previous note.

¹⁴²Interpolation: “as an imperfect hot thing that imperfectly possesses heat is, according to him, not sufficient to cause heat.”

¹⁴³Interpolated note: “the major of the second syllogism which was...” [as in the interpolation to the cancelled text in a previous footnote].

¹⁴⁴Or the reference may again be to the interpolated text mentioned in a previous note, where the minor is stated thus: “some divine supposit has of itself a principle of producing, which principle is perfect memory;     therefore etc     .”

¹⁴⁵Interpolation: “the thing is plain as to the first part, because unless some person in divine reality had of itself perfect memory there would be a process to infinity; the other part of the minor, namely that perfect memory in a supposit possessing of itself that memory is a principle of producing generated knowledge...”

¹⁴⁶Interpolation: “every created memory, not because it is created nor because it is limited or imperfect, is a principle of producing generated knowledge, because imperfection is never a reason for producing or communicating existence; and     therefore the fact that it is a perfect principle of producing a generated knowledge corresponding to itself, this belongs to it not from imperfection but from its own natural perfection.” A further interpolation follows: “Therefore this too belongs to it most perfectly where memory is most perfect and exists most perfectly; so it is in the uncreated supposit of the Father; therefore etc     .”

¹⁴⁷Text cancelled by Scotus: “The conclusion absolutely inferred, namely that memory in the first divine person is a principle for itself of producing or simply communicating, proves the intended proposition [n.220], because it is only a productive principle by way of nature; but such a production is only internal [n.222]. It proves the intended proposition more in another way, that it is a productive principle of generated knowledge; therefore internally [n.224]. And then the major [n.221] ought to be taken in this way: ‘Whatever of its own formal nature is a productive principle of something according to this something’s formal nature, is a productive principle, in whatever it is of itself in, of such a thing’. In a third way it proves most of all the intended proposition thus:” Here Scotus breaks off and cancels the note, because he has not yet made clear (he does it next in n.225) the major of the second syllogism [n.222].

¹⁴⁸In place of “I prove” Scotus wrote “I prove in two ways, first.” on which then follows this interpolation: “.thus: the memory in anything is either really productive of generated knowledge, as it is in us, or quasi-productive, as it is in God, because in God his accidental intellection is understood as generated quasi-knowledge. Next I argue.”

¹⁴⁹Text cancelled by Scotus: “It is proved secondly because the intellect is a power of acting, not of making, as is said in Metaphysics 9.8.1050a21-b2; therefore if it can produce a product it can produce it in itself and not outside itself, otherwise it would not have the idea of acting as this is distinguished from the idea of making. This intellect, therefore, which cannot produce knowledge in itself, cannot produce another knowledge, as it seems.”

¹⁵⁰Interpolation: “one per se and another”

¹⁵¹Interpolation: “because it knows itself by co-created knowledge according to them.”

¹⁵²Text cancelled by Scotus: “if however it could have another object actually intelligible present to itself, it can generate another knowledge in a nearby receptive thing, if there is something such [or an interpolation: ‘if any such knowledge is something that is received in another’], or it can generate a self-standing knowledge if it have the virtue of generating something self-standing; therefore, when the idea of being receptive of knowledge is removed, though the idea of being productive of knowledge remains and this a self-standing knowledge, knowledge will be able to be generated by the intellect, although it would not be received in the intellect which is the principle of the generating.”

¹⁵³Text cancelled by Scotus: “therefore this is something acting freely, in the way stated before.”

¹⁵⁴Interpolation: “the product is the supreme good, abiding per se, produced from the fullness of the perfection of the producer itself; but it is not produced so that the producer may be perfected through it.”

