Book Two. Distinctions 4 - 44

Fourth and Fifth Distinctions

Question One. Whether between the Creation and Blessedness of the Good Angel there was any Interval

1. About the fourth distinction, where the Master treats of what sort the angels were when created (‘perfect or imperfect, blessed or wretched’), I aska whetherb between the creation and blessedness of the good angel there was any interval or interval.Cf. Scotus Rep. II A d.4 single question; for questions 1 and 2 Scotus Lectura II d.4-5 qq.1-2. ¹

a. a[Interpolation]: whether the good angels were blessed in the first instant of creation and the bad angels wretched (and then the text of q. 1 follows). Again I ask...

b. b[Interpolation]: About the fourth distinction, where the Master shows of what sort the angels when created were as to their non-natural conditions (which are happiness and misery), there is one question, whether namely between the creation and blessedness of the good angel there was any interval, or - under the other term - whether the good angels were blessed in the first instant of their creation and the bad wretched (and the text of the question follows). Second the same question is asked, under the other term, whether namely.

2. That there was not:

Because the good angel had without interval natural blessedness, - therefore supernatural blessedness too.

3. Proof of the antecedent: for the created angel at once had the species (spoken of in d.3) in which there was present the objectOrd. 2 d.3 nn.324-331. ² and the power for natural blessedness - and consequently, not being impeded, the angel could use the power, by considering the divine essence under the idea of it (for the angel was not impeded); and also the species was moving over all the other species in considering the divine essence. But in understanding the divine essence in this way, and in loving it, there was natural blessedness.

4. Proof of the consequence, because a natural cause is not more perfect in producing its effect than a supernatural cause in producing its; but the natural cause had is effect at once, namely natural blessedness; therefore God - who is a supernatural cause - produced his effect at once, namely supernatural blessedness.

5. Further, Augustine City of God 12.9 n.2 says: “[God] creating nature and lavishing grace at the same time;”   therefore the created angel had grace at once. But the angel had grace and blessedness at the same time - proof: because there was guilt and punishment at the same time in the bad angels (otherwise their guilt would be remediable).

6. On the contrary:

Augustine On Genesis 1.3 n.2: “The angel was first made unformed, secondly light:” therefore etc     .

Question Two. Whether the Angel merited Blessedness before receiving it

7. And because the solution of this question depends on the following question, I therefore ask - about the fifth distinctiona - whether the angel merited blessedness before receiving it.

a. a[Interpolation] About the fifth distinction, where the Master deals with the conversion of the good angels and the turning away of the bad angels, there are principally two questions; the first has regard to the conversion of the good, and it is^

8. That he did not:

Because something is only merited from submissions paid to man; but nothing is merited which is waited for, because “hope that is deferred afflicts the soul” (Proverbs 13.12); therefore the angel only merits what he has. But this would not be the case unless he merited by submission the blessedness he has.

9. Further, greater reward requires, according to reason, greater merit; but the angels have greater glory than many elect men;     therefore a greater merit was required in them. But a man is a wayfarer for a long time, and he has many meritorious and many difficult works; therefore the reward of the angels requires these; but there was not so great a interval before their blessedness - therefore etc     .

10. To the opposite is Augustine On Rebuke and Grace: “the holy angels, who stood firm, merited to receive the reward of that life;” wherefore, if they merited to receive it before they received it, then etc. (look at Augustine’s text).

I. To the Second Question

A. The Opinion held by Peter Lombard

11. In this second question the Master is not held to because, at the end of the fifth distinction, he approves more the opinion that says, “they were blessed before they merited it, and they did not merit blessedness itself.” But he says “they merited it in a way by submission paid to the elect” (as a soldier merits a horse by serving well on it in war).

12. For this opinion is not held to:

First, because if man had not been created, then the angel would not have had blessedness; for he would not have had intrinsic merit when all merit by which it might be merited is removed - the act by which blessedness could be merited; but this seems unacceptable, because one angel does not depend on another in meriting, and much less on a man.a

a. a[Interpolation] Likewise, an intrinsic act is meritorious when the extrinsic act is removed; therefore the angels could merit through the intrinsic act.

13. Further, someone does not merit to receive a thing because he will use it well after he has received it; for then a man could merit grace, because God who gives it foresees that he will use it well - and then grace would not be grace, because it would come from merits (though from merits not present in fact but foreseen). Therefore the angel did not merit blessedness if he only had it because of a good use foreseen in him by his submission toward the elect

14. Further, then the state of blessedness would not be certain of itself; for although the world were in fact to come to an end, and thereby the number of submissions to be finite (those paid out to the elect by certain of the angels) - yet the world could last longer, enduring for a thousand years or however long; yet, not for this reason would the state of blessedness be less certain but - on this supposition - the certitude of merit would not be as great as the reward would be; therefore this reward ‘certain of itself’ does not necessarily correspond, because of the fact it is certain of itself, to the merit ‘which is not certain’.

B. The Common Opinion and Scotus’ Opinion

15. Therefore the opinion is held that the angels merited their blessedness, and that they did so before they received it.

16. Clarification of the first point: because every nature attains its perfection by its proper operation; but the perfection and end of any rational creature is blessedness, which is natural only to God. Now every “such operation, which leads to the end, is either maker of the end, namely when the end does not exceed the virtue of the one operating (as medication in respect of health), or is meritorious of the end, namely when the end exceeds the virtue ‘of what operates for the sake of the end’, and then the end is expected from the gift of another; but ultimate blessedness exceeds both angelic and human nature; therefore both man and angel merit their blessedness,”Aquinas ST Ia q.62 a.4. ³ - and so the first point is plain.

17. The second point is made clear thus: the same thing cannot be from perfect and from imperfect grace; but merit is from imperfect grace, reward from perfect grace.

18. But this reason does not seem cogent, because it is possible for some soul to have as much grace on the way as it will have in the fatherland, although now it cannot have as perfect use of it as it will have in the fatherland; hence the same habit will remain, and it could remain equal, but the same act will not.

19. Therefore I make the second point clear differently, because the will does not at the same time will mutably and immutably, or fixedly (such that then it could not will the opposite) and not fixedly (such that at the time when it elicits the act it could will the opposite); but when it is rewarded it wills immutably, that is, insofar as it is considered as eliciting the act (and consequently, as naturally prior to the act itself, it operates for it) -but when it merits, it does not thus immutably will, but it seems as contingently eliciting to elicit it.

20. In favor of this, there are congruences also adduced, that the disposition should precede what it is the disposition for, and the way should precede the term; but merit is the disposition and the way with respect to blessedness;     therefore etc     .

C. To the Principal Arguments

21. To the arguments of this question.

As to the first [n.8], it is conceded that angels merit some accidental blessedness; but ‘submissions’ are as it were certain works redounding from the perfection of blessedness - as is true of acts ‘generated and proceeding from a perfect, generated habit’, which generate no perfection (nor do they intensify the habit because it is not intensifiable), but they only proceed from the full perfection of the habit; so it is here. But I concede that, in the way they merit accidental blessedness, they do not have it when they merit it; nor is there any ‘affliction’ from this, because they have essential blessedness, which they most of all will.

22. To the second [n.19] I say that the angels’ greatest merit was by their willing the ultimate end with an intrinsic act - when the bad were turned away from that end by being proud, as will be plain in distinction 4 [n.46]. But a multitude of merits is not required for a great reward, but one intense merit is much more required than a hundred thousand weak ones; and so there was in them a very intense movement of merit for that little interval during which they merited, to so great an extent, perhaps, that no man -according to common law - could have as intense an act of merit as they had.

II. To the First Question

23. As to the first question (in the fourth distinction) [n1], which depends on the solution of the other [n.7, 11-20], two things need to be seen: first, how many intervals must be posited for the angels - second what are those intervals.

A. How Many Intervals must be Posited for the Angels

1. The Possibility of Several Intervals

24. As to the first [n.23] manifold things can be said.

For two intervals can be posited: namely one in which the angels are in the term -and another single one preceding it, when they are on the way. And thus a certain doctor [Aquinas] posits that the angels were created together in grace in the first instant, and therein all merited; in the second instant these merited and those who interposed an obstacle did not, such that, had they not interposed it, they would have been rewarded as the others were.

25. However three intervals can be posited, and this in many ways:

In one way that in the first interval they all existed in their natural state, in the second the bad angels were in sin and the just in merit, in the third the bad in punishment and the good in grace and reward. And this seems the way of the Master [Lombard], who seems to say that the bad demerited having grace applied to them when it was being applied to the good, as if they had already sinned in the second interval before - in the third interval - grace was applied to the good; and then, in the third interval, the good had, all at once in duration, grace and glory.

26. In another way by positing three intervals such that in the first all were in their pure natural state, in the second the good were in grace and merit, the bad in demerit -and in the third both the former and the latter in the term.

27. In a third way by positing three intervals such that in the first interval all were created in grace and merited, in the second only the good stood in merit and the bad fell, in the third they were both in the term.

28. There can, in a different way, be posited four intervals, and this doubly:

In one way that in the first interval they were in their pure natural state, in the second the bad sinned, in the third grace was applied to the good and they merited, in the fourth the good were rewarded and the bad in like manner condemned.

29. In another way, that in the first interval all were in their pure natural state, in the second all were in grace, in the third the good stood (and merited) in grace and the bad failed, in the fourth both were in the term.

2. What Should be Thought

30. Now, in order to inquire into these ways [nn.24-29], six probable propositions must be supposed.

The first of these is: ‘those who merit up to the now of reward, are rewarded in that now’. The proof of this is that in that ‘now’ they are not on the way, because that ‘now’ is the now of reward; therefore in that ‘now’ none of them can demerit because they cannot now be prevented from receiving the due reward for the merit for the whole duration of merit completed up to that ‘now’.

31. There is a confirmation. For a man, existing in merit for the whole of his life, cannot demerit in the instant of death nor interpose an obstacle to his being rewarded; for he has merited that then impeccability should be given him so that he not be able to interpose an obstacle. And therefore, about those who merit for the whole interval of the way, it cannot be said that this man interposed an obstacle in the instant of reward and that man did not; for this seems to posit that the instant of reward is not the term but that the man is then on the way (or at least that he is on the way who can interpose an obstacle), and it seems irrational to interpose an obstacle.

And by this, the first opinion is at once rejected - because there cannot be only two intervals posited as it posits [n.29].

32. The second proposition is this, that ‘merit precedes reward in time’; and this is proved from the proof of the preceding question [nn.12-20]. And by this is rejected the first way of positing three intervals [n.25].

33. The third proposition is this, that ‘the whole interval of the way prefixed for any angel whatever was equal’; for this is likely, because just as the whole interval prefixed for man is up to the instant of death, so also there was prefixed for these angels and those an equal interval of existing on the way.

34. And from these three follows a fourth, that ‘when the good finally merited, then in the same instant the bad demerited’; for if they did not demerit, either they then merited, and consequently they would have been rewarded along with the good, from the first proposition; or they would then have been in the term - against the second proposition, because then the good were on the way; or they would then have been in their pure natural state, and thus they would still have been on the way in the following interval (when however the good were in the term), which is against the third proposition.

35. The fifth proposition is that ‘all were created uniform’.

36. From these propositions it follows that one must posit at least three intervals: namely one in which all are in the term, and another in which the good finally merit and the bad demerit, and a third in which all are created uniform (from the fifth proposition); and then, if it is posited that all were created in grace, the last way of positing three intervals is held. There can also probably be posited four intervals, according to those who posit four intervals [nn.28-29, 40].

37. But for further inquiry into the disposition of the angels in these intervals, a sixth proposition seems probable, that ‘any angel whatever was at some time in grace’, whether in the instant of creation or afterwards; for although it is not necessary - as will perhaps be said elsewhere [Ord. 4 d.1 p.4 q.1 nn.4-5, d.16 q.2 n.4] - that in order for someone to sin he first had grace, yet it is congruous that the angels were not only not unjust (because they received the natural liberty whereby they could preserve natural justice), but that they received gratuitous justice, according to Anselm Fall of the Devil 14-16, 18.

38. Likewise, it seems that this sixth proposition is proved by another, a seventh, namely that ‘God does not make separation between these and those before they separate themselves by their acts’ - because, according to Augustine On Genesis 11.17 (look there; and it is put in 2 d.4 of the Sentences, ‘Why these were separated and not those”, look there): “For God is not an avenger before anyone is a sinner.” Therefore up to the instant of merit and demerit they were all uniform.

39. And if grace was then first applied to the good, it seems that it should also then have been applied to the others; for before that instant they did not demerit; so why should grace not have been applied to them as also to the others who merited? But if they had then demerited it, therefore they did so before they had it, because grace and guilt do not exist together.

40. So if this sixth proposition be conceded, that ‘any angel - one sinning - was at some time in grace’, it necessarily follows that the three intervals (if three are posited) will be these: that the first will be of all of them in grace, and the second will be of these (the good) in merit and of those (the bad) in demerit, and the third will be of these and those in the term. Or if it be said that they were at some time in their pure natural state, then one must posit four intervals - such that all in the first interval were in their pure natural state, in the second all were in grace and the good merited and the bad demerited, in the third the good persevered in good and the bad in bad, and in the fourth these and those were in the term. And this last way about four intervals keeps several states in them and saves several affirmative authorities - and if this plurality is not pleasing (because it does not have evident necessity), then it is probable to posit at least the three intervals before assigned [above here n.40].

B. What these Intervals Were

41. About the second article, namely what were these intervals [n.23]? Although some posit that these were diverse by an instant of discrete time, yet, from 2 d.2 nn.153-167, it is plain that one should for no reason posit discrete time in angels but diverse ‘nows’ of the aevum.

42. But to what in our continuous time do those ‘nows’ of the aevum correspond? I say that the final interval, namely of existing in the term, corresponds to the whole time after the first instant of the blessedness of the good and the damnation of the bad. However the first interval, in which they were uniform, can be posited to have coexisted with our instant or with a part of our time. And one must make a posit consistent with this about the second interval; for if the first interval coexists with time and a final instant of it, then the second interval did not have any first instant in our time corresponding to it.

43. And although it seems to some that it was necessary for the angel to have first sinned in an instant (or with an instant) of our time, and although it seems to others that the angel would necessarily have to have sinned along with our time - the first indeed have on their side that between privative opposites in a subject naturally apt for them there is no middle, and when a subject is indivisible there is no cause of succession from term to term (neither on the part of the terms, nor on the part of the movable thing), and the second have on their side that ‘no created virtue acts in an instant, because then a greater virtue would act in less than an instant’ [2 d.2 nn.287, 505] - however neither of these reasons is conclusive. The point will be clear about the first in 3 d.3 q.1 nn.11-13, 9-10, where a reply will be given to that reason by maintaining that the soul of the blessed Virgin could precisely have been in sin for an instant and afterwards have been clean; nor is the second conclusive, but a response was given to it before [2 d.2 nn.505-506].

44. So in both ways it was possible both that the first interval of innocence coexisted with time and not with an ultimate instant of it, and that the second interval had a first instant of time coexisting with it - or that the first interval would coexist with time and an ultimate instant of it (or to one instant of time only), and then that the second interval did not have any first interval corresponding to it, just as neither is there a first change in continuous motion, from Physics 6.5.236a7-b18.

45. But of what sort was the second interval in itself - was it instantaneous or indivisible?

It seems that it was not, for two reasons:

First, because the bad angels sinned with many sins, of diverse species, and did not have all their acts at once [d.7 n.18 below]; therefore they had one after another - and thus, in the whole interval during which they had those acts, they were on the way (otherwise the later acts would not have been demerits for them, but as it were punishments for them as they exist in the term).

46. Second, because to the good angels is ascribed for their great merit that they overcame the battle of temptation, Revelation 12.7-8, “A great battle was waged in heaven; Michael and his angels battling with the dragon, and the dragon was fighting and his angels etc.” For if there were precisely one instant in which the bad demerited and the good merited, that battle would not have existed in it nor the victory over temptation, and thus this victory would not be ascribed to them for their praise and their excelling merit. -The proof of the assumption is that, if there had been only one instant, the bad would have sinned and the good would have merited at the same time; but in the instant of nature in which the bad sinned, their sin did not tempt the good; for it did not tempt them save posterior in nature to its being committed by the bad. Therefore the good overcame temptation after the bad sinned, and so this fact proves that the interval of demerit of the bad was not indivisible; and from this it follows that neither was the interval indivisible of the merit of the good (because they were equals, from the fifth proposition [n.35]), and the second way [here n.46 above] proves this specifically of the interval of the merit of the good.

C. To the Principal Arguments

47. To the principal arguments [nn.2-5]

To the first [n.2] I say that the consequence is not valid.

48. To the proof of the consequence [n.4] I say that God could have given the angels blessedness in the instant of creation had he wished, but it was more glorious to have it from merit - and thus did his wisdom dispose. But the merit could not exist - on the supposition of the divine liberty, which created them all equal - save in at least two intervals preceding the blessedness [nn.40, 36].

49. To the other argument [n.5]: although the likeness of grace and glory to guilt and punishment may be denied, nevertheless I say that the bad were not bad with culpable demerit and at the same time damned, because they were not on the way and at the same time in the term (as neither were the good); and although they are at one time in guilt, yet they are not at another time demeriting - as wayfarers when eliciting an act whose eliciting is imputed to them for demerit.

D. To the Reason for the Opinion Positing only Two Intervals

50. To the reason which is relied on for the opinion that posits only two intervals, namely [Aquinas] ‘because angels understand non-discursively and thus do they acquire their perfection’ - I reply:

If they would, because of this, have been blessed at once after one act, it would follow that the bad - who according to the same doctor [n.24] merited in the first instant - would have been blessed and would never have sinned; therefore the assumption [sc. about non-discursive understanding] is false of the natural perfection of angels (as was touched on in 2 d.3 p.2 nn.315, 325), and is much more false of the supernatural perfection that they acquire meritoriously. For this latter perfection is according to the acceptation of the one who gives the reward, whose law it is that “he who perseveres to the end will be saved” - and he who falls will be condemned (Matthew 10.22, 24.13); and therefore, if at some point they merited and did not persevere for the whole interval deputed to the way, they did not sufficiently merit eternal blessedness.

Sixth Distinction

Question One. Whether the Bad Angel could have Desired Equality with God

1. About the sixth distinction I ask whether the bad angel could have desired equality with God.a

a. a[Interpolation] About the second principal matter, namely the turning away of the bad angels, there are two questions: the first is whether the bad angel could have desired equality with God; the second is whether the first sin of the angel formally was pride. About the first the arguments are...

2. That he could not:

The intellect when understanding the first truth does not err, therefore neither does the will sin when loving the supreme good; therefore by loving equality with God it would not sin; therefore the angel could not, in the first act of sinning, have desired equality with God.

3. To the opposite is the Master [Lombard] in the text.

I. To the Question

A. The Opinion of Others

4. It is said here [from Aquinas] that the bad angel could not have desired that equality.

5. For this there seem to be four reasons:

First, because the bad angel did not sin from passion (as is plain), nor from ignorance (because punishment does not precede guilt) - therefore from choice; but “choice is not of things impossible” Ethics 3.4.1111b20-23; now for an angel to be equal to God is impossible - therefore he did not sin about this.

6. Second, because ‘for an angel to be equal with God’ involves a contradiction; therefore it does not involve any idea of being; therefore in no way is it included under the first object of the will - therefore it is not in any way willable.

7. Third. The will cannot will anything that is not understood first; therefore the angel’s being equal to God is understood first and shown first by the intellect; either then by an erring intellect, and then it is punishment and not guilt; or by a non-erring intellect - and this is impossible because a ‘non-erring’ intellect cannot show what involves a contradiction.

8. Fourth,abecause an angel’s being equal to God involves the non-being of the angel, for an angel cannot be an angel unless he is inferior to God; but no one can desire ‘that he not be’, from Augustine On Free Choice 6-8 nn.63-84; therefore no one inferior to God can desire equality with God.

a. a[Interpolation] and it seems to be Anselm’s reason, Fall of the Devil [however, no such reference can be found in Anselm, or Aquinas]

B. Scotus’ own Opinion

9. Because, however, these reasons are not cogent, one can respond differently to the question [n.1], because the angel could have desired equality with God.

10. For this there is persuasive proof:

First as follows, that the will has a double act, an act of loving with love of friendship and an act of coveting something for what is loved - and according to each act the will has the whole of being for object, such that, just as someone can love any being whatever with love of friendship, so he can covet any being whatever for himself as loved; therefore an angel could have loved himself with love of friendship, and could also have coveted for himself any covetable good whatever - and so, since equality with God is a good covetable in itself, the angel could have coveted this good for himself.

11. Further, if equality with God were possible for an angel, the angel could covet it for himself (as is plain); but an impossibility of this sort does not prevent an angel from being able to will it, because “the will can be of things impossible” according to the Philosopher Ethics 3.4.1111b22-23 and Damascene Orthodox Faith 36.

12. There is also this proof, that the damned hate God (from Psalm 73.23, “the pride of those who hate you rises up always”); but he who hates wants the thing hated not to be, according to the Philosopher Rhetoric 2.4.1382a15; therefore they want God not to be. But this is in itself altogether impossible and incompossible; therefore this sort of impossibility does not prevent its being able to be desired by a sinning will.

13. There is also this confirmation, that a sinning will could have wanted God not to be and could also - along with this - have wanted the grade and eminence of God to be in another; therefore it could have wanted it to be in itself just as in another, and so it could have willed the eminence of God for itself.

C. To the Arguments for the Opinion of Others

14. To the arguments for the first opinion [nn.5-8].

To the first [n.5] one can say that ‘choice’ is taken equivocally: in one way for an act of will following full apprehension of the intellect, and in this way one is said to sin from choice when there is no passion disturbing the intellect and no ignorance; in another way choice is taken for an act of will following the conclusion of a practical syllogism, which choice is nothing but efficacious volition of the object and for investigating the means by which the object can be attained. In the first way choice is of things impossible, as the Philosopher says Ethics 3 [n.11] that ‘will is of things impossible’ - not only an erring will but a will ‘presupposing full apprehension of the intellect’. In the second way choice is not of things impossible, because no one engages in practical syllogisms about things impossible; for a practical syllogism concludes from the end to what is for the end, so that ‘through this thing, which is for the end’ the end may be reached - and such discursive reasoning is never done for the sake of something ‘impossible’.

15. Or it could more plainly be said that choice is ‘what states full acceptation precisely’ or is ‘efficacious willing consequent to a practical syllogism’. In the first way it can be of anything for which perfect knowledge of the object is presupposed. In the second way it cannot be of anything unless for the ‘being’ of it the will operates as much as it can, because the will wills nothing efficaciously save what it disposes means for through what can be deduced; and such ‘efficacious volition’ is never of anything impossible; for no one deliberates about things impossible, nor does he prescribe to the practical intellect the investigating of means to them - and in this way has to be understood the Philosopher’s remark “choice is not of things impossible” [n.5]. The angels did not in this way sin from choice, that is, from an efficacious volition through which they might want to strive to attain their purpose, by launching an attack and surreptitiously taking God’s eminence for themselves; however they could sin from choice, that is, from something non-surreptitious but from perfect volition of that equality.

16. It is by means of this distinction that one should reply to the question [n.1], because an angel could not with efficacious volition have desired equality with God, since the object is not shown as possible; however the angel can do so with simple volition (which does regard things impossible), wherein there can be merit and demerit -and it is through this that the second arguments [sc. those for Scotus’ opinion, nn.9-13] draw their conclusion.

17. To the second argument [sc. for the first opinion, n.6] I say that, just as there is a double intellection, absolute and comparative (the absolute indeed is only of some simple object, contained under the intellect’s object - the comparative or collative intellection can be for anything at all, and this whether the comparison is ‘possible’ or ‘impossible’; for the intellect composes not only possible propositions but also impossible ones) - thus there is one volition that is absolute, and it is only of some simple object contained under the first willable thing; and another volition that is comparative, and it can compare any simple willable to any other, even if in that comparison there is included a contradiction. But speaking of the first volition, the propositional complex here [sc. ‘an angel being equal to God’] is not willable, because it is not something ‘simple’ including in itself the idea of the first object, but is only a certain relation of a simple object to an object - each of which ‘simple objects’ is per se willable, for both what the angel wills and for whom he wills is per se willable. When, therefore, one says that ‘this whole does not include the idea of the first object’ [n.6], the thing is false when speaking of the parts of the whole; for both parts - namely the ‘what’ and the ‘for whom’ in themselves - include the per se object of the will, and this is enough for the will to will one part in its order to the other.a

a. a[Interpolation] just as, for the intellect to combine any simple with any simple, it is enough for each simple to be able per se to be apprehended by the intellect.

18. To the third argument [n.7] I say that the simple intellect can apprehend equality with God without error; and such simple apprehension suffices for the appetite to desire for another ‘the apprehended thing’ - just as, with the intellect apprehending white and apprehending a raven, it can will whiteness to be in the raven. Now equality with God can be apprehended without error because it exists in someone without error; for the Son of God is equal to the Father and he can be apprehended. Even if nothing were equal, still equality could be apprehended absolutely; nor is there error or falsity in that simple apprehension, and yet the simple apprehension suffices for willing this simple for anything understood or loved.

19. But if you argue ‘by what intellect is this shown, by an erring intellect or a non-erring one?’ [n.7] - I say that it is shown by a ‘non-erring’ but simple one, to which it does not belong to err or to say truth (for these are conditions of the intellect when combining and dividing); and there is no need for the intellect to apprehend beforehand [n.7] (to combine this with that or to divide this from that), but it is enough that the will compares this to that, because the will is a collative power just as the intellect is - and consequently it is able in some way to bring together the simples shown to it, just as the intellect can.

20. To the fourth argument [n.8] it could be said that the will could will ‘itself not to be’ by way of consequence, because anyone who is ‘sinning mortally’ wills something wherein he does not will to be subject to God; and in this - as a consequence - he wills ‘himself not to be’, because he cannot be unless he is subject to God.

21. To the form of the argument, however, it can be said that, if he wills the antecedent, he need not will the consequent when the consequent does not belong to the per se understanding of the antecedent - as in the example posited about someone being able to desire being bishop without desiring to be priest [Ord. 1 d.1 n.47]. And the reason is this, that just as knowing the consequent does not follow on ‘knowing the antecedent’ unless the consequence of the first from the second is knownAn example from Rep. II A d.6 q.1: “The intellect can know the antecedent and not know the consequent - as that every mule is sterile and yet not that this mule is, because it does not know the consequence.” ⁴ - so, the willing of the consequent does not follow on the ‘willing of the antecedent’ unless there is ‘a willing of this consequence’; for if the consequent is not known (or there is no ‘willing of the consequence’) there is no need - because of willing the antecedent - to will the consequent. Now, however, in the proposed case, the consequent does not belong to the per se understanding of the antecedent [sc. ‘the angel wills himself to be equal to God, therefore he wills himself not to be’]; nor, if it was, would the per se relation [sc. of the consequent to the antecedent] be known or willed - and therefore there is no need to will the consequent.

22. To the remark of Anselm On Likenesses,Alexander of Canterbury On St. Anselm’s Likenesses ch.64: “If you want to be equal to Peter in glory, you will be; ‘in glory’ I say, because you cannot will to be Peter in person; for if you will this, you would will yourself to be nothing - which you will not be able to will.” Scotus here responds to an authority he did not cite above earlier; it is found, however, in Rep II B d.6 q.1. ⁵ the response is that one cannot in ordered way will to be Peter, because the will is not ordered when it wills something and refuses what necessarily follows on it (whether as something intrinsic or not), but about a ‘non-ordered’ will this need not be true.a

a. a[Interpolated note]: Note, according to Anselm Fall of the Devil 6, that the angel desired something that he was going to have had he stood, and thus not equality first of all, although - as a consequence - after other sins he would have desired it directly or indirectly.

II. To the Principal Argument

23. To the principal argument [n.2] I say that an intellect understanding the supreme truth errs about some non-supreme truth, as by understanding that a stone is the supreme truth; but it does not err by understanding stone in itself by a simple intellection, of by a collative intellection understanding it with what it belongs to. Thus the will, by willing the first good with a simple volition, does not err by being pleased - nor by willing it for someone whom that good fits; but that good only fits God; and so by willing it for someone other than God, as by a collative volition, it errs.

Question Two. Whether the First Sin of the Angel was Formally Pride

24. Second I ask whether the first sin of the angel was formally pride.

25. That it was:

Augustine City of God 14.13 n.1, “The beginning of evil will, what could it have been save pride?” and he proves it by the verse of Scripture, Ecclesiastes 10.15, “The beginning of every sin is pride.” Again he says in the same chapter, “That the vice of exaltation is most of all damned in the devil, we learn from the Sacred Scriptures.”

26. Further in I John 2.16, “Everything that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life.” But the angels did not sin by concupiscence of the eyes or by concupiscence of the flesh - therefore by the pride of life.

27. Further, there is argument by way of division, that they could not have sinned first by any refusing, and consequently not by anger first or avarice or this sort of thing [sc. the rest of the seven capital sins, n.73]; the proof of the antecedent is that every refusing presupposes some willing. Nor did they sin by any ‘inordinate willing’ about temporal goods, or by a sin of the flesh, because such things are not objects of appetite for them.     Therefore by division, once the others are excluded [sc. the others among the seven], it follows that they sinned by the sin of pride [sc. the only one of the seven still left].

28. The thing is also plain from the verse of Psalm 73.23 [n.12], “the pride of those who hate you etc     .;” but they sinned by only a single sin (because otherwise their sin would have been remediable [nn.77-78]), for they did not sin by several sins at once, since the will cannot have two perfect acts at the same time, as neither can the intellect; therefore if they sinned by several sins, they sinned by one sin after another - and so in the second instant they could have repented (and therefore they sinned after the first instant [n.78]), which is commonly held to be unacceptable, because it is commonly held that their sin was irremediable.

29. To the opposite:

Their sin was the greatest, because irremediable. But pride is not the greatest sin -the thing is plain, because its opposite, namely humility, is not the greatest good, both because humility can be unformed but not charity (    therefore humility is less ‘good’), and because, speaking of the moral virtues, humility is a sort of temperance - but all temperance is less perfect than friendship, which is the most perfect virtue under justice (Ethics 5.3 1129b29-30, 8.1.1155a1-2, 8.4.1156b7-10). Therefore etc     .

30. Further, pride is placed in the irascible power; but no act of the irascible power can be first, because the irascible power fights on behalf of the concupiscible power - and therefore the passions of the irascible power arise from the passions of the concupiscible.

31. Further, pride seems to be an appetite for excellence (because according to Augustine City of God 14.13 n.1, “What is pride but an appetite for perverse eminence?”) - but excellence is in respect of some others whom it excels; but the angel did not first desire something in its order to others, but he first desired something in himself before desiring it in its order to something else; just as nothing is to a second save what is first to itself, so no one desires something in its order to another unless he was first desiring for himself - and consequently he was first desiring that [sc. eminence] for himself.

32. Further, the inferior demons do not seem to desire a dominion disagreeable to them - nor even to have consented to the dominion of Lucifer, because it seems probable that they desired more to be subject to God than to Lucifer; therefore their first sin was not pride.

I. To the Question

33. In this question the affirmative side is commonly held [sc. that the first sin of the angel was pride], because of the argument by division for the first side [n.27]. But in order to see the truth of the question, one must first see what the malice was in the first angel sinning - and second, to what class of sin that malice belonged

A. What the Malice was in the First Angel Sinning

1. On Ordered and Disordered Acts of the Will

34. As to the first, one must see first about the order of acts of the will. And on this point I say that there is in general a double act of the will, namely to will and to refuse; for ‘to refuse’ is a positive act of the will whereby it flees the disagreeable or recoils from a disagreeable object; while ‘to will’ is an act whereby it accepts some agreeable object. There is also - further - a double ‘to will’, which can be called the to will of friendship and the to will of concupiscence, so that the ‘to will of friendship’ is of the object for which I will a good, and the ‘to will of concupiscence’ is of the object that I will for some loved other.

35. And of these acts [sc. to will, to refuse] the order is plain, because every refusing presupposes some willing; for I do not flee from something save because it cannot stand along with something that I accept as agreeable; and this is what Anselm says Fall of the Devil 3, when he posits an example about miser, coin, and bread.“For a miser, when he wants to hold onto his coins and prefers bread, which he cannot have unless he gives a coin - he first wants to give, that is to abandon a coin, than not to want to hold onto it. Because not for this reason does he want to give, that he does not want to hold onto the coin; but for this reason he does not want to hold onto the coin, that in order to have bread he necessarily has to give...Therefore not wanting to hold onto something is not always prior to wanting to abandon it, but sometimes to want to abandon is prior.” ⁶ And of these two willings [sc. of friendship, of concupiscence] the order is plain, because concupiscence presupposes the willing of friendship; for since the ‘beloved’ is - with respect to the coveted thing - the end, as it were, for whom I will the good (for because of the beloved I covet for him the good that I will for him), and since the end possesses the first idea of the thing willed - it is plain that the willing of friendship precedes the willing of concupiscence.

36. And from this proved conclusion there follows further that a similar process exists in disordered acts of the will; for no refusing is the first disordered act of the will, because a refusing could not be had save in virtue of some willing - and if the willing were ordered (by accepting the object along with its due circumstances), the refusing that would consequently be had would likewise be ordered;a in the same way, if the willing of friendship were ordered, the willing of concupiscence consequent to it would be ordered - for if I love in ordered way that for which I love the good, I will in ordered way what I covet for that for which I will the good.

a. a[Interpolation] for if I love in ordered way, I hate in ordered way what is harmful to the thing loved.

2. On the First Disorder in the ‘Willing of Friendship’

37. The result, therefore, is that the simply first disordered act of will was ‘the first willing of friendship’ with respect to that for which it willed the good. But this object was not God, because the will could not have loved God from friendship in disordered way - by intensity - , for God is a lovable object of such sort that, from the mere idea of him as he is the object, he gives the complete nature of goodness to an act perfectly intense. Nor is it likely that the will too intensely loved with love of friendship something other than itself, both because natural inclination is more inclined to thus loving itself than any other created thing - and because it does not seem that the angel understood any created thing beside himself in the way he understood himself - and because friendship is founded on unity (Ethics 8.71158a10-13) and also the features of friendship toward another proceed from the features of friendship toward oneself (Ethics 9.8.1168b1-10). So the first disordered act of the angel was an act of friendship with respect to himself.

38. And this is what Augustine says City of God 14.28, “Two loves made two cities; the love of God to contempt of self made the city of God, and the love of self to contempt of God made the city of the devil.” The first root, then, of the ‘city of the devil’ was a disordered love of friendship, which ‘root’ germinated into contempt of God -wherein this malice was consummated.

Thus are things plain about the simply first disorder, which was simply in the first disordered willing.

