b. As to the Second Question

23. Also against what it says to the second question the same objection, it seems, can be made, that the intellect of the Father ‘as it is converting’ is purely active and ‘as having simple knowledge’ it is purely passive, according to him [Henry of Ghent];     therefore it seems unacceptable that ‘as converted’ it is that as from which the word is generated, and that ‘as knowing with simple knowledge’ it is the reason for generating the word quasi actively.

24. Further, some say that this conversion of the intellect is a quasi disposition of matter, - which seems unacceptable, because the disposition of matter is not more perfect nor as equally perfect as the active form of the agent; but this conversion is as equally perfect as simple knowledge, or more perfect; therefore etc     .

25. Further, this conversion is with respect to first act as object, - therefore it is declarative knowledge of that act, just as any knowledge declares the object of which it is; therefore, before the generation of the word that follows this conversion (according to him [Henry]), there is had a declarative knowledge of first act, and so a word before the word!

26. Again, this opinion, as to the fact it posits the intellection of the Father to be the reason for generating the word, was refuted above in distinction 2 nn.291-296, in the aforesaid question ‘About productions’, and as to the fact that it posits the intellect of the Father to be that from which the word is generated, it was refuted in the same place, nn.283, 285, and also in distinction 5 nn.72-75; and I repeat one of the arguments touched on there.

Because the intellect as converted belongs to some supposit; for the conversion is, according to him, a certain action of understanding, and acts belong to supposits; therefore the conversion belongs to some supposit. I ask whose supposit it is as it is converted? If the Word’s, and ‘as it is converted’ it precedes generation (according to him [n.25]), then it precedes the Word, and so the Word exists before the Word! If the conversion is the Father’s, and whose it is ‘as it is converted’ is his as from whom generation happens by impression, and whose it is ‘as from whom something is generated by impression’ is his as the impressed thing exists in him and consequently is his ‘as he has that impressed thing’ - then, from first to last, it follows that the intellect of the Father ‘as Father’ formally has generated knowledge impressed on it, and so the Father formally understands by generated knowledge, contrary to Augustine On the Trinity VII ch.1 n.2.

27. The response made is that, just as in generation in creatures there are three moments of nature to distinguish, the first moment in which matter is under the form that is to be corrupted, the second in which the matter is under no form but is quasi bare and in proximate potency to the form that is to be generated, and the third in which it is under the form of the generated thing, - so it can correspondingly be said in divine reality, that the intellect in the first moment, as it is in the Father, is thus being converted to itself, and this conversion is a quasi disposition of the matter for the generation of the Son; in the second moment, in which it belong as it were to no person, it is then in proximate potency to the term of generation; and in the third moment, in which it is under the property of the generated person, it belongs then to that person.

28. An example is set down: if wine is in proximate potency to vinegar (so that the form of wine is pre-required in the matter in natural order for its being in proximate potency with respect to vinegar), if along with this the matter of wine were not limited to these two forms and consequently neither of them, when introduced, would expel the other, and if along with this each is hypostatic, bestowing personal existence - then vinegar would be generated from matter ‘as it was the matter of the wine’ as if from matter disposed with a previous disposition necessarily preceding this form. But if it be asked whose it is as vinegar is immediately generated from it, - the response is that it is no one’s but is generated from it immediately when matter is under neither hypostatic form.

29. Hereby response is given to the argument here in the matter at issue; the concession is made that it is the Father’s, the way the matter is the wine’s as it is disposed to the form of vinegar.

30. And when it is argued ‘therefore as it is Father’s it receives generated knowledge’, the consequence is denied; nay, by the fact that it receives generated knowledge it belongs to another subsistent, and even that from which the word is immediately generated does not exist as the Father’s but as converted.

31. And if it be objected against this that generation is not from the intellect as it is the Father’s more than from the intellect as it is the Son’s and the Holy Spirit’s, - the consequence is denied, because there is a double ‘as’ there. One that indicates the idea of the immediate principle ‘from which’ - and thus the word is generated from it as it is no one’s, as from the immediate receptive thing, which indicates the idea of what is disposed to the form that is the term, although it is not the idea of the immediate receptive thing absolutely; therefore the word is generated from the intellect as it is no one’s - as however it was first the Father’s it was also first existing in the Father, so that neither reduplication [sc. of ‘as’] is precisely without the other. And yet by the fact the word is generated from it [sc. the intellect], it is not in the subsistent of the word but of the Father and not no one’s.

32. But the addition is made that some people are deceived when they argue against this opinion ‘from which, as from matter or quasi-matter’, as if they imagine that there is there [sc. in God] a distinction of a quasi-passive potency from act, - which is not true, the way it is held generally by certain people about the attributes; but only, just as there is there wisdom formally and goodness formally, without distinction, so it is posited that there is truly impression there and truly the one impressing, - and everything that is said there to be without distinction; but a distinction of these things is only by act of intellect busying itself about the same one thing that exists in reality.