¹⁵⁵Text cancelled by Scotus: “When it is further argued about what acts and what makes [footnote to n.230], I say that these are different accidental productive powers, namely the power that acts and the power that makes. For universally every power of itself productive of something receivable in something, produces or can produce that producible in any proportionate or nearby receptive thing; but if the producible is not of a nature to be received in anything, the productive power will produce it and not in anything but as per se subsistent, if however the productive power is sufficient for producing it without anything else presupposed. So it is in the intended proposition, that the Father has generated knowledge not by acting, that is, not by producing something in himself, nor by making, that is, not by producing something essentially distinct outside himself; but because the product is not of a nature to be received in anything, and the intellect is a sufficient productive principle, because it is infinite, therefore it produces a generated knowledge that is in itself subsistent, and that is a person.Note added here by Scotus: “Note, why is my agent intellect not able to cause in you an intelligible species, at least in the fatherland? Another response to the instance [footnote to n.230] is that the Word is generated in the same intellect according to substance [n.232]. This, without simple identity [n.238], suffices for action distinct from making; an example: if intellection in us is consubstantial, it produces a generated knowledge, etc. [n.233].” therefore in the production too, because it does not of itself signify imperfection. The proof of the antecedent is that, just as the necessary is a condition of perfection in being insofar as it is being, so also it is a condition of perfection in anything that divides being which is not necessarily of itself imperfect and limited. For just as when being is divided through opposites, one of the dividing things is a matter of perfection in being and the other of imperfection, so in anything at all which is a matter of perfection one member of any division is possible and is a matter of imperfection, and the other is necessary and is a matter of perfection. But the producer insofar as it is such does not include imperfection, therefore it is not a perfect producer in idea of producer unless it is necessarily a producer. But the first producer cannot be necessarily a producer of something other than itself and externally, as is said later [I d.8 p.2 q. un nn.12-14]; therefore internally. A similar argument is made about natural production, because natural production is primary production; therefore it belongs to the first producer; but it does not belong to the first producer externally, as will be clear elsewhere [ibid.], therefore internally. ¹

And thus the responses to the instances [nn.231-237] are clarifications of the first reason [n.221], and consequently of the principal proposition [n.220].”

¹Note added here by Scotus: “Note, why is my agent intellect not able to cause in you an intelligible species, at least in the fatherland?

Another response to the instance [footnote to n.230] is that the Word is generated in the same intellect according to substance [n.232]. This, without simple identity [n.238], suffices for action distinct from making; an example: if intellection in us is consubstantial, it produces a generated knowledge,     etc . [n.233].” therefore      in the production too, because it does not of itself signify imperfection.A response to the third [n.429] was not given by Scotus. But there is an interpolation: “The answer to the third is plain. It is said that neither are they per se the same thing nor are they per se two things; but it is well said that when the syncategorematic term is removed, namely the ‘per se’, the affirmative is true, namely that ‘they are the same thing’.” ²²⁵ The proof of the antecedent is that, just as the necessary is a condition of perfection in being insofar as it is being, so also it is a condition of perfection in anything that divides being which is not necessarily of itself imperfect and limited. For just as when being is divided through opposites, one of the dividing things is a matter of perfection in being and the other of imperfection, so in anything at all which is a matter of perfection one member of any division is possible and is a matter of imperfection, and the other is necessary and is a matter of perfection. But the producer insofar as it is such does not include imperfection, therefore it is not a perfect producer in idea of producer unless it is necessarily a producer. But the first producer cannot be necessarily a producer of something other than itself and externally, as is said later [I d.8 p.2 q. un nn.12-14]; therefore internally. A similar argument is made about natural production, because natural production is primary production; therefore it belongs to the first producer; but it does not belong to the first producer externally, as will be clear elsewhere [ibid.], therefore internally.An empty space was here left by Scotus. An interpolation follows: “The response will be that, with the ‘insofar as’, it is neither repugnant nor not repugnant. But, without the ‘insofar as’, I say that the relations are not possibles but exist necessarily, and that by identity; but they are not possibles either formally or non-formally.” ²²⁶

¹⁵⁶Text cancelled by Scotus: “I reply that it is not imperfect, nor does it signify a respect to something imperfect, because necessity in such a relative requires a necessity in the imperfect thing for what it is.”

¹⁵⁷Text cancelled by Scotus: “The antecedent is denied as the natural is distinguished from the artificial, or as nature is from the intended proposition. It is conceded by philosophers as the natural is concomitant to the intellectual and the volitional; thus it is posited externally.”

¹⁵⁸Text cancelled by Scotus: “Therefore the relations of producer and produced are compossible in the same nature”

¹⁵⁹Text cancelled by Scotus: “The reason [n.240] is also confirmed because all relative opposites equally involve contradiction; therefore if some of the second mode do not involve it then neither do others.”

¹⁶⁰Which these articles are is obscure. The articles must at any rate have said that the Trinity is not a matter of demonstration but of faith.

¹⁶¹A reference to Henry of Ghent.

¹⁶²Interpolation: “and it would be as it were adventitious to the person already [constituted].”

¹⁶³Interpolation: “and this thing a second person.”

¹⁶⁴A reference to Bonaventure and Richard of Middleton.