3. On the First Disorder in the ‘Willing of Concupiscence’

39. It now remains to see about the first disorder in the ‘willing of concupiscence’.

a) On the Concupiscence of Blessedness

40. [Proof that the angel first coveted blessedness immoderately for himself] -And it seems that here one must say that the angel first coveted blessedness immoderately for himself. The proof is:

First as follows, for the first disordered ‘coveting’ did not proceed from affection for justice, just as neither did any sin so proceed;     therefore from affection for advantage, because “every elicited act of the will is elicited according to the affection either for justice or for advantage,” according to Anselm (Fall of the Devil 4). The greatest advantage is most greatly desired by a will not following the rule of justice, and so is desired first, because nothing else rules a will that is not right save a disordered and immoderate appetite for the greatest good of advantage; but the greatest advantage is perfect blessedness; therefore etc     . And this reason is got from Anselm ibid.

41. The second proof is this, that the first sin in ‘coveting’ was some willing; for one does not shun anything away from oneself - that is, so that something not reach one -save because one covets the opposite for oneself. The angel coveted it, then, either with love of the honorable, or with love of the useful, or with love of the delightful (because there is only this triple love for loving something with); not with love of the honorable, because then the angel would not have sinned; nor with love of the useful, because that love is not first (for because the useful is useful with respect to something, no one first desires the useful but that for which it is useful). He first sinned, then, by loving something excessively as the supremely delightful thing; but the supremely delightful thing is the honorable good and very blessedness, whereby the delightful thing is supreme;     therefore etc     . - And this argument can be taken from the Philosopher Ethics 8.2.1155b18-21, from the common distinction of the good into useful, delightful, and honorable.

42. Third it is proved thus, that every appetitive power, consequent in its act to some act of the apprehensive power, desires first the delightful thing most agreeable to its cognitive power - or first desires delight in the desirable thing, because in such desirable thing it is most at rest; this is plain of appetite consequent to the apprehension of taste or hearing or touch - because any such appetite desires the most perfect object of the apprehensive power whose act it follows in desiring. Therefore the will, when separated from all sensitive appetite, first of all desires that which is most agreeable to the intellect, whose agreeableness the desire follows - or it first desires delight in such object and consequently blessedness, inclusive of object and act and consequent delight.

43. Fourth it is proved thus: that thing is first desired by a will not ruled by justice which - if there were that thing alone - would alone by desired and nothing else without it. Such is delight; for no excellence or anything else - if it were sad - would be desired, but delight or something such would be desired.

44. As far as this second stage is concerned, then, namely as to the sin of the angel, it seems that he first coveted blessedness:

Because just as the first sin of the visual appetite would be in desiring the visible thing most beautiful to its cognitive power (and in which it would perfectly delight and be at rest), so, in the case of a will conjoined with sensitive appetite - when it is not following justice or the rule of reason - the first desirable is something supremely delightful to that sensitive appetite which the will is most in conformity with in acting. And so there is in men a domination of the sensitive appetites according to the diversity of their bodily composition; indeed, if any cognitive power whatever has its proper appetite and there is, according to diversity of composition, a diversity of dominion in diverse cognitive powers and in their appetitive powers, then in anyone at all - I say - the will, according to the predominance of sensitive appetite, is most inclined to the act of that appetite; and therefore some people, following their first inclination without the rule of justice, are first inclined to luxury, some first to pride, and some otherwise.

45. So a will separated from all sensitive appetite, and consequently not inclined to anything because of inclination of sensitive appetite, such a will - having deserted from justice - follows the absolute inclination of the will as will; and this inclination seems to be to the greatest thing agreeable to the will or to the appetitive power, which thing is also the greatest perfection of the intellect or of the cognitive power - for what the cognitive power is most perfected in, that is what the appetitive power corresponding to the cognitive power is most perfected in. The immoderate concupiscence, then, was for blessedness, because blessedness is the object of the will.

46. [Reasons to the contrary] - And if argument be given against this:

First, because according to Augustine, On the Trinity 13.5 n.8, “blessedness is desired by everyone;” but what is uniformly in everyone seems to be natural; therefore blessedness is desired naturally. But natural appetite is always right, because it is from God; therefore a will consonant with it is right, because what is consonant with the right is right; therefore no one sins in desiring blessedness.

47. Further, no intellect errs about the principles (Metaphysics 2.1.993b4-5) -therefore neither does the will about the end. The consequence is proved through the similitude of the Philosopher in Ethics 7.9.1151a16-17 and Physics 2.9.200a15-16: “as the principle is in matters of speculation, so the end is in matters of action.”

48. Further, third: the good had affection for advantage just as did the bad; but according to Anselm On Concord 3.13, the will “cannot not will advantage;”     therefore the good will advantage just as do the bad. Therefore all sinned equally if they sinned from affection for advantage; therefore etc     .

49. [Solution of these reasons] - To see the solution to these reasons, I distinguish what can be understood by the affections for justice and for advantage that Anselm speaks of in Fall of the Devil 4 [n.40].

Justice can be understood to be either infused (which is called gratuitous justice), or acquired (which is called moral justice), or innate (which is the liberty itself of the will). For if it were understood - according to the fiction of Anselm in Fall of the Devil -that there was an angel that had the affection for advantage and not the one for justice (that is, having an intellective appetite merely as such appetite and not as free), such an angel would not be able not to will advantage, or even not to will it supremely; nor would this be imputed to him for sin, because the appetite would be related to his cognitive power as the seeing appetite is to sight, by necessarily following what the cognitive power shows and the inclination to the best thing shown by that power, because it would not have means to hold itself back. The affection for justice, then, which is ‘the first moderator of the affection for advantage’, both as regards the will’s not having actually to desire what the affection for advantage inclines to, and as regards its not having to desire it supremely (namely what the affection of advantage inclines to) - this affection for justice, I say, is the liberty innate to the will, because it is the first moderator of the above sort of affection.

50. And although Anselm frequently speaks of an act not only of the justice that is acquired but also of the one that is infused (because he says it is lost by mortal sin, which is only true of infused justice), yet by distinguishing, from the nature of the thing, the first two ideas among these [sc. affection for advantage, affection for justice, intellective appetite, free appetite], insofar as the first inclines the will supremely to advantage, while the second moderates it so that in eliciting an act it does not have to follow its inclination - these two affections are nothing other than the same will insofar as it is intellective appetite and insofar as it is free; because, as was said [n.49], insofar as it is merely intellective appetite, it would be supremely inclined actually to the best intelligible (as in the case of the best visible and sight), but insofar as it is free, it can hold itself back in eliciting an act so that it does not follow the inclination - whether as to the substance of the act or as to the intensity of it - to which the power is naturally inclined.

51. But a power, if it were appetitive precisely [sc. and not also free], following its inclination in its act as the seeing appetite follows sight and the inclination of sight, although - I say - that power could only desire what was intelligible (just as the seeing appetite can only desire what is visible), yet it could not then sin, because there would not be in its power anything else or any desiring otherwise than as the cognitive power would show and would incline towards. However, when the same power has now been made free (because this is nothing other than that one thing includes virtually several ideas of perfection, which it would not include if it were without the idea of freedom), this power - I say - can, by its liberty, hold itself back in willing, both as to willing what the affection for advantage inclines to and even if it incline supremely to willing advantage; and because it can be moderated, it is bound to be moderated according to the rule of justice that is received from a superior will. So it is plain, according to this, that a free will is not bound in every way to will blessedness (the way a will, if it were only intellective appetite, without liberty, would will it), but it is bound - in eliciting an act -to moderate the appetite qua intellective appetite, which is to moderate the ‘affection for advantage’, so that namely it not will immoderately.

52. But the will - while being able to moderate itself - can in three ways immoderately will the blessedness that befits it: as to intensity, that is, by willing it with greater effort than befits it; or as to timing, namely by willing it more quickly for itself than befits it; or as to cause, namely by willing it otherwise for itself than befits it, as without merits; - or perhaps in other ways that there is no need to be concerned with here.

53. So it is probable that in one of these ways the angel’s will went to excess: namely either desiring blessedness for himself as it is a good for himself more than loving that good in itself, namely by desiring that good (as the beatific object) to be his own good as a good for himself more than desiring it to be present in another (as in his God) - and this is the supreme perversity of the will, which is ‘using what should be enjoyed and enjoying what should be used’ according to Augustine 86 Questions q.30; or, in the second way, the angel could have desired to have blessedness at once, when however God wanted him to have it after some little while on the way; or in the third way, by desiring it to be had from natural powers (not having it by grace), when however God wanted it to be had from merits.

54. The free will therefore should have moderated its affection as to these circumstances, which right reason had to show it; because blessedness should have been desired less for itself than for God, and should have been desired for the time for which God willed it, and from the merits for which God willed it should be desired. Therefore if in one of these ways the will followed the affection of advantage, not moderating it through justice (that is through infused justice, if it had it, or through acquired, or through innate or natural justice, which is freedom itself), then it sinned.

55. Hereby therefore to the arguments:

To the first [n.46]. Natural will is not of itself immoderate but inclined only by way of nature - and in this it is not immoderate, because it is inclined the way it has received to be inclined, nor is there anything else in its power; but in the power of the will, as it is free in elicited act, there is only its being inclined, or less inclined.

56. So when the argument assumes the proposition that ‘the will is natural in respect of blessedness’ I concede it - but it is not actually immoderate in elicited act; for the ‘inclination of natural appetite’ is not any elicited act but is a sort of first perfection -and this is not immoderate, just as neither is the nature immoderate whose it is. Yet it is inclined by affection for advantage to its object such that - if it had of itself an elicited act - it could not moderate it from being elicited supremely as much as it could be elicited; but the will as having only natural affection for advantage is not cause of any elicited act but is so only as free, and so ‘as eliciting an act’ it has the means for moderating passion.

57. When therefore the proposition is assumed that ‘the will, consonant with natural will, is always right (because natural will too is always right)’ [n.46] I respond and say that it is consonant with itself in eliciting an act as it would elicit it if it were acting of itself alone; but it is not right, because it has another rule in acting than that it would have if it were to act from itself alone; for it is bound to follow a superior will, from which - in moderating that natural inclination - the moderating or not moderating is in its power, because it is in its power not to act supremely on what it has power for.

58. To the second [n.47] I say, through the same point, that it is not in the power of the intellect to moderate its assent to truths which it apprehends, for to the extent there is shown to it the truth of the principles from the terms, or the truth of conclusions from the principles, to that extent it must assent, because of its lack of liberty. But the will has power - over itself and the inferior powers - to moderate the inclination from being altogether dominant in eliciting the act, or at least to moderate it so that the act is not elicited; for it can turn the intellect away so that it does not speculate about the sort of objects of speculation about which it would be inclined, and the will is bound to turn it away if speculation of them is a sin materially for the intellect or formally for the will; thus - on the other side - the will, with respect to the ultimate end, is bound to moderate its inclination for that end so that it not will it immoderately, namely in a way other than it should will it, and so that it not will it for itself in a way other than that end is in itself.

59. In another way it can be said that, just as an act of the intellect ‘when considering a principle in itself’ cannot be false, so neither can an act of will ‘when loving the end in itself’ be bad - and this act is an act of friendship, not an act of concupiscence; yet, just as an act of intellect could be false in attributing the truth of the first cause to some created principle which that truth does not fit - so an act of the will can be bad in coveting the goodness of the ultimate end for something other than the ultimate end in a way that does not fit that something other.

60. To the third [n.48] I reply that in the good there was as much a natural inclination to blessedness as in the bad - even a greater one if they had better natural powers, because the inclination accords with the perfection of the natural powers; yet the good, in eliciting their act, did not use the will according to its imperfect idea, namely to the extent it is an intellective appetite only, namely by acting in the sort of way they would desire to act by the intellective appetite - but they used the will according to its perfect idea (which is liberty), by acting according to the will in the way in which it is fitting to act freely as a free thing acts, but this was in accord with the rule of the determining superior will, and that justly.

61. And when it is said ‘the angel cannot not will advantage’ [n.48], I reply: the good neither could nor wanted to refuse blessedness for themselves, even by coveting it for themselves - but they did not will it for themselves more than they willed well being in itself for God, rather they willed it less so, because they were able to moderate their willing through their liberty.

62. And if you object ‘therefore in no way did they desire blessedness well for themselves, but they only moderated well their desiring it’ - I reply that to have a perfect act of desiring good for oneself, so that thereby the object in itself is more loved, I say that this is from the affection of justice, because what I love something in itself for is what I will it in itself for. And thus the good could desire blessedness so that - in having it - they would more perfectly love the supreme good; and this act of coveting blessedness would be meritorious, because it does not use but enjoys what should be enjoyed; for the good that I covet for myself I covet for this reason, that I may love that good in itself more.

b) On the Concupiscence of Excellence

63. Having seen, then, about the first thing inordinately coveted [n.48], one can posit that the angel further coveted inordinately another good for himself, namely excellence in respect of others. Either he had a disordered refusal, namely refusing the opposites of the things he coveted, namely by not willing blessedness to be in himself less than it is in God in himself (or than God is); or by refusing to wait for blessedness until the end of the way; or by refusing to have it from merits but from himself [nn.52-54] and, as a result, refusing to be subject to God - and finally not wanting God to exist, wherein, as in the supreme evil, his malice seems to be consummated [n.38]; for just as no act is formally better than loving God, so neither is any act formally worse than hating God.

B. To what Class of Sin the Malice in the First Angel Sinning belonged.

64. As to the second article [n.33], it remains to be seen what sort of sin the immoderate love of friendship is [nn.37-38]; and what sort of sin the immoderate concupiscence of blessedness is [nn.40-62] that the angel coveted for itself according to one of the three stated modes [n.53]; and what sort of sin the consequent refusal is, and this whichever of the aforesaid kinds [n.63] the inordinate refusal was.

65. As to the first of these [n.64] it is said that the sin was pride.

And it seems to be the intent of Augustine City of God 14.13 n.1, where he supposes that presumption is ‘pleasing oneself too much’ - and for this reason are ‘the proud’ called in Scripture ‘self-pleasers’; therefore since this immoderate love of self is an immoderate being pleased with oneself, it was properly pride and thus presumption.

66. But this seems doubtful, because if pride is properly an immoderate appetite for one’s own excellence, and being immoderately pleased with oneself does not properly seem to be an immoderate appetite for excellence - how then is it pride?

67. Again, secondly: the presumptuous person seems to prefer himself to others, either in goods which he really has or in those he reckons himself to have of himself - but immoderate love of oneself does not seem to be this sort of preferring of oneself, because immoderately loving oneself with love of friendship and immoderately loving another thus (as a neighbor) seem to be of the same nature in malice; but no one by loving another immoderately is said to be presumptuous, but rather luxurious; therefore he is not said to be presumptuous by loving himself either.a

a. a[Interpolation; cf. Rep. II A d.6 q.2] Again, the angel did not first sin by desiring excellence in respect of others (as a sort of master), because the good for himself and to himself came first - nor by desiring excellence in the opinion of others, because then he would have desired a false excellence. For that reason he [sc. Scotus] said that the angel’s first sin was not pride properly speaking, but, because of the delight which it properly imported, seems rather to be reduced to luxury [n.71] - just as the sin whereby someone inordinately delights in speculation of a conclusion of geometry is reduced to luxury.

68. To these [nn.66-67] I say that someone loving a good immoderately wants it to be immoderately a great good, even the greatest good; and therefore he immoderately - because without his willing something to be present by which that good might increase - wills it to be more in itself than it is. And when he is unable to attain its being in itself more and greater than it is (because this is impossible), he wills as a consequence that it be greatest in the way it can be greatest, and this either in comparison or in opinion; in comparison, that is, so that it might excel the goods of others - in opinion namely so that others might think his good to be the greatest. And therefore the will of being preeminent or dominant above all others follows the willing by which someone wills immoderately his own good.

69. I say therefore to the first argument [n.66] that one who presumes (as presumption is the first species of pride [n.66]) does not will his own good to excel the goods of others according to any superiority, nor even does he will it to excel in fame (as in the case of him who desires praise), but he wills it to be great in itself, and so great that - without the addition of anything else - he wills it to be greater than all other things that he does not thus will. In this way it can be conceded that immoderate love of oneself -which is ‘the root of the city of the devil’ [n.38] - is presumption, because anyone who loves himself immoderately wills that he be as good as is able to be proportionate to the act by which he loves himself; and in this way can Augustine be expounded in City of God [n.65], and expounded well, because ‘he who pleases himself immoderately’ is proud (and this in the first species of pride), and that not by desiring the excellence that is a kind of relation, but by desiring the excellence that is ‘greatness in itself’, from which greatness follows his excellence in relation to others.

70. To the second [n.67] I say that presumption is not a sin of the intellect, as if the intellect of the presumptuous person were to judge or show itself to be as great as it is not - but it is a sin of the will immoderately desiring its own good to be as great as it is not, and from this follows the blinding of the intellect. But when it is added also that ‘the immoderate willing of oneself does not seem to be pride, as neither the immoderate loving of one’s neighbor’ [n.67] - see the response elsewhere [nn.74, 69].

71. But as to the disorder of the willing of concupiscence [n.64], it seems that that appetite for blessedness was not properly pride - not, to be sure, as to the first species of it; the thing is plain, because presumption (the way it was expounded in the preceding article [n.69]), if it belonged to the first inordinate willing of friendship, does not belong to any willing of concupiscence. And if it has to be reduced to something, it seems more consonant with the sin of luxury; for although luxury exists properly in acts of the flesh, yet everything delightful - desired immoderately insofar as it is delightful - can be called luxury, provided it is not a coveted excellence (such as that ‘appetite for blessedness’ was not).

72. As to the disorder of the third act, namely refusal [n.64], it is plain enough that any of those inordinate refusings was avarice or envy.

73. And if it be objected about the above disordered coveting [n.71] that it was not the sin of luxury, therefore it was properly some other sin - and it does not seem, by division, that it was anything other than pride [n.27] (as is proved by that famous and common division of mortal sins into seven) - I reply:

Whether mortal sins be distinguished by the bad habits opposite to the good ones (such as are the seven good habits, namely the four moral ones [courage, temperance, justice, prudence, Wisdom 8.7] and the three theological ones [faith, hope, charity, I Corinthians 13.13]), or whether - which seems more the case - by good acts (such as are the acts of the ten commandments [Exodus 20.1-17]), whether this way or that, the sevenfold division of capital sins would not be sufficient, because, in the first way, there would need to be seven capital sins other than theseOther than the usual seven (pride, avarice or greed, envy, wrath, lust, gluttony, and sloth or acedia), which, in the first way, would have to be the opposites of the four cardinal virtues - imprudence, injustice, intemperance, cowardice - and the three theological virtues -infidelity, despair, hatred. ⁷ (for infidelity and despair are properly opposite to those listed seven [the cardinal and theological virtues] and are not contained under any of the usual seven [the capital sins]), but in the second way there would have to be ten capital sins according to transgression of the Decalogue. This division [sc. of capital sins], then, should not be held to be sufficient for all evil acts, although they are not roots first (nor perhaps the principal sins), but perhaps very common to other sins, as occasions for sinning.

II. To the Principal Arguments

74. To the principal arguments [nn.25-28].

To the first [n.25 - no response is given to the second part of the first argument ] I say that Augustine is speaking of the simply first sin, which was an inordinate willing of friendship - and that was presumption; and I concede that that presumption was the simply first sin, but not as it is the first species of pride, the way it is properly taken [n.69].

75. To the second, about the division from John (“Everything that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life” [n.26]), it is plain from what he first says “Everything that is in the world” that this is a bringing together of the men living in the world - such that the sins by which men commonly sin are contained under those three. But there is no need that the first sin of the angel, a spiritual one (whereby the angels originally sinned), be contained under this carnal sin; but their sin of concupiscence at the second stage [n.44], if it need to be reduced, should rather be reduced to the concupiscence of the eyes; for just as in us immoderate appetites for any beautiful visible thing have reference to the concupiscence of the eyes, so also in the angels the immoderate appetite for anything delightful should have reference to the concupiscence of the eyes.

76. As to the third [n.27], it is plain that that division by seven, about the seven capital sins, is not sufficient [n.73] - making comparison with the act of concupiscence -save by a sort of reduction; and in this way it can be conceded that the angels’ sin may be reduced to luxury as an inordinate appetite for the delightful, as delightful to the concupiscence, for example, of the eyes.

77. To the fourth [n.28] I say that there was not one single sin only, because there were many sins, as was said in d.4-5 n.45.

78. And when it is said that ‘the first sin of the angel was irremediable’ [n.28], I say that when he sinned with the second sin he was still on the way - and consequently, when he sinned with the second sin, he could have repented of the first sin and have, further, received pardon and mercy, and thus the first sin was not of itself irremediable; however, from the fact of the angel’s reaching the term while in that first sin, all his sins became irremediable; for any sin of any sinner, when it perdures to the term, is irremediable (and how that irremediability is only from the law of God, which has grace for no one when he is in the term, will be stated below in d.7 nn.51-54, 56, 60). I deny, therefore, what is assumed there [n.28], that there was only one sin; hence the malice of the demon began from immoderate love of himself, which was not the greatest sin - and it was consummated in hatred of God, which is the greatest sin, because from it followed that the angel could not have what he willed while God remains; and therefore from his inordinate appetite he first willed God not to be, and thus to hate him.a

a. a[Interpolation ] But there is here a doubt, namely whether anyone could desire God not to be -because, just as nothing can be the object of volition save under the idea of good, so neither of refusal save under the idea of bad; but in God there is no idea of bad apprehended by an angel. Nor can it be said that God could be hated because of justice, because no idea of bad is apprehended in his justice just as neither in himself; for although there appear in the effect of justice some idea of bad, yet not in itself; and if this is true, then one must say that the hatred is not with respect to God in himself, nor with respect to his justice, but as to the effect that is appropriated to the perfection of justice. And hereby one can say to the verse of the Psalm “the pride of those who hate you etc.” [n.28] that it is not directed to him in himself but is in their wanting his justice not to be avenging - and thus they refuse his justice as to its avenging effect. And if this is true, then one must say that their hatred of God is not the greatest sin [n.78], because it does not regard God in himself, but is against him in reference to his effect; likewise, it then follows that it would not have ‘loving God’ as the directly contrary act, but only the act contrary to the love of the effect.

III. To the Arguments for the Opposite

79. To the first argument for the opposite [n.29] I say that the first sin was not the greatest; for just as in the case of goods there is a process from the more good to the less good (as from love of the end to love of what is for the end), so - conversely - in the case of bads there is a process from the less bad to the greater bad, according to Augustine City of God 14.28 [n.46], “love of self to contempt of God.”

80. The other two arguments, namely about the passion of the irascible power in respect of the concupiscible, and about the appetite for one’s own excellence (speaking of excellence as it states a comparison to others of the one excelling [nn.30-31]), can be conceded, because - as concerns the act of concupiscence - the angel did not first covet excellence, which is a passion of the irascible or the concupiscible, but most perfect blessedness; however if we speak of the first inordinate willing of friendship, one can say that it was not an act or a passion of the irascible, but of the concupiscible; for if it is the mark of the concupiscible to covet the good for the one loved, it is its mark to love also the loved good for whom it covets that good.

81. To the verse from 1 Timothy 6.10, “the root of all evils is greed”...Scotus here responds to an argument not given above but contained in the Lectura 11 d.6 n.21. It has no particular reply there but only the general one that the answer to objections is plain from what has been said. The fourth argument given above in the Ord. here is not responded to by Scotus. ⁸

Seventh Distinction

Single Question. Whether the Bad Angel necessarily Wills badly

1. About the seventh distinction I ask whether the bad angel necessarily wills badly.a

a. a[Interpolation] About the seventh distinction, where the Master [Lombard] deals with the confirmation of the good and the obstinacy of the bad, there is one question, namely whether^

2. That he does not:

James 2.19: “The demons believe and they tremble;” but these are, as it seems, good acts;     therefore etc     .

3. Further, the image [of God] remains in them, according to Psalm 38.7, “Man in image passes through     etc .;” so in this respect they have capacity for God and are sharers in him (for in this respect is the image of God in the soul, “whereby it can have capacity for God and be sharer in him,” according to Augustine On the Trinity 14.8 n.11); but they cannot grasp God or be sharers in him save by a good act; therefore      there can be good acts in them.

4. Further, Dionysius Divine Names 4, “in the demons their natural abilities remain complete,” therefore their free choice is complete; but “the ‘possibility for sin’ is not freedom nor part of freedom,” according to Anselm On Free Choice 1;a therefore they have freedom of choice for that for which it per se exists, which is ‘willing well’; therefore they can will well.

a. a[Interpolation] ‘Free choice is the power of keeping rectitude for its own sake’, Anselm On Free Choice 3.

5. Further, no intellect is so turned away from the first principle that it cannot know anything true, because the first principles are true for any intellect from the terms; therefore no will is so turned away from the ultimate end that it cannot will the ultimate end. The consequence is plain from the similitude of the Philosopher, Physics 2.9.200a15-16, Ethics 7.9.1151a16-17, “As the principle is in matters of speculation, so is the end in moral matters.” - There is also proof of the consequence in another way, that “everyone bad is ignorant” (Ethics 3.2.1110b28-30); therefore there is no malice in the will without error in the intellect. Therefore where the intellect cannot be blinded about some intelligible object, there neither can the will be wrong about the same object as desirable or lovable.

6. Further, if they necessarily will badly, and they are always in an act of willing (because they do not have any impediment) - then they are always willing badly and so they are increasing their malice to infinity; but if, by the law of divine justice, to an increase in guilt there corresponds an increase in punishment, then their punishment would grow infinitely;     therefore they will never be in their term. Something else unacceptable also follows, that by parity of reasoning charity could be increased in the good if malice can be increased in the bad, and thus it follows that the good would never be in the term of blessedness just as neither the bad in the term of malice; therefore etc     .

7. Further, “nothing violent is perpetual” (De Caelo 1.2.269b6-10), because it is contrary to the inclination of that in which it is - and so, if that thing is left to itself, it returns to the opposite state (just as water, if left to itself, returns to coldness); but malice is against nature, according to Damascene; therefore it is not perpetual. Therefore it is not in the will necessarily.

8. To the opposite:

In Psalm 73.23, “The pride of those who hate you rises up always,” but this cannot be understood as to intensity, because thus no evil would be so intense that there would not be a greater evil; therefore it has to be understood extensively, and so they are always sinning.

I. To the Question

A. The Opinions of Others

9. Here there is posited a double cause for the continuation of malice in them.

First thus: the appetite is proportioned to its apprehensive power, by which it is moved as a movable thing is moved by a mover; but an angel apprehends immovably, non-discursively, because he does so through intellect - man apprehends movably, through reason discursively, wherein he has a discursive way of going to either opposite. The will of an angel, therefore, immovably adheres after the first complete apprehension, while the will of man - in line with a volition following reason - adheres movably. And therefore, although the will of an angel, before it had fixed itself by a complete volition, would have been movable to opposites (otherwise it could not have sinned or merited indifferently), yet after the first choice it immovably adhered to what it had chosen; and thus the good angel was made radically impeccable and the bad radically impenitent -from the immobility of the cognitive power.

10. Another way is posited as follows, that the more perfect the will the more perfectly it immerses itself in the willable thing. When separated from body, of which sort the angelic will is, it is altogether perfectly free - but our will, conjoined to a corruptible body, has a diminished liberty; and therefore, although our will has liberty, yet the angelic will, which is altogether separate from body, has it maximally. Our will too, “when existing in an incorruptible body,” immovably immerses itself in the object so that it cannot rebound from it.

11. Now the manner is assigned from Proverbs 18.5, “The sinner, when he comes into the depths, despises.” When therefore the will is perfectly free in a preceding perfect choice, it efficaciously runs to the thing willed, placing there its end; but when it comes to the obstacle of conscience, it does not stop at it but thrusts itself into it and is blunted back so that it neither wills nor can will to withdraw itself; just as iron, if driven into bone, is blunted back and cannot be withdrawn, either by the same force by which it was driven in or by a stronger one.

B. Rejection of the Opinions together

12. Against the conclusion, in which these two opinions come together, there seems to be the authority of Augustine [Fulgentius] On the Faith to Peter n.34 where he speaks thus, “If it were possible that human nature, after it turned from God and lost the goodness of the will, could have had it again from itself, much more would the angelic nature have this, which, the less it is burdened by the weight of an earthly body, the more it would be endued with this ability     etc .” - The argument then goes as follows: if the human will could of itself return to justice, much more the angelic will; therefore      the angelic will, neither because of the immovability of its cognitive power (of the sort that the cognitive power of our will is not), nor because of its own full liberty (from the fact it is separate from body), is incapable of returning to justice after it has sinned; on the contrary, according to Augustine [Fulgentius], it is more capable than our will is.

13. Further, I argue against this common opinion.

First as follows: not only is the will of a damned angel obstinate, but also the will of a damned human being (and one should assign a common cause for both, according to what Augustine [Fulgentius] seems to say op.cit. a little after the cited passage, where he maintains that there is one common cause why God will together judge human spirits and damned angels - and he seems to maintain the same in City of God 21.11, 23); but neither of these causes [nn.9-11] can be posited as the cause of the obstinacy of a damned human being; therefore not of an angel either.

14. Proof of the assumption [sc. the minor premise, n.13]: because the conjoined soul does not have a cognitive power that immovably apprehends, as an angel does, according to the first way [n.9] - nor even does it have such liberty that it immerses itself in the object immovably, according to the second way [n.10].a Therefore one has to assign a cause for this obstinacy in the soul when it is separate; so either the soul is then obstinate before any elicited act (and consequently neither of the aforesaid causes is the cause of its obstinacy because, before it wills anything according to an act of an immovably apprehending intellect or from the full liberty it has when separate, it was already obstinate) - or it was obstinate through some act that it elicited when separate (which, according to the first way, follows the immovable apprehension of a separate intellect, or, according to the second, full liberty); but this second option seems unacceptable, because a soul does not demerit when separated, but only through the acts that it had on the way does it receive what it merited or demerited; so it has no act preceding the obstinacy by which to be rendered obstinate.b

a. a[Interpolation] according to perfect liberty, according to the second way;     therefore it cannot rebound back - which is false.

b. b[Interpolation] Or thus: the sinning soul is obstinate in the instant of separation, because it is in the term - yet not by an act that it then elicits, because in the same instant in which it is separated the whole composite is corrupted, and in that instant it does not understand; nor even is it obstinate through an act preceding that instant, because then it was a wayfarer; therefore etc     . Or thus: if the will of a man, because it has an immovable apprehension, renders itself obstinate, whether this is while it is in the body or while it is outside the body; not while in the body because then it does not have an immovable apprehension (since it is a wayfarer) - nor in the second way because in the instant of separation the soul is obstinate and damned (but it does not then have apprehension, because that is the instant of corruption);     therefore etc     .

15. A confirmation can be taken from Lazarus, whose intellect, when he was dead, had the apprehension of a separated soul and whose will had full liberty (because it was separated); and yet because of neither of these did he will immovably, because then he would have been impeccable if he was good (and then God would have done a prejudice to him when he resurrected him, because then he would have made him peccable from being impeccable), or obstinate if bad - but both of these are false (because he was still a wayfarer!), unless one imagines that God miraculously suspended him from an operation of the sort that follows a separated soul (in as much as he predestined to resurrect him), but this does not seem probable, because he is said to have narrated many things that he had seen.Vatican editors: Scotus seems to be referring to stories that appeared in the 11th or 12th centuries, found in an ancient manuscript from Perugia. They were printed in Italian by a certain Razzi in 1613 and reprinted in Orvieto in 1859 under the title of Life and Praises of St. Mary Magdalene, St. Martha, and St. Lazarus bishop and martyr. ⁹

16. Further, second: a total cause does not cause differently unless it is itself, according as it is cause, differently disposed, and this when no diversity is posited on the part of the undergoing subject or on the part of any extrinsic impediments; but the will as naturally prior to its act, not as actually existing in act, is cause of its act (which is manifest from the fact it is a free cause of its act, which freedom does not belong to it save as it is prior to its act - because as it is in act it has the act as natural form; it is also plain that a thing, as it is under an effect as under a form, is posterior, as the composite is posterior to its form, Metaphysics 7.3.1029a5-7); therefore the will is not differently disposed in eliciting an act unless it is differently disposed as it is prior to act. But from the fact that it is posited as having an act inherent in it [nn.9-11], it would not be differently disposed as it is naturally prior to act, because although it would be as it is in act differently disposed, namely as to a certain accident, yet not as to its nature, according to which it is the sort of first act that the will is; therefore, as the will is understood to be in any act whatever, it will not be differently disposed in eliciting any act whatever; therefore through no act (or habit) that is posited in it as it is separated, and that cannot be posited in it as conjoined, will it be eliciting in a way opposite (a good act or a bad act) to the way it was eliciting before, and so, if before it acted contingently, by nothing of the sort - posited in it - will it elicit necessarily.a

a. a[Interpolation] Or thus: the will is not cause of its volition save as naturally prior to it, so if it is not differently disposed as it is naturally prior to it, it is not differently disposed as it is cause of it; but as it is naturally prior it is not differently disposed by the fact that it is under an act of willing, because it is thus disposed in first act; therefore it is not by that act differently disposed in causing - therefore it does not through the act that it is placed under become ‘impeccable’ or ‘impenitent’ [n.9]. Confirmation: a cause that in itself is uniformly disposed to several effects, by the fact that it causes one, it is not differently disposed as regard another, as is plain of heat with respect to several heatings; but the will is cause with respect to several volitions; therefore by the fact that it elicits one it is not differently disposed as to eliciting another. Therefore if it elicited the first freely, such that with respect thereto it was not impeccable, neither will it be impeccable with respect to another. - Second confirmation: the will of an angel, with respect to the act that is posited as the cause of its obstinacy [nn.9=11], is disposed contingently (and only necessarily disposed by necessity in a certain respect), because it is cause of the act as it is naturally prior to it - and as such it elicits contingently; but such an act does not more necessitate the will with respect to another act than with respect to itself;     therefore etc     . Third...

17. The reasoning is confirmed, because no second cause can be the cause for a principal cause of acting in a way opposite to the way belonging to the principal cause from its own causality; for thus the principal cause would not be principal cause, because it would be determined by the second cause to a mode of acting opposite to its own proper mode of acting; therefore since the will is principal cause of its act (because whatever is posited in the will with respect to its act will either not be the cause of thus eliciting the act, or, if it is the cause, it is a second cause in respect of the will, and not principal cause), it follows that the will is by nothing else determined to acting.

18. Further, as was said d.4-5 nn.45-46 and d.6 n.77, both the good angel and the bad had time such that they were not wayfarers for an instant only; but the bad angel had several sins in order - namely from the act of loving himself he elicited an act of loving the supreme advantage, and from that an act of excellence (whereby he willed to have that advantage not under the rule of the superior will but against it), and finally an act of hating God (who resisted him in that appetite [d.6 nn.37-40, 51-54, 63, 78]), and he did not have all those acts distinctly at the same time; therefore, when he was demeriting in the second sin, he was still on the way, and yet he had already sinned with the first sin from the first choice. Therefore not any sort of immovable apprehension or any sort of first sin, or full immersion in the object, made him impenitent; for whenever he sinned in one of those sins on the way, it was not the same as the preceding sin.