33. Against these arguments [nn.27-32]:

Generation in creatures is a change formally, for the reason that the matter, belonging to nothing before, is afterwards understood to be under the form of the generated thing; for by this it is understood to be changed from privation to form, which change is formally generation-change. Therefore if under this idea passive potency is posited in divine reality, then there will be true change in divine reality.a

a [Interpolation] at any rate in the intellect as it busies itself about it, and so there will necessarily be imperfection there; or if only through the act of the busying intellect this conversion and generating of the word takes place, the word will not be a real person but only a person of reason and in intention.

34. The reason is confirmed by the example they give [n.28], that although the wine is not corrupted in the generation of vinegar, yet the generation would be truly a change from privation to form, although there not go along with it the other change, ‘from form to privation’, as now commonly happens when one thing is generated and another corrupted; for in this case there commonly come together there two changes and four terms of change (two forms and two privations), but - after removing one of the changes and its terms - the other change would no less exist; therefore so will it be in the proposed case, that insofar as it belongs to nothing before - and so is under privation of the term ‘to which’ and is later under that term - it changes.

35. Further, if first it belongs to the Father and secondly to nothing, and third belongs to the Son by the fact that it receives the impressed knowledge (so by the fact it belongs to the Son, because it is quasi-potential, it receives the formal feature of the Son [nn.27, 30]), and belongs to the Son as the formal term communicated to the Son by generation (as was shown in distinction 5 nn.64-85), - then the Son will have intellect in a double way of having it, such that, when either of these ways is removed, it would no less have it in the other way of having; just as in creatures the composite has matter as something of itself, and truly has it, although it is not the formal term of generation; also the same composite has the form as something of itself, and truly has it, although the form is not subject of generation.

36. But the inferred consequence, namely that the Son has the essence in two ways of having, seems impossible, both in reality and in the consideration of the busying intellect. There is proof also through this, that what is material in generation is in potency to the formal term of the same generation; but the same thing, under the same idea, is neither in reality nor in the intellect in potency to itself; therefore neither will the intellect be at the same time a receptive potency and the formal term of the same generation.

37. And as to what is added about the double ‘as’ on the part of the matter, as if there is pre-required for the ‘as’ which is the idea of the proximate susceptive factor the ‘as’ which is the same ‘as’ under the form ordered to the form of generating [n.31], - this does not seem to exist per se in creatures, because if the matter which is under the form of wine is posited to be without any form and a created agent can act on it as it is denuded of form, then it would be the proximate receptive factor of any form that is of a nature to be impressed on pure matter, and such a form could be induced by any sufficient agent at all. Therefore the second ‘as’ is precisely sufficient in creatures for proximate potency, although frequently now its ordering is concomitant with it, because matter is never without form and is, as it is under form, not changed indifferently from any form to any form - by a created agent - but from a determinate form to a determinate form; the proof is that when it is understood to belong to nothing, then it is not under the prior form, which is posited as the disposition for the form of what is to be generated [nn.27-29]; its order then to that form is only a relation of posterior to prior, which perhaps is not a positive relation (because the term ‘to which’ is not then of the nature of the thing), or if it is a real relation, it does not seem to be the proper reason in the matter for receiving the form to be induced. - Applying this to the issue at hand, it seems that although the intellect should in origin be in the Father before it is in the Son, yet, if it were posited as receptive of generated knowledge, it would not be posited to be such essentially because of some order to existence in the Father, but according as it belongs precisely to nothing and, according to the way they themselves say precisely, to ‘quasi nothing’.

38. What is added to exclude a deception [n.32], seems to be the remark of someone deceived, because that remark seems in itself absurd and to destroy itself.

39. The first point is proved by the fact that the intellect in the nature of the thing is as truly a passive potency and as truly receptive as God is from the nature of the thing truly act and wise and good, - which seems absurd, because what in creatures necessarily has imperfection annexed to it or is an imperfection (as is the nature of passive potency, because it always states an imperfection the way it divides being against active potency) is posited to exist as truly in God as what is a perfection simply!

40. And if you say that rather passive potency states a perfection, although one not distinct from act, - this seems to be a fiction, because there is nothing lower in creatures than the idea of passive potency; for this idea belongs truly to prime matter, which is posited as the lowest of beings; therefore more truly can it be said that God is formally a stone than passive potency, if it is because of some perfection in the idea of passive potency that passive potency should be formally posited there.

41. Second I prove that the remark destroys itself [n.38], because it does not seem intelligible that there be opposite relations there without there also being distinct relations (if real, really, - if of reason, by reason) just as much as opposite ones; therefore if there is there from the nature of the thing something that impresses and something that is impressed and something on which it is impressed (which cannot be understood without relation), then to posit that they are there from the nature of the thing without any distinction is a contradiction.