¹⁶⁵Interpolation: “because if some per se subsistent person is known to have been produced, yet he would not seem to himself to be so through a relation but through an absolute.”

¹⁶⁶Interpolation: “Nor is the consequence valid, because common inspiriting is a relation and not constitutive.”

¹⁶⁷Text cancelled by Scotus: “Also it is not necessary for the intended proposition, because even if the distinction there were in another way, origin could still be preserved.”

¹⁶⁸Interpolation: ‘nor is this consequence valid that ‘the distinction is through relation, therefore through a relation of origin’ because not all relations are relations of origin.”

¹⁶⁹Interpolation: “and consequently neither is the communication of goodness supreme.”

¹⁷⁰Interpolation: “but it is not a supreme that is univocally similar, because then it could produce another God.”

¹⁷¹Interpolation: “but this is impossible, because there cannot be several Gods, as was shown in the question about the unity of God” [nn.165-181].

¹⁷²Text cancelled by Scotus: “A stand therefore is made in the Son that he is formally necessary of himself, and yet from another producing him by efficacy [interpolation: or originally], together with whom he has the same necessary entity [interpolation: for necessary formally and non-necessary in origin are not contradictory].”

¹⁷³Interpolation: “for here the intellect, by abstracting in this way, does not merely abstract but also divides what exists in reality.”

¹⁷⁴Interpolation: “For it is not the same thing to understand animal without rational when understanding by way of a proposition that it is not rational, and not to understand animal to be rational by way of abstraction. Hence this is the order in the intellect: first not to be understood to be, second to be understood to be; but in real existence there is no order.

But on the contrary: in the first stage one must understand that the thing is not, because in that first stage it does not have being, otherwise it would have a priority of being along with that first stage.

To this objection, which is set down in the Reportatio IA d.2 n.142, I reply as follows: it is not understood in that prior stage not to be absolutely but not to be in prior stage of origin, that is, not to be of itself, and it is in this way understood to exist in that prior stage, and absolutely, because that is prior; but in the later stage of origin it is understood to have been produced, because it is from another.”

¹⁷⁵Interpolation: “and they have essence first equally by the primacy that is opposed to dependence.”

¹⁷⁶Text cancelled by Scotus: “by reason of the more imperfect forms introduced they have greater imperfections, or because...”

¹⁷⁷Interpolation [from Appendix A]: “This mode is set down, and it is gathered from the many statements of that doctor, scattered about in several places. For, according to him, the word is formed in us in this way, that ‘when first known it impresses a simple knowledge of itself on our intellect by representing itself to it as to what is purely passive and to it as under the idea in which it is intellect. But the intellect when perfected with simple knowledge through the object known, which it contains expressively in itself, is made fecund and an active principle as nature - in itself being as intellect merely and as a passive principle - for forming a declarative knowledge in itself from the simple knowledge. And in this respect, when it is said that ‘the word is formed through the intellect’ and that ‘the intellect is active in the formation of the word’, this is understood of the intellect actually informed with simple knowledge; for by this simple knowledge, as by a formal idea of acting, the intellect is an active principle, and necessarily the idea of it, as intellect is passive, though passive with respect to the simple knowledge which it receives from the object, is prior to the idea of it according to which it is nature and active through the simple knowledge inhering in it; and therefore, in the order of reason, it has being first as intellect before it has it as nature, and before the notional act is founded that it performs as nature over and above the essential act which it undergoes as intellect’ [Henry of Ghent, Summa a.54 q.10 ad 2], namely over and above the simple knowledge of the object which it receives as it is bare.

But as to how the intellect as nature is an active principle with respect to the intellect as purely for producing he makes clear in this way, that ‘Both the intellect and the will, whatever they have being in, because of their separation from matter, after they have being in their own first act of simple intelligence or volition, can turn themselves back on themselves and on their simple acts and on their objects through acts of turning back or through conversive acts of understanding and willing.

For the intellect not only understands truth by simple intelligence but also by conversive intelligence, by understanding that it understands, by turning itself back on the understood object and on the simple act of understanding and on itself understanding through a conversive act, because the second knowledge which is in the word not only knows and understand the thing but knows and understands it in such a way that it knows that it knows and understands that thing. Likewise the will not only wills the good with simple volition, but also with conversive volition, by willing that it will, by turning itself back on the willed object and on the simple act of willing and on itself willing through its conversive act.