C. Rejection of the First Opinion in Particular

19. Further, against the first way [n.9] there is argument specifically.

First, because it supposes something false, namely that the intellect is a sufficient mover - as will be made clear in 2 d.25 [lacking in Ordinatio, but found in Lectura 2 d.25 n.69].

Second, this false thing is repugnant in two ways to the statements of those who hold this position. First, because since the intellect of the angels was right in apprehending (for punishment does not precede guilt), it was moving the will to desire something rightly; nor could it move the will otherwise, because the intellect moves by way of nature and consequently it can only move according to the mode of cognition that it has; therefore it moves the will to willing rightly. Therefore the will could in no way sin. - Second, the false thing contradicts their position because, if from the idea of mover and movable there is a proportion of the sort between them, the will not only will be immovable after the first choice of the will, but will be in itself first so even before the first choice - because the angels’ intellect, just as it immovably shows something after the first choice of the will, so does it also do so before it; and if the intellect itself, when immovably apprehending, moves the appetite immovably, then it will move immovably in the first act, and consequently not after the first act only!

21. Further, from this way it seems to follow that since, according to them, the angel was created in grace [d.4-5 n.24] and thus had some act in grace (because it is not likely that in the first instant he was idle, for he was not impeded - and if he was then idle he would perhaps have sinned by the sin of omission), and he did not sin with grace (as is plain) - then at some point he had according to grace a good and full choice, because a choice following perfect apprehension of the intellect, for, according to them, there is only such apprehension in the angels, and this apprehension immovable and not discursive [n.9]. Therefore any angel in that first good choice confirmed himself and was made impeccable.

22. Further, the difference between the wills of man and angel [n.9] is not valid, because although the angel understands non-discursively what - according to them - man understands discursively, yet the intellect of man does not movably adhere to that which he reaches discursively; for he holds the conclusion he reaches discursively with as much certitude (that is, without doubting) as an angel holds it by seeing it non-discursively in the principle; therefore this immovability of the human intellect (that is, this certitude) would have an equally immovable will just as does the other immovability posited in the angel. Also, the fact that all discursive reasoning is denied to the angels does not seem probable - as is proved above [Ord. Prol. nn.208-209, 2 d.1 nn.312-314].

D. Rejection of the Second Opinion in Particular

23. Against the second way [nn.10-11] there is argument specifically:

Because, just as a natural agent does not dominate its act, so neither does it dominate its mode of acting - and, by the opposite, as a free agent dominates its action so too does it dominate its mode of acting, and consequently it is in its power to act intensely or weakly; therefore there is no need, from the fact the will is perfectly free, that it should immerse itself with supreme effort in the object; rather it dominates itself more, since it tends to the object with any amount of effort at all and is thus carried freely to any object at all, and it can also by its absolute liberty not be thus carried to the object. There is a confirmation for this as well, that not all the bad angels seem to have sinned with their utmost effort, just as neither do all the good angels seem to have merited with their utmost effort - or at least it was possible for them not to elicit an act with the whole faculty of their nature.

24. Further, a thing tends (or moves) to the term by the same principle by which it rests in it; therefore if the will - perfectly free - tends of its perfect liberty to an object, then by the same liberty it rests in it; therefore from the full liberty of tending to an object, the sort of liberty that the bad angels sinned with, the resting of the will in it does not necessarily follow, but only a voluntary and contingent resting, just as the will contingently tends to it.

25. Further, as was touched on in the first common way against both ways [n.14], it cannot be said that the will of a separated soul renders itself obstinate by any act that it is then eliciting, because it is obstinate naturally prior to its eliciting some act as it is separated, for it is in the term; therefore it renders itself obstinate by some act that it elicits in the body, by thrusting itself then into the conscience; but this is false, both because it was then a wayfarer - and because someone can, by the sin because of which he is damned if penance does not follow, sin with lesser effort than the effort someone else (or himself) sins with by the same sin, and that sin is destroyed through penance.

26. Further, against the example about the sharp iron, by thrusting it into bone [n.11]. Although this example and the whole position seem similar to the saying of Hesiod, Metaphysics 3.4.1000a9-19, that “those were made immortals who tasted nectar and manna [ambrosia]” (which saying the Philosopher there mocks, because people like the Hesiodans “have despised our understanding”, for - according to the Philosopher there - what is meant by such hyperbolic or metaphorical words cannot be understood, nor is it the manner of a philosopher or a scientist to speak in such way) - yet, by taking the example for what it is worth as to the intended conclusion, the opposite deduction can be made. For why is sharp iron, when fixed in a hard body, not able to be extracted by the cause or power that fixed it in? - the reason is that the parts of the body in which it was thrust cling more together, and so the thing fixed in it is more compressed than at the beginning when it was being fixed in; but if the motive power is increased, then by the amount of increase that the motive power adds - if the thing fixed in remains equally straight in its nature - it can now by extracted. Therefore since the will, when thrusting into anything, remains straight in its natural powers (even though it may have some curvature, that is, a certain deformity, a sort of inherent privation), and since that in which it immerses itself does not have, when it immerses itself, a greater power of enclosing it (because there is in the object no such clinging together), the result is that the active will can withdraw itself.

II. Scotus’ own Response

27. For the solution of this question [n.1] two things need to be seen; namely first the degrees of goodness and malice - second what goodness there could be in the volition of a damned angel, or whether any malice is necessarily present in it.

A. On the Degrees of Goodness and Malice

28. About the first I say that over and above the natural goodness of volition that belongs to it insofar as it is a positive being and that also belongs to any positive being according to the degree of its entity (the more the more, the less the less) - besides this goodness there is a triple moral goodness, disposed according to degree: the first of which is called goodness in genus, the second can be called virtuous goodness or goodness from circumstance, and third is meritorious goodness or gratuitous goodness or goodness from divine acceptation in its order to reward.

29. Now the first belongs to volition from its being about an object befitting such an act according to the dictate of right reason, and not merely because it befits the act naturally (as the sun befits vision). And this is the first moral goodness, which is therefore called ‘in genus’ because it is as it were material with respect to any further goodness in the genus of morals; for the act about an object is able as it were to be formed through any other moral circumstance, and so it is as it were potential; but it is not altogether outside the genus of morals (as the act itself in its genus of nature was), but is in the genus of morals, because it already has something from that genus, namely an object befitting the act.

30. The second goodness belongs to volition from the fact that it is elicited by the will along with all circumstances that have been dictated by right reason as having to belong to the will in eliciting the volition; for the good is from ‘an integral cause’ (according to Dionysius Divine Names 4) - and this is as it were the good in the species of morals, because it now has all the moral differences that contract the good in genus.

31. The third goodness belongs to the act from the fact that, on the presupposition of double goodness already stated, the act is elicited in conformity with the principle of merit (which is charity or grace) or according to the inclination of charity.

32. An example of the first goodness: to give alms. An example of the second: to give alms from one’s own property to a pauper who needs it, and in the place in which it can better befit the pauper and for the love of God. An example of the third: to do this work not only from natural inclination, such as could have happened in the state of innocence (or perhaps it could still now be done by a sinner if, while still being a sinner and not penitent, he were moved by natural piety for his neighbor), but also from charity, which he who acts from is a friend of God, insofar as God has regard to his work.

33. Now this triple goodness is so ordered that the first is presupposed by the second and not conversely, and the second by the third and not conversely.

34. To this triple goodness is opposed a triple malice; the first indeed is malice in genus, namely when an act that has only natural goodness (from which it should be constituted in the genus of morals) has malice because it is about an unfitting object (for example if ‘to hate’ is about God); the second is malice from some circumstance that makes the act disordered, even though the act is about an object fitting the act -according to right reason; the third is malice in demerit.

35. Now any of these malices can be taken as contrary to, or privative of, its goodness; and as taken privatively it only removes the goodness - but as taken contrarily it posits something beyond that lack which is repugnant to such goodness. And this distinction is plain in Boethius On Aristotle’s Categories 3 ch. on quality.

36. But malice in genus, taken contrarily and privatively, is convertible - and so, just as between immediate privation and immediate habit there is no middle, so good in genus and bad in genus are immediate contraries; the reason is that an act cannot not be about an object, and the object is fitting or not fitting to the act; and so necessarily an act is good in genus from a fitting object, and an act is bad in genus from an unfitting object.

37. Malice taken privatively and contrarily in the second way is not convertible. For an act can lack a circumstance required for the perfection of a virtuous act and yet not be elicited with a repugnant circumstance that would render the act vicious; for example, if one gives alms to a pauper not from the circumstance of the end (because one does not consider it), nor according to other circumstances required for a virtuous act, then this act is not morally good or vicious - nor however is it bad contrarily, because it is not ordered to an undue end, as one would do if one gave alms to a pauper for vainglory or some other undue end.

38. Malice in the third way taken contrarily and privatively is not convertible -because an act can be bad privatively (such that it is not elicited from grace), and yet it would not be de-meritorious; the thing is plain from the second way [n.37], because an act which is good simply in the genus of morals is not meritorious and yet not every such act is de-meritorious; and thus both in the second way and here there seems to exist an ‘indifferent act’ - an act that, although it is bad privatively, is yet not so contrarily (because it is indifferent), and this indifference will be spoken of elsewhere [d.41 nn.6-14 below]. Likewise, an act can be neutral in the third way (that is, neither good nor bad, taking these contrarily), not only because of the neutrality of the act in the second way, but because of the disposition of the operator; for example, if in a state of innocence -without grace - someone had rightly acted, that act would have been perfectly good in the second way and not good in the third way, because it did not have the principle for meriting nor was it bad contrarily.

39. Perhaps however in this present state of life there is no act neutral between good and bad taken in the third way, save in one case, namely when the act is good from its circumstance and yet to it charity does not incline. And the reason is that anyone now is either in grace or in sin. If in grace and he has an act good in the second way, then grace inclines to it and thus it is meritorious; if he has an act bad in the second way, it is plain that he is de-meritorious (for always the first malice brings in the second, not conversely; and the second the third, not conversely). But if he is bad [sc. in sin] and he has an act good in the second way, then he is not good in the third way and not bad in the third way; therefore he is neutral as to good and bad as these are contraries in the third way, but he is not neutral speaking of the second way.

B. On Goodness and Malice in the Bad Angel

40. About the second point [n.27] I say that a bad angel’s having a good volition can be understood of this triple goodness.

1. On Goodness in Genus

41. And as to the first goodness, which is in genus, there is no doubt but that he could and does have many volitions about an object befitting such act (as in loving himself, hating punishment, and thus in many others).

2. On Meritorious Goodness

42. But as to the other two modes of goodness, namely virtuous and meritorious, there is difficulty.

And first one must see about meritorious goodness.

Here I say that a bad angel cannot have a volition good in this way, understanding this in the composite sense, because that he is bad and that he has a volition good in this way do not stand together, just as neither can a white thing be black in the composite sense, because then the same thing would at the same time be white and black. But in the divided sense it can be denied of a bad angel either by logical potency or by real potency; if real, either the one which states the idea of principle or the one which is a difference of being and which states order to act [cf. Ord. 1 d.20 nn.11-12].

a) On Real Potency which is a Principle

43. About real potency then, one must see how a bad angel does not have ‘the potency which is a principle’ for willing thus.

This principle, first, is understood to be a passive one - and the bad angel has this, because his will is a thing receptive of some right volition; for what is of itself receptive of some right volition is, as long as it remains in itself, not non-receptive; but his will was at some time receptive of a good volition (because before damnation he was able to have merited and been blessed), and he has not lost his natural powers now; therefore now his will is a thing thus receptive.

As to, second, the active principle of right volition, we can speak either about the total principle of volition or about a partial principle. The will indeed is a partial active principle, as has been touched on [I d.17 nn.32, 151-153; Lectura 2 d.25 n.69]; and the bad angel has it complete (according to Dionysius, [n.4]) and the same as he had it in the state of innocence; and consequently it is not true to deny the potency of him, that is, the partial active principle of meritorious volition. But this is not the total principle, because the will alone does not suffice for meritorious willing, but grace is required as a cooperating principle; nor is his will a ‘partial principle’ that is principal or sufficient for putting another partial principle in being; for although a will using the grace already possessed is principal agent as regard the act, however, when grace is not possessed, the will is not sufficient for putting grace into existence, because grace cannot be put into existence save by God alone creating it.

45. And thus a bad angel does not have the total active principle for acting, nor is he a partial active principle in whose power it is to produce in being the remaining partial active principle and to remove the impediments to the use of himself and of his principle for eliciting the act and effect that is common to them. An example of this would be if someone possessed of sight were in darkness; although he would then have a partial principle for an act of seeing (and a principal principle for seeing when light and the visual power come together), yet he does not then have the total principle nor the principal principle sufficient for putting into existence what is required for the effect of these two partial principles, nor even would he be able to remove impediments; and therefore although he has the visual power (inasmuch as he has a principle diminished with respect to vision), yet it would not be in his power to see. Thus I say that it would not be in the power of a bad angel to will meritoriously, because it is not in his power to have grace nor - by consequence - to use grace, nor even to use his will along with the grace for eliciting his act; but all these negative statements are true because it is not in his power to have the form which he is to use, or to remove impediments.

46. But there is here a doubt, because although what has been said about the active principle is true in comparison with the principal effect (which is to act meritoriously from the grace by which one meritoriously wills), yet it remains doubtful about the dispositive principle - or the principle active for disposition - with respect to the principal agent; namely whether he who has the will as principal active principle can dispose himself for grace.

And if so, then it is in a bad angel’s power to will well, just as this is in the power of a wayfaring sinner; for the bad wayfaring sinner cannot do more than dispose himself, and then grace is given him by God whereby he afterwards acts well.

47. Now whether the wayfarer can have some motion of attrition from his pure natural powers, under the existence of general influence, or whether some special operation is required will be discussed later [Ord. 4 d.14 q.2 n.4]; but on the supposition that he can, someone might deny this dispositive power of a damned angel and assert that it can belong to a wayfaring sinner.

But there is an obstacle to this from the authority of Augustine [Fulgentius] On the Faith to Peter [n.12], which more concedes to a fallen angel the power for returning to good from his pure natural powers than to a fallen man; therefore if a man wayfarer can from his pure natural powers have this dispositive power, much more so can an angel.

48. According to this, then, as to all the members about potency as it is a principle [nn.43-45], it does not seem one should deny of the bad angels that they can will meritoriously, save that they do not have the total principle of meriting, nor the principal partial principle, either with respect to good volition or with respect to the special grace which is required for good volition; and yet neither can a bad angel will well in the same way that a wayfaring sinner can, as will be said later [nn.54-56].

b) On Real Potency which is a Difference of Being

49. If the understanding is about the potency that is a difference of being, namely what is ordered to act - then it can be conceded [sc. that a bad angel can have a meritoriously good will] as to remote potency, namely the potency that follows the idea of passive and active potency (although secondarily and in diminished fashion); but it cannot be conceded as to proximate potency, because it only issues in act when all impediments are removed, such that what has it can at once issue in act; and this sort of potency does not come from the passive potency that a [bad] angel has, nor from the partial cause that the will is; for one of the partial causes needed for acting [sc. grace] is lacking

c) On Logical Potency

50. But if it is understood of logical potency, which states the manner of composition formed by the intellect, then in this way the impossibility can be in the composition either because of the intrinsic repugnance of the terms to each other or because of an extrinsic repugnance to what is required for the extremes to be united. An example of the first is ‘man is irrational’. An example of the second is if the eye were in darkness and it were impossible for the opaque obstacle causing the darkness to be removed, then it would be impossible to see; not to be sure because of the intrinsic repugnance of the terms (which terms are ‘eye’ and ‘to see’) but from the repugnance to one or other term of something extrinsic, namely the repugnance of the opaque obstacle to the term ‘to see’.

51. Applying this then to the issue at hand, I say that there is not here [sc. in a bad angel] an impossibility from an intrinsic repugnance of the terms or extremes; on the contrary there is no repugnance to the predicate in the subject. If there is any impossibility, then, it will be from the repugnance of something extrinsic to the union of the extremes; but this extrinsic thing can only be the active cause that is required for the extremes to be united; such a cause, with respect to the union of grace with some subject, is not of a nature to be any other cause than God; therefore, it will only be impossible for the bad angels to will well or to have grace because it is impossible for God to give them grace.

52. Now the impossibility on the part of God is assigned in two ways: on the part of absolute power and on the part of ordained power [Ord. 1 d.44 nn.3-11].

Absolute power is in respect of anything that does not include a contradiction. And it is plain that it is not impossible in this way for God to give grace to that nature; for since that nature is capable of grace (as touched on when discussing passive potency [n.43]), the consequence is that there is no contradiction in the proposition ‘grace actually informs that nature’.

53. The ordained power of God, as was touched on earlier, is that which is conform in its acting to the rules predetermined by divine wisdom (or rather, by divine will [1 d.44 nn.3, 6-7, 1 d.3 n.187]) - and, as to beatifying or punishing the rational creature, the rules are those of ordained justice. These rules are collected from the Scriptures, among which is the authority of Ecclesiastes 11.13, “Wherever the wood falls, there will it be” (that is, in the love of whatever thing the rational creature will have remained, in that it will continue to remain).

54. And Augustine concludes, City of God 21.23, from such rules of Scripture (for example Isaiah 66.24, “their fire will not be extinguished, and their worm will not die,” and Matthew 25.46, “these will go into eternal punishment, but the just into eternal life”), that it is certain God will never give them grace. According to this then it would be impossible for the bad angels to will well, because it is impossible by God’s ordained power to give them grace.

55. But against this it is argued that then there seems to be an impossibility in the same way about the wayfaring sinner who, however, will not in the end repent - for God has pre-ordained not to give him grace; and if the impossibility is only on this side, because of this sort of order, then it does not seem more impossible for a demon to repent than for such a sinner to repent.

I reply that the ordained power of God does not regard particular divine acts (about which there are not universal laws), but regards the universal laws or rules of doable things; of such sort is the law about the damned - and there is no such law about the bad while they are on the way, even if they remain finally bad. An example of this: if someone had laid down that every murderer should be killed, it would not be possible by ordained power - according to the order already in place - to save this particular murderer; if however he could kill a murderer but not because of some such universal law, he could also save him (or not kill him) even by ordained power. Thus a wayfarer who will not be saved can be saved, because there is no universal law laid down already against this as there is against the salvation of the damned.

56. If it be objected against this that ‘as law is about the universal so is judgment according to law about the universal, and the judgment follows from the law (    therefore the reason there can be no going against the law is equally a reason there can be no going against judgment following the law); but this wayfarer, if he will be damned, will be so according to a judgment consonant to the law; therefore etc     .’ - I reply that the law is about him who is bad in the term, and therefore when the law is applied to some particular individual (that is, to this or that already judged individual, because he is in the term), the judgment is no more revoked than is the law; but about this bad individual still present on the way there is no judgment by any law, just as the general law itself does not extend itself to the wayfarer.

57. There is another doubt: is this obstinacy of a bad will from God or from the bad will itself? For if it is from the will, it seems that the will could spring back itself from the obstinacy, just as it could of itself have willed the bad; for the power by which it moves itself to something is the same as that by which it rests in it, and it can withdraw itself from it and move to something else that more inclines it, of which sort is the object of it. But if the obstinacy is in place from God, then the malice will be from God, and thus God is cause of sin, which seems unacceptable.

58. On this point.

Although Augustine [Fulgentius] may seem to say, On the Faith to Peter ch.34 that God has ordained the turning away of the will to evil to abide perpetually, and obstinacy is sign of a bad will - yet because the act, while it exists, has as it were a cause continually (because its being is as it were in a state of continually being caused), then just as God cannot be the cause of bad ‘qua bad’ in the first act of eliciting it so neither is he in its continued being, which is its ‘being continually elicited’; therefore the will alone will be the cause, but from God is the punishment of fire, which is what punishes evil. Also, this obstinacy, as it states the malice of sin in the will, can be said to be from God, not indeed as positively willing it, but as abandoning and refusing to give grace; for just as God graces him whom he disposes to give grace to, so he does not grace him whom he forsakes (that is, with respect to the gracing that he has a refusing of).

59. When, therefore, it is argued that if the obstinacy is from the will alone then the will alone can spring back to the opposite (namely back from the object toward which it inordinately inclined itself) - I reply and say that for springing back meritoriously there is required a principle other than the will, namely grace, which a bad angel cannot have of himself - and God, according to his desertion of him, has disposed not to give him grace. But if you argue that a bad angel can at least have a ‘circumstanced willing’ as to what he inordinately willed, although that willing would not be meritorious for him -then this belongs to the following point, namely about moral goodness [nn.75, 28, 30, 39].

60. From what has been said, then, it seems there is no denial of power, that is, of power as active principle, unless ‘active principle’ is taken to be the total or principal principle [n.44]. Nor is there denial of the power which is order to act, save of proximate power [n.49]. Nor denial of logical power save extrinsically [n.51], on which side there is no impossibility of uniting the extreme terms when speaking of God’s absolute power [n.52], but there is when speaking of his ordained power, as collected from Scripture (as was said before from Augustine [n.54]), because God has not disposed to unite those extreme terms, and because there is no other cause of the permanence of the bad in bad than divine abandonment [n.58] - or the fact God has disposed not to give them grace, since they are in the term [n.59], and that he has not made this disposition about bad wayfarers [nn.55-56].

61. It seems too that this is proved by the authorities of the saints - first from Damascene ch.18, “What the fall is for the angels, this death is for men;” second from Augustine City of God 21.11, 23, “There is nothing more certain in Scripture than the judgment [sc. about the saved and the damned] of Scripture.”

3. On Goodness of Virtue or of Circumstances

62. . It remains now to see about moral goodness and the malice opposed to it [nn.30, 34, 37, 40].

63. Here it is said that the bad angels cannot have a morally good volition, because they deform every volition by some disordered circumstance, referring it inordinately to love of self.

64. Likewise habit in them is perfectly bad, being in the term, and so most perfectly inclines them.

65. Therefore they never will well, because of the first point [n.63] - but they always will badly because of the second point [n.64], namely because of the vehemence of their inclination to evil.

66. For the first of these Augustine is adduced On the Psalms 118.11 n.5, “Lead me, Lord, in the way of your commandments.”“But because one is little able to keep the precepts of love by one’s own strength unless one is helped by him who commands that one do what he commands, ‘lead me,’ the psalmist says, ‘in the way of your commandments, because I have wanted it;’ my will is too little for me, Lord, save in that I have willed that you yourself lead me.” ¹⁰

67. Against the first point [n.63].

They have their natural powers complete (according to Damascene [n.4]), therefore there is in them a natural inclination to good; therefore they can, in accord with that inclination, will something in conformity to it, because their power - considered merely as to its nature - can elicit some act consonant to the natural inclination; therefore they can have an act that is not bad, because not contrary to their nature.

68. Further, they have ‘their worm’ [n.54], which is remorse for their sins; but that remorse is a certain displeasure, which displeasure is not a morally bad act because, although it can be deformed by a disordered circumstance, yet - focusing on the fact it is ‘a willing not to have sinned’ - it does not seem to be formally moral malice.

69. Further, if they do not will punishment to the extent it is an injury to nature, focusing on this alone (without any circumstance), it does not seem to be a morally bad act - because just as it is possible to love one’s own nature in a way that is not morally bad, so is it possible to hate what is contrary to it [n.41].

70. Against the second [n.64] I argue in three ways [nn.70-72].

First because it seems that the will could, of its own liberty, not will or not have any act. The proof is that according to Augustine Retractions 1.22 n.4, “nothing is so in the power of the will as the will itself” - and this is not understood of the will as to its first being (because, as to its first being, non-will is more in its power than will), but it is understood as to operation. Therefore the will is more in a bad angel’s power as to operation than any inferior power; but the will can suspend any inferior power from every act - therefore it can also suspend itself; therefore a bad angel does not necessarily will bad.

71. Further, second: what is adduced about habit [n.64] is disproved in two ways.

First, because every habit inclines to some act in the same species; therefore this habit, which is posited as the cause of sinning, inclines either to an act of pride only or to an act of hate only. But to whichever act it is posited as inclining, it seems probable that he [a bad angel] could at some time not have that act, because he can have another act distinctly and with his whole effort, and he cannot have two perfect acts at the same time; therefore there is no single act that is necessarily perpetual from the vehemence of the inclination to it, and consequently there is not in general a bad act present necessarily from the habit.

72. Further, second: a habit is not in the power an idea of acting in a way opposite to the proper way of the power itself - which is proved as was proved before against the two opinions, in the reasoning about the priority of the cause as it is a cause, when the second cause does not determine the mode of acting for the first cause but conversely [n.17]. Therefore if a non-habituated will could non-necessarily will this thing (which belongs to the liberty in it), an habituated will may non-necessarily will it. - And then what the Philosopher says Ethics 7.8.1150a21-22, that ‘the bad man does not repent’, has to be expounded, that it is about ‘repents with difficulty’, because no act can be so intensely in the will that it altogether takes away power for the opposite.

73. As to this article [n.62], then, it seems one can say that the bad angels do not necessarily have some bad act, whether speaking of some determinate act or of some vague or indeterminate one.

74. And as to determinate act the point seems sufficiently plain, because if a bad angel has only a determinate habit, that habit inclines to a definite act, one in species -and it is plain [sc. from n.71] that he can have some act other in species than that one and, for that time, not have another act, and by parity of reasoning not have any other act at all to which such habit does not incline. He may also have several habits inclining to acts diverse in species, but some habit does not incline very strongly; and he is able not to have an act of that ‘non-maximally inclining’ habit; therefore he is able not to have an act of any other habit.

75. As to vague and indeterminate act the same thing is proved; either if he can suspend himself from every volition, as one of the reasons [n.70] proceeded (which, however, assumes a doubt, because it does not seem a bad angel could suspend himself from every act or volition). Or because sometimes he can have a volition that is not bad with the malice contrary to moral goodness, though he not have an act good with complete moral goodness [nn.68, 37] (which good act is based on all the circumstances [n.30]). Although there does not appear in this any impossibility to prevent him having an act completely good morally [n.67]; at any rate this seems probable, that he can have his act to be ‘good in genus’, that is, by focusing on this and not deforming it with circumstances contrary to the circumstances of good volition [n.169]. Or if he has the act circumstanced with certain good circumstances and disordered with certain bad ones, but it is not necessary that he be always bad; for it seems strange to deny natural power in that excellent nature where no reason appears that it should be denied. Yet it is probable that the bad angels do not proceed to act in accord with this power, because of the vehemence of their malice, and it is more probable that they act by this malice than that they act by the natural power by which they have ability for acts that are in some way opposite.

III. To the Principal Arguments

76. To the first principal argument [n.2] the statement is made that, although the bad angels believe, yet the act in them of believing is bad because they hate what they believe. - But against this: an act of intellect, as it precedes an act of will, does not get deformity from a following act of will, but the bad angels can, in that prior act, conceive something true, and this a truth both of speculation (as that ‘God is three’) and of practice (as that ‘God is to be loved’).

77. One can say therefore to this argument that it proves a truth, namely that the bad angels have some act with diminished moral goodness, namely because the act is not bad with the contrary malice, that is, does not have any circumstance contrary to a due circumstance, although it does lack a circumstance that is due; for the bad angels do not believe because of the end that they should believe, and the circumstance of the end is necessary for moral goodness.

78. To the second [n.3] I say that ‘capacity’ and being ‘a sharer’ point to a remote potency when speaking of potency to act [n.49] - or, when speaking of potency which is a principle, they point to a partial, diminished active or passive principle.

79. To the third [n.4] I concede that there is free choice in them.

80. And when you argue that ‘the possibility for sin is not part of free choice’ (according to Anselm [n.4]) - I say that it is one thing to speak of the possibility for sin and another of the power for sin; for the first states order to a deformed act, while the second states the idea of a principle whereby a deformed act can be elicited.

81. Now the first order is not free choice absolutely, nor anything of it, nor is any ‘order to act’ some active principle or part of it.

82. In a second way I say that that by which there is a ‘possibility for sin’ includes two things, one of which is ‘possibility’ and the other is ‘being defective’. And that by which this thing is possible is its ‘possibility’, which ‘possibility’ is per se liberty and power of choice - but the second part does not belong to free choice as it is free choice, but as it is this sort of free choice, namely a defective one; such that, just as free choice in general is that whereby someone can will (and this taking the ‘in general’ as Anselm takes it, as it belongs to God and the blessed), so ‘this’ free choice - a free choice that can sin, namely a created one (that is, belonging to a wayfarer) - is that by which one can will defectively. However a dissimilarity can, up to a point, be posited, that for ‘absolute willing’ the whole positive entity of free will (and it alone) is the principle - but for the deformity in the act nothing positive in free choice is principle first.

83. And then to the form of the argument [n.4] I say that, given there is freedom of choice there, all that follows is that it is the power by which a positive act can be performed, which act is from the power qua power - and consequently that, insofar as there is free choice for it, it is not a sin; but it can be a sin from the defect accompanying the act.

84. However, one can concede the whole argument [n.4], namely that the bad angels have power for not sinning, because they have a power that is not formally sin -although they do not have a power of not sinning, that is, of not being in sin. Just as a sinner is said to be in sin after the sin he has committed has passed, and just as, being deprived of grace, he remains guilty (namely until he does penance for the sin committed), so the bad angels cannot of themselves not sin, that is, not be in sin; nor does their free choice need to be a power for not sinning, that, is for not being in sin.

85. And if you argue according to Anselm that ‘free choice is a power of keeping rightness for its own sake’, and that therefore he who has it can keep rightness by it and so not be in sin - I reply that someone can by free choice keep rightness when it is present (but not otherwise), and this is how Anselm expounds the matter.

86. To the other argument [the sixth, n.7] I say that in the case of merely natural agents there is a return, when all impediments cease, to the natural disposition, provided no violent action prevents it; and the reason is that the intrinsic principle (as far as concerns itself) is necessary in respect of natural goodness, and so always causes this natural goodness unless it is overcome by something that dominates it. But the will is not in this way a cause with respect to goodness in its act, but it has only a certain as it were passive natural inclination to goodness in act, which goodness, although it can give it to the act, yet it is not inclined to the giving of it by natural necessity the way a heavy object is to going downwards.

87. One can say in another way that sin is against nature, that is, against the act that is of a nature to be elicited in concord with and in conformity to the natural inclination; but there is no need, from this, that it be contrary to the will in itself, just as it is not necessary that what is contrary to an effect or an accident be contrary to the cause or the subject, especially when this sort of cause is not a natural cause of its effect but a free one.

88. To the other argument [the fourth, n.5] - about the likeness [between intellect and will] - I say that although it concludes against those who say the intellect is a sufficient mover of the will [nn.9, 19], because they would have to say that the intellect of the first angel [sc. Lucifer] does not rightly conceive any practical principle (because if it did rightly conceive, it would move the will in conformity with itself and so rightly), yet I believe this to be false, because just as the first principles of speculation are true from the terms, so also the first principles of action - and consequently an intellect that can conceive the quiddity of the terms of the first practical principle, and combine them, has a sufficient mover, and a mover ‘by way of nature’, for assenting to that principle; therefore the will, whose act is posterior, cannot impede the intellect in this - or at any rate cannot drive it to assent to the opposite.

89. As to how what is said in the Ethics is true, “everyone bad is ignorant” [n.5, Ethics 3.2.1110b28-30], this has to be dealt with elsewhere [Ord. 3 d.36 nn.11-14].

90. One can however say to the argument that the likeness [between intellect and will] is not valid, because the intellect can be compelled to assent such that it cannot be so blind that - when it apprehends the terms from the evidence of the terms - it cannot conceive the truth of the proposition composed of them. But the will is not compelled by the goodness of the object; therefore it can be so turned aside that no good, however great, when shown it moves it to love it, or at least to love it in ordered way.

91. To the other argument [the fifth, n.6] I say that when a habit is perfect or at its peak (as far as it can be perfected in such a subject, or according to the limit prefixed for it by divine wisdom), all subsequent acts do nothing to increase it but would only proceed from the habit already generated. Just as the acts of a good angel do not increase the habit of his charity, whether effectively or meritoriously (because he is in the term, either according to the nature of the habit or according to the capacity of the subject, or at any rate according to the term prefixed for him by God), but all those acts proceed from the fullness of the habit thus made perfect - so similarly in the issue at hand, the perfection of the habit [of a bad angel] is in the term according to the rule of divine wisdom, which does not permit the bad angels to increase their malice in intensity, and so the subsequent acts are only disposed as effects of a bad habit and not as agent causes of it.

92. The same response works for the point about punishment [n.6], that just as the substantial reward is determinate in the first instant in which an angel is blessed (nor does it then increase, because the good acts that follow are not meritorious, though they are good), so too in the case of a damned angel, he is, in the first instant of his damnation, determined to a definite punishment, which does not increase in intensity. And yet neither will his bad acts which he elicits be unpunished, just as neither will the good acts of a good angel be unrewarded; those good acts, indeed, of a good angel are included in the first act, because they proceed from the perfection of the beatific act - but as to the accidental reward that they can have, any act is its own reward; so too the bad acts which a damned angel elicits, are included in the first punishment determined with certainty for him - and any act, in the way it can have an accidental and a proper punishment, has itself for punishment (“you have commanded, Lord,” says Augustine Confessions 1.12 n.19, “and it is so, that every sinner is a punishment to himself”). For the most powerful and greatest punishment is the privation of the greatest good, and of this sort formally is the malice of guild in an evil act turning away from God. Therefore the punishment of the bad angels increases infinitely in extension, just as does also their malice - but neither increases in intensity.

93. And if you object that a second bad act is demeritorious, therefore a proper punishment corresponds to it - I reply that, although one can concede that a second bad act is guilt, yet it is not properly demeritorious (because it is not elicited by a wayfarer, to whom alone belongs meriting and demeriting), but can more properly be called a damnatory act or an act of someone damned; just as, on the other side, the act of someone blessed, although it is acceptable to God, is yet not properly meritorious but rather beatific or the act of someone blessed, or an act proceeding from blessedness.

Eighth Distinction

Single Question. Whether an Angel can assume a Body in which he may Exercise Works of Life

1. About the eighth distinction I ask whether an angel can assume a body in which he may exercise works of life.

2. That he cannot.

Because, if he does, then he has a greater unity with the body assumed than with one not assumed, because ‘to assume’ is ‘to take to oneself’; but this does not seem possible, because he cannot be the form of the body (as is plain, for he is naturally a separate form), nor can the body be assumed by him in unity of supposit, in the way the Word assumed our nature;     therefore there will only be the unity of mover to movable. But he can have such unity to a non-assumed body (as to the heaven which he moves); therefore etc     .

3. Further, second, if an angel assumed a body, he would either assume an elemental body - which does not seem to be the case, because that body does not have the accidents of body, as color and the like qualities that appear; or he would assume a mixed body, which seems not to be the case; first because an angel does not seem to have the active power for mixing the elements according to the mixture of a mixed body, for since the form of a mixed body is a substantial form, a devil would be able to transmute matter into a substantial form immediately, which is false, because he can do it neither by natural action (for he is not naturally determined by the Creator for such action), nor artificially (for, according to the Philosopher, Meteorology 4.3.380b16-24, “art does not follow nature in perfection of effect,” and the gloss says this on Exodus 7.12, “And the rod of Aaron devoured, etc.”); second, because the whole agency of nature cannot generate a mixed body as perfect as the human body. Nor does the angel assume a celestial body - as is plain, because a celestial body does not receive foreign impressions nor, consequently, the operations of life.

4. Further, third, if an angel can exercise the operations of life in an assumed body, then there is there something alive. The consequent is false, because a body is not alive save by a form of life informing it; but there is no such form there. The proof of the consequence is that vital operations belong to the composite (On the Soul 1.1.403a5-7, On Sense and Sensed Object 1.436a6-11) - because a form separate from matter cannot transmute matter, Averroes on Metaphysics 7 com.28; but in the acts of life, at least the acts of the vegetative soul, there is transmutation;     therefore etc     .

5. To the opposite:

Genesis 18.1-19 on the three angels appearing to Abraham, and the whole of Tobit about Raphael, and Judges 12.2-23 about the angel appearing to Manuel and his wife.

I. To the Question

6. In this question three things need to be looked at according to what the three arguments [nn.2-4] touch on.

A. What it is for an Angel to assume a Body

7. First, what it is for an angel to assume a body.

To assume is not, to be sure, to inform a body, nor to unite it to himself hypostatically, but only to be the intrinsic mover of a body and to be there definitively, which is a way of being there other than by operation, as is plain above about the location of an angel [Ord. 2 d.2 nn.310, 246]; and also - on account of the proof that God is everywhere ‘since he operates everywhere’ - because if being there definitively and operation were the same mode of being in something, there would be a begging of the question and the argument would proceed from the same to the same.Tr.: that is, if ‘definitively there’ and ‘operation’ meant the same, the argument ‘an angel is definitively there because he operates there’ would reduce to ‘an angel operates there because he operates there’. ¹¹ In addition an angel is said to assume according to this, for he assumes a body - that is ‘takes it to himself’ - at the moment when he uses it as an instrument for exercising the operations proper to himself; and this assuming is not said to happen when an assumed body is moved by local progression, because such motion fits the end for which such body is assumed.Tr.: that is, an angel who, for example, moves a heavenly body is not said to assume the heavenly body he moves, for the heavenly body’s motion is the proper end of that body. ¹²

B. What Sort of Body an Angel assumes

8. Second I say that an angel does not assume a celestial body [n.3]. Nor does he assume an elemental body in which he may appear, because he does not visibly appear in an elemental body, nor is an elemental body susceptive of the accidents in which he appears [n.3]. But mixed bodies - already generated by nature - he can assume, as the corpse of a dead man or a stone or something similar.

9. However, when he assumes some body which does not seem to have been first caused or formed by natural causes but seems to be as it were caused then and to disappear at once - complete with operation - (as was the case with Raphael and the angel appearing to Manuel [Tobit 12.21, Judges 13.20-21]), then it seems probable that the body is a mixed one, because of the accidents that appear in the body, but not mixed with full mixture, both because such a mixed body could not be suddenly formed thus by generation - and because such a body would not be of a nature to be generated save according to the determinate process of nature, and the sort of body there is not according to nature (for example, if an angel appears in the body of a man not previously generated by nature - which body would not be of a nature to be generated save in a mother). Nor can it be said that an angel at once induces the form in the matter, because he cannot induce a natural form - but all he can do is use active and passive elements together in a suitable way and put them next to each other in a place suitable to the celestial bodies, so that a particular form may be induced that is of a nature to be induced by such particular celestial agents. Therefore, a body that is as it were suddenly formed and dissolved is mixed with imperfect mixture (of the sort that can be induced suddenly as it were by natural agents, when they are brought close to the elements), such that this sort of body is more like an impression, which is something imperfectly mixed; and a sign of this comes from corruption, because, when such a body disappears, there does not remain anything of the sort of body that the assumed body would naturally be immediately resolved into if it had been perfectly mixed (for the body of a man, if it were perfectly mixed, is not of a nature to return to anything but a corpse); rather, it is resolved at once into elements, just as it was able to be immediately generated from elements because of their imperfect mixing.

C. What Works of Life an Angel can Exercise in an Assumed Body

10. On the third point [n.6] I say that an angel can cause all local motion in an assumed body - and so the motion that seems to be by progress, the motion too that would be of inhaling and exhaling, the motion of eyelids and hands and the like. And the reason is that there is no imperfect body in the universe that does not have in its active virtue some ‘where’; the point is plain about a heavy body with respect to the center; therefore much more does an angel have this with respect to a body.

11. But of the natural operations that consist in doing and undergoing, of which sort are the sense operations - an angel has no power for these, because these are not of a nature to be received save in a thing composed of an organic body (at least a perfectly mixed one) and of a soul, to the extent the soul has perfective power; and neither of these is present there [sc. in the imperfectly mixed body assumed by an angel], neither such mixture nor perfecting soul - and so in such a composite body there is simply no sensation. The operations too that consist truly in true action, of which sort are the vegetative operations, do not belong to that composite body, because these operations are of a nature to belong to an animate composite body (which is not the sort there), or of a nature to belong to a perfectly mixed body (for example, if flesh were to generate flesh [sc. by nutrition]); but neither exists there.

12. Now as to the knowing which the angel seems to have about particular facts, hearing or seeing them, this is nothing other than intellection; and the angel can express that intellection by forming words and moving the tongue locally. As to the vegetative acts too that appear - if we are speaking of true nutrition, nothing there is nourished; but if we speak of the eating that precedes nutrition, it is nothing other than the division of the food by the local motion of the jaws and the drawing of it into the stomach by local motion (and then the exhaling and resolving of it into humors and elements can take place) - and these local movements can be done in a body by the active virtue of an angel.

13. And as has been said about the nutritive power, so must it be said about the power of growth, because there is no nutrition or growth there; however there can be juxtaposition there, if the angel wishes suddenly to add elements - which can be imperfectly mixed for such imperfect mixture - to his [assumed] body, so that it may seem to grow.

14. And should you say, ‘if eating is not an operation of life, then the argument about Christ’s eating with his disciples - to prove his true resurrection [Luke 24.41-42, Acts 10.40] - is not valid, which is against the saints,’ I reply:

There are many other arguments in the Gospel more efficacious than this one to prove Christ’s resurrection - and this one, along with the others, does well prove it, although not by itself alone. Or I say that Christ’s eating was a true eating, ordered to true nutrition, because it is not unacceptable to me that a glorious body could convert non-glorious body into itself, just as it can exist together with a non-glorious body. Nor is it corruptible for the reason ‘that it can convert another into itself’; for God could make a glorious body in the smallest quantity and grow it through eating, and yet nothing of what was nourished or grown would be corrupted. But in the sort of bodies assumed by angels there is no nutrition or improvement but only addition and juxtaposition.

15. However, as to the generative power, one must say that this happens by virtue of semen, deposited by the father into the woman, in which is preserved the virtue of the father, as is commonly said. If a bad angel can get that semen from another - by being a succubus - and keep it in its natural quality (agreeable to its natural generation) until he transfers it, he himself does nothing there save that he first receives (in the assumed body) what is moved locally by its being deposited, and then he moves this locally to another part where he is an incubus; and if the semen has not lost its natural quality before it is received in the mother, then generation can happen through it just as if it were immediately transferred by the first depositor into the same mother. And in this way is generation attributed, not indeed to a good angel (because far be it from a good angel to mix himself up in such vileness), but to a demon, whom it befits to generate like this -because the same demon, first a succubus and then an incubus, receives the semen transferred by the first depositor and next transfers it into the mother.

II. To the Principal Arguments

16. To the first principal argument [n.2] I say that the heaven is not said to be assumed, because an angel does not assume the heaven for any special assumption or form, and especially that whereby he intends to appear visibly to us; likewise, an angel that moves the heaven moves it perpetually and so does not assume a body temporarily. The ‘assuming’ in question here is appropriated for a body that is moved for a time, and moved for the sake of some effect that will visibly appear to men.

17. To the second [n.3] I say the answer is clear from what has been said [n.9], that an angel assumes a body imperfectly mixed - which indeed the angel himself does not bring into existence by his own power, but he only unites mixable things with each other and in respect of the heaven, in such proportion as such form can be induced through the virtue of the heaven and the mixable things.

18. To the third [n.4], it is plain [nn.10-12] that no act of the vegetative or cognitive power belongs properly to an angel in a body, or even to the body, but only acts of the motive power do; not, to be sure, acts of the organic motive power, of which sort is the motive power of an animate body (because its acts belong to the composite, as do also acts of the cognitive and vegetative powers), but acts of a higher motive power whereby an angel can move from place to place a body that does not disproportionately exceed the angel’s motive power.

Ninth Distinction

Question One. Whether a Superior Angel can illumine an Inferior Angel

1. About the ninth distinction when the Master [Lombard] deals with the orders of angels, I ask, where it pertains to the superior angels to illumine the inferior, whether a superior angel can illumine an inferior one.a

a. a[Interpolation] About the ninth distinction, where the Master deals with the distinction of orders, of gifts, of offices of the angels, a question arises about the illumination of the inferior angels by the superior ones, and this in the multitude of the blessed angels...

2. That he cannot:

To ‘illumine’ means either to cause light or to intensify a caused light. But an angel can do neither. He cannot do the first because to cause light in another angel is only possible through creation (but an angel cannot create, as Damascene says, ch.17); he cannot do the second because ‘a habit is caused by the same thing that intensifies it’ according to the Philosopher Ethics 2.2.1104a27-28.

3. Further, second: all change is between opposites -     therefore everything that is illumined was first dark; but in the blessed angels there is no darkness; therefore etc     .

4. Further, third: a superior angel is a superior light with respect to an inferior; but in bodies a greater light darkens a lesser light or at any rate impedes its effect (as is plain, because during the day the stars are not seen in the presence of the sun); therefore, by similarity, in the issue at hand a superior angel will impede an inferior one from operation - therefore he will not perfect him by illumining him.

Damascene ch.17, 18 [“It is manifest that those who are eminent hand on illumination and knowledge to the inferior.”]

Question Two. Whether one Angel can intellectually speak to a Second

6. Next to this, I ask about the speaking of the angels (because it is similar to the preceding question), namely whether one angel can intellectually speak to a second.

7. That he cannot:

The essence of an angel is more intimate to him than his intellection, and yet, notwithstanding that intimacy, one angel sees the essence of a second;     therefore in vain is speaking made about what was manifest before speaking; therefore etc     .

8. Further, second: if an angel can speak, he can speak thus to one distant as to one nearby (because this belongs to men too, in whom there is a more imperfect power). But the consequent is false for two reasons: first because it would then be necessary first to change the medium and afterwards the angel (for prior to any action on an extreme is action on the medium in between); but this is unacceptable, because nothing is generated in a bodily medium by an intellectual thing, and moreover nothing can be generated in an angel himself by a bodily medium; - second because it would then be necessary for him to speak to all the angels who are equally nearby, and necessary to speak first to a nearer angel than to a more distant one (in the same straight line), both of which seem unacceptable; for it seems he could speak to any of them without speaking to another.

9. Further, third: an angel only understands through innate species; but any angel has these about anything intelligible to him; therefore any angel has any intelligible present to him in the way it can be present to him. Therefore speaking is superfluous.

10. The first proposition [the major, n.9] is proved in many ways:

Because if angels could understand through acquired species, then they would have an agent intellect whereby potential intelligibles could become actually intelligible in them; but this is false, because since their object is of itself actually intelligible, there is no need for the actually intelligible to be made from the potentially intelligible. Likewise, there does not seem to be a possible intellect in them - therefore not an agent intellect either; the proof of the antecedent is that their intellect is not sometimes in act and sometimes in potency to first act.

11. Second, ‘as the angels are disposed to being so are they disposed to operation’ [n.20]; but angels do not depend in being on a body, therefore not in operation either; therefore they do not receive any species from a body. The reason is confirmed because the soul depends in understanding on the body for the reason that it is united to the body, and the reason for its union with the body depends on the fact it receives its perfection from the body.

12. Third, because there is no passage from extreme to extreme save through the middle; but imaginable being is the middle between sensible being and actual intelligible being;     therefore , since an angel cannot have anything in imaginable being (because he does not have phantasms), neither can anything pass from sensible being to intelligible being in an angel. Wherefore etc     .

13. Fourth, because as the celestial bodies are to other bodies, so is the angelic intellect to other intellects; but the celestial bodies have perfection co-created with them and do not acquire it through motion; therefore, by similitude, angelic intellects have their perfections co-created with them.

14. Fifth, because if the angels can have acquired species, then the object outside would act to generate those species - and one needs also to posit that the angelic intellect acts together with it, otherwise the possible intellect of the angel would be cheaper than our intellect;     therefore the two act at the same time to generate the species acquired from some object, namely the two of the intellect and the object. But this is false, because agents diverse in genus cannot produce the same effect; but these two are diverse in genus; therefore etc     . Proof of the major [sc. agents diverse in genus cannot produce the same effect], because either they are required as diverse in genus or they are not; if they are, then there corresponds to them some proportional diversity in the effect (and thus the effect will not be simple and homogeneous but heterogeneous); if they are not, then -without such distinction between them - there could be a power so intense that one of the joint agents would suffice for producing such an action. The proof of this last claim is that where there happens to be a distinction between two movers, the power in one can be so intensified that it can supply the place of the other; therefore the bodily object could be so intensified in its action that it alone could generate the species in the angel’s intellect. But this is false, both because ‘the agent is more excellent than the patient’ according to Augustine On Genesis 12.16 n.33, “Now no body is more excellent than the spirit, therefore no body acts on the spirit,” according to him; and also because this [sc. a bodily object alone generating a species in an angel] does not seem it can be understood more truly of the bodily object’s own agent power than of the agent power of another -therefore the body does not act on the angelic intellect by its own power but by the power of the angel’s intellect. So these joint agents will not be two partial causes of which neither acts by the virtue of the other [Ord. 1 d.3 nn.495-98].

15. Further, the like is known by its like -     therefore a singular would generate a singular species in the angel’s intellect; therefore his intellect, having been made to be like by the species, would know the singular through its proper idea, which is absurd; therefore etc     .

16. The opposite is maintained by Damascene, as above [n.5].

I. To the Second Question

A. The Opinion of Henry of Ghent

17. As to these questions [n.6] there is need first to see about the speaking of the angels.

18. And, passing over a number of opinions, there is one opinion that needs reading out, and here four things need looking at:

Namely, first, how the speaking angel knows the thing he speaks about (which, according to this opinion, is posited as being an individual singular); second, how what is known by one angel escapes another; third, how the thing is plain to the angel when - by speaking it - he expresses it; and fourth about illumination.

1. How the Angel who speaks knows Singulars

19. As to the first point, it is said that an angel knows the singular, not first and not through any proper idea, but through the universal that was co-created with his intellect.

20. The proof is fourfold:

First, thatThe Vatican editors put quotation marks round much of what follows because Scotus is following Henry’s words very closely. ¹³ “‘as each thing is disposed to being, so it is to knowledge’ (Metaphysics 2.1.993b30-31); but the form of a singular adds nothing to the universal save negation; therefore it adds nothing in knowledge either.”

21. Second, because “if an angel did not know the singular under the idea of its universal, then, since there is no other intrinsic reason by which he may know it (because neither the angel’s essence nor his habit is such a reason; for, to begin with, the habit is in respect of the universal), it would follow that the very singular would be presented to the angel’s intellect so as to move it as its first and per se object under the idea of singularity; but this is false, because things that are per se objects and not first do not move save through the idea of objects that are per se and first, in the way that size and figure do not move sight save with color at the same time.” But the singular is not the first object of the intellect, because “nothing is the first object of the intellect save the universal.”a

a. a[Interpolation] The first consequence is plain, because there is no other intrinsic idea whereby the singular may be known; because neither the essence of the angel is such an idea - nor the habit, because the habit is first with respect to the universal.

22. Third, thus: “Every cognitive power must, in apprehending, be determined proportionally to what it has to apprehend. Therefore the intellect, when understanding the singular, is determined proportionally to the determination of this singular - and as to this, either it is determined of its own nature or it is determinable by the species that it receives (namely by the species of the singular). And if in the first way, then the angel’s intellect would be more determined than our intellect is;” nay, in both ways a determination or determinability of the angelic intellect “greater than of our senses” follows, because our senses are not limited or determined of their nature, nor are they determinable by the species that they receive (“for the species of the singular is not received in the sense first but in the organ”). Further, the deduction is drawn that such determination to the singular object would be a certain limitation and impediment “to intellection of the universal, just as it is in the case of the senses,” - and much more in an angel than in the senses, because the sense does not receive the species of the singular [sc. since rather the organ does].

23. Fourth, because “just as through the apprehension of universals from without there is generated in our intellect the habit of science - so in the intellect of an angel, if it knew singulars first, there could be an acquired habit of science besides the science of his own universals, which is against the Philosopher in Metaphysics 7.10.1035b33-6a8 where he maintains that the scientific habit of universals is not other than that of singulars.”

24. As to this first article [n.18], the speaking angel’s mode of knowing the singular is set down thus:

“An angel’s intellect apprehends the form, by its own habit, according to the idea of a universal - but after the supposit has existence in fact or in revelation, the angel’s intellect at once apprehends the form in the supposit under the idea of a universal first and per se with the same apprehension as it apprehended it with before it was participated in by the supposit; and it is an accident of the angelic intellect that it apprehends the form in the supposit, just as it is an accident of the essence of a thing that something included under it is in the supposit. So first and per se the angel’s intellect knows the singular form under the idea of a universal (that is, under an indeterminate, confused, and undesignated idea), but because this very same form - as it is in the thing itself - is determinate and designated, the intellect secondarily understands this designation. And the knowledge of the universal is the same as the knowledge of the singular, save for the addition of a respect and a negation whereby the universal is understood as designated ‘in this’;” “for these [sc. knowledges] do not differ on the part of the thing known nor on the part of the act of knowing, but only in the manner of knowing without designation and knowing with designation, of which the latter adds to the former only the idea of negation, as has been said” [n.20].

25. From this it is plain how “the angelic intellect - as along an extended line -understands the singular.”

First, indeed, “the essence in the habit does not move under the idea of an object but under the idea of something inherent - but it terminates the act of understanding under the idea of something known and not of something inherent;” and so from the object to the habit “there is properly no circumflexion” but as it a were a line extended from point to point. “Next, from the object known in the universal, the intellect proceeds to the universal in the supposit, under the idea of universal, and finally from the object, known in the supposit under the idea of a universal, it proceeds to know the same object under the idea of a singular,” so that there is as it were a straight line from the object in the habit (as from a first point) to the singular (as to the last point) through two intermediate points.

2. How Knowledge of a Singular escapes another Angel

26. From this the second point is clear [n.18], namely how the intellection by this angel about a singular can escape another angel:

For - according to this position - by the same old apprehension, by which he was previously apprehending a quiddity set before him in his habit absolutely, he will now comprehend it “in whatever way it was (existent or revealed [24]), for it cannot escape him in any respect save only because what was conceived before is conceived by him now under a new respect.” An example: “if there were a single intellect one in number in everyone, then, from whoever’s phantasm a universal were abstracted - after the intellect had once abstracted it, and had understood it in him from whom it abstracted it, then if (while that intellect remains in place) it begins to understand it in someone else, it would not perceive a new universal with a new intellect; rather the old universal (that it had first perceived under the old respect) it would now perceive under a new respect, namely in this phantasm.”

27. So it is with the angelic intellect, because, without making some new thing under the universal concept but by renewing the concept - conceiving the universal many times in diverse particulars - this singular and that singular are conceived. And, because this angel sees a singular (which he did not see before) without any newness of concept, therefore “although another angel sees universal forms in the first angel (which are the ideas for knowing particulars), yet this other angel does not see the particulars that the first angel sees, whether they are existent or revealed;” or at any rate, if the second angel could see existent singulars through his own habit and through the universals that shine within him, yet he cannot see revealed ones. Nor even can he see - as the first angel sees - those singulars, because the first angel sees them without any newness of concept.

28. Briefly then, as to this article:

For this reason a singular - understood by one angel - is posited as escaping another angel, that although the intellect of the first angel (and the universal, which is for him the idea of understanding) is plain to him, yet his concept, as it is about the singular, is not plain to the second angel, because the fact that the first angel is using the universal form to conceive the singular produces nothing new in the intellect of the second angel. And if the singular is not existent, the second angel cannot see it - not even the very thing known - through his own habit or the first angel’s habit; but if it is existent and he can see it through his own habit, yet the singular, known or unknown, does not enable him to see the intellectual acts of the first angel. And so there is need of speaking [sc. by the first angel to the second] either because of the singular the first angel knows that escapes the second angel (as when the singular is a non-existing revealed singular) - or because of the first angel’s very act of knowing which escapes the second angel, and this whether the act of knowing is about a revealed singular or a naturally known one.

3. How Knowledge of a Singular is made Clear to Another Angel

29. On the third point [n.18] it is said that “just as we cannot express to another in speech designated singulars known to us save by expressing vague singulars (whatever the properties and accidents they are designated by), so neither can an angel by speaking manifest something to another angel under the same designation under which it was revealed to the first angel; rather he forms for the second angel a new concept - really different - about a vague singular” (which new concept in fact the second angelic intellect sees in the intellect of the first angel as if he were reading in a book), and by this concept the intellect of the seeing or second angel is changed so as to perceive the singular, not only as it is something in itself, but also as it is something in the speaker, as in the case of our own speech. Hence the second angel too “forms in his intellect a like vague concept, under the idea of a universal, about the particular - and hereby he is said to ‘hear’, because ‘to see in another angel’ and ‘to hear’ are the same thing; and, because the second concept is ordered only to indicating a hidden concept of the mind, therefore it is not properly called ‘to understand’ but ‘to speak’, even though it is in itself a sort of understanding.”

4. How One Angel illumines Another

30. On the fourth point [n.18] it is said that a superior angel’s illuming an inferior angel can be understood in four ways, namely: either by pouring in light, or by presenting light, or by removing an obstacle, or by making something by which, when made, light is caused in the receiver. In the first way the sun illumines the medium; in the second way someone carrying a candle illumines a house at night; in the third way someone who opens a window during the day; in the fourth way someone who cures an eye - which sick eye had no capacity for light before and now does - is said to illumine the eye.

31. Now it is said that only God illumines in the first way, and this either by causing natural light, or by impressing supernatural light, whether created light (of grace or glory) or uncreated, either as the reason for seeing or as the object seen (and this whether temporarily as in the enraptured, or permanently as in the blessed). In the second way one angel illumines another about some truth perfective of the intellect by speaking to him in the way stated [n.29]. An angel also illumines in the third way, as is proved from Augustine On the Psalms, psalm 118 sermon 18 n.4, Psalm 118.34, ‘Give me understanding’, when he says, “An angel can do something in a man’s mind so that it has capacity for God, just as someone who makes open a window is said to illumine the house.” In the fourth way too an angel can illumine another, as is proved from Augustine ibid. when he says, “God has made the angel such as to be able to do something whereby the human mind is helped to grasp the light of God.”

32. This is also proved by reason, because “all things are ordered” and “connected with each other” (according to the Philosopher Metaphysics 12.10.1075a16 and Dionysius Divine Names ch.7); and this order is noted not only in essences but also in operations. From this the argument goes: “An inferior angel is, through the natural influence on him of a superior angel, able to be reduced to his natural state and his state of ultimate natural perfection; but his ultimate perfection is through his best work (or in his best work), and the ultimate and most perfect work of an angel is to understand something as a divine work in a way over and above the common course of understanding by light of the natural intellect; therefore by the influence of a superior angel the inferior one is reduced from potency to act, so that he may be illumined in respect of such knowledge.”

B. Rejection of the Opinion

33. Against these views, and first against the first article [nn.19-25].

If ‘as each thing is disposed to being, so it is to knowledge’ (n.20, Metaphysics 2.1.993b30-31), and the singular adds some entity over and above the entity of the universal (from 2 d.3 nn.147, 168-70, 187-88, 192, 197), then the universal when known is not the total perfect reason for knowing the singular according to the total knowability of the singular - which is against him who holds this opinion [nn.24-25].

34. Further, where a plurality entails a greater perfection, a numerical infinity entails an infinite perfection. But so it is in the reasons about representation, because ‘to be apple to represent several things’ entails a greater perfection (for it entails that this single idea includes the perfection of two proper ideas, representative ideas, as I say); therefore being able to represent infinite things distinctly entails that the representing reason is infinitely perfect [2 d.3 nn.367-68, 1 d.2 n.127, d.3 n.352].

35. Further, the representing reason, uniform in itself and in the intellect, does not represent anything in a non-uniform way; nay, neither can the divine ideas - because they are reasons that naturally represent - represent to the divine intellect any diversity in the objects unless they necessarily naturally represent this, as was touched on in 1 d.39 on future contingents [not extant in the Ordinatio but in the Lectura]. Therefore this single idea (which is posited by Henry [nn.19, 24]) will either represent opposites at the same time, opposites pertaining to the existence of things, and this naturally (and then it will always represent opposites, and thus the angel will understand opposites and so nothing) - or it will represent one opposite determinately, and so never the other one. So if an angel at some time has a certain and determinate knowledge of one opposite - as to its existence - through this single idea, he will never through the same idea have a determinate and certain knowledge of the other opposite.

36. Further, fourth, there is particular argument:

An angel cannot, by this habit, know a revealed singular. - For it is posited [by Henry] that the singular is not known through the universal that shines in the habit save because the universal is participated in by the singular itself [n.24]. On this supposition I argue as follows: the singular is naturally known in revelation before the habit is the reason for knowing it; therefore the singular is naturally known distinctly before the habit is the reason for knowing it; therefore the habit is not the reason for the first distinct knowing of the singular - and thus we have the proposed conclusion [sc. set down at the beginning of this paragraph].

37. The proof of the antecedent is from their own statements, because the universal that shines in the habit is not the reason for knowing the singular save because the universal is in the singular, whether it exists in itself or in revelation [n.24]; so the singular naturally has such and such existence - and so naturally has the universal within it (the universal abstracted from it) - before the habit is the reason for knowing the singular.

Proof of the first consequence [n.36]: existence in revelation is nothing but the existence in actuality known by him to whom the revelation is made. For it is not existence in the intellect of the revealer, because this existence is eternal and perpetual; nor is it existence in any existence other than the knowledge of him to whom the revelation is made, because then - by the fact it would exist in such existence - it would be naturally known to anyone else, in the way this opinion posits that anyone can, by his habit, have distinct knowledge of anything existent [nn.27-28].

38. Further, from this position it follows that any existent singular will be naturally known to any other angel [nn.27-28], and so local distance will not impede the intellection of the angel, which is denied by many [including by Scotus himself, 2 d.2 n.205] and seems to be contrary to Augustine in his book On Care for the Dead ch.14 n.17.Here Augustine says, about Luke 16.19-31, that Abraham, because of distance in place, did not know that the rich man had five brothers but had to learn it from Lazarus. ¹⁴

39. Further, the reasons by which he proves that the singular cannot be understood by an angel [nn.20-23] seem to proceed from the view that knowing a singular is a mark of imperfection in the intellect; but this is false, because then the divine intellect would not know the singular. The reasons are also not conclusive, nor should the conclusion be conceded unless necessary reasons lead to it; for it is probable that just as some common sense can sense every sensible, so some created intellect can understand everything per se intelligible - of which sort the singular is.

40. Against the second article [nn.26-28] the argument is as follows:

Henry himself rejects species in blessedness, because one of the blessed would naturally see it in the intellect of a second blessed, and consequently he would naturally see what the species represents. So it is argued in the issue at hand: if the habit is the reason for naturally knowing the singular, then, since a first angel would see the habit naturally in another angel, the object that this other angel would see through this habit could not escape the first angel.

41. Further, when two intelligibles are compared to a same intellect which is not bound to the power of imagination, the more actual and more perfect intelligible - not exceeding the natural faculty of the intellect’s nature - is more intelligible to that intellect; but for Henry, a vague concept, formed in the intellect of the angel who does the speaking, is intelligible to the other angel by its natural power [n.29];     therefore much more intelligible to this other angel is the determinate concept which this vague concept expresses (because a determinate concept is more perfect and more intelligible; and the intellect of any angel whatever has any caused concept whatever for any intelligible not exceeding it, and this intellect is not bound to a phantasm, as is plain; therefore etc     .).

42. Further, third: either there is one act of understanding all singulars or there are different ones. If there is a single same one - and it is naturally of all singulars (for it is of them as it precedes the act of will of the one understanding, because it is through an action of understanding which precedes every commanded intellection and every volition) - then that act cannot be of one singular without being of another singular; just as neither can a natural cause, as far as concerns itself, be cause of one effect (to which it is naturally ordered) and not of another [sc. to which it is also naturally ordered] - and if by one action it is of all effects in general, then it is necessarily of all of them together. So if this act cannot be of all of them together, it cannot - as far as it is natural - be one and the same for all of them, because then it could (as such) be of all of them together. - If there are several acts, then one angel, seeing this and that act to be different in the intellect of the angel speaking to him, can distinctly see which object this act is of and which object that act is of; and thus it will not escape him what singular the speaking angel is considering, because of the identity of the non-varied act in that angel (for that angel will have different acts for considering different singulars).

43. Against the third article [n.29]:

First: it follows that in the intellect of the angel who is speaking there are two concepts about the same thing, one vague that designates and the other determinate that is designated [sc. which is unacceptable]; for it is then determinate when it is the reason for generating the vague designating one.a

a. a[Interpolation] Hence if the determinate conditions of the singular were in the hearer as they are in the speaker, the hearer would express that singular determinately to himself; but so it is in the case of an angel, because the habit he [Henry] posits is in the one angel just as in the other.

44. Further, it seems superfluous to posit this vague concept. For we express a determinate singular, known to us, through a vague singular, because we know we cannot cause a concept in the intellect of him to whom we speak and we know that the universal conditions of a vague particular are known to him; if we could make a distinct concept about what we were speaking about, a determinate singular known to us would not be expressed by a vague particular; therefore since an angel can make a distinct concept of a distinct singular known to him in the intellect of another angel (as will be plain in our solution [nn.49-52, 65]), in vain does Henry posit a vague indeterminate concept.

45. Against the fourth article [nn.30-32]:

First: it does not seem that the disposition for a purely supernatural form could be caused by an angel, because although for a form immediately producible by God (but as cooperating with the common course of nature) some natural cause could make disposition (as with the organic body in respect of the intellective soul) - yet for a form altogether supernatural (that is, without the common course of nature cooperating), that ‘a natural agent produce an immediate disposition’ seems unacceptable.

46. Further, the reason adduced for this article [n.32] would prove that the superior angel made the inferior angel see something revealed in the Word [nn.86-87]; for this is the ultimate perfection of the intellect, to see the Word, much more than to understand some revealed truth beyond the common course of natural intellection.

47. Further, against this whole opinion there are two difficulties:

First, how the speaking angel does not speak to just anyone. For if ‘to speak’ means precisely ‘to express a concept’ (which is seen in him as in a book [n.29]), and if this expressed concept can be seen by anyone equally - then he who expresses it speaks equally to anyone.

48. The other difficulty is how a first angel speaks to a second when he causes nothing in the second but only in himself [n.29]; for there seems no reason for the second to understand more now than before if nothing else comes to be in him. And this seems especially absurd in illumination [n.31], for it is clear that the first angel is illumined immediately by God and when God illumines he makes nothing in himself but the first thing he makes is in the intellect or angel illumined; therefore it is likely thus in the case of other inferiors who illumine, that the one who illumines does not cause anything in himself by the fact he illumines, but that the first thing caused is in the one illumined.

C. Scotus’ own Response

1. On an Angel’s Mode of Speaking

49. To the question then about speaking [n.6] I first reply that an angel speaks to an angel by causing in him immediately a concept of the object he is talking about.

For this I posit two reasons.

a) First Reason

50. The first reason is as follows: every speaker would, if he could, cause a concept immediately in him to whom he is speaking about what he is speaking of; an angel can do this in respect of a second angel;     therefore etc     .

51. Proof of the major, because a speaker intends principally to express his concept to the intellect he is speaking to; but every natural agent would, if it could, at once introduce what it principally intends.

52. Proof of the minor: that which is sufficiently in first act with respect to some effect can cause that effect in something receptive that is proportioned to it and nearby; but an angel, possessing actual knowledge of some object - let it be a - , is sufficiently in first act for causing actual intellection of a; therefore it can cause that effect in any intellect that is receptive of the effect. Now the intellect of a second angel, which does not conceive a distinctly, is receptive; therefore the first angel can cause in this intellect knowledge of the object. - Proof of the major here, because the first extremes of an active and passive proportion are the most universal ones (being abstracted from any active and any passive extreme), because the proportion is present in the particulars under each extreme by its common idea and therefore is present in the extremes. Proof of the minor here: an angel has in himself the act of knowing a and has the species (whatever species be posited as necessary for knowledge), and through what he has he can make his understanding to be in a second act by causing in himself intellection of a as an effect; so it follows that he can cause this in a second angel’s intellect, a passive one (which is of the same nature as his own intellect).

53. An instance against this reason [n.50] is that it is not conclusive save about two angels absolutely taken - because if they are distant from each other, the distance will be an impediment because of one’s not being able to act on the other; for a distant thing cannot act on a distant thing unless it first act on the medium between them; but the medium cannot receive the speaking of an angel nor can it hear an angel speaking;     therefore etc     . [Lectura 2 d.9 n.52].

54. There is confirmation from the Philosopher in On the Soul 2.7.419a15-20, where he maintains that if there were a vacuum nothing would be seen, because the visible species cannot reach the eye; hence the Philosopher maintains Physics 7.2.243a3-6 that ‘mover and moved are simultaneous’, and this when speaking of what is immediately moved, which must be moved by the mover before the thing mediately moved is moved.

55. To exclude these objections I show first that a distant angel can cause a concept in a distant angel: for if the action on the medium not be prior in nature to the action on the term, the action on the term would not depend on the action on the medium (the point is clear from the idea of natural priority, because a sufficient cause of two things - neither of which is naturally prior to the other - can cause either without the other); but in the issue at hand there is no such priority; therefore an angel can act on a distant term while not acting at all on the medium.