But this turning back agrees with the intellect and the will partly in one and the same way and partly in different ways. For the fact that both turn themselves back as they exist as bare, pure, and mere powers, this happens in one and the same way as far as concerns their turning themselves back; for both turn only themselves back by their own active force, which force agrees equally with both; but it happens in different ways as concerns the objects to which they turn themselves.

For the intellect, after it has turned itself back to the things to which it has been turned back, possesses itself as a certain potential and pure possible, and this in the way the bare and pure intellect is of a nature to receive something from those things, as a proper passive thing receives from its proper natural active thing, which active thing indeed is the intellect informed with simple knowledge, and this in respect of the formation of declarative knowledge. But the will, after it has turned itself back to what it has turned itself back to, is related as a certain active thing, and this in the way the bare and pure will is of a nature to express a certain incentive love about those things, as a proper active thing about its proper passive thing (of which sort is the same will when informed by simple love) [ibid. a.60 q.1 in corp.].’ Applying this to the proposed case in divine reality he says, ‘the intellect as notional essence existing in the Father, or, which is the same thing, existing in an act of understanding its own essence, which act the essence itself as it were brings about in its own intellect as intellect is in potency, as it were, to essential knowledge according to the idea of understanding - this intellect is fertile with natural fertility for producing from itself something like itself, to which it is as it were in potency through the fact that it is in act under that essential knowledge. For the intellect, as it is a certain essential knowledge in act, is the nature and as if the active principle by which the Father, as he is pure intellect and only intellect, forms from the same intellect, as from a passive principle, the knowledge which is the Word, which in reality is the same knowledge as that from which it is formed, differing from it only insofar as it proceeds from it as making it manifest and declaring it’ [ibid. a.54 q.10 ad 2].

‘Therefore on the part of the intellect an act of saying is caused by simple knowledge in the bare intellect when it is turned back on itself and on its simple knowledge, such that the intellect informed with simple knowledge is an active and eliciting principle of the notional act of the intellect. But the bare converted intellect itself is only a passive principle, about which, as if about some material, the Word is produced as though by impression. Now, on the part of the will, a notional act is caused by the bare will itself when turned back on itself and on its simple love and on its will informed with simple love, such that the bare converted will is an active and elicitive principle of the notional act of the will. But the will itself, informed with simple love, is a quasi-passive principle, from which, as from some material, the Holy Spirit is produced according to a certain expressing’ [ibid. a.60 q.4 ad 1], ‘not by an informing of that about which he is subjectively, nor through any impression made on the same according to the manner in which the Word or the Son proceeds from the Father by a certain quasi-informing or impressing made on the intellect by the paternal turning back, but by a certain quasi-striking or pushing out or progress or -speaking more properly - by a certain expressing of what is produced by that about which it is subjectively produced’ [ibid. q.1 in corp.].

In this way, then, the mode is plain in which, according to this opinion, the notional act is founded on the essential act, and how it is founded in diverse ways in the intellect and the will.”

¹⁷⁸Interpolation: “For the word is formed in us, according to him, in this way, that ‘when first known it impresses a simple knowledge of itself on our intellect by representing itself to it as to what is purely passive and to it as under the idea in which it is intellect. But the intellect when perfected with simple knowledge through the object known, which it contains expressively in itself, is made fecund and an active principle as nature - in itself being as intellect merely and as a passive principle - for forming a declarative knowledge in itself from the simple knowledge. And in this respect, when it is said that ‘the word is formed through the intellect’ and that ‘the intellect is active in the formation of the word’, this is understood of the intellect actually informed with simple knowledge; for by this simple knowledge, as by a formal idea of acting, the intellect is an active principle, and necessarily the idea of it, as intellect is passive, though passive with respect to the simple knowledge which it receives from the object, is prior to the idea of it according to which it is nature and active through the simple knowledge inhering in it; and therefore, in the order of reason, it has being first as intellect before it has it as nature’. But how intellect as nature is an active principle with respect to the intellect as bare for producing the word, it is made clear thus, that...” [as in nn.276-277 below].

¹⁷⁹Text cancelled by Scotus: “as it is declarative knowledge about simple knowledge.”

¹⁸⁰Text cancelled by Scotus: “And hence is apparent the difference between intellect as intellect and intellect as nature.”

¹⁸¹Text cancelled by Scotus: “to which it is as intellect in potency as it were through the fact that it is in act under that essential knowledge.”