56. Proof of the minor. Action on the medium only naturally precedes action on the term for two reasons: either because the action is of the same nature on the medium as on the term, and then the action is naturally received in the medium first, just as the nearer passive thing is naturally affected before the more remote one; or because, if the action is not of the same nature, the agent has two active forms (or a same form that includes virtually two active forms), one of which is naturally prior to the other, and the agent is of a nature to act on the medium according to the form that is active first and to act on the term according to the other form. An example of the first is when the sun illumines the parts of the medium [sc. the air]; an example of the second is when the sun generates minerals in the bowels of the earth [1 d.37 n.4] or generates a worm in the earth, and illumines the interposed medium. - Therefore, when each of these causes is excluded (namely that neither is the medium receptive of the same action as the term, nor does the agent have another active form really or virtually by which it is of a nature to act on the medium with an action of a nature other than the action on the term), then in no way does action on the medium precede the natural action on the term. And so it is in the issue at hand; for the corporeal distance, which is between the distant angels, is of a nature to receive neither an action of the same nature as the distant and listening angel, nor another action of a different nature prior to it, because the speaking angel has a form neither virtually nor formally active for an action prior to the action which is his speaking.

57. This point is confirmed in three ways:

First, by positing an impossibility, namely that were God not everywhere in his essence, he would yet be omnipotent (according to what was said above in 1 d.37 nn.7-8), and he could immediately cause anything anywhere (although he were not present there by his essence); and yet he would not act on the medium by an action of the same nature nor of another nature, because the thing caused would come from him immediately.

58. Second, if this impossible position be not admitted, since the idea is manifest as impossible - the conclusion is sufficiently obtained because the sun immediately causes a worm (or some other generable and corruptible substance), and yet it does not act on the medium with an action of that nature (namely, of generation), nor with an action of another nature, save because the sun has another active form (namely a quality, light) whereby it is of a nature to act in some way before it acts through its substantial form, just as alteration precedes generation.

59. Third, if this is not conceded, it is plain that every natural generator generates a natural body (not a surface merely), and yet it is not present immediately save by its surface, and it acts on the surface of the thing generated; therefore a generator acts where it is not either by essence or by mathematical contact; yet it is there [sc. beneath the surface] by virtual contact and this suffices for action, just as if it were present by essence or mathematically. And that a thing act first on the medium between itself and what it is thus present to is not absolutely required for it to act on what it is thus present to, but just because the medium has a capacity for an action of the same nature as the term.

60. A more apt example for the issue at hand, after these three, is about the act of knowing, because the intuitive knowledge of sight is not of the same nature in the medium as in the organ [sc. because then the medium itself would see; 1 d.3 nn.471-472, Rep. IIA d.9 q.3] - and if an action happen in the organ of another nature than in the medium, vision is what happens to sight, insofar as it is an effect of the visible thing, by the fact that the visible thing is of a nature to generate both the species [sc. in the medium] and vision [sc. in the organ] as two ordered effects. Therefore, this remote receptive thing [sc. the organ as receptive of vision] receives something of which nothing of the same nature is received in the medium; but a received thing of another nature is received in the medium, and this is what happens to it, because the thing received in the medium is not the cause of the thing received in the term [the organ], but is as it were a prior effect, when comparing both effects to the same cause.

61. Hereby is the response plain to the instance from On the Soul [n.54], namely that nothing would be seen unless there were a medium; not that it is per se of the idea of visible color to cause something in the medium so that it may be seen, but that vision and the species of the visible thing are ordered effects of the same object (of the color), such that the species is of a nature to be generated before vision is (as first act before second act), and the species is in a nearer medium or organ before it is in a remoter medium or organ, just as in fact in general a form of the same idea is caused in a nearer thing before it is caused in a remoter one [1 d.3 nn.239, 254-55, 388-90, 473, 504-505, 2 d.3 n.295].

62. And by the same fact the response is plain to the quote from the Physics [n.54], for the agent is immediate to the proximate passive thing, and this by an immediacy corresponding to mathematical contact, when the medium is receptive of an action of the same nature (or of another nature, with respect to which the agent has the form [n.56]) -or by an immediacy corresponding to virtual contact, because the agent is present to the distant thing mathematically (so as to cause the effect in it) just as if it were present to it in its essence [n.59]; and in this way ‘to be present in essence’ is thus not that its power is there but that it is able by its power to cause the effect as if it were there, although neither it nor its power is there.

63. But there is an objection against this, that then local distance will not impede the speaking of an angel; for if a distant angel may immediately cause illumination in another distant angel, while causing nothing in the medium, that medium will be for it -in its action - as if it were no distance; for, as far as its action is concerned, it will be just as if the two angels were immediate to each other. Therefore the result will thus be that local distance will not impede the speaking of an angel.

64. I reply that between agent and patient there can be a mathematical distance in three ways. [No response to the objection given here; see Lectura 2 d.9 nn.60-63].

b) Second Reason

65. Second principally, for the solution [n.49], I argue thus: an inferior angel knows himself intuitively by essence (as is plain above, 2 d.3 nn.269-71), therefore a superior angel too knows the inferior intuitively by essence (proof of the consequence, that every object knowable by an inferior can be knowable by a superior with equal or more perfection; but no abstractive knowledge of any object is more perfect than intuitive knowledge, because abstractive knowledge through a species can be about something not existent and not present in itself, and thus such knowledge does not know it nor reach it most perfectly [n.98, 2 d.3 nn.318-323, 392]); and it is not necessary that angels be immediate to each other locally for a superior angel to know intuitively an inferior one; therefore, given that they are distant locally, the superior will intuitively know the inferior. But this knowledge is not through any species or habit that could be present in something not existent; therefore it comes about in the angel intuiting that intuitive knowledge, and yet the known essence does not generate in the medium anything of the same idea - or of another idea - , because the medium is not capable of intellection nor of a species purely intelligible [nn.56, 60-61]; therefore, by similarity, if something actually intelligible is posited in an angel, something of a nature to generate some knowledge (though not intuitive) in a passive or receptive intellect, then that something actually intelligible can generate actual knowledge in the intellect of a distant angel without generating anything in the medium.a

a. a[Interpolation] (in place of ‘in the intellects medium’) but the intellect of a distant angel is receptive of such knowledge; therefore that something intelligible in act, existing in the intellect of an angel, can cause actual knowledge of itself in the intellect of a distant angel.

2. Further Clarification of the Question

66. For further clarification of the proposed position [n.49] two things remain to be seen: first, what is generated in the intellect of the hearing angel by the speaking angel - second, how an angel can speak to one angel and not another if both are equally present.

a) What is caused in the Intellect of the Hearing Angel

67. On the first point [n.66] I say that the speaking angel can then cause the act only (such that he does not cause the species), and can cause the act and the species together, and can cause the species only.

68. Proof of the first claim [n.67]: the speaking can be about something habitually known to the hearing angel, because just as we can speak imperfectly about what we would perfectly know by communicating our concepts to others (although we would know that others know those same concepts), so it seems possible in the case of angels that the speaking is about what is habitually known to both; but then no species is generated by the speaking angel other than the one that is had by the hearing angel (because then there would be two species in the same angel with respect to the same object) - nor even is the already possessed species intensified, because we may posit that the already possessed species is most perfect.

69. Likewise, the speakings - for the most part - are about propositions pertaining to the actual existence of things; now such propositions are not evident from the terms; therefore, although someone may have the species of the extremes, not for this reason is his intellect capable of some propositional intellection (or knowledge) about those extremes, namely one that is determinately to one side of the contradiction (as about the thing’s existence or non-existence). There can in that case be caused some act of knowing such a proposition without the causing of any species.

70. I prove the second [n.67] because if the hearing angel does not have the species of the singular about which the speaking angel is speaking, his intellect is receptive both of the species and of the act and lacks both - and the intellect of the speaking angel is in first act, sufficient for generating both; this is plain about the species, because an intelligible species can generate an intelligible species of the same nature, just as also the species of a sensible thing in the medium can generate a sensible species of the same nature; it is likewise plain about the act, because the species that in the speaker is the principle of knowing what it is the species can also be the reason for generating actual intellection of the same object in another intellect capable of it.

71. I prove the third [n.67] because a lesser active virtue cannot hinder a greater virtue from its action; therefore if the greater considers something in its proper genus, for instance a, the inferior - wanting to speak to him about b - will not be able to impede his actual intellection; so he will not then cause actual intellection of b, because there cannot be two in the superior angel. But the inferior angel will cause something, as far as he will be able, because he wants to communicate something to another as far as he can; therefore he will cause a species of b, if it is not already possessed in the superior angel’s intellect.

72. Also from the same major as before [sc. that a lesser virtue cannot hinder a greater virtue, n.71] and from this minor, namely that ‘a superior and an inferior can together speak to the same angel’, it follows that the superior will make that same angel understand what he himself is speaking about but the inferior will not, though he will make something compossible with that intellection, namely the species of what he himself wishes to speak about.

73. In these two cases [nn.71-72] the speaking angel can generate a species such that he cannot generate then an act; given too that there is nothing on the part of the hearer to prevent him being able to receive both (the species and the act), the speaker -from the fact he wants to cause (as will be said later [n.177]) - can cause one [the species] and not the other [the act] (namely causing the first but not the second), because the two need not always accompany each other.

74. And in this last member [n.67, 71-73] the speaker speaks and yet the hearer does not perfectly hear, because hearing is an intellection of the intelligible thing expressed by the speaker; it is just as if a man were to speak to a man distracted by study, whose ear would receive the species of sound and yet he would not hear (that is, he would not conceive it distinctly under the idea of sign), and he would not have an understanding of what was expressed; rather only the species of the sound would generate in his memory or imagination some residual species, and he would be able later - recovering from the distraction - to consider what it was a sign of; and so the preceding speech would be an occasion for him of understanding, although he had earlier heard nothing distinctly through it. However, in the other two members [nn.67-70], where actual intellection is expressed by the speaker when he says something, the hearer hears.

75. But what sort of understanding is this act called ‘hearing’?

I reply:

An angel can understand an object a in four ways (besides seeing it in the Word [2 d.3 nn.328-330]), namely intuitively in itself, intuitively in the intellect of another angel that knows it, abstractively through an habitual species (co-created or acquired), and none of these intellections is hearing, because none of them is per se expressed by someone understanding qua understanding - rather it is accidental to the first angel that the one understanding is understanding (for he would remain just the same if the one understanding were not understanding); and in these three ways, if some intellect causes something, it is the intellect of the one understanding (and not of someone else), and the object concurs there with the object as partial cause, as was said before [1 d.3 nn.486-94]. In the fourth way an angel can understand a such that the intellection is brought about in him through another ‘expressing’ intellect, and the first angel’s intellect has no causality with respect to this act but is passive only; this knowing alone is hearing, and it is expressed by the one understanding insofar as he is understanding.

76. The difference is plain, then, between hearing and the other three ways of knowing (which ways can generally be called ‘seeing’), because in the case of hearing the intellect of the hearer is as it were passive, and whatever is in it, as that it has an habitual species of what is heard - that species too does not act on the hearing; also, whatever is present there does nothing for the hearing, for if the same singular were intuitively present to the hearer as is present to the speaker, it would not - as present to the hearer - generate hearing but would only generate vision in him. Therefore only the intellect of the speaker or the things that are in it as it, or that are present to it as it, are active with respect to hearing; and they are so with respect to hearing as to a proximate effect, for they first cause, as present to the speaker, actual intellection in the speaker before they cause hearing in the hearer.

77. And from this is plain how the will of the speaker makes for this speaking, because as the will, after the first intellection, makes for the union of memory and intelligence for any second act that needs to be had in the angel whose will it is, so it can make for the later act to be had in the hearing angel; for if the prior effect, without which the posterior one is not caused, is in the power of someone, then if the prior is not, neither will the posterior be.

78. And from this something else is also apparent, namely how the actual intellection in the speaking angel is not the reason for him of his acting insofar as he speaks, but something pertaining to the speaker’s memory is - because in ordered effects of the same nature, as it were, one of which is of a nature to be generated by an equivocal cause, the prior effect need not be the cause of the posterior effect but each can be caused by the same equivocal cause; and this is specifically the case in the issue at hand, because actual intellection does not have the idea of being parent so much as the memory does (hence the Father in divine reality does not generate by intelligence [but by memory, I d.2 nn.221, 291]).

79. Evident also, third, is what the order is of hearing to the intellection that is ‘vision’ [n.76]. For although vision in Michael - whether of the object or of the intellection of the object - could be followed by Gabriel’s speaking about the same thing, yet Gabriel does not then cause knowledge of anything not already known [sc. by Michael]. Nor is speaking as necessary then as when Gabriel’s speaking precedes either vision [sc. of Michael]; for when Gabriel knows something in its proper genus or as revealed, which Michael does not know in particular, he can cause a concept in Michael’s intellect which may properly be called hearing - and when it has been caused, Michael can turn himself to see Gabriel’s intellect, and therein will be seen the intellection that Gabriel has, and in that intellection too will in some way be seen the object of Gabriel’s intellection; and if that object cannot be seen further (neither in itself nor in the Word), then it [sc. Gabriel’s intellection] is the ultimate perfection that Michael can have of the known object, namely to see it in Gabriel’s intellect. Thus, therefore, insofar as hearing is ordered to having knowledge of something unknown, it precedes all vision, both of the thing in itself in the intellect of the other who sees it, and of the thing through its habitual species - and this triple vision was said to be distinct from hearing [n.75].

80. Hearing is also said to differ from all vision as far as certitude is concerned -and this difference can perhaps be inferred from the idea of ordered effects, of which the posterior [sc. hearing] is more imperfect etc.The Vatican editors quote from Rep IIA d.9 q.1-2: “There is a difference in certitude, because certitude is greater when something is caused by itself than when it is caused by another, because certitude when something is heard from another is no greater than is the believability of the speaker; but proper vision is greater, just as I believe more when I see a man in church than if someone tells me this... For vision is caused in the seer before speaking in the speaker, such that hearing follows vision - not as an effect follows its cause but as two ordered effects do, one of which (as vision) is more immediate to the cause.” They also quote from Lectura 2 d.9 n.81: “But when one angel hears from another angel and gets from him knowledge of some proposition (because he does not speak about a simple concept but about some true proposition), he does not then have evident knowledge but believes the speaking angel who causes the knowledge, because the speaking angel precisely has the act and the conception about some proposition (as that the Son of God is incarnated); however he [sc. the hearing angel] has the certitude of believability, because he knows that he who is speaking is truthful - and this is only the knowledge of faith.” ¹⁵

b) How an Angel speaks to One Angel and not to Another

81. On the second principal point, namely how an angel can speak to one angel and not to another [n.66], I say that just as it is in the power of an angel - as concerns the first intellection - to use this species or that in the memory for actual intellection of this object or that, so, if he had several intelligences, he would have it in his power to generate knowledge in this intelligence or in that; for what is naturally passive is not more determined to undergoing than what is naturally active is to acting. So just as the active power that is of itself subject to the will can of itself act and not act (because of the will’s command to act and not to act), so it can be determined to act on this passive thing and not on that; and just as a determination would be made for intelligences intrinsic to an angel, if there were several intelligences in it, so a determination could be made for this or that extrinsic intellect, which intellects - to this extent - are passive in the same way as the intrinsic ones are passive, in that the intrinsic active power would act by command of the will.

82. Further, there follows a corollary from this, that there are as many speakings as there are hearings - because however many angels be present (or whether one of them is nearer and one further away), then, just as memory would not generate [sc. actual intellection] in Michael save by command of his will, so neither does memory generate it in the intellect of one angel and not of another save by determination of the will of the speaking angel.

83. But then a doubt arises about how many angels one angel can speak to at once, because a natural agent cannot have at the same time any number whatever of adequate effects - and so one act of generating is not sufficient for many angels to hear, because one act of generating is of one intellection in one angel, which intellection that angel alone hears.No response to this doubt is found in the Ordinatio, or in the Reportatio or the Lectura. ¹⁶

II. To the First Question

84. To the other question, about illumination [n.1], I say that illumination in an angel is a sort of speaking about a truth that is perfective in second existence; for just as not every intellection is simply the perfection of the angelic intellect but the vision of the Word is, and not the vision of quiddities (whether through habitual species or intuitively), so not every knowledge of singulars - knowledge other than vision of the Word and knowledge of quiddities - equally perfects the angelic intellect in a secondary way as it were; but vision of a revealed truth perfects it in second existence, while knowledge of a singular in its proper genus does not so perfect it.

85. I say then that a superior angel, to whom some particular is in the common course first revealed, causes a certain concept in an inferior angel - a concept about the thing revealed - which is called ‘hearing’; and this causing, which is a sort of spiritual speaking, is illumining. It also seems probable that the illumining angel causes something in the angel illumined and not in himself, because God too - illumining the first angel -causes nothing in himself but in the angel illumined [n.48].

86. But there is a doubt whether a superior angel can make an inferior see anything in the Word [n.46] - and whether an inferior angel can illumine a superior (it seems that he can, if something is first revealed to him).

87. To the first it seems that just as knowledge of the Word is purely supernatural, such that it is not subject to the causality of any created cause, so neither is the vision of anything in the Word thus subject. Yet a superior angel, when illumining an inferior in the way stated [n.85], can act dispositively so that the inferior see something in the Word; for the hearing makes disposition that the hearer turn himself to the intellect of the speaker and see there what the speaker is speaking about (and this seeing is in some way more perfect than the hearing); and makes disposition further that the inferior angel, seeing something in the superior angel, see the same in the Word, because, if he desires to see in a perfect mirror what he sees in the superior angel as in an imperfect mirror, he will see it, rejoicing, and then he is perfectly illumined (perfectively by the Word indeed and dispositively by the superior angel).

88. To the second doubt [n.86] I say that God, of his absolute power, could reveal something to an inferior angel that was not revealed or known to a superior, and then the inferior could in some way speak to the superior about what the superior does not know -and this speaking would in some way be illumination; but he could not have as much efficient power over the intellect of a superior as the superior has over the intellect of an inferior, and so he could not necessarily make the superior hear (the way it works the other way around), because if the superior were considering something in its proper genus, the inferior would not make him hear simply [n.71] (but the superior can make an inferior hear simply, and can prevent his understanding some intelligible thing). In fact, however, it is likely that God distributes his illuminations in ordered fashion (just as he distributes the angels in their orders), first to the superior indeed, and then to the inferior.

III. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question

89. To the principal arguments.

To the first [n.2] I say that an angel can cause the hearing, that is, perfect vision in second existence. And when you say ‘therefore he will create’, it does not follow, as will be plain in the question on seminal reasons;Not in the Ordinatio but the Lectura 2 d.9 n.92, d.18 nn.66, 70-72. ¹⁷ for creation is an action with no concurrent cause of any genus but only with the first efficient and first final cause, and nothing such is an action of a creature.

90. To the second [n.3] I say that vision of the Word is the most perfect perfection, and therefore the intellect - when possessing it - is said to be perfectly luminous (or illumined), however much it may not have the knowledge which, with respect to vision of the Word, is said to be as darkness to light; and therefore neither is the lack of any other intellection said, in one who has the vision of the Word, to make his intellect dark. Yet it can be conceded that just as the blessed angels are in potency to something which is light, so they are in potency to something which is dark.

91. To the third, which is taken from corporeal light [n.4] - it is in a certain respect false; for the sun does not prevent the other stars from multiplying their rays to the surface of the earth; the point is plain because if someone were in a deep well he would see the stars at middayVatican editors: A point made by Pliny Natural History 2.14 and Roger Bacon Multiplication of Species 2.2. ¹⁸ (for their rays would not reach his eyes if they did not first reach the surface of the illumined medium [sc. the air]). However the sun itself prevents the lesser lights from any action (namely from the action they would have on sight), because the lesser lights cannot be seen in the presence of the sun; and the reason is that the presence of an excelling visible acts excellingly on sight, so as to activate it in its total capacity (and perhaps it afflicts sight in some way with pain), as Alhazes says Optica 1.5 n.32. But as to this, “it is not the same with intellectual light in respect of the intelligible (as is plain from the Philosopher On the Soul 3.4.429a29-b4), for after excelling intelligibles we understand other ones not less but more, while after excelling sensibles we sense other ones less,” because the power or the organ is weakened.

IV. To the Principal Arguments of the Second Question

92. To the arguments of the second question.

To the first [n.7]. Although some say that ‘an angel can by an act of will hide his intellection and not hide it’ (and this ‘not hiding’ is a speaking), yet there does not seem any reason that something actually intelligible should be present to a passive intellect and not be able to affect it; nor does there seem a greater reason that an angel could through his will more hide his intellection than his essence. Also, why can the other angel, from whom he wills to hide his intellection, not see that volition? If one posits that the volition is hidden too, then it would be hidden by another volition, and so on ad infinitum. - And therefore, if one concedes that the knowledge of this angel is open to another, just as is his essence, but his speaking cannot be - the speaking by which this knowledge (or known thing) is expressed - yet this is not for the reason that, without such expression, it could not be seen, but because, without the expression, it would not be known by the knowledge that is hearing; and also often, without previous hearing, there would not be vision of this cognition.

93. And if you say that at any rate in that case it could be vain to speak about that by which, without speaking, the thing he wants to speak about is manifest [n.7], I say that although an angel may see another angel’s intellection before he hears from him, yet the hearing would not be vain, because it would be ‘a per se perfection’ communicated liberally to the angel (by the other angel); and it is for this most of all that speaking exists among intellectual beings, that they may liberally and freely communicate their concepts to each other. But if the knowledge of this concept is seen in this angel [sc. without this angel speaking it], then this angel does not liberally communicate his concept to another; for he is disposed in this seeing [sc. the seeing of him by the other angel] as someone not understanding and not willing, because his knowledge is naturally visible (and what is naturally active - and what naturally moves when seen - would act in the same way even were it not in someone understanding and willing). Likewise hearing too, when it precedes, stimulates to seeing the intellection of the speaking angel - such that, although the vision could exist without the stimulation, yet it does not exist without it.

94. There is also a confirmation of the fact that speaking is not posited here in vain [n.93], because the angels are conceded to speak to God, and yet they cannot make anything more manifest to him than it was before, nor even manifest in another way to him than it was before (which are however possible in the case of an angel), but they can will from liberality alone to make this plain to God (they desire everything as much as they can, so that if they could cause a concept in him they would cause it [n.71]) - and this is speaking to God. So the speaking [sc. of angel to angel] is more necessary.

95. To the second argument it is plain from what has been said how one angel can speak to another distant angel while doing nothing to the medium [nn.55-60] - and how he can speak to one and not another, whether this other is nearer or further away [nn.81-82].

96. To the third [n.9] I say that although it is most true that God has communicated to an angel the species of all quiddities, yet, if those species had not been communicated (or co-created), it would not be unacceptable for an angel to acquire them, because what is a matter of perfection in an inferior intellect is not to be denied to a superior and more perfect intellect; but it is a matter of perfection in our intellect that it has something whereby it can actively acquire the species of all quiddities, so that, although ‘to be able to receive such species’ is a mark of imperfection, yet ‘to be able actively to acquire them’ is a mark of perfection (making up for the imperfection), such as commonly are all the perfections of creatures.

97. Likewise too, given that God has co-created the species of the quiddities, yet one need not say that he co-created the species of all singulars intelligible to an angel; for it is not likely that a singular would be able to come to be of which an angel could not have a distinct knowledge - and yet if the world were to last to infinity (as is possible), there would be an infinity of singulars, each of which an angel could distinctly know, and yet he would not have infinite co-created species at the same time; therefore he could acquire the species of something de novo.

98. Given also that God co-created with the angel’s intellect the species both of singulars and of future quiddities, yet the angel cannot have through them all the knowledge possible to him - because he does not have intuitive knowledge; for this cannot be had through the species of an object that can remain while the object is absent; for this is contrary to the idea of intuitive knowledge, that it be of a thing not actually existent and not present to hand (2 d.3 nn.318-323). So let the assumed proposition be denied, that ‘an angel can know nothing save through innate species’ [n.9].

99. And given, fourth, that this assumed proposition were true, there could still be a speaking about propositions whose terms an angel has innate species of, because those species of the terms would not be a sufficient cause of knowing a contingently true proposition about those terms, because a contingent proposition is not known to be true from the terms [n.69, d.11 n.15].

100. To the adduced proofs that an angel cannot have acquired species [nn.10-15]

I reply:

To the first [n.10], that he has an agent intellect and a possible intellect.

101. And when argument is made against this as concerns the agent intellect [n.10], I say that an angel’s first (that is, adequate) object is not his essence, but the whole of being, comprehending under itself intelligible and sensible species. Now although his essence is actually intelligible yet a singular sensible is not, when we are speaking of what is intelligible by abstractive intellection of the sort that the universal is known by.

102. Also, when argument is made against this as concerns the possible intellect, because an angel’s intellect is not in potency to first act [n.10] - I say that even if a surface were created along with whiteness, it would no less be of itself receptive of whiteness, because a receptive potency need not precede in duration, but only in nature, the act for which it is in potency. Thus the intellect of an angel, although it were created along with all the species of intelligible things, would yet truly be possible and of itself in potency to first act even if it never preceded first act in duration; neither too would the possible intellect be denied in us if it had been created along with all intelligible species, because simultaneity in duration does not take away the idea of its passivity.

103. The same way too on the other side [sc. about the agent intellect]. Given that an angel would not need to abstract any species (if he had all such species co-created with him), he would no less have the power of abstracting, because active potency - which is a mark of perfection in an inferior nature - should not be denied to a superior nature [n.96], although the superior cause [sc. God, by co-creating species] prevented the action of the active power of the inferior cause; just as the agent intellect should not be denied in us such that our agent intellect could not have any act of abstracting - not because of its own nature, but because it was prevented by another superior agent which produced the effect that could be produced by our agent intellect.

104. To the second [n.11]. If the argument is made in uniform way, I concede the whole of it; for an angel is without a body that may be a part of it or an organ of it in operating - and so conclude that it does not depend on a body as on a part or organ as to what it operates on. But it does not follow that it does not depend on a body as on an object; for every passive intellect that is unable to have in itself the whole perfection of the object depends on the object about which it operates, and proportionally according to the proportion of the object.

105. And as to what is said about the union of the soul [n.11], I say that the soul is united not only so that it may operate about the body as an object, but is also united so that the whole composite of which it is a part might exist - such that the whole operating thing has the body not only for object but for part of the operator; but it is not so with an angel.

106. To the third [n.12] I say that it would prove that God could not understand the singular, because he cannot have an object in that middle, namely in the imaginable; therefore I say that a middle that is a middle for an inferior agent is not a middle for a more perfect agent. And as was said in the questions on the motion of an angel [2 d.2 nn.428-31, 515], although succession in the middle is possible, yet there is no actual succession save by reference to a limited power, for which the middle is what is of itself a middle between extremes and cannot make the movable to be simultaneously in the middle and at the extreme, or to be at once at the extreme as if there were no middle; but it is otherwise with infinite power. Likewise, if an imperfect heat had to proceed through many degrees up to degree a, then all those degrees would, for a perfect heat, not be in between, because it would at once begin from a itself; thus I say that a more perfect agent intellect can cause at once from a sensible object an intelligible species (in which species the thing would have being as actually intelligible), but a more imperfect virtue can require imaginable being as an intermediate disposition for intelligible being.

107. One can reply otherwise by saying that imaginable being is not a middle in the present case but an extreme - because the two extremes are these: ‘non-intelligible in act’ and ‘intelligible in act’. And though the extreme that is ‘non-intelligible in act’ could have many extremes (for example, sensible being, imaginable being), yet it is matter of accident in which of the extremes this extreme [sc. non-intelligible in act] is, because all of them have this extreme; and from this extreme, as it is in one of the many extremes, there can be some power of acting for the other extreme [sc. intelligible in act] - but this extreme [sc. non-intelligible in act], as it exists in another supposit, requires other things as well so as to act on the other extreme [sc. intelligible in act].a

a. a[Interpolation] [it is a matter of accident] that this extreme is in something that has all those extremes; for some power from this extreme can act immediately for the other extreme, but some power cannot.

108. To the fourth [n.13] I say that the symmetry about the celestial bodies is not conclusive; for if those qualities [sc. those that constitute the perfection of celestial bodies) were not co-created with the celestial body, there is nothing given that body whereby it could acquire those qualities - and thus it would always be non-perfect in reference to itself and to every natural cause, because no natural cause can produce those qualities in that body; but in general, any perfection that nature cannot supply is supplied immediately by God. But it is not so in the issue at hand, because an angel has that whereby (along with the cooperation of its other natural powers) it may act and be able to acquire such perfection - namely the species of all things - , given that they were not cocreated with it; for his intellect can from its natural virtue have intellection of any object whatever, and from these two [sc. intellect and object] as from partial causes, that is, by the action of the intellect and the object, he can have the species of the quiddity of any object whatever, and can afterwards use the species for abstractive intellection.

109. And when it is next argued that ‘then the object would act on the intellect of an angel’ [n.14] - I concede that it truly does, along with the intellect of the angel.

110. And when it is supposed that ‘two things of diverse genus cannot be cause of one effects’ [n.14] - I say that this is universally false; for an essential order is not of individuals of the same species (the thing is plain from Avicenna Metaphysics 6 ch.3); for individuals of the same species are not ordered to each other, therefore there is no essential order of the sort either [2 d.3 nn.13, 15]. Nor is there an essential order of individuals of diverse most specialized species; for of such kind are contraries and the means [sc. between them], which are not essentially ordered for causing the same thing.     Therefore all diverse efficient causes, which are essentially ordered, are diverse in genus.

111. And when the division is proved that ‘either they are required insofar as they are other in genus or insofar as they are the same in genus’ etc     . [n.14] - I say that either member of the division may be granted, because of the argument made against him [sc. against the proponent of this division, which argument now follows, nn.111-112].

For if it be said that they are required insofar as they are other in genus, then it cannot but follow that the effect is homogeneous; for the most simple effect can be caused by essentially ordered causes that differ in genus, from what was said [n.110]; this is plain in the case of heat, which is generated by the celestial body and by fire or by substance and quality, the first two of which [sc. celestial body and fire] differ in physical genus, and the second two [sc. substance and quality] differ in genus of category - and yet the effect is simple, not composed of things diverse in genus. Or as follows: it is universally false that effects ordered in the cause require two natures in the effect, one of which is caused by a superior and the other by an inferior cause; for then they would not be effects ‘ordered’ in respect of the one cause or in respect of the other, for this effect would be immediately caused by one cause and that effect would be immediately caused by the other cause.

112. But if the other member is granted [n.111], that the causes are not required insofar as they are other in genus - it does not follow that then one cause alone could be intensified so as to suffice for acting; for some perfection of causality in both is required (although they do not have to be other in genus), and this perfection could not be in one of them however intensified it is, and so the effects of both could not be in it either.

113. But setting aside the consequences here (which are not valid for establishing the truth), I say that agents diverse in genus are not per se required insofar as they are diverse in genus by an absolute diversity. Two causalities are, however, required well enough for intellection (one of which causalities is on the part of the intellect and the other on the part of the object), but sometimes the two causalities can come together in one nature, as when the intellect understands itself; for one of these causalities is common to the whole of being (namely that on the part of the object), but the other is determined to a determinate nature (namely to intellectual nature), and thus, in the case of intellectual nature, the common causality comes together with the special one; these causalities are not then per se required for causing insofar as they are diverse in genus by an absolute diversity. And I concede (not because of the argument in itself) that, in truth, each causality can come together in the same thing; for where there is the entity that the causality of the object follows and the entity that the causality of the intellect follows, the same thing can - according to the same causality - be the total cause with respect to intellection [n.75, 2 d.3 n.70, 1 d.3 nn.486-494].

114. But if an objection is still made that although things diverse in genus can cause the same thing, yet not things as diverse in genus as the intelligible and sensible; or at any rate, they cannot so cause without at least one acting in virtue of the other - and thus either the object would act in virtue of the intellect or conversely, and they will not be two causes acting for the effect equally.

115. I reply that if the argument is taken from the idea of diversity in genus and applied to the intelligible and the sensible [n.114], as if it were more conclusive here than in other things, then there is a departure from the middle term. So from this the argument is that there is not a greater diversity here than in other things; for substance and accident (which are diverse most general genera) are more diverse than are sensible and intelligible substance (which belong to the same most general genus); for substance and accident can be agent causes with respect to the same effect (as with respect to simple heat [n.111]).

116. And in the issue at hand too I say that for an action that is consequent to every being, the sensible must operate just as also the intelligible (for the sensible is some sort of being); but the affecting of the intellect is such an action, and therefore the difference in genus that the sensible has from the intelligible is accidental to the sensible insofar as the sensible happens to affect the intellect, because this does not belong to the sensible insofar as it is non-intelligible but would belong to it if it were intelligible. Nor can anything so differ in genus from the intelligible as if it were in a disparate genus, because any being whatever, however much it is a sensible, is yet an intelligible; for whatever an inferior power can do per se and first, that a superior power can do per se and first.

117. When therefore it is said that ‘things diverse in genus, as are the sensible and the intelligible, cannot cause the same thing nor come together for the same action’ [n.114] - this is false of the action where the sensible is a sort of intelligible.

118. And when you add that ‘one cause acts in virtue of the other’ [n.114], I say that a acting in virtue of b can be understood in two ways: either that a receives from b the form by which it acts, or that - once the habit has been formed - it receives the action from it. Now in the second way, the efficient cause does not act in virtue of another, for fire - possessing the active form by which it acts - does not receive from the sun the action of heating nor does it receive from it a special motion for heating. Therefore in this case the inferior is said to act in virtue of the superior only because it in some way receives the form from the superior - just as ordered natural agents have their forms in ordered way such that an element receives its form in some fashion from the celestial body as the superior agent.

119. In the issue at hand [sc. of the sensible and intelligible] one partial cause receives from the other neither first act nor second act; and so in neither way [n.118] is one cause said - in the issue at hand - to cause in virtue of the other. Nor indeed does this belong to the idea of ordered agent causes, namely that one act in virtue of the other; but it is sufficient that one act more principally than the other [1 d.3 nn.559-560, 496].

120. To Augustine on Genesis [n.14] response was made in 1 d.3 nn.506-507. For Augustine proves that body cannot be the total cause of any action on spirit, which I concede. However it can be a partial cause, because what undergoes can exceed in nobility an agent cause that is partial; for the proposition from Augustine [sc. the agent is more excellent than the patient, n.114], as was said elsewhere [sc. 1 d.3 nn.506-507], depends on these propositions, that ‘the agent (or cause) is more excellent than the effect’ and ‘the effect as act is more excellent than what is as potency receptive of act’ - of which the first is only true of a total agent and the second only true of perfection simply; therefore the inferred proposition about the active thing in comparison with the passive thing [sc. the agent is more excellent] will not be true when speaking of a partial agent -and there is no need that the acting be in virtue of the partial agent.

121. As for the final argument [n.15], when it is said that ‘the like is known by its like’ - in the case of an angel nothing unacceptable follows, because an angel can have both abstractive and intuitive knowledge of a singular in its proper idea; for a perfection should not be denied to that intellect when there is no manifest reason for the denial; but it is mark of perfection in an intellect ‘to be able to know the singular distinctly’, otherwise this would not belong to the divine intellect.

122. But if argument is made about our intellect that ‘the phantasm in us - which is of the singular object - generates the intelligible species, therefore it reduces the intellect to act with respect to the singular’, I say that there is in this inference a fallacy of the consequent. For a likeness does not prove (or does not include) every likeness; the phantasm does indeed generate a species like itself (and representative of the object) with natural likeness, but not with likeness of determination or indetermination - for the natural likeness can be carried off by reason of the co-causing agent intellect, which intellect is able to attribute to the effect a greater indetermination than the effect could have from the phantasm alone, such that the likeness is of the nature represented whether the phantasm is a partial or a total cause; but it is not altogether the same with the likeness of determination and indetermination when a greater agent concurs that can attribute a greater indetermination.

V. To the Arguments for Henry’s Opinion

123. To the arguments for the first opinion recited, which were set down for the first article [nn.18-23], I reply:

To the first [n.20] it is plain that the minor is false, and it was refuted earlier [2 d.3 nn.46, 48-56].

124. To the second [n.21] I say there is equivocation over ‘first’ and ‘per se’ object.

For in one way that object is said to be first which has per se the idea of moving a power - and that object is said to be per se which does not have of itself that it move a power but moves it along with another; and in this way the Philosopher speaks in On the Soul 2.6.418a8-21 of the ‘first’ sensible, of which sort is a proper sensible, and of a ‘per se’ sensible, of which sort is a common sensible. In another way the first object is sometimes said to be the adequate object, and adequate to power or to act - and when contained under the first object adequate to the power it is called ‘the per se object of the power’, but when included in the first object adequate to the act it is called ‘the per se object of the act’.

125. Although therefore an object ‘per se and not first’ (in the way Aristotle speaks of it in On the Soul [n.124] cannot move a power save in virtue of the first object (or along with the first object [nn.21, 124]) - yet when speaking of ‘the per se object’ not adequate to the power but contained under the adequate object, it can move the power under its proper idea as well, to the extent it adds something to the first object.

126. Now when the proposition is taken that ‘the universal is the first object of the angelic intellect’ [n.21], it is false of the first adequate object, speaking of the universal insofar as it is universal; because although what universality is incident to, as to being, is in this way first object, yet being is saved equally in the singular as in the universal - and so being under the idea in which it is universal is not the adequate object such that universality is included in the adequate object.

127. Likewise, the universal is not ‘first’ in the way in which the Philosopher speaks in On the Soul [n.124], and the singular is not ‘per se’ in the way in which the sensible is common in respect of the senses, because the singular includes the same moving idea as the universal does; and yet the argument would not proceed without equivocation unless one provided a gloss or took the major of it in the first way.Vatican editors: There would be equivocation if the first object adequate to the power were understood to include the singular and the universal; but the equivocation can be avoided if one glosses it by saying that the first object adequate of itself is neither the singular nor the universal, and that as neither singular nor universal it moves the angelic intellect. ¹⁹

128. To the third [n.22] I say that proportionality does not always include likeness, but very often unlikeness instead; for four is double of two (and is proportional to it in double ratio), and three is to two in sesquialterate proportion, and the agent is proportional to the patient (because the former is in act and the latter in potency), and matter is proportional to form - and yet in all these unlikeness is more required than likeness. So I say in the issue at hand that the power must be proportioned to the object but not assimilated to it, because neither if the object is indeterminate (namely infinite) need the power be infinite (because a finite intellect knows the infinite as infinite finitely), nor if the object is determinate need the power be determinate, for an infinite intellect knows the finite as finite infinitely.

129. When therefore the proposition is taken that ‘the power must be determinate because the object is determinate’ [n.22] - if it is understood to mean that the power must thus be of a determinate object (and this in a determinate proportionate object), it is true; and in that case when - in the minor - the proposition is taken that ‘the intellect of an angel cannot be thus determinate’ (that is, does not have a proportion to an object thus determinate)A point not found in n.22 above but rather in the Lectura 2 d.9 n.24. ²⁰ it is false.

130. And when you ask ‘by what is the intellect thus determinate, by its own nature or by the species?’ - I say in neither way, for without a species it can know the singular as singular by intuitive knowledge, and by a species it can know the singular as singular by abstractive knowledge [2 d.3 n.394].

131. And when it is concluded against the first member here that ‘then the intellect of an angel would be more determinate than our intellect’ [n.22], and against the second that ‘then it would be more determinable than our senses’ - I say that this determination is not intrinsic to the power (neither of itself nor by the species) but is relative to a determinate object, and in this way the divine intellect is relative to a determinate singular; and it is not unacceptable that a more perfect intellect is determinate and determinable with respect to an object in a way that a more imperfect intellect is not determinate or determinable with respect to the same object.

132. But if it is concluded that ‘therefore it is more limited, because this determination introduces imperfection’ [n.22] - I deny the consequence, because this determination is not one of limitation but of perfection; for the intellect is altogether determinate to knowing the object altogether most determinately.

133. And if it is objected that ‘the angelic intellect will be more passive than our intellect, because affected by more objects’, I reply (see.. Scotus Metaphysics 7 q.15 nn.28-29: “Every actual entity is the idea for acting immediately on an intellect that has the capacity, not for any action immediately, but for action from such entity; thus the intellect of an angel has a capacity for action from any actual entity, both quidditative and individual, but ours now [sc. in this life] is not capable of action from an individual entity... And therefore the angelic intellect can be moved by any entity because it is more perfect than ours - nor is ‘being actable on by more things’ more imperfect when perfection is not possible save by being acted on; just as something transparent is not less perfect because it can be illumined by any light source than one that can be illumined only by the sun.” know them; and therefore a power that can know more things (even through receiving) is more perfect than a cognitive power that cannot know as many things - just as it is plain that our intellect is more perfect than any sensitive power because it can know more things. Hence generally in the case of cognitive powers that lack knowledge of some objects, it is a mark of greater perfection to be able to know more things, and consequently to be capable of being acted on by more objects - although in the case of the divine intellect (which actually knows everything) it is impossible for it to know anything de novo, as to be acted on by any object or to receive knowledge of it. ²¹).a

a. a[Interpolation] and I say that although the receiving of intellection is a certain imperfection (since it is a certain undergoing), yet it is in a sense a perfection, because in a cognitive power -which does not know things actually of itself - it is a mark of perfection to have the capacity to

134. To the fourth [n.23] I say either that ‘habit’ cannot be in an angelic intellect, taking habit for the quality that follows act (whereby it is distinguished from first act by which a thing is present under the idea of being actually intelligible), and this even if that intellect were supremely habituated of itself; or I say that if that intellect had the capacity and if such habit were not co-created with it, then I concede that it could generate in itself such a habit from acts, as was said before (to the similar argument about the generation of a habit in the angelic intellect [2 d.3 nn.360, 401-402]).

135. And when Aristotle is adduced, who maintains that ‘the habit of universals is not other than the habit of singulars’ [n.23] I say (as was said in the question on individuation [2 d.3 n.193]) that a singular does not have proper features that are knowable of it, and so there is properly no science about it; and thus neither is there a habit about it, speaking of the habit whereby singular knowables are present to the intellect - which are called by the Philosopher ‘proper knowables’, namely those that contain properties demonstrated of them as of their subjects.Scotus Exposition on Aristotle’s Metaphysics, 11 s.3 ch.2 n.60: “Each of the sciences considers the proper subject according to that science, namely by demonstrating the proper features of the proper subject.” ²² However the habit that is a facility for considering - left behind by acts - can well be different for a singular than for a universal; for an intellect that has distinct knowledge of a singular can frequently consider the singular and not frequently consider the nature in general - and thereby a quality would be made habituating for similar acts of considering the singular, but not universally inclining to considering the nature in general; if therefore there is a different habit consequent upon the acts, namely a habit that is a quality habituating to consideration more in respect of the singular than the universal, yet it is not a different scientific habit in the way in which the Philosopher speaks there [n.23] of scientific habit.

Tenth Distinction

Single Question. Whether all Angels are Sent

1. About the tenth distinction, where the Master enquires about the mission of the angels, I ask whether all angels are sent.

2. That they are not:

Daniel 7.10, “Thousands upon thousands ministered to him, and ten hundreds of thousands assisted him;”     therefore etc     .

3. On the contrary:

Hebrews 1.14, “Are they not all administrators of the spirit, sent for ministry..?”

I. To the Question

4. I reply:

The authority of the Apostle [n.3] must absolutely be conceded.

5. But a distinction must be drawn between inward and outward mission. For according to common process and order, the superior mysteries of God are revealed to the superior before to the inferior; and thus the superior are sent interiorly to the inferior (by speaking to and illumining them) - and the others, the inferiors, are sent exteriorly to announce or expound to men the things revealed, and thus not all are commonly sent outwardly; and in this way can all the authorities be expounded that say they are sent outwardly.

6. However it seems that the supreme angels (or one or other of them) are sometimes sent outwardly:

For the incarnation of the Word was unknown to many of the angels before the time of the incarnation or passion of Christ, as is plain from Isaiah 63.1, where in the person of the inferior angels the question is asked, “Who is this who cometh from Edom, with dyed vestments, etc.” and Psalm 23.8, “Who is this king of glory?” (and the reply comes, “The Lord strong and mighty etc.”). It is also apparent from the Apostle Ephesians 3.8-10, “so that it may be known to Principalities and Powers through the Church     etc .” where Jerome’s Gloss says that “the angelic dignities did not know the aforesaid mystery in its purity until the passion of Christ had been completed and the preaching of the Apostles had been spread among the nations” - which mystery, however, was until that point “not unknown” to the greater angels according to Augustine’s Gloss. Now it is clear that it was not unknown to the angel sent to the blessed Virgin to make this announcement; therefore      he to whom this was laid open was one of the superiors -and not of the lowest to whom this sacred mystery was unknown.

II. To the Principal Argument for Each Side

7. From this is evident the answer to the passage from Daniel [n.2]; for the distinction is between those commonly assisting and those commonly ministering.

8. But the authority of the Apostle [n.3] must be conceded to the letter, but indistinctly as to inward and outward mission.

Eleventh Distinction

Single Question. Whether a Guardian Angel can effectively cause Something in the Intellect of the Man whose Guardian he is

1. About the eleventh distinction where the Master deals with the guarding of men by the good angels, I ask whether a guardian angel can effectively cause something in the intellect of the man whose guardian he is.

2. That he can:

Because otherwise he would guard in vain if he could not direct a man in human actions (and rule him as a man), which actions are a man’s as far as intellect and will are concerned; nor could he otherwise do anything about a man as far as man is rational, because not about will or intellect.

3. Further, an angel can effectively cause something in the intellect of another angel (as was said in 2 d.9 nn.50, 67-69), so he can do the same in the intellect of a man. - Proof of the consequence, because an active thing that can cause something in a more excellent passive thing can also cause something in a less excellent passive thing. Also because every agent possessing first act can cause second act in anything receptive (for by this was the proposition proved in d.9 n.52); now an angel is knower in act and our intellect is in potency to second act,     therefore etc     .

4. Further, a sensible object can do something immediately to our intellect, as is plain about phantasms [On the Soul 3.7.431a14-15], wherefore     etc . Therefore      much more can what is actually intelligible do so, of which sort is what is in the intellect of an angel.

5. On the contrary:

On Psalm 118.73, “Your hands have made and molded me; give me understanding and I will learn your commands,” Augustine’s gloss, “‘Your hands have made me,’ means, ‘only God illumines the mind’.”

I. To the Question

A. The Opinion of Avicenna

6. There is here the opinion of Avicenna On the Soul p.5 ch.6.“Either we will say that the ‘intelligible forms’ are things per se existing, each of which is a species and a thing per se existing, but the intellect sometimes looks at them and sometimes turns away from them and later turns back to them... Or [we will say that] from the acting principle there flows into the soul form after form according to the request of the soul...and when later the soul turns from the principle, the flowing ceases; which if it were so, the soul would have to learn again every time just as at the start. We will say, therefore, that the last part of this division is true... , and so that ‘learning’ is nothing but the perfect aptitude of joining oneself to the agent intelligence until understanding comes to be from it. For when what coheres with the sought-for understanding passes ‘into the mind of him who is learning’ and the soul turns itself to look at it (now this looking at is the turning of the soul to the principle giving the understanding), the soul is wont to be conjoined with the intelligence and the virtue of simple understanding flows therefrom, which is followed by the flow of ordering; but if the soul turns away from the first principle, the forms come to be in potency, but in proximate potency. For when Plato is said to be ‘knowing intelligibles’, the sense is that, when he wishes, he will recall the forms to his mind; and the sense too of this is that, when he wishes, he can be joined to the agent intelligence so that understanding is formed in him by it. For this way of ‘understanding in potency’ is the virtue which acquires understanding for the soul whenever it wishes - because, whenever it wishes, it will be joined to the intelligence from which flows into it the understood form, which form is understanding most truly attained.” ²³ Look at it.a, b

a. a[Interpolation] because the superior intelligence is cause of the inferior as to being and as to knowledge, and so on by descending from the supreme intelligence; and at last a certain separate intelligence, superior to the intellective soul, causes in it intellectual knowledge (or an intelligible species), and thus the soul understands through actual intellectual conversion to that intelligence.

b. b[Interpolation] because the species of things flow from the separate intelligence for men’s having natural knowledge, so that - according to him - it is natural for our intellect to be turned to the separate intelligence so that it may understand (which whether it is true is plain from Reportatio IA d.3 nn.139, 153-155).

7. Against the opinion of Avicenna the argument is made [by Aquinas] that then [sc. if the soul had to turn to the separate intelligence to have intelligible species of things] the soul would be united to the body in vain, because this would be for no perfection of the united soul; for it is not for the perfection of it in itself, because form is not for matter but the reverse (Physics 2.9.200a24-34); nor is it for its perfection in operating, because it could have when not united intelligible species from the intelligence just as when united.

8. This reason [n.7] seems at fault because it seems to conclude that a blessed soul would in vain be united to the body; because this uniting is not for any perfection necessary to its operation, for it has an operation in which it neither receives nor will receive anything from the body.

9. Besides, according to some of them [sc. followers of Aquinas], the soul understands insofar as it is above the body - therefore it does not belong to it to understand insofar as it is united to the body; therefore neither is it united per se because of any perfection that might be necessary for its operation, namely for understanding.

10. The stated position [sc. of Avicenna, n.6] is rejected in another way:

First because all our knowledge arises from the senses (Posterior Analytics 2.19.100a3-8), and when a sense is lacking the science is lacking that accords with that sense (Posterior Analytics 1.18.81a38-b9, Metaphysics 1.9.993a7-8, Physics 2.1.193a7-9); for someone born blind cannot have a determinate knowledge of colors. But all this would be false if the intelligible species were impressed on the soul by the intelligence.

11. Further, if no habitual knowledge remained when the act of understanding does not remain [sc. as Avicenna supposed], then it would follow that the intellect was always equally in essential potency to understanding. For although some facility would be generated from the acts for turning the intellect toward understanding, yet because a form would never be possessed by which the intellect could understand (which would be the first act making it to be in accidental potency), but there would always be need to receive de novo such a form whereby it could operate - then in the intellect when not understanding would always be an essential potency for the act of understanding (because the intellect would always be in that potency to the form which is the principle of intellection), although an intellect possessing the acquired habit (consequent to act) could more easily acquire that form than another intellect not possessing it. Hence, although one passive thing is more disposed to undergoing the process than another, yet both are in essential potency before they receive the form; just as, if a piece of wood (when it was not heating) were not hot, and one piece of wood were dry and another damp, then although the dry piece would be more easily receptive of heat and the damp one with more difficulty, yet each (when not heating) would be in essential potency to heating. So it is here.

B. Scotus’ own Opinion

12. To the question therefore I reply first that an angel cannot effectively cause anything in the intellect of a man whose guardian he is; second what an angel can do.

1. An Angel cannot effectively cause anything in the Intellect of the Man whose Guardian he is

13. On the first point I say that no actual intellection or intelligible species can be caused in our intellect by an angel as by a total cause. But the reason is not because of any lack of power on the part of the angel (because he is sufficiently in first act and can cause second act in another angel [n.3; d.9 n.52]), but the reason is because of our intellect which, for this present state, is a passive thing determined to a determinate active thing, that is, to phantasm and agent intellect; and so it is prevented from being able immediately to be affected by any actual intelligible without a phantasm, because ‘phantasms are for this present state disposed to our intellect as sensibles are to the senses’ [n.4] - namely to this extent, that as the senses are only first affected by the external sensible thing, so our intellect is only affected, as to first affect, by the phantasm. Now why this is so was touched on earlier [1 d.3 n.187], namely, that it is from the order of powers - which order is not merely from the nature of man as man, because then there would not be another order in blessedness; so the order is either because of guilt, or because of this present state on account of something pertaining to guilt (let the cause of this be sought elsewhere [2 d.3 nn.289-90, Lectura 2 d.11 nn.15-16]).

14. Now from this there follows a certain corollary, namely that an intellect cannot be caught up in rapture by an angel to intellectual vision, and that any rapture -done by the power of the devil - is precisely to intensely imagining something; and so raptures by devils are rather madnesses than raptures, because intense imagination makes the mind very distracted from all other thought of anything of actual intellection which the mind seems to be seeing intellectually; and perhaps there accompanies the intense imagination of a thing an intellection of the imaginable thing, but there is there no intellection of a merely intelligible and non-imaginable thing. Thus too any rapture for which a man can by custom dispose himself in this life is not to any intellectual vision but to an imaginative one (and to an intellection concomitant with the imaginative vision), although however (perhaps) such quieting in a man from all extrinsic things by such a vision sometimes disposes him so that God may catch a mind thus tranquil up to intellectual vision.

2. What an Angel can do in the Intellect of the Man whose Guardian he is

15. On the second point, namely what an angel can do in the intellect [n.12].

Because of the statements of the saints (especially of Dionysius Celestial

Hierarchy 4 who says that ‘revelations are made to us through the angels’), it is manifest that an angel can teach a man just as a man does (though more perfectly), because a man teaches by proposing certain signs known to the hearer, and when these have been proposed the hearer is occupied with them as much as possible and is thus united in himself (which sort of union does not exist in someone who is finding out a science, because someone finding out a science is distracted about many things). Likewise from these signs the hearer puts together in turn the simple concepts (the way the speaker and teacher puts them together), conjoining in turn complex concepts (the way the signs of ordered conjoining are in the speaker), and from such signs he perceives the truth of the propositions from their terms, and the relation of proposition to proposition, from which he gets his own truth and so learns; which truth or proposition he would not learn by himself or get hold of without any teacher, even though he had the species of all the terms; for a possessor of the concepts of many terms does not know how and in whatever way he may put them together, nor does he know the propositions ordered in any way to the terms; and if he did this he could from the terms quickly conceive the truth of many propositions, and from these propositions the truth of other propositions - and this is how the clever learn, finding things out for themselves; but the slower need to have someone propose known signs to them so that they may learn through teaching.

16. And in this way it is certain that an angel can teach, either by using conventional signs and doing this by forming the signs in an assumed body (or in something else [sc. the air]), or by using natural signs, namely the things themselves, applying to the senses those present to hand, by which the senses are in turn affected and from these the phantasms are in turn generated and so further - from the phantasms -intelligible species are in turn abstracted.

17. However there might be doubt whether an angel could use natural signs more quickly than he himself (or a man) could use conventional signs. - For it would seem remarkable if he could affect sight more quickly with many sensible or visible objects -from which objects species would be abstracted necessary for one great argumentation -than he (or a man) could use conventional signs representing those objects.

18. But as to other affirmations [sc. about an angel’s power as to phantasms and intelligible species, n.16], namely about what an angel can do or cause in a man’s power of imagination - whether he can effectively cause a new phantasm (as by offering a new imaginable thing) or transpose phantasms already possessed, is matter for doubt.

19. However it is commonly conceded that he cannot cause a new phantasm without a natural cause as intermediary, namely the object that is of a nature to cause such a phantasm.

20. About the transference too of a phantasm from the organ of one man to the organ of another there seems to be doubt whether he could transfer the spirit or humor -informed with a phantasm in the organ of Socrates - to the organ of Plato while the same phantasm remains (for he cannot transfer a phantasm other than by transferring the subject of it [sc. the spirit or humor]).

21. And perhaps it might be said that, when the humor is transferred from the organ of Socrates, the phantasm would not remain in it, because the phantasm would not be in the same proportion to its cause [sc. the particular sense] by which it was generated.

- But this reason is not conclusive, because the particular sense in respect of a phantasm is only a cause of the phantasm’s being made and not of its being when made.

22. Also, if such a transfer might be made, with the phantasm formed in Socrates still remaining, it might be denied that he to whose organ the transfer was made could use such phantasm, because no one’s imagination is of a nature to use a phantasm save one generated by a sensible object present to his own senses. - But this reason too is not conclusive, because if God impressed on a man born blind a phantasm of color, he could use it when awake to imagine colors; for what is not a cause of the being of a form but only of its coming to be does not seem to be a necessary cause of the form as to the second act of it.

23. Now as to neither of these two doubts does there seem to be a necessary reason for one side or the other.

24. In a third way, about the transference of phantasms in the same man, it is said that an angel can cause local motion of humors and spirits, on which motion there follows the transference of phantasms and the affecting in turn of the possible intellect by them. -But this seems difficult to understand; for not just any phantasm has spirit or humor for its subject, because there could be so many phantasms together in the power of imagination that proper subjects could not be assigned to them; also, no motion of spirit or humor seems to make any phantasm move more than before unless it does something to the phantasm by way of alteration.

25. Finally fourth, one can concede the following, that an angel can remove an impediment from the power of imagination; for example, if the impediment to orderly affecting by phantasms was a disturbance of the spirits or humors, an angel can quiet them, and when these are quieted the phantasms can occur in turn.

26. It can also be said - besides the way in which an angel can teach by sensible signs more excellently than a man can [nn.15-16], and besides any way he can act about the power of imagination [nn.18-25] (although no way is very certain save the last one about the removal of an impediment [n.25]) - that an angel can do something as regard the possible intellect; not indeed by immediately causing an intelligible species as total cause of it but as partial cause, by the joint action of his agent intellect with the agent intellect of the man, so that the two agent intellects (namely of man and angel), which are of the same nature, could operate along with the phantasm more effectively than the agent intellect of the man could alone, and thus produce a more perfect intelligible species and one that more perfectly represents the quiddity.

II. To the Principal Arguments

27. To the arguments.

To the first argument [n.2] I say that an angel does not in vain guard a man, because he can do something with respect to man’s intellect - teaching through sensible signs - more efficaciously than a man can, and perhaps by doing something with respect to his imagination, and perhaps with respect to his possible intellect (in the last way stated [n.26]). Given even that an angel could do none of these things, the guarding of the angels would not be in vain, because they guard us from many of the assaults of the demons, according to what Jerome [Hilary] says in his homily (on Matthew 18.10, “Their angels always see, etc.”), “Nor would the life of mortals be safe [among so many assaults unless it were fortified by the guarding of the holy angels].”Hilary, Tractate on Psalms, psalm 134 n.17: “For there are angels for little ones who behold God every day. These spirits therefore are sent out for the salvation of the human race. For our infirmity, without the gift of the angels to be our guard, would not withstand so many and so great wickednesses of celestial spirits. God then produces these winds [sc. the good angels] from his storehouse, giving through them aid to human infirmity, so that these divine protectors for us against the worldly powers of the present darkness might keep watch in inheriting salvation for us.” ²⁴

28. To the second [n.3]: the consequence is not valid, because the lower passive thing [sc. our possible intellect, n.13] is not able in this present state to be affected by that agent [sc. an angel], and this because the passive thing is impeded for the present state from receiving anything such; hence this lack of power is not because of any defect in the active power of the angel or of impotency in the passive power of our intellect absolutely, but because of an impediment in it for this present state.

29. By this is also plain the answer to both proofs of the consequence [n.3]; for the active thing can act on the passive thing when the passive thing is not impeded from receiving such form as such an agent acts for - but when there is an impediment, the active thing cannot act by immediate power although it could by remote power.

30. And if you say that ‘then God cannot for this present state act immediately on the intellect without a phantasm’ - I say that the consequence is not valid, because the impediment for the present state is an order among the inferior powers [n.13], and this order is subject to the causality of God but not to the causality of any creature - and therefore in the case of any created agent (which presupposes this order) there is an impediment, but not in the case of God, who is above this order.

31. As to the final argument [n.4], it is plain that sensible things can affect the intellect for this present state but purely intelligible things cannot; not, however, because they are not active, nor because our intellect is not passive with respect to them absolutely, but because it is for this present state impeded from being immediately acted on by, or receptive to, such things. But when this sort of impediment is removed, then it will receive, as it will in blessedness; for then an angel will speak to a blessed man and a blessed man to another blessed man, as was said before that ‘angel speaks to angel intellectually’ [n.13, d.9 nn.49-52]; for then, according to the promise of the Savior (Matthew 22.30), we will be “like the angels of God in heaven”.

32. And from this is plain why a teacher cannot cause science in his students; not because of a defect of active power in the science of the one teaching, but because of a blindness in this present state in the intellect of the student - for which state he is prevented from being thus affected, because for this present state he is determined to phantasms as to what affects him, as is plain from what has been said [nn.31, 28, 13].a

a. a[Interpolation] Question: Whether matter can exist without form, that is, whether it is repugnant to matter to exist in fact without form. Here Avicenna replies [that it cannot] Metaphysics 2 ch.3 -and for this he has several reasons. First it seems that what is indefinite [sc. matter] cannot exist without a definite term; second, either matter would exist in place, and then either divisibly and as of determinate quantity, or indivisibly, and thus it would be a point; or it would not exist in place, and then it would be an intelligence; the third reason he gestures to is that form is the cause of matter’s existing in fact and not conversely. See what he says there. - For the opinion [sc. of Avicenna, that matter cannot exist without form] there are the reasons of the moderns [identity unknown] who hold this opinion, and their Achilles is: because if matter can exist without form then for the same reason it can exist without privation, which is more separable or alone separable (because it is other than matter). They prove this in many ways by means of problems about the same and different, Topics 7.1-2.151b28-153a5. The falsity of the consequent is plain, because thus matter would be deprived [sc. not have form] and not deprived [sc. not have privation], and would lack [sc. lack form] and not lack [sc. lack privation, which is to lack nothing]. Against this opinion are the reasons of Scotus [Reportatio IIA d.12 q.2] and other reasons [William of Ware et al.]

[The Twelfth Distinction (on matter and form in corruptible things) is lacking in the OrdinatioThe Vatican Editors point out that the absence of the twelfth distinction was supplied in various ways by different editors, who excerpted passages from Scotus’ other works and from the Additiones Magnae complied by William of Alnwick. ²⁵]

Thirteenth Distinction

Single Question. Whether Light Generates Illuming as its Proper Sensible Speciesa

1. About the thirteenth distinction I ask at the same time about illuming [lumen] and about light [lux], and my question is single: whether light generates illuming as its proper sensible species.The distinction Scotus means here is between the light at the light source (lux) and the light illuming the air (lumen). The first is the light we see, as the burning candle, the lit light bulb, the shining sun, etc.; the second is the light we see things through, as the air illumined by the light source. The two are the same, for both are light, and also not the same, for one is seen and not seen through, while the other is seen through and not seen. ²⁶

a. a[Interpolation] In this thirteenth distinction, where the Master deals with the distinction of created things, and first of light, which was produced on the first day, the question is asked:

2. That it does not:

Augustine Literal Commentary on Genesis 7.15.n.21 says, “The soul administers bodies through light and air     etc .”

3. Further, illuming generates a substance, as is plain of fire [sc. which can be generated by the illuming of the sun]; therefore      it is a substance.

4. Further, illuming is refracted and reflected; therefore it is a body, because these are properties of body.

5. Further, that illuming is not a species:

Because it denominates the medium; not so the species of color [sc. air is said to be illumined but not to be colored].

6. It also excludes the opposite, namely darkness; not so species, because the species of opposites are present together (as the species of white and black are together in the medium).

8. To the contrary:

Light is of itself sensible (On the Soul 2.7.418b4-17, 419a1-6);     therefore it has some sensible species; not a species different from the illuming; therefore etc     .

I. To the Question

9. Here one must look at three things: first what light is; third what illuming is; third, how illuming is generated by light.

A. What Light is

10. About the first I say that light cannot be set down as a substance, because it is a per se sensible; a substance is not such;a     therefore etc     .

a. a[Interpolation] save per accidens; the thing is plain in the sacrament of the altar after consecration, where there is no substance of bread but it is transubstantiated into the body of Christ, and yet whatever was discernible before by any sense remains there.

11. Light is also an accident in something, therefore in nothing is it a substance (for what is truly a substance is not an accident of anything, from Physics 1.3.186b4-5). The antecedent is plain, because if light were the substantial form in fire, it would be either the ultimate specific difference or some more imperfect difference that was in potency to the specific form; not in the first way, because then everything that had light would be of the same species; not in the second way, because then the form in question would be more imperfect than the specific form of fire and so would not be the substantial form of any celestial body, in which there is no substantial form more imperfect than the form of the element.

12. Third, it is probable that some active form follows the substantial form of a celestial body, just as the active qualities follow the substantial forms of generable and corruptible things; but there is no other quality than light that follows the substantial form of a celestial body (this is confirmed from Damascene Orthodox Faith ch.8 [“But the illuming generated by fire, remaining inseparable and always in it, does not have a proper hypostasis (that is, subsistence) besides the fire; for it is a natural quality of fire”]).

B. What Illumining is

13. About the second [n.9] I say that illuming is not a complete substance, that is, subsistent per se, for it is neither spiritual (since it is extendable) nor corporeal (for then two bodies would be together simultaneously, for illuming is in the whole air).

14. Nor does the air have to be moved locally when illuming comes to it, nor moved when it departs and stops coming, because then there would be no breathing of air in the illumined medium if the air were moved aside locally because of the illuming. Nor even is illuming a substantial form, because what it is accidental to [e.g. the air] remains perfect in its species when the illuming goes away, as is clear of air when illumined and when dark. Nor is it matter (as is plain), nor anything pertaining to the genus of substance; nor is it plausible that it belongs to any other genus besides the genus of quality.

15. Now since the genus of quality, as to its third species [Categories 8.9a28-10a10], is distinguished into sensible quality and into quality that is a species or intention of sensible quality, one should notea that by ‘intention’ here is not meant what the sense intends (for in this way the object itself would be the intention), but by ‘intention’ is meant here that by which - as by formal principle - the sense tends to the object; and just as whatever is a sign is a thing (according to Augustine On Christian Doctrine 2.1. n.1), but not conversely (and therefore in distinguishing between thing and sign the thing is taken for the thing which is not a sign, though that which is a sign is also a thing), so in the distinguishing of thing and intention, although intention may be a thing (and perhaps a sensible thing) that the sense can tend to, yet ‘intention’ is said to be that which is not only the thing to which the sense tends but is the reason for tending to some other thing of which the intention is the proper likeness. I say that in this way illuming is properly the intention or sensible species of light itself.

a. a[Interpolation] the noun ‘intention’ is equivocal: in one way intention is said to be an act of will; in another way the formal reason in a thing (as the intention of a thing from which is taken the genus differs from the intention of it from which is taken the difference); in a third way it is said to be a concept, and in a fourth way the reason for tending to an object (as a likeness is said to be the reason for tending to that of which it is the likeness). Hence...

16. This is proved by the fact that, if it were not an intention, then it would, when placed on the sense, impede the sense, because what is only a sensible and not a reason for sensing impedes sensation if it is placed on the sense (because ‘a sensible placed on a sense is not sensed’ On the Soul 2.7.419a11-13, 28-30, 9.421b17-18), and so illuming placed on the eye would prevent it from seeing; but this is false and against the Commentator [Averroes] on Sense and Sensibles chs.2, 3, where he maintains that a proper illuming in the eye is necessary for it to receive the species of color and to see.

17. The way it is posited is this, that just as visible light is naturally prior to color, so too is its species naturally prior to the species of color, and this both in perfecting the medium (so that a non-illumined medium is not fit for the perceiving of colors) and in perfecting the sight (so that a non-illumined organ is not in proximate power to see).

C. How Illuming is Generated by Light

18. And as to the third article [n.9], which makes the second article clear, one needs to note that illuming is generated by light according to a threefold root: direct ray, refracted ray, and reflected ray (according to Alhazen in his Optics 7.1 n.1).“Sight comprehends visibles in three ways, namely directly, by reflection from clean bodies, and by refraction on the other side of transparent bodies that differ in transparency from the transparency of the air.” 4.1 n.1 “The acquisition of seen objects is diversified in three ways, either directly, or by reflection on polished bodies, or by penetration, as in rare bodies whose rarity is not like the rarity of air...” ²⁷

19. A direct ray is one that flows from a luminous body in a medium of the same transparency in a direct line, and stops at the limit of the terminating or terminated body as long as the power of the luminous body lasts. A reflex ray is one that, when an opaque body intervenes (before the active power of the luminous body reaches its limit), flows in an opposed direction, not by choice, but naturally, because the natural agent whose active power is not completely used up in direct line acts as much as it can, and when it cannot act on a straight line it does so on an oblique one. A refracted ray is one that, when a medium of different transparency (but not completely opaque) intervenes, is continued in that medium though not in a straight line but there is an angle incident there; now when a more dense medium intervenes the ray is refracted toward the perpendicular, because from the fact that a perpendicular force is strongest in acting (hence it is not fractured) a position closer to a perpendicular ray is required for acting on a denser medium (such is the position of a ray refracted to the perpendicular); but when a less dense medium intervenes, the ray is refracted away from the perpendicular, for the opposite reason.The description here (whatever is said about the proposed reason) is correct. A ray of light coming from the air and falling on water at an angle is bent inwards, as it were, toward the perpendicular, and vice versa when coming from water into air. ²⁸

20. I say then that the illuming continued according to these three rays is generated by the light itself, and is also immediately a sensible species of the light.

21. Direct ray is plain. The proof about reflected ray is, first, that by this ray the thing is seen in itself and not in any species impressed by the reflecting mirror; second (see the conclusion below, nn.24-27). In the same way too is the thing itself seen by the refracted ray continuing itself, and not any species of the thing seen.

22. And just as these three primary illumings, diffused by multiplication, are immediately species of the light generating them, perhaps they are likewise as immediately generated by it, speaking of their immediacy to the cause, not excluding the order of the effects ordered in respect of the same cause.

23. But besides these three there is another, secondary illuming (which is called ‘accidental illuming), of the sort that is where a shadow is; for actual shadow is distinguished from darkness in this, that darkness is a privation of illuming both primary and secondary, but shadow is not a privation of secondary illuming. Now although this secondary illuming is sometimes diffused by reflection, though not from a polished body, for reflection from a polished body is the generation of a primary illuming because it is immediately a species of the light generating it; but not so this secondary illuming, which rather is generated by the primary illuming, so that if, per impossibile, reflection were to remain within the illuming of the impressing ray, it would generate this secondary illuming in a spherical, or semi-spherical, manner; but reflected illuming is not generated in this way by a primary ray of the sort that reflection from a polished body is.