¹⁸²Text cancelled by Scotus: “The first is that in the intellect as bare, turned back on the intellect formed by simple knowledge, generated knowledge is formed; this I refute as follows...”

¹⁸³Text cancelled by Scotus: “Again, that the Word be formed about the intellect as bare, and yet that it be impressed on the intellect as having essential knowledge [the matter of the fourth article], do not seem to stand together, because under what reason the intellect is the proximate about-which, under that it is also the proximate in-which; but at point f [n.278] he says that it is in quasi-potency to the Word through the fact that it is in act under essential knowledge.”

¹⁸⁴Interpolation [replacing what follows after ‘intellect bare’]: “from which generated knowledge is formed, and is communicated to the Son by an act of producing generated knowledge, - about which we will speak in distinction 5, and so I pass over it here.”

¹⁸⁵Text cancelled by Scotus: “The third article is that the turning back of the bare intellect on the formed intellect is necessary for the bare intellect to be formed by the formed intellect [n.277]. This I do not see.”

¹⁸⁶Interpolation: “But that intelligence or essential knowledge in the Father is not the formal idea of acting or generating the Word, I prove...”

¹⁸⁷Interpolation: “through an act of intelligence but through an act of memory.”

¹⁸⁸Interpolation: “at the end: ‘the way,’ he says, ‘that the Word of the Father is knowledge from knowledge, etc.’; knowledge according to him is only ever in the memory.”

¹⁸⁹Interpolation: “according to Augustine On the Trinity 15 ch.7 n.12, however.”

¹⁹⁰Text cancelled by Scotus: “There is a confirmation, that for you essence quasi-operates the essential act of understanding in the paternal intellect [n.278]; the essence then as present to the intellect is a sufficient principle ‘by which’ with respect to actual intellection; but the fact that it is only a quasi-principle with respect to it as it is in the Father is because the intellection of the Father is not producible; therefore with respect to actual producible knowledge it will be simply the principle ‘by which’, and so the first Word will not be produced by the actual intellection of the Father as by the formal productive idea.”

¹⁹¹Interpolation: “because one person and not another has it from himself.”

¹⁹²Interpolation: “But it has been made clear [in the footnote to n.293] that actual knowledge in the Father, if it were generated, would have the essence as formal principle; therefore in the Son, where it is generated and is of the same idea, it will have the essence as formal principle and not the intellect or simple knowledge.”

¹⁹³Text cancelled by Scotus: “the productive principles which are nature and will have opposite modes of being a principle, because one is of itself inclined to acting naturally, the other has the producing freely in its own power, such that it is not of itself naturally inclined to this; but if they were reduced to some single productive principle^”

¹⁹⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “I prove that perfect memory is productive inwardly by way of nature, from the preceding solution [nn.225-226], because perfect intellect, insofar as it is an operative power, is of a nature to understand an object insofar as the object is knowable, and thus, insofar as it is a productive power of generated knowledge, it is of a nature to be a principle of as much knowledge as there can be of the object; but the intellect in the first thing too, as it is a productive principle, is simply perfect, as is plain, because it is not reduced to another prior principle, and everything imperfect is reduced to a perfect thing prior to itself. This first object too of the intellect is an infinite intelligible; therefore the intellect, as it is a productive principle, is of a nature to be a principle of producing an infinite knowledge. A similar argument holds of the will with respect to infinite love.”

¹⁹⁵Note cancelled by Scotus: “One must keep in mind that the whole matter of distinction 13 [I d.13 q. un.] turns about the antecedent of this causal argument [n.300],     therefore either the dispute about the antecedent should be deferred to that point, or here the whole of it should be touched on.

Second, it would be done better if this question is moved, ‘Whether productions are precisely distinguished according to the distinction of formal principles of producing’. The solution of this question depends on these questions: ‘Whether essence as essence is formal principle of communicating essence’ (and as to the former ‘That thus’ in the Collations [16], and as to the latter ‘It is objected to the contrary’ etc     . [n.304]); again, ‘Whether there can be the same formal principle of producing with respect to distinct products’ (as here at ‘Fourth, whence’ etc. [n.307]); again third, ‘Of what nature is the distinction of principles of producing’, but this pertains to the question about the distinction of attributes [I d.8 p.1 q.4].

Note, for the solution of the question [‘Whether productions are precisely distinguished...’] let there be the proposition: ‘Everything that, while being of the same idea, extends itself to many things of the same idea, is not determined of itself to as many such things as it extends itself’. The proof is found in the relation of what is common to the supposits and in the relation of the cause to its effect. From the proposition it follows that neither does the divine nature, insofar as it is common, determine for itself a number of supposits, nor insofar as it is a principle of producing - if it is such a principle - will it determine for itself a number of things from a principle; therefore if there is a definite number of persons, it will be because the productive principle is distinguished. Thus are [the first] two ‘Whether.’ questions solved; the third requires a proof through the adequation of one or a single principle to the principle of one idea.’

¹⁹⁶Interpolation: “against the ultimate proposition of the aforesaid deduction I argue; for I ask...”

¹⁹⁷Note cancelled by Scotus: “Note: the instances against the antecedent are about the matter of distinction 13 [I d.13 q. un], however some are touched on here, at least the first one [n.304]; the second [n.305] can be against the preceding solution [nn.221-241, 258] rather than here, and the argument about the distinction, in idea of principle, of intellect from nature [nn.216-217] is proper here.

The instances against the consequence [nn.307-308] pertain to the question ‘Whether two Sons’, in distinction 7 [n.309].

See in the other part of the folio the four instances [nn.316-319] against the rejection of the second article of the opinion [nn,290-296]: of which two are put first for confirming the opinion [nn.316-317], the other two are against the reasons against the second article of the opinion [nn.318-319].”

¹⁹⁸Note of Scotus: “Note how in the production there is a double principle ‘by which’, how the essence alone is not a ‘by which’ sufficient for communicating existence, how something quasiposterior can be a principle ‘by which’ for communicating which is quasi-prior in perfection, how essence is not as it were the root of everything equally in anything whatever [n.304] (but the Son is first knowledge and the Holy Spirit first love, and as it were concomitantly with essence; distinction 13 [I d.13 q. un. nn.11-25]).”

¹⁹⁹Interpolation: “where he says: ‘Many kinds of animals are procreated from earth without parents, and yet they produce their like among themselves something; nor is there because of the diversity of their birth any difference in the nature of those which are procreated from earth and those which come from their coition; for the live and die in similar way despite have a dissimilar birth’.”

²⁰⁰Interpolation: “Fire, then, that is generated from a stone by the motion of striking it and that is generated from the reflection of the rays of the sun is generated equivocally, and the fire thus generated univocally generates fire.”

²⁰¹Interpolation: “Between contradictories, because for the most part and more often than not a mouse will be generated if the sun comes close to such and such matter.”

²⁰²Interpolation: “namely by comparing an equivocal effect with an equivocal cause under disjunction to contradictories.”

²⁰³Text cancelled by Scotus: “which chance things - in the proper sense of chance - do not come about from a cause ordered to producing them, but what produces chance things is an impeded cause ordered to producing something else.”

²⁰⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “But that the assumed proposition is false when one of those two propositions is false is plain, because the same ‘where’ can be acquired by circular and by direct motion, which are also motions of a different species and incomparable, according to the Philosopher Physics 7.4.248a10-b6; but this is because the form which is the term of the transience does not have a specific distinction, just like the form which is transient or according to which there is transience.

However it may be with the example, one must perhaps expound the Philosopher there and hold that the ‘where’, which is transient in a circular or straight line, is of the same species insofar as the ‘transient wheres’, whether straight or circular, which are accidents of the line or magnitude over which the motion is, are not of the same nature; and therefore in this respect they are incomparable, but not in respect of the ‘where’ or the ‘transient where’ per se; and therefore not in respect of the motion per se. At least this is true as to the example here adduced, because when the transient form is of a different nature from the terminating form, one should not conclude from a distinction of motions to a distinction of terms.

But in the proposed case production is of a different nature from the terminating essence, as from the terminating form taken from it, because production is relation but essence is for itself; therefore a plurality of productions does not prove a formal distinction of their terms.”

²⁰⁵Note by Scotus: “This response [nn.241-242] is valid in responding to the first instance brought against the solution of this question [n.304].”

²⁰⁶Text cancelled by Scotus: “A further reason for what is here [nn.241-242] supposed, namely about the twofold principle of communicating nature in divine reality, but not in creatures, can be set down as follows:...”

²⁰⁷Text cancelled by Scotus: “and so by it can be communicated a formal term of production adequate in being to itself and to nature.”

²⁰⁸Interpolation: “But you will say that one and the same person can be produced by either production. On the contrary.”

²⁰⁹Interpolation: “nay, when everything else is removed.”