So therefore all illuming is a species; but primary illuming is a species of the light generating it, and secondary illuming a species of primary illuming.

24. Hereby is the response clear to the arguments that could be made against this section [nn.20-23], that, since illuming is seen, it will not be a visible species.

Response:

Notwithstanding that an intended species is the intention and species of another visible thing, yet it can be visible in itself, as the Commentator says on Sense and Thing Sensed 2.437a23-24 [Averroes Paraphrase thereon ch.3], “when illuming is reflected by green plants, the walls appear colored.”

25. Likewise species are not visible save when they are stopped at opaque bodies, so that, when they are not in contact with the opaque, they cannot generate a species of themselves whereby they may be seen (as the species of color is not seen while it is in the medium); but when a species is in contact with the opaque, then it can be seen, as is plain about a ray passing through colored glass; the color appears on the wall when the ray is stopped at it and the wall is seen colored like the glass, and yet the colored ray was not visible in the medium; nor for this reason is the red that appears on the wall denied to be a species, for the eye focused on the wall would, if the red were put in its way, see the red glass or the redness of the glass.

26. Hence this proposition is false: ‘that which is the intention of the visible object is not visible’; but this one is true: ‘every intention is not only visible but is a reason for seeing’. Hence the form that illumines the moon is illuming (and not light, because it is not a body terminated in the moon), and yet it is sensible and is a species of light.

27. Likewise, from Aristotle at the beginning of Sense and Thing Sensed 2.437a23-24, “the gleam emitted from an eye in darkness is visible,” and yet it is a species of light only.

28. In the same way, illuming not terminated at an opaque body is not seen. The point is clear, first, because the solar rays do not appear at night, and yet they intercept between us and the sky at the tip of the cone of shadow cast by the earth; second, because someone in an opaque and dark prison, where a solar ray passed through opposite holes, would not see - so that, when the solar ray is not reflected anywhere on something opaque, he would not see the ray, unless the corpuscles are refracted.

29. Likewise, if an illumined medium were infinite and did not end at an opaque body, nothing would be seen when the sun was above the horizon, because there would be no end to the illuming.

30. Illuming then has the same condition as to being seen and not being seen as other principal species of colors have; and just as the principal species of colors, namely those that are continuied in rays, can generate other accidental secondary species not continued in rays, and can be seen through them (and yet there is no denying that the first species are intentions, because they are simply likenesses of the first generating colors); so it is in the issue at hand.

31. But that the whole ray is generated immediately by the light and not one part of the ray by another [n.20] is proved thus:

Because if it is posited that illuming in one part of the medium generates illuming from itself, then any point of illuming multiplies itself spherically (because every natural active principle acts spherically on the surrounding medium if it is equally disposed on all sides); and even if there were an opaque body in the way on one side of it, at any rate it multiplies itself hemi-spherically; therefore in the same way, if illuming were to be generative with respect to another illuming, then, from its not having an opaque body in the way on any side of it, it multiplies itself spherically; and thus, just as a principal illuming generates further another secondary, indirect illuming, so a secondary illuming would be generated from every part of a distant ray, which is contrary to the senses.

32. In addition, any luminous body can act at a distance in place (because if it could only act where it was in place it could only illumine something indivisible [sc. place is the surface of the containing body, and surface is an indivisible quantity]). But if it is present, in idea of agent, in some distant place, then, and by parity of reasoning, it is present in the whole medium, to as great a distance as its power is sufficient to reach; and if it is present to the whole and can cause illuming in the whole, then it does so cause it -because, even given that the illuming generated by it could cause another illuming, yet the present luminous body is of greater power than the illuming generated, and so it will precede the illuming in acting on a remote part.The Vatican editors remark that the proof in these two paragraphs, nn.31-32, was omitted or forgotten here and placed by Scotus after n.39 (the same sort of thing has apparently happened elsewhere). The Vatican editors have restored it to its place here. ²⁹

II. To the Principal Arguments

33. To the arguments.

To the first [n.2] I say that Augustine takes light there for a subtle body (to wit, for fire, which is the more subtle body in a mixed body, or for some subtle body very much agreeing with fire in nature), just as Scripture too says that light was made on the first day; not because then an accident came to be without a subject, but a luminous body then came to be whose more known form was light; and so the subject is described through a more known term.

34. To the second [n.3] I say that the altering agent, and not the quality by which it generates, generates at the end of the alteration.

35. To the third [n.4] I say that those things are said metaphorically of light, as is plain from Avicenna On the Soul p.3 ch.2.“For as to our saying that a ray descends or goes out or enters, these words are taken transumptively, because a ray has nothing of this... But that a ray shines back is also transumptively taken; for when a body is illumined and is polished, another body opposite to it is said to be illumined by it, in such a way that the first body is not moved toward the second by local motion.” ³⁰ For no same illuming proceeds in a direct line as by local motion, and yet it is sometimes turned obliquely (by bending or refracting), but when the active power is not totally used up (that is, has not caused as much as it can cause), then, if it cannot then further act in a straight line (in which direction nature acts most of all, because a straight line is shortest and most effective for acting in), it acts in another line nearer to it if it cannot do anything further (and this a refracted or reflex line [n.19]), by reacting on the same thing it acted on before, causing there however, along with what was first caused, something simply more imperfect.

36. And if you object that a later more imperfect caused thing cannot stand together with a prior more perfect caused thing, and so there cannot be light along with a whole medium illumined by the primary ray, nor even can a reflex ray exist along with a medium illumined by a direct ray - I say that the falsity of the conclusion is manifest to sense. For it is plain that if a ray of the sun falls on water and is reflected into some dark place where there is no direct ray, the sense says that a reflection comes to be in that dark place; for it would not come to be there if the reflex ray was not first in the medium illumined by the direct ray. In the same way the sense says that a secondary illuming (or the species of a primary illuming) is diffused by the primary illuming (in contact with some opaque body) up to the eye; otherwise the primary illuming would not be seen, and yet the primary illuming is there through the whole medium. So then this proposition must be denied, ‘where there is a more perfect form, a more imperfect form (or a species, which is a more imperfect form) cannot be multiplied there’.

37. To the other arguments that are against the species or against the intention [nn.5-7].

I say to the first [n.5] that every accident could, perhaps, denominate its subject in which it is, if it were an imposed denominating term which would signify a denomination agreeing with such a form in respect of such a subject; in this way a denominative term is not imposed by the species of colors, because the denominatives imposed by colors denominate the subject that is possessed of the colors in its real being. But if a denominative were imposed that would denominate that a subject has a form in intentional being (not in real being), the medium could well be denominated by such a name as ‘white’; such a name is imposed by the illuming, and perhaps more here than in the case of colors, because of the greater perfection and evidence of this sort of intention than of other visible intentions.

38. As to what is added secondly about the opposite [darkness, n.6], I say that one illuming does not exclude another illuming of a different idea, as the illuming of the sun does not exclude the illuming of the moon in the same part of the medium, or of another star - just as neither does the species of black exclude the species of white (or conversely) in the same part of the medium; but just as any illuming excludes darkness from the medium, which darkness is a privation of illuming (not the contrary or the disparate of it), so the species of any color excludes the privation of that color in the medium.

39. To the third [n.7] I say that illuming is a thing and can have a real effect; but it is not a thing in such a way that it cannot be an intention, because along with its idea stands that it is per se the reason for tending to the object, and this suffices for the idea of intention.

Fourteenth Distinction

Question One. Whether a Celestial Body is a Simple Essence

1. About the fourteenth distinction I ask whether a celestial body is a simple essence.a

a. a[Interpolation] About this fourteenth distinction, where the Master deals with the work of the second day (namely celestial nature) there are three questions: first whether a celestial body is a simple essence; second whether any heaven is movable by the starry heaven; third, whether the stars act on things here below. As to the firsts

2. The answers that should be given seem different according to the theologians on the one hand and the philosophers on the other.

I. According to the Philosophers

3. According to Aristotle’s meaning, since every passive power of matter is a power for contradictories, from Metaphysics 9.8.1050b6-27, and since, ibid., any eternal thing is necessary and so not potential in any way to contradictories, and since the heaven according to him is eternal, the consequence, according to him, is that there is nothing in the heaven that is in potency to contradictories; and as a result the heaven does not have matter, because if it did have matter it would be formally corruptible, as fire is; for given that there was no agent outside it that could corrupt it (‘because it does not have a contrary’ [Averroes Metaphysics 12 com.41]), this would not take from it its having within itself a principle of corruption, namely matter (whereby a thing is able to be and not to be), as fire does. And on this point Averroes in his treatise the Substance of the World seems to grasp Aristotle’s intention better than others who posit matter in the heavens.

4. However to demonstrate the incorruptibility in themselves of the heavens (which is the supposition here) one must proceed along the way of Aristotle in On the Heaven 1.2.268b13-269a32, 3.270a12-b25, and herein show that the heaven is not composed of any elementary nature. When this incorruptibility has been shown, the absence of matter will be shown, unless an incorruptible form could necessarily actuate a matter able of itself to lack the form, so that the disposition of incorruptibility would not be necessary on the part of both but only on the part of matter and, conversely, the heaven would be contingent as far as concerns the part of its matter; accordingly, where the necessity is not on the part of both extremes, it is not similar to the necessary inherence of some accident in a subject.

5. But if you say [e.g. Henry of Ghent] that celestial matter does not have the same idea as matters do that are susceptive of diverse forms, and for this reason it cannot of itself be changed from one form to another - this seems unacceptable:a

First, it seems indeed difficult to assign why there is this difference of idea in this matter and in that, because then there would beb two first matters of different ideas; the consequent is false, therefore the antecedent is too. Proof of the falsity of the consequent: there are not two first ends nor two first efficient causes of different idea; therefore likewise there are not two first matters of different idea.

a. a[Interpolation] Against the statement that ‘there is no matter of the same idea here and there’.

b. b[Interpolation] I prove by reason that positing that there is a matter of a different idea here and there is impossible, because if there were then it would follow that there will be...

6. Second, given this difference, the matter in the heavens is at least in potency to this form and to privation of this form, so that this matter is of itself in potency to contradictories although what potency to form it is in is not set down; but, as things are, matter is not the per se reason for corruptibility insofar as it is in potency to a form other than the one it has, but insofar as it is in potency to the privation of the form it has.

7. Likewise, the Philosopher only posits matter because of potentiality for change; in the heavens there is no potentiality for change save in ‘where’.

8. If it be said [e.g. Richard of Middleton] that the matter in the heaven is not in potency to contradictories, because the form of heaven completes the whole appetite of the matter, on the contrary: no form completes the whole appetite of its matter in respect of some other form save because it gives the matter an act opposed to privation of the form; but the form of heaven does not give an act opposed to privation of the form of fire;     therefore a privation of the form of fire remains there. Proof of the minor: no form gives an act opposed to privation of any form whatever unless it contains in itself all forms, at least virtually; but the form of heaven does not thus contain all forms, because it does not contain the intellective soul; therefore etc     .

9. From this follows further that, according to the philosophers, the heaven would not be formally alive, because then either the heaven would essentially be only a soul, and that an intellective one (because the philosophers only posited an intellective soul there), and thus the intellect would by itself be a quantity (which is unintelligible, for the heaven, as is plain, is formally a quantum), or there will be there, besides the soul that is of the essence of the heaven, something else that is per se perfectible by a soul, and thus there would be a passive potency there and a potency for contradictories, and so the heaven would not be eternal and necessary; hence, whether the Philosopher [On the Heaven 2.2.285a29-30] or the Commentator [Averroes On the Heaven 2 com.61, Metaphysics 8 com.12, com.41, Substance of the World ch.2] posits that the heaven is alive formally with a soul that is per se of the essence of the heaven, he seems at once to abandon the first position initially held [n.3].

10. Whatever may be true about Averroes, let us not say that Aristotle abandoned the first position; nor do his words compel us to impute this to him, because wherever he speaks of ‘soul’ he may be expounded as to the condition whereby the soul is a mover, not whereby it is a form, because the soul is the properly moving intelligence of this sphere, joined to it as the proper mover of it (there is only one such for one thing; this was proved by Avicenna, who openly distinguishes between the first produced intelligence and the soul of the first sphere, but there is no necessity for so much plurality).

11. In favor of this conclusion there is the Philosopher in Physics 8.5.257b12-13 who distinguishes what is ‘moved of itself’ into two parts, one of which is a moved only and the other is a mover only. This distinguishable thing is composed of two units, namely the mover and the movable, and the former truly moves and the latter truly is moved; but in us the soul does not move but is only the reason of moving, therefore it is moved per accidens since it is the form of the moved - the mover in the heaven is moved neither per se nor per accidens.

II. According to the Theologians

12. According to the theologians matter must be posited in the heavens, because the ‘chaos’ which they posit [Genesis 1.2: ‘the earth was without form and void’] reached up to the empyrean heaven, and the matter of all corporeal things was contained under the empyrean heaven; and let the matter be posited to be - in itself and as concerns itself - of the same nature.

13. And thus the theologians have to disagree with the Philosopher in the proposition ‘the heaven is necessary and incorruptible’ [n.3]; for as far as its matter is concerned it would be simply corruptible, because the potency for contraries would be in it; but because the form of the heaven does not have a contrary able to overcome its form, therefore it cannot be corrupted by the natural agent from which it receives the form, nor corrupted into fire or water.

14. But in that case it seems that the heaven could at least corrupt fire and turn it into heaven, because the active power of the heaven surpasses the form of fire (the power comes from the form of the heaven), and the matter of fire is also capable of receiving the from of the heaven; therefore fire can be changed by such an agent into being heaven. Or perhaps the heaven cannot change an element into the qualities fit for such a heavenly body, and yet the heavenly form so much dominates the matter that the matter cannot be changed by anything else (by receiving passing impressions), and so cannot be corrupted either.

15. But as concerns the animation of the heaven, there is doubt, because Augustine Enchiridion ch.15 n.58 says hesitantly, “Nor do I hold for certain whether the sun and moon and all the stars belong to the city above, since it seems to some that the shining bodies do not possess intelligence.”

16. Similarly Literal Commentary on Genesis 2.18 n.38 [“A question is wont to be raised whether the luminaries evident in the heavens are only bodies or whether certain spirits of theirs direct them; and whether, if there are such spirits, the heavenly bodies are given life by them, the way flesh is animated by the souls of animals^ Although this cannot easily be understood, yet I think places more opportune for the purpose may arise in the course of our treating of the Scriptures^ For the present, however, while always preserving a pious moderation and gravity, we should believe nothing rashly about a matter obscure.”]

17. And in Retractions 1.11 n.4 when he makes mention of what he said in ibid. Genesis ch.5, he seems to say that the heavens do not have a soul; and to his remark in ibid. ch.10, “it is not retracted as false” he says, “Whether this world is a living thing I have not been able to track down either by authority or reason,” though he does not for this reason deny it.

18. Hence it seems manifest that in no book written prior to the Retractions does he say in the Retractions that he has retracted it. Therefore the authority is of no weight that is adduced from Augustine’s book On Recognizing True Life [really a book by one Honorius], namely “Now those who say that the heavens are rational beings are rightly themselves irrational.” It is agreed too that that book is not Augustine’s (or that he wrote it after the Retractions), because Augustine nowhere seems to have asserted what is denied in the Retractions.

19. Likewise Jerome on Isaiah 1.2 ‘Hear, O heavens’ says that the words are addressed to non-living things.

20. Likewise the Greek Augustine, namely Damascene Orthodox Faith ch.20, asserts that the heavens are not alive.

21. A reason given for this is that it would be pointless to unite a soul with such a body, because such a body has no senses and consequently the soul gets no perfection from it [d.11 n.7].

22. But to say that form is united to matter so that it may receive a perfection from matter does not seem fitting, but rather so that form may communicate a perfection to matter; nay more principally, so that the whole composed of these may be perfect.

23. Response: a form united to matter does receive some perfection from it, otherwise the blessed soul would in vain be united to the body, because it would not acquire perfection from it [d.11 n.8].

III. Scotus’ Opinion

24. Briefly: if the heavens are not alive, this is a matter of belief and not something proved by reason, because there is no condition in the heavens - thus perfect -that appears manifestly repugnant to their bodies being alive.

Question Two. Whether there is any Movable Heaven other than the Starry Heaven

25. Second, I ask about the motion of the heavens, whether there is any movable heaven other than the starry heaven.

26. That there is not:

In Genesis 1.17 it is said of the stars that ‘God placed them in the firmament of the heaven’; therefore all the stars are in one firmament.

27. Further, by reason:

“The continuous is that whose motion is one,” according to the Philosopher Metaphysics 5.6.1016a5-6; but the motion of any inferior heaven is one with the superior heaven, because every inferior heaven - if one be posited - is moved with a diurnal motion [sc. from East to West] and also with other motions proper to the superior heavens, if superior heavens are posited; therefore any inferior heaven, if it is posited, is continuous with the whole superior heaven.

28. Further, the whole heaven other than a star is of itself and in itself uniform;     therefore no other motion should be posited because of it, because one part when present does perhaps the same as another; no motion therefore is necessary save the motion of the stars. But the proper motion of the stars seems it can be accounted for in one heaven, just as can the many proper motions in water or air; therefore etc     .

29. To the opposite:

The stars are moved differently, so they have diverse heavens; because if not, a star would be moved with its own motion without the motion of the sphere, and so either there would be a vacuum in the heaven, or the sphere would be rent, or two bodies would be in the same place [n.31].

I. To the Question

30. To discern the number of the heavens we must first show what all the astronomers agree in, and secondly we must see what some of them disagree with others in.

A. All Astronomers Agree that there are at least Nine Heavens

31. Here the supposition must be made that no star [sc. planet] has a proper local motion, that is, that it is not moved with a motion other than with the motion of the sphere in which it is located; for if it left the part of the sphere where it is and moved to another part, either nothing would succeed to it (and so there would be a vacuum), or something else would succeed to it (and so the heavenly body would be made thinner or denser, or it could be rent and, when the rending body recedes, be again continuous), or if none of these is conceded, then the result is that a moved star is always in the same place as another moving body. - This is what Aristotle means in On the Heaven 2.8.290a29-35, “If nature had given a power of progress to the stars, etc.”

32. With this supposition it follows that all the stars that are not at the same distance from each other are not in the same heaven, for different distances at different times cannot be by a motion proper to the star but only by the motion of the heaven in which it is; and if one star is at different distances from another, then the heaven of the first is differently moved from the heaven of the second, and so the heaven of the first is other than that of the second.

33. Now seven stars [sc. the seven planets] are moved differently, so that they are not always at the same distance from the fixed stars, which are for this reason called fixed that they are always at the same distance from each other and keep the same place and local arrangement; and so there is no need to posit more than one heaven in respect of all the fixed stars. But the seven planets are not always at the same distance from each other.

34. These two points, about the varying distance of the planets from each other and from the other stars that are called fixed, are the supposition for the second consideration of the astronomers; for it is possible to be sure of the positions of the planets by means of instruments, one of which - namely armillary spheres - is dealt with by Ptolemy in the Almagest statement 5 ch.1.

35. And if it is objected that ‘the visual ray is refracted because of the diversity of the mediums, and so does not give certainty about the position of the stars’, then at least it will give certainly about the visible position of a star; and if the stars be at the same distance according to the visible position, then they are so also according to their true position, because their varying visible positions are disposed proportionally to their true positions (or at least they are not so disproportionally disposed that there could be so great a distance in their visible positions without some distance in their true positions), and this distance suffices for the matter at issue.

36. So, in addition to the sphere posited for all the fixed stars that are always at the same distance from each other, at least seven other spheres are posited proper to the seven planets that are moved differently both from the fixed stars and from each other; therefore there are eight heavens.

37. Further it is also commonly conceded that there is a ninth heaven higher than the starry heaven, because there is only one proper motion to one celestial body; but the diurnal motion is not proper to the motion of the starry heaven, since the starry heaven is moved by another motion, as has been proved by observations (for no fixed star is always at the same distance from the stationary poles, nor is it even at the same distance at the same times from the houses of Aries and Libra); therefore this diurnal motion will be proper to some other body - and only to a higher body, because the eighth heaven [sc. that of the fixed stars] is moved by this motion (but no heaven is moved by the motion proper to another unless that other is higher than it). There is therefore some movable body that is uniformly moved with a diurnal motion, higher than the starry heaven; Avicenna says this in his Metaphysics 9 ch.2 and Ptolemy in his Almagest statement 1 ch.8, statement 7 ch.3.

B. Astronomers Disagree whether there are more than Nine Heavens

38. On the second point [n.30], about what not all those who treat of this matter agree in, there is doubt whether each planet’s heaven is sufficient for it, and so whether only positing nine heavens is enough.

39. A threefold difference indeed appears in the motions of the planets:

One is in latitude, because the planets do not always appear at the same distance from the stationary poles.

40. Another is in longitude, because the planets pass along the zodiac in different ways and not the same way.

41. A third is in departure and approach, because the same planet sometimes comes closer to the center of the earth and sometimes is further away, as Ptolemy proves in his Almagest, statements 3-12, because there is a circle whose visual diameter is longer in a longer longitude and shorter in a shorter longitude. It is clear too about Mars which, when at the aux,For this term see the figure and footnote to n.49. ³¹ appears of a notably small size with respect to what it has when it is opposite the aux. It is also proved of the moon, because when it and the sun are equally near the tail and head of Draco, an eclipse of the moon does not last the same time but is sometimes longer and sometimes shorter; this is only possible because the moon sometimes enters more and sometimes less into the earth’s shadow, so that when the shadow passes across the diameter of the moon, it stays longer because of the fact the diameter of the shadow is longer there in the cone than it is elsewhere. Also, if this departure and approach of the sun and moon were universally denied, no difference in amount of shadow could be assigned either on the one part or on the other; for the shadow would always stretch to an equal depth and so would be of an equal quantity, and the moon, since it would always be at the same distance near the cone, would always be in equal proximity to the shadow. The supposition of departure and approach is based on these and other observations of Ptolemy.

42. One could perhaps, by attributing one heaven to a planet, save the first two differences (namely of longitude and latitude [nn.39-40]) with a displacement of the polls of the heaven, in the way that Alpetragius [al-Bitruji] tried to do in his book On the Quality of the Celestial Motions when, by positing that the polls of the starry heaven are displaced from the polls of the ninth heaven (and that, as a result, they describe small circles round those stationary polls), he posited that the eighth heaven revolves about its own polls (but not with a motion contrary to the motion of the ninth heaven, but in the same direction), and that the poll of the eighth heaven receives the influence less effectively than does the ninth heaven, and so its poll does not complete a circle when some point on the ninth heaven does complete a circle.

43. And the deficiency of the poll of the lower heaven in its completion of a circle he calls the first shortening which, according to him, supplies the lower heaven’s motion about the poll, and supplies it perfectly in the eighth heaven as far as longitude is concerned; but as far as latitude is concerned there is necessarily a difference, for poll is displaced from poll; for although the motion about the poll of the lower heaven completes that heaven’s motion about the poll of the higher heaven as to longitude, there cannot however truly be a circle to any star moved in the lower heaven but rather a spiral, because it does not return to the same point from which the motion began.

44. Thus by the diversity of the polls of some heavens from others, and by the first shortening and the supplying of it, and especially in the case of some stars because of their not being situated in the middle of their heaven, he tries to give bases for saving the differences of longitude and latitude in the motions of the planets, and this not by positing ad hoc that some lower heaven is moved contrary to the motion of a higher heaven, but by positing that a lower heaven is moved in the same direction as the higher one, but yet less efficaciously, because it is natural that a power received in things ordered relative to each other is more efficaciously received in the ones closer to it.

45. This tradition seems sufficiently to agree with natural principles, provided that through it all the appearances as to longitude and latitude can be saved; for perhaps through it the stoppings and retrogressions and processions of the planets can be saved in the way he in fact tries in his book to save them in the case of certain planets.

46. The third difference, however, namely of departure and approach [n.41], can only be saved by positing that all the heavens are eccentric, because if a planet does not in that case leave its heaven but only a part of its heaven, and that part of its heaven, however it is moved, is always equally distant from the center (because that whole heaven, being rotated in a circle, is concentric with the world), then, wherever the star is, its departure and approach will always be at the same distance with respect to its center. And though it would not be necessary to posit eccentric circles and epicycles (as Ptolemy and other astronomers do) because of the first two differences, yet it is necessary to do so because of the third difference.

47. And, on this supposition, the conclusion for the issue at hand is that a single heaven does not suffice for any planet in respect of its motion.

So, for example’s sake, let the heaven of Saturn be taken. If it is posited as eccentric to the world, let the heaven of Saturn be moved while the eighth heaven is concentric with the world; the aux of that heaven therefore succeeds to the opposite of the aux. If the aux of it did not penetrate the starry heaven (so that two bodies would be together in the same place) but only reached it, then the opposite of the aux, which is less distant from the center of the earth than the aux is, will not reach the concave surface of the starry heaven, and thus there would be a vacuum there.

48. So it is only possible to avoid an unacceptable result about bodies being rent and existing in the same place or about a vacuum by attributing to each planet at least three heavens circling the earth,See the figure at n.49. ³² the two limits of which heavens (namely the lower and higher) would have concentric ultimate surfaces, namely the superior being convex and the lower concave; but those two would have another two surfaces, namely the higher being concave and the lower convex, being eccentric to the world; and between these two surfaces [sc. the concave of the superior and the convex of the inferior] let there be a third sphere (which may be called the deferent), eccentric to those two deferent surfaces, so that when the two revolving heavens are moved to any part a vacuum does not follow; for the thicker part of one is against the less thick part of the other, and conversely.

49. Likewise, in whatever way the deferent is moved within the two revolving spheres (the higher and lower), no vacuum or rending follows from its motion because its surfaces are both concentric to the surfaces within which it is contained and moved; and thus the star [planet], fixed at one part of the deferent will sometimes be at the aux -namely when the part of the deferent where it is is placed directly above the thicker part of the lower revolving sphere and directly placed beneath the less thick part of the superior revolving sphere, for then it will be at the greatest distance from the center of the earth; but the star [planet] will be in the opposite of the aux when the part of the deferent sphere - and the part where the planet is fixed - is placed above the thinnest part of the lower revolving sphere and placed beneath the thickest part of the higher revolving sphere, for then it will be at the shortest distance from the center of the earth. An image of this is more clearly evident in the figure below.In this figure (provided by the Vatican editors) the asterisk marks the place of the planet in the deferent sphere; cd is the center of the deferent sphere; cm is the center of the world; the shaded areas are the two heavens, possessed of thicker and thinner walls, within which the deferent sphere carrying the planet revolves. In this figure the planet is at the aux (that is, the point of the sphere furthest from the center of the world). It would be at the opposite of the aux (and so closest to the center of the world) when the sphere has revolved 180°. ³³

cd

C"?l

50. Further: since Mercury has a deferent, whose center moves (and not round the earth like the center of the moon but off to one side) by describing a small circle (as is clear in the Almagest statement 9 ch.6), the result is that the deferent sphere is not concentric with the revolving spheres, namely the highest and lowest; and so one must posit there at least five spheres, four revolving and one deferent.

51. Now in addition to these spheres one must posit epicycles (which are not spheres circling the earth but little spheres placed at a determinate point on the spheres that do circle the earth), and this because the departure of the star is greater at some times than at others, and this departure cannot come from the deferent alone. Procession too and stopping and retrograde motion are more easily saved by epicycles.

52. But however it may be with epicycles, there will be at least twenty five movable spheres circling the earth, namely twenty three for the planets [sc. five for Mercury and eighteen - six planets times three spheres - for the rest], and in addition the eighth and ninth heavens.

II. To the Principal Arguments

53. To the arguments.

To the first [n.26] I say that Scripture takes ‘firmament’ for the whole heaven, between the empyrean and the elements.

54. To the second [n.27] I say that the conformity of motions does not entail continuity.

55. To the third [n.28] I say that the heaven cannot yield to a moved star as water or air can yield to a body in motion placed in them, because a naturally incorruptible body is naturally indivisible, and this if it is incorruptible both in its parts and in the whole, as the heaven is posited to be; and thus there could not be a motion of anything in the heaven, unmoved as it is by any natural agent.

The Fifteenth to Twenty Fifth Distinctions are lacking in the Ordinatio

[Fifteenth Distinction: Whether in a mixed body the elements actually remain in substance

Sixteenth Distinction: Whether the image of the Trinity consists in three really distinct powers of the rational soul

Seventeenth Distinction: About the origin of Adam’s soul and the place where it was produced Eighteenth Distinction: About the production of woman and the seminal reasons

Nineteenth Distinction: Whether we had immortal bodies in the state of innocence

Twentieth Distinction: About the offspring of Adam had any been procreated in the state of innocence

Twenty First Distinction: About the venality or gravity of Adam’s sin

Twenty Second Distinction: Whether Adam’s sin came from ignorance

Twenty Third Distinction: Whether God could make a rational creature’s will impeccable by nature Twenty Fourth Distinction: Whether the superior part [sc. of the intellect] is a distinct power from the inferior part

Twenty Fifth Distinction: Whether anything other than the will causes efficaciously an act of willing in the will]

Twenty Sixth Distinction

Single Question. Whether Grace is in the Essence or in a Power of the Soul

1. Concerning the twenty sixth distinction I ask about grace and firsta whether it is in the essence or in a power of the soul.

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning this twenty sixth distinction, where the Master deals with the gratuitous helps that the first parents had for resisting evil and advancing in good, the question concerning the present distinction is first about grace.

2. Proof that it is in the essence:

Because the essence comes from God before the power,     therefore it is reduced first back to God; but it is reduced by grace; therefore etc     . Proof of the consequence: first from Dionysius [Celestial Hierarchy ch.4], “for things are reduced back to God the way they proceed from God,” and second because, just as each creature has God for first efficient cause, so also for final end.

3. Further, the essence is more indeterminate than the power, therefore it is more in need of being determined; but grace is as it were the form that determines indeterminate soul, therefore grace is more in the essence than in the power.

4. Again, grace is always in act; a power is not always in act; therefore grace is not in a power. The proof of the first premise is that the act of grace is to make pleasing; but grace always makes pleasing. The proof of the second premise is that a habit can only be always in act if what it belongs to is in act.

5. Again, approval of the essence suffices for approval of the power and not conversely; therefore grace, which is the principle of approval, ought to be put per se in the essence.

6. Proof the antecedent, Genesis 4.4, “God had respect for Abel and his offering;” further, since the essence is essentially prior in being to the power,     therefore likewise in approval, as it seems.

7. Further, the form determining for action should be put more in the principal agent than in the instrument; the essence is the principal agent, the power is as an instrumental agent, according to Anselm On Concord q.3 ch.11; therefore etc     .

8. Again, there should be a correspondence of the recreated image to the created image; the created image requires a unity of essence and a trinity of powers;     therefore that which is recreated also requires a unity of grace perfecting the essence and a trinity virtually perfecting the powers.

9. To the opposite:

Grace is a form in the soul, as is proved in 1 d.17 nn.121, 129-131; it is not a passion or a power, so it is a habit, according to the division posited by the Philosopher Ethics 2.4-5.1106a11-24, “Every habit is in a power, because it makes the work of the possessor of it good;” therefore etc     .

10. Again, operating grace and cooperating grace are the same, as is plain from the Master in the text [Sentences 2 d.26 ch.s.1-2]; but cooperating grace is in the power of will;     therefore etc     .

I. To the Question

A. The Opinion of Others

11. On this point it is said that grace is first in the essence [Aquinas Sentences 2 d.26 a.3].

12. The proof is from Augustine On Charity [Sermon 350 n.1], that charity is “the root and life of all the good;” ibid., “charity is the life of the dying;” life and death pertain to the essence;     therefore etc     .

13. A confirmation is that if grace is posited in the essence, it gives supernatural and primary being; therefore by parity of reasoning it will be able to give supernatural acting. Now it would not give per se supernatural being if it was only in the power, but since being necessarily precedes all acting, natural being necessarily precedes natural acting, and supernatural being supernatural acting.a

a. a[Interpolation] Or in another way thus, that acting presupposes being;     therefore what gives natural or supernatural acting gives natural or supernatural being. But grace gives acting to the soul, therefore it gives being to it; but being belongs to the essence; therefore etc     .

B. Rejection of the Opinion

14. Argument is made against this position in two ways.

15. [First argument] - First, because since grace is the same in reality as glory, or is a per disposition for it, the result is it is per se in the same subject as blessedness is; but blessedness is not per se in the essence but in a power; therefore grace is too.

16. A response is made that blessedness is principally in the essence and, by means of it, redounds into the powers.a The soul, by a special descent of God into it, is deiform in the first way (as burning embers are igni-form).

a. a[Interpolation] according as they are capacities, more or less, or prior or posterior.

17. On the contrary:

Therefore the soul, with its powers removed, could be per se blessed, and thus blessedness would not be in any second act, nor even in the attaining of the ultimate object, for an object is not attained as object save by second act, and second act belongs to the soul as it is a power.a

a. a[Interpolation] Again, blessedness is only present because it satisfies and gives rest to the blessed; this resting can only come through union with the beatific object; union is only through some act that belongs to a power alone - and this is the opinion of the Philosopher when he posits that blessedness is in an act.

18. Further, if blessedness were placed in the essence and if ‘grace in the essence’ is of the same idea in a wayfarer as in the fatherland, then the soul would be blessed now, although less so than in the fatherland; the consequent is false, therefore so is the antecedent. The proof of the consequence is that now the soul has - for you - a first act of the same idea as the act in which blessedness is.

19. A response is made that one could thus argue in the same way about the act as about grace, because the act is of the same idea now as it will be then; nor is it valid to make objection about the act of seeing and the light of glory, because these do not per se belong to glory.

20. I say that the argument about first act [n.18] proves that the soul would now be blessed (although less now than later), but not if blessedness is placed in the second act also of loving, because this act is not of the same idea here and in the fatherland [contra n.19]. For if intellection is a partial per se cause in respect of volition (as the third opinion says in the preceding question [lacking in the Ordinatio; see Lectura 2 d.25 n.69]), then it follows that vision and obscure intellection [cf. 2 Corinthians 13.12] -which are intellections of different idea - can come together for a volition of simply different idea (and this was one of the reasons touched on above for the third opinion [Lectura 2 d.25 n.79]), because the same object when known in diverse ways can be loved by acts diverse even in species. But if the view is held that the will is the whole cause of enjoyment, then it is more difficult to save the view that blessedness consists more principally in enjoyment; for that by which the perfect qua perfect is formally distinguished from the imperfect qua imperfect seems to be more perfect in it; but if enjoyment in the fatherland and on the way are of the same species (which seems to be the case), and if the will alone is the cause of enjoyment and if the object is the same and the habit the same, then the blessed qua blessed is distinguished from the non-blessed by vision and not by enjoyment, which is of the same idea in both; therefore vision would be nobler than enjoyment.