²¹⁰Interpolation: “the non-produced person is only one.”

²¹¹Interpolation: “See the authority in the text” [Reportatio IA d.2 n.205].

²¹²Text 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.”

²¹³Text cancelled by Scotus: “Second thus: plurality should never be posited without necessity; there is no necessity, whether in relation to itself or outwardly, for the contingency that there are several unborns; therefore there is only one. - Third, because one essence actually existing does not seem of itself to have very immediately several modes of existing. The opposite would follow if there were several ungenerated supposits. But it does not follow now, because the divine essence does not have very immediately several modes of existing without production, but only one of existing without production and another two by intermediates that are also productions.”

²¹⁴Text cancelled by Scotus: “because the relations of the produced can be distinguished by the distinct ideas of producing in the producer, although there is the same supposit producing.”

²¹⁵Text cancelled by Scotus: “The idea of the supposit then exists in a double incommunicability.”

²¹⁶Interpolation: “such that matter is actually a being through form.”

²¹⁷Text cancelled by Scotus: “This is also argued as follows: divine nature, and whatever belongs to this nature as it is nature, is ‘perfection simply’; every ‘perfection simply’ is communicable to several things;     therefore etc     . Proof of the minor: ‘perfection simply’ is that which in anything whatever “is better existing than not existing,” Monologion ch.15; which fact is understood in this way, that ‘perfection simply’ is better than whatever may be incompossible with it, whatever supposit absolutely considered it may be in, that is, not determining what nature it is subsistent in. But if the divine nature determined itself to incommunicable subsistence, it would in no other subsistence be better than anything incompossible with it save in that subsistence to which it determined itself, because it would be incompossible with any other subsistence; therefore it would not be ‘perfection simply’.”

Text following on from this also cancelled by Scotus: “This is also argued on the part of the idea of supposit; for because a supposit is of its idea incommunicable simply, that idea should not include any idea of existing through identity, and thus another distinct idea of supposit can stand, and     therefore the idea of supposit is not ‘perfection simply’ in the aforesaid way [in the previous paragraph of this footnote]; but if two distinct ideas of supposit can stand, then so can two distinct supposits, and without division of nature; therefore etc   . - This fourth...”

²¹⁸Text cancelled by Scotus: “on the contrary: therefore the Father communicates that whole entity of one idea.”

²¹⁹Text cancelled by Scotus: “omitting the words about distinction of reason and virtual distinction [nn.401-402]; not because they are badly said but because it is not necessary to use them; I say...”

²²⁰Text cancelled by Scotus: “An example could be posited about a quantitative whole, by subtracting what belongs to imperfection and positing what belongs to perfection [nn.386-387]; but it would be unlike in more things than like [n.408], so let it be omitted.” [It is stated in Lectura I d.2 n.273: “a quantitative whole is taken possessing parts, and we imagine that the extension of the parts is taken away and that the parts remain and that one part is another by identity, the formal idea of the one part will still exist outside the formal idea of the other part.”]

²²¹Text cancelled by Scotus: “Augustine therefore understands that in the mode that the Father is in the same way wisdom and essence, in that same mode the Father is not in the same way Father and God” [cf, On the Trinity VII ch.4 n.9]

²²²Text cancelled by Scotus: “Augustine in the same place: ‘Now substance will not be substance, because it will be relative’; and there follows: ‘It is absurd for substance to be said relatively’ (deduce: ‘therefore the converse is absurd’).”

²²³Note cancelled by Scotus: “Let here be introduced the saying of the doctor [Augustine] about double predication in divine reality, namely by identity and formally, which he well explains in this one way...”

²²⁴The point seems to be that the argument is of this form: ‘if it is not per se this thing, then it is some other thing; but it is a thing; therefore it is some other thing’, which amounts to denying (‘destroying’) the antecedent, and asserting the consequent, which move is fallacious.

²²⁵A response to the third [n.429] was not given by Scotus. But there is an interpolation: “The answer to the third is plain. It is said that neither are they per se the same thing nor are they per se two things; but it is well said that when the syncategorematic term is removed, namely the ‘per se’, the affirmative is true, namely that ‘they are the same thing’.”

²²⁶An empty space was here left by Scotus. An interpolation follows: “The response will be that, with the ‘insofar as’, it is neither repugnant nor not repugnant. But, without the ‘insofar as’, I say that the relations are not possibles but exist necessarily, and that by identity; but they are not possibles either formally or non-formally.”