21. However, by maintaining that will is the whole cause of its own act [the opinion of Henry of Ghent, mentioned second by Scotus in Lectura 2 d.25 n.54], one can say that a cause that is without limit as to diversity of effects can cause things diverse in species because of the coming together of the diverse things required for the causation of a thing diverse in species, even though these diverse things do not come together in idea of effecting cause; hence a cause without limit as to diversity of effects causes diverse things when the requisites, according as they are requisites, come together - the way the sun solidifies mud and liquefies ice, because of the diverse disposition of the things it acts on [1 d.2 nn.347-350]; but the will is a cause without limit, possessing in its power volitions diverse in species, and so, when vision and obscure intellection come together (which are things diverse in species and per se required for an act of will), the will can cause acts diverse in species, and thus enjoyment in the fatherland and on the way can be distinct in species.

22. [Second argument] - Further, second [n.15]:

When some form is undetermined in its active power for several things, then what has a precise respect to one determinate action cannot be a perfection of the form insofar as the form is undetermined, but insofar as it is a power determinate with respect to the action in respect of which it is perfected by such perfection. An example: if the soul is undetermined as to the several acts agreeable to it according to its several powers, then wisdom (or any other intellectual habit) does not perfect the soul insofar as the soul is undetermined but precisely insofar as it is intellect (and the reason for this proposition is that, if wisdom were to perfect the soul insofar as the soul is undetermined in its active power, then wisdom could equally perfect the soul in its order to any of its acts whatever; likewise, if it does perfect the soul precisely in its order to a determinate act, it would thus perfect the soul only if the soul were an active power for that act and were not undetermined as to several acts). But grace only perfects the soul in its order to a determinate act (namely a meritorious act), which belongs namely to the will alone, according to Anselm, On the Virginal Conception ch.4 and frequently elsewhere;     therefore it precisely perfects the soul insofar as the soul is the power to which such act belongs; this power is the will, therefore etc     .

23. There is confirmation of this reason in that, if grace were to perfect the essence as essence of the soul, grace would be able to redound to the first act of the power, namely of the intellect, and so an act of the intellect, as it precedes an act of the will, could be meritorious; indeed, if the intellect existed alone without the will, grace and merit could be in the essence.

C. Scotus’ own Opinion

The conclusion of the above reasons [nn.15, 22] can be conceded, because the habit which was proved to be supernatural in 1 d.17 n.129 perfects a power of the soul and a determinate power, namely the will, because it is ordered to the determinate object of such power; but it does not perfect the essence, because essence has regard to no object nor to any act.

25. There is confirmation from Anselm On the Virginal Conception ch.3, “All justice and injustice are formally in the will.”a

a. a[Interpolation] grace is a certain justice and rectitude;     therefore etc     .

26. Again, opposites are naturally about the same thing; but grace and sin are opposites; now sin is in the will, according to Anselm, ibid.

II. To the Principal Arguments

27. To the arguments for the opposing side [nn.2-8].Scotus’ response to these arguments is actually to the order they have in the equivalent place of the Lectura, as that the first one he answers here is actually second in the Ordinatio though first in the Lectura. Further the one he answers fourth here [n.31] is the first in the Ordinatio and lacking in the Lectura. The last argument in the Ordinatio is also lacking in the Lectura and is not answered here at all. ³⁴

I say [n.3] that grace determines to a gratuitous operation in the way that habit has the property of determining; a power is in this way indeterminate with a proximate indetermination, and the essence is not.28. To the next [n.4] I say that although ‘to en-grace’ (that is, ‘to make pleasing’) has an active signification, it is not an acting; just as neither is a white wall making whiteness an acting but an informing [sc. an informing of the eye to see white].

29. To the third [n.5] I say that approval of a power suffices for approval of the essence and not conversely. For just as a man, if he could see another’s act of loving, would approve, because of the act, that other person as a whole, and thus would approve first the act freely elicited first and then the power freely eliciting it (and thereby he would sufficiently approve the whole supposit) - so God first approves the act freely elicited by the power; not indeed with the general approval with which he approves every creature (because in this way the essence is first approved), but with the special approval by which he ordains to blessedness the one approved; but God thus approves first and principally the power itself, which is capable first of blessedness, and through it he approves the essence.

30. And when objection is made bout Abel and his offering [n.6], I say that an exterior act is only approved because the interior one is, and the interior one is only approved because it is elicited or commanded by the power of which it is the act; but there is no further resolving of the approval of this power back to the approval of some prior approved thing, because nothing prior is approvable with special approval save by mediation of the power.

31. And as to the statement [n.2] that ‘things are reduced back to God in the order they proceed from God’ (according to Dionysius), one must say that this is true of extremes produced in diverse persons and not of things that are in the same supposit, because the essence receives being first and yet is reduced back through the power first, because it is reduced through the power’s operation.

32. To the next argument [n.7] I say that the major can be conceded about an extrinsic instrument, but not about an intrinsic one that is the same as the operating thing (the way the operating thing is called an instrument insofar as it has a determinate operative power); for in the sense in which the instrument is an intrinsic instrument the form receiving the action should be posited as instrument, but in the principal agent as it is distinguished from an instrument should be posited only the form.

Twenty Seventh Distinction

Single Question. Whether Grace is a Virtue

1. Concerning the twenty seventh distinction I aska whether grace is a virtue.

a. a[Interpolation] About this twenty seventh distinction, where the Master deals with inquiry about virtue, the question is asked:

2. That it is not:

Because as the supernatural light is disposed with respect to the virtues of grace, so is the natural light disposed with respect to the natural virtues; but the natural light is not a virtue;     therefore etc     .a

a. a[Interpolation] nor is grace, which is the supernatural light, a supernatural virtue.

3. To the opposite:

Grace is a habit (from the preceding question [d.26 nn.9, 24]), and it is not a vice; therefore it is a habit-virtue.

I. To the Question

A. First Opinion

4. [Exposition of the opinion] - The opinion here was onceThe opinion of Thomas Aquinas (ST Ia IIae q.110 a.3, Sentences 2 d.26 q.un. a.3) as well as of Albert the Great (Sentences 2 d.26 a.11), which Scotus, like Giles of Rome (Quodlibet 6 q.5), here speaks of as definitely abandoned by theologians. ³⁵ that grace was the supernatural light as it were, being related to the theological virtues [sc. faith, hope, charity] as the natural light is related to the acquired virtues; in the way that the soul is posited to be the same as its powers, so either grace would be the root of the theological virtues, or these three virtues would perfect in ordering to the supernatural light (which is grace) just as the acquired virtues perfect in ordering to the natural light.

5. [Rejection of the opinion] - But from this it would follow that faith cannot remain unformed [sc. without charity], because it could not perfect if the light did not remain in its ordering to what it perfects, just as neither can acquired virtue remain a virtue if its natural disposition toward what it has respect to (as prudence) does not remain.

6. And if it be said that degrees can be assigned to grace and that in its lower degree it is faith and hope and in its higher degree it deserves the name of charity, and so the lower can remain without the higher (and in this way do faith and hope remain without charity) - against this:

The same essence cannot perfect the powers of the soul in diverse ways like this.a

a. a[Interpolation] Again, although charity of itself could be diminished without grace, yet in fact it is never diminished or corrupted save by a cause removing merit; venial sin is not of this sort because it stands along with charity, but mortal sin does not, because it does not permit anything of charity to stand along with it.

7. Further, it would also seem that the three theological virtues would exist in the fatherland; for then perfect grace will remain, and so all the virtues, according to this opinion, will remain.

B. Scotus’ own Opinion, already Proposed by Others

8. So there is another opinion, which says that grace is formally the virtue that is charity, because whatever excellences are attributed to charity are attributed also to grace, and conversely; for both equally “divide the sons of the kingdom from the sons of perdition” (Augustine On the Trinity 15.18 n.32), both are also the form of the virtues and neither can be unformed, and both join the wayfarer to the ultimate end with that perfect conjunction which is possible for wayfarers; and if they are posited as distinct, one of them would be superfluous because the other would suffice.

9. And in this regard can the opinion of the Master be held (as it was in 1 d.17 nn.167-168), that the Holy Spirit by no other habit distinct from charity (distinct from the habit by which he also indwells) moves the will to meritorious loving of God; for the habit by which the Holy Spirit indwells the soul is grace and grace is charity. And by the same habit by which the Holy Spirit indwells the soul does the will incline to its meritorious act; but not so does the soul believe and hope all things by the same habit by which the Holy Spirit indwells, but by other imperfect habits, because the acts of these habits do not require perfection.

10. But from this there seems to follow a distinction between grace and charity, because charity is a perfection simply, for otherwise it would not formally belong to God who, according to John, is charity, 1 John 4.16, “God is charity;” but grace is not a perfection simply, nor is it formally posited in God;     therefore etc     .

11. Response:

Charity is that whereby he who has it holds God as beloved, so that charity considers God not under the idea of lover but under the idea of lovable; grace is that whereby God holds someone as pleasing, so that grace considers God as approving or loving, not as loved. However grace is not said to be that because of which God loves (because then the divine essence in the Son could be called grace, since because of it God loves the Son), but grace is said to be that because of which God approves him who has it as worthy of blessedness (with the worth that is the correspondence of merit to reward); and so grace includes some imperfection, because such worth posits some imperfection in the worthy person, that he is not blessed of himself.

12. In this way then we can concede that, although the same absolute thing in the soul is that by which the soul loves God as object and that by which the soul is approved by a special approval that ordains it for blessedness, yet there is a different idea in that absolute thing insofar as it considers God in this way or in that; and one of these ideas, namely the first and principal, belongs to the soul as this idea is a perfection simply, while the other belongs to it as this idea is a limited perfection; and thus in the first way it is appropriately called charity, and in the second way called grace; and thus all grace is charity but not conversely.

13. And yet this distinction of reasons, or this non-convertibility, does not entail that when grace and charity come together in the same soul they are distinct in form, just as, though wisdom is a perfection simply and ‘a wisdom of this kind’ is a limited perfection, yet, when they come together, it does not follow that the second is distinct from the first in form (or according to form), and yet they are distinct from each other formally; for that which is science [sc. a habit] in my intellect and that which is acquired by teaching [sc. a doctrine] are the same, and yet in God there is wisdom and no such limited habit. The two state the same thing, then, but as taken in different ways.

14. And grace and charity do not differ only in this way but in a connoted respect, because the absolute thing that they state can be considered as it is a principle of operating for the one who has it, and thus it does not state imperfection; and in this way it can be in God and in this way it is called charity; in another way it can be considered as it is the object in me of God, insofar as God holds me as dear, and in this way it determines the object and is called grace [1 d.17 nn.115-118].

II. To the Principal Argument

15. To the argument [n.2] one must say that the acquired moral virtues perfect the soul in ordering it to some light that can be called prudence, and prudence does not perfect in ordering to any light other than that of the agent intellect; yet prudence is a virtue. So it is in the issue at hand: the supernatural virtues perfect the soul in ordering to the virtue that is charity, and charity perfects further in ordering to the supernatural end.

Twenty Eighth Distinction

Single Question. Whether Man’s Free Choice without Grace can Guard against all Mortal Sin

1. Concerning the twenty eighth distinction I aska about the error of Pelagius, namely whether man’s free choice without grace can guard against all mortal sin.

a. a[Interpolation] About this twenty eighth distinction, where the Master deals with the insufficiency of free choice without grace, the question is asked:

2. That it can:

Romans 2.14, “The nations who do not have the law naturally do the things that are of the law, and not having such law are a law unto themselves.” Here it seems that the Apostle is rebuking the Jews because the Gentiles, without having the law given them, were keeping the law;     therefore they were guarding against all sin and yet it seems they did not have grace.

3. Further, Augustine On Free Choice 3.18 n.17, “No one sins in something he cannot avoid;” some sin cannot be avoided;a therefore etc     .

a. a[Interpolation] so either someone can avoid sin without grace or he cannot; if he cannot, then he does not sin; if he can then I have the conclusion intended. Or: so what cannot be avoided is not a sin.

4. Again Anselm On Liberty of Choice ch.13, “Free choice is a power of keeping rightness for its own sake;” therefore while free choice remains, so does its power.

5. On the contrary:

The Pelagian heresy seems to consist in this, that free choice suffices without grace.

6. Again, this heresy seems to have been very strongly rebuked by Augustine On the Perfection of Justice [Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 5.20: “Some heretics said that man in mortal sin could, without grace, endure and no more sin mortally.. .which Augustine sufficiently rejects against the Pelagians, especially in On the Perfection of Justice”].

7. Again, Gregory Moralia 25.9 n.22 on the verse of Job 34.24-25 ‘He will destroy many and uncountable.’ says, “A sin that is not destroyed by penance soon by its weight draws toward another.”

I. To the Question

A. The Opinion of Others, Proposed in Two Versions

8. Here, because of the words of Augustine that he brings against the Pelagians, the assertion is made [by Aquinas, Henry, Richard of Middleton] that it is not possible to guard against all sin without grace.

9. But this is put forward in diverse ways:

In one way that free choice could avoid individual mortal sins without grace but not all of them. An example is given about being in a leaking ship, that although one could stop up any single hole yet not all of them; for while one hole is being stopped another is left open.

10. In another way it is said that free choice can be considered doubly: in one way before deliberation and before time for deliberation, or in another way after both (namely after time for deliberation and after the deliberation itself); or in a third way, after time for deliberation has passed but when no deliberation was done. In the first way it is posited that one cannot sin mortally but one can sin venially. In the second way it is posited that one can avoid all mortal sin after deliberation has been done. In the third way it is posited that one cannot, if one is in mortal sin, avoid every mortal sin; the reason is the deficiency in the intellect before the time of deliberating, because of which one will not deliberate rightly even though one passes through the time when there could have been deliberation; and so, if one does not deliberate when one is going through the time suitable for deliberation, one will be understood to have given consent.

B. Rejection of the Opinion

1. Against the Conclusion in Itself

11. There is argument against this, and first against the conclusion [n.8], because mortal sin consists only in transgressing God’s precept, according to Augustine Against Faustus 22.27, and it is contained in Sentences d.35; according to Jerome [actually Pelagius himself, in a book once attributed to Jerome, On the Faith to Pope Innocent n.10, “We execrate too the blasphemy of those who say that something impossible for man has been commanded by God”] - ‘let him be anathema who says that God has commanded impossibilities’; therefore, just as it is possible to avoid one sin and transgression against one precept, so it is also possible to avoid any of them.

12. Response is made [Aquinas, Alexander of Hales] that when someone is in mortal sin it is not possible for him, while he remains in sin, to keep the precept, but it is possible for him to prepare and dispose himself for grace, by which, once given, he can keep the precept; and thus, if he did not prepare himself, the lack of preparation is imputed to him as sin, as Anselm illustrates [Why God became Man 1.24] with his example of a servant throwing himself into a well [sc. so as not to go to the market as he was bidden].

13. Another response [Bonaventure] is that although one could, while remaining in mortal sin, keep the precept as regard fulfilling it, yet not as regard the intention of the command giver, because the intention of the command giver was that by fulfilling the precept one attain the end, but one does not attain the end by observance of the precepts unless one is observing them through charity.

14. Against this [n.13]:

If God by his precept intended to oblige everyone to observe the precept through charity, then whoever does the work of the precept but not through charity sins mortally -and this both when what is in question is a negative precept, to which one is bound always and at all times (and if one is bound to do it through charity, then, by not doing it through charity, one sins mortally), and when what is in question is an affirmative precept, to which one is bound at some time (if one does not at that time do it through charity one sins mortally); and thus, if anyone has committed mortal sin and afterwards avoids killing ‘because God commanded not to kill’, and afterwards avoids stealing ‘because God commanded not to steal’, he sins mortally - and if afterwards he keeps the Sabbath ‘because God commanded it’, he sins mortally. But to say this seems to be nothing other than to make perverse everyone who has once committed mortal sin, so that he does not do afterwards any work good in its kind [cf. d.7 nn.28-29] (to which, however, he is otherwise bound [nn.34-37, 47]), although he is nevertheless advised and admonished to do the opposite, namely to do works good in their kind because these works dispose him to obtaining grace more quickly and easily.

15. Likewise, someone existing in charity can do a work of a precept not moved to it then by charity but by natural piety and meekness (or by something else), not actually then carrying it out for the ultimate end, so that the fulfilling of the work of the precept would not be meritorious for him. But if he were also bound to keep the precept according to the intention of the command giver, how then could he be attaining the end?

He would be bound at that time to merit and he would be sinning mortally at that time by doing such a work (a work good in its kind and by precept), which is absurd.

16. The same argument can be made against the first response [n.12], because if we posit someone not disposing himself to grace but being still then in a state of guilt, he cannot keep himself from guilt; therefore it is impossible for him during that time to keep himself from guilt - which is false, because all guilt is voluntary. But if he can during that time keep himself from guilt (which at least seems obvious as far as the kind of work commanded by the precept is concerned), the argument before given returns [n.14], which suffices to excuse him from mortal sin.

2. Against the Two Versions of the Argument in Particular

17. I argue against these two versions in particular, and first against the first [n.9]: If one can at this particular time guard against this mortal sin and against that mortal sin and, while guarding against this one, guard against all of them (and likewise at the next following time and so on at all times), then, if one can guard against this sin and against that, one can guard against all of them at once. The assumption that one can guard against this mortal sin and against that is plain, because the will cannot simultaneously have distinct acts of consent, which are required for mortal sin; and so, while it has a distinct act of will to resist this mortal sin, it has no act of will for so willing any other mortal sin that it mortally sins by this willing. Again, by preserving oneself from one mortal sin, one becomes stronger for resisting other sins. Therefore if one can guard against this sin, which one is afraid of (or which one sins by), much more can one guard against it otherwise, and so on in other cases.

18. Against the second way [n.10] I argue as follows: at the time when one could deliberate about this sin a, then either one can deliberate about a, and the result is that, while one is deliberating, one is not sinning mortally (also when deliberation is complete, one can, according to you, guard against actual sinning with the sin a, or with any other sin at that time) - or one is unable to deliberate about a at the time of deliberation, and so one will not possess the use of reason.

19. But if you say that one cannot deliberate rightly because the intellect is blinded, this seems absurd, because a single mortal sin does not make anyone intemperate with general intemperance, for one day does not make a summer [Aristotle Ethics 1.9.1098a18-20], and one act of vice does not make a man generally vicious or blind generally as a result to all principles of doable things; therefore he can have correct deliberation about many things he is tempted by, notwithstanding the fact that he is in one mortal sin.

20. Likewise, vices are not so connected that one sin would make one blind to the principle of action for acting well, because it is also not the case that a single sin corrupts the appetite by inclining it per se to another sin; rather, along with one particular sin can stand an acquired habit contrary to another sin, because a single mortal sin does not corrupt the whole habit of virtue. Therefore by such habits acquired both about the same doable thing and about other ones, one can rightly judge and deliberate, and so at the time of deliberation one can rightly deliberate or be tempted as regard the same sin or as regard another; and if one could rightly deliberate so as not to sin by construed consent [n.10], one can, according to you, guard against every sin; therefore one can do so simply.

C. Scotus’ own Response

21. In response to the question it can be said, speaking of a sin of commission, that sin can be taken in one way for the elicited act of deformity itself, and in another way for the stain of sin (or for the abiding guilt) that remains after the elicited act until the sin has been destroyed by penance [cf. above d.7 n.84].

22. I say that in the second way free choice cannot of itself guard against all mortal sin in this present state, because a soul without grace is stained by some sin (whether original or actual), from which it is not freed save by grace.

23. But if the question is asked whether this is because of an immediate opposition between guilt and grace, I say no, because guilt and grace were not immediate opposites in the state of innocence (for at that time someone could have been in a purely natural state, being both without grace and without guilt; so these are in no way immediate opposites) - nor even are they immediate opposites by comparison to the power of the maker, because God can restore the will, after it has sinned, to the kind he could have made it to be. Rather, the fact that the will is only freed from sin by grace [n.22] is because of the universal law that now [in this present state] no one’s enmity is remitted unless he becomes not merely a non-enemy but also a friend,“A sinner is a non-enemy by remission of guilt, but a friend by infusion of grace” 4 d.16 q.2 n.2. God so acts now by his ordained power, but he could by his absolute power [d.7 nn.52-56, 1 d.17 n.164] act in the other two ways listed here in n.23. ³⁶ made acceptable to God by sanctifying grace.

24. If an objection be raised about how God could remit guilt without giving grace (for if a change is not posited in the person justified, there seems to be a change in God), the response is twofold.The responses are not given, but see n.23 again. The Vatican editors also refer, among other places, to 4 d.16 q.2 n.11, “The divine will can will affirmatively for this man at moment a and negatively for him at moment b without any change in the divine will.” ³⁷

25. As to the first way [n.21] see Henry Quodlibet 5 q.20.The relevant passage from Henry is given by Scotus in the Lectura 2 d.28 n.21. The Vatican editors give it as follows: “Therefore one must say that man’s free choice, even while he is in mortal sin, can be considered in two ways: in one way on the part of his freedom in itself, in another way as he is exposed to the temptations that come to him. I say that in the first way he can simply guard against falling into another mortal sin, in the sense that he falls by no necessity into it; but if he does fall, he falls voluntarily such that, if he did not fall voluntarily and he did fall, then by falling he did not sin. I say in the second way that he cannot guard himself for long without it being necessary either that he fall soon enough into mortal sin or that he receive grace from God by which to be able perfectly to guard himself and be liberated from mortal sin. But whichever of these happens to him, it happens to him only by consent of his will. For whoever is in mortal sin, whether one or many...is, after he is in sin, either well disposed, as far as concerns himself, with respect to the sins he has committed...by detesting them to the extent he can in his present state, or not well disposed. If he is well disposed, it cannot be that he should for long be thus well disposed about his moral acts without God moving his free choice by some motion of prevenient grace [gratia gratis data] to assenting simply to the good. And if he does not resist, God at once confers sanctifying grace freeing him from all sin; but if he resists, he at once sins mortally by contempt and ingratitude for the divine call. And as I said about someone in mortal sin, so I say about someone only in original sin, supposing however it is possible for him to sin venially before he sins mortally.” ³⁸

26. And this opinion can be confirmed by the fact that the precept ‘Thou shalt love the Lord they God etc.’ is the first, on which hang all the law and the prophets [Matthew 22.37-40, Deuteronomy 6.5]. The will then is bound to sometimes eliciting an act of this percept, so that there cannot always be omission of the act of this precept without mortal sin; but whenever the will executes an act of this precept (even in an unformed way) it disposes itself by congruity to sanctifying grace; and it will either resist this grace when offered and sin mortally, or consent to it and be justified.Henry Quodlibet 8 q.5, “Now about the process of grace in an adult before baptism, or after baptism in a state of actual mortal sin, one must hold that God anticipates the sinner with prevenient grace [gratia datis grata] as soon as he comes to a use of free choice such that he is able, by deliberation, to do something. And if through his free choice he disposes himself well to prevenient grace, he disposes himself by congruity to God’s bestowing on him justifying grace... If he thrusts this prevenient grace from him, he makes himself unworthy to be further helped, but to be justly more hardened thereby in his sin. If however he accepts it, he disposes himself by justice of congruity to sanctifying grace, which God then and there confers on him, and by which he is cleansed from sin.” ³⁹ This opinion, therefore, gives a negative answer to the question [n.1], not because of an absolute impotency in free choice [nn.5-7], but insofar as the impotency is compared to God who freely offers grace to a free will that is in some way well disposed.

II. To the Principal Arguments

27. To the Arguments.

To the passage from Romans 2 [n.2] it can be said that, if the children of Israel alone were bound to the law of Moses, the rest, the Gentiles, could have lived justly by keeping the law of nature, and then they were ‘a law unto themselves’, that is, by the law of nature ‘written within on their hearts’ [Romans 2.15] they directed themselves in living rightly, just as the Jews did by the written law; but the Gentiles did not live well without all grace, because grace could - ex hypothesi - have been in them without observance of the Mosaic law.

28. As to the next [n.3] the statement of Augustinea can be conceded according to the opinion stated [sc. of Henry nn.25-26]. And to the minor [sc. ‘some sin cannot be avoided’] it can be said that he to whom grace is offered can guard against resisting grace, but he cannot guard against sin; for if he does not resist grace, he is justified; so only this sin [sc. resistance to grace] is what can be guarded against, but when a man is in a sin previously committed, sin cannot be guarded against [see the quotation from Henry in footnotes to n.25 and n.26 above].

a. a[Interpolation] namely that ‘no one sins in what he can in no way avoid’.

29. To the third [n.4] Anselm responds that, as far as concerns the part of free choice, justice can be kept once it is had, although when justice is not had it cannot be kept by free choice alone [cf. d.7 n.85].

Twenty Ninth Distinction

Single Question. Whether Original Justice in Adam must be Set Down as a Supernatural Gift

1. Concerning the twenty ninth distinction I aska whether original justice in Adam must be set down as a supernatural gift.

a. a[Interpolation] About this twenty ninth distinction, where the Master deals with the grace that our parents had in the state of innocence, there is one question to ask:

2. That it should not:

Original justice is posited because a rectitude excluding all rebellion of the powers and an immortality were possessed in the original state; but both of these can be preserved on the basis of pure nature, because each of the opposites is a punishment, and punishment is not without guilt. That death is a punishment is plain; that rebellion is also is proved by the fact that the fighting of the lower powers against the higher is a punishment.

3. Further, the will in its pure nature is right, because God did not make it crooked. And this rightness is from the origin, therefore it belonged to man originally; and it is justice, because rightness of will is justice. Therefore the will in its pure nature has original justice.

4. Further, if it were only a supernatural gift, then original sin would only be a lack of this supernatural gift; therefore someone who was made in a state of pure nature would be equal with him who by sin had lost original justice, and so they should be equally punished, which seems unacceptable.

5. On the contrary:

Nature remains complete in the sinner (according to Dionysius Divine Names ch.4 [d.7 n.4], “The band of demons is not evil as it accords with nature but as it does not. And all good was given unaltered to them, but they fell away from all the good given. And the angelic gifts given to them we do not at all say were changed, but they are complete and most splendid, although the demons, blocking out the virtues that gaze at good, do not see them,”); and original justice does not remain (as is plain from the effects assigned to original justice [n.2]);     therefore etc     .

I. To the Question

A. The Opinion of Henry of Ghent

6. [Exposition of the Opinion] - It is said here [by Henry, Quodlibet 6 q.11] that besides infused rectitude - if any there was - one must posit in the will a rectitude that is as a quality in a quantity, to which is opposed the naturally inflicted crookedness that the will incurs by sinning; and from this crookedness follows disobedience in the lower powers, because although a right will could of itself be master, yet not one that is thus crooked. An example is given of a rod that is straight and afterwards bent; its straightness is natural to the rod but not such as to belong to the essence of it.

7. This is made clear by the fact that it does not seem possible [otherwise] to save the contention that ‘sin wounds pure nature’: for if sin corrupted only some freely given gift, it would despoil only in things freely given; so in order to posit a wound in nature one must posit some rectitude that is taken away by sin. So if some supernatural gift is posited beside natural rectitude, one must say that natural justice includes both - because if one say that it includes the supernatural gift only, the result would be that, according to that gift, he who is in pure nature and he who is a sinner are equal, as one of the arguments on the opposite side said [n.4].a

a. a[Interpolation] the result would be that both were to be punished equally.

8. [Rejection of the opinion] - It is objected against this that, according to this position, it does not seem possible for the will to sin unless it has a natural rectitude that could be corrupted by sin. Let the will exist then in its essence alone without this addition [sc. without natural rectitude], and it will not be able to sin - which seems absurd, because it can be in agreement with justice, that is, be bound to will in agreement with the dictate of natural law; and the will need not necessarily so will, because it is free; therefore it can sin. Therefore one should not posit such a quality whose opposed crookedness is introduced because of sin.

9. Further, the rebellion of the powers does not seem to exist only by this crookedness, because the will seems to dominate the lower powers through its essential freedom more and better than through this accidental quality, because it is in its essence the supreme power; therefore the accidental quality will not be the whole reason for domination such that the will, if the quality is not present, will not dominate.

10. Further, this natural rectitude has been totally corrupted by mortal sin; therefore, since a second sin is as formally a sin as the first one, the second sin must corrupt natural rectitude in the way the first one did. But the second sin cannot corrupt this rectitude because the rectitude is no longer there; so neither does the first sin formally have its being a sin from its corrupting natural rectitude.

11. Further, one could then know by natural reason that this present state [sc. of corruption] is not natural, because it is manifest now that there is rebellion in the lower powers and, according to you, the rebellion cannot exist unless rectitude of the will is corrupted [n.6]; the consequent is unacceptable, because the most famous philosophers were unable to attain this knowledge.

12. Further, this rebellion seems to exist in man in his pure nature; therefore the rebellion does not exist because of a crookedness that the will incurs by sinning.

Proof of the antecedent:

It is natural for any appetite to be drawn toward its appetible object and, if it is not a free appetite, it is natural for it to be drawn supremely and as much as possible, because, just as such an appetite is ‘drawn’ [sc. and does not ‘draw’]- according to Damascene

Orthodox Faith ch.36 - and therefore its act is not in its power, so neither is the intensity of the act so in its power that it does not act as much as it can; therefore, since the sensitive appetite, existing in its pure nature, has a proper appetible and delightful object, it would have to tend supremely of itself to that object, and the tending would impede the act of reason, because the sensitive powers would still be existing then in the same essence as they are now - and because of this unity [sc. of essence] they will impede themselves mutually in the intensity of their acts, according to Avicenna On the Soul p.4 ch.2. Therefore reason would have to make an effort to impede this supreme delight of the sensitive part, and the inferior power could not be curbed without some sadness or difficulty existing in it, because just as it supremely inclines to delight so it struggles, on its own part, supremely against the opposite. There would then be a rebellion there, because there would be inclination of the inferior part toward enjoyment against the judgment of reason, and a difficulty in restraining this appetite.

B. Scotus’ own Opinion

13. It can therefore be said that if original justice did have this effect, namely to cause perfect tranquility in the soul as to all its powers (so that no lower power would incline against the judgment of a higher; or if it did incline as far as concerned itself, it could yet be ordered and regulated by a higher power without difficulty on the part of the higher, and without sadness on the part of the lower), then, since the soul would not have this when made purely in its natural conditions alone, there is need to posit in it a supernatural gift so that this perfect tranquility may exist in the soul.

14. For the will,a when conjoined to the sensitive appetite, is of a nature to enjoy delight along with that appetite, just as the intellect, when conjoined with the senses, is of a nature to understand sensible things; and if such a will is conjoined with many sensitive appetites, it is of a nature to enjoy delight along with all of them - and thus, not only can it not draw the appetite back from what delights it without any contrary inclination on the part of the appetite and without any difficulty, but neither does it seem able without difficulty to draw itself back from delighting along with the appetite. In order, then, for it to draw itself back with delight, something must become more delightful to it than is the delightful thing of the lower appetite that it jointly delights in together with that appetite; so in order for the will to be able to draw itself back with delight from every disordered delighting along with a lower power, something must of itself be more delightful to the will than any delightful thing of any lower power; and since there is nothing such on the part of the will itself, there must have been something supernatural in the will whereby the end became more delightful to it than anything delightful of any sensitive appetite -and for this reason the will would more delightfully draw itself back from joint delight along with the sensitive appetite than depart from that delightful thing, namely from the end.b If there was then this effect in the first man, namely perfect tranquility, and it was an effect of original justice, that justice was a supernatural gift, because God made it more delightful to the will than any appetible sensible thing, and this could not have come from any natural gift of the will itself.

a. a[Interpolation] From this a second argument can be formed.

b. b[Interpolation] according to which it jointly delighted along with the sensitive appetite.

15. But is it really the case that by this all rebellion is taken away, so that the lower power delightfully draws itself back from its proper delightful object?

I reply:

If the will abstains delightfully from joint delight with a lower power, the whole man delightfully abstains from the delightful object of the lower sensitive appetite; but the whole man does not abstain with sadness if the lower power abstains with sadness; for what belongs to man according to a higher power belongs to him simply, and not for this reason is it denied to him if it does not belong to him according to a lower power.

16. But if it be said, on the part of a lower power, that the lower power on its part delightfully obeys reason, then it seems that something must be placed in the lower power so that it may be thus delightfully drawn to something delightful to the will; for it does not seem that a lower power would from its own nature be delightfully torn away from its own delightful thing; nor even was the lower power from its nature as it is a power lower than the will delightfully torn away in itself from its delightful object, because this essential order remains now and yet there is no such delight now. There would be need, then, to posit in the individual lower appetitive powers individual gifts, so that each of them would, through its gift, be moved by the will, and the will by its gift would move itself delightfully in relation to the lower powers; and if there were several such gifts, that gift was most of all original justice which was in the will.

17. For through that gift the will would prevent certain delights of the sensitive appetite from ever being present in it, as the delight of committing adultery with another’s beautiful wife. The will would have had command over some delights and would have made a good use of them, as the delights of knowing one’s own wife by obeying the divine precept (namely the precept ‘Be fruitful and multiply etc.’ Genesis 1.28), so that those lawful delights, which by occasion, for the time they were present, are to be had, would not have been held by the will as end, but would have been referred to the due end. From some lawful delights too, which are sometimes to be had, the will would sometimes have turned away, as from the delight that was not be had save for a time. And each of these acts, whether preventing delights, or using well delights possessed, or turning away from possessed delights, the will would do delightfully through that supernatural gift whereby it was more delightful to it to adhere to the ultimate end and to all things ordered toward it than to be separated from it by adhering to something delightful not ordered to the end.

18. All these things the will could not have had from pure nature, although it would of itself have some gift to which all these were proper. Nor for this reason would there be delight, although the whole man, to whom the principal power of delighting belonged, would delight. Nor perhaps is it necessary to posit that no sensitive appetite could then have been saddened; for sight could then have seen something foul and hearing could then have heard something foul, and both could have offended the sensitive appetite, just as a fitting sensible object could also have delighted it; but the will then would have used those sadnesses well, and would even have used the sadnesses of the lower appetites delightfully (so that it would not have been saddened immediately by the inferior appetites), just as it would have used the delights of them well, delighting along with them not immoderately.

19. About the other effect attributed to original justice, namely immortality, there is no need to argue, because this immortality - as was said in d.19 [not in the Ordinatio, see Lectura 2 d.19 n.5] - was not an impossibility of dying (even while that state continued), but a possibility of not dying; and this possibility would have been preserved in an act of not dying by means of the many aids that are talked of there, namely eating of the tree of life, the guardianship of the angels, also divine protection and good internal regimen, and the rest of the things there talked of [ibid. nn.10-15].

II. To the Principal Arguments

20. To the first argument [n.2] I say that neither of the above [sc. immortality and lack of rebellion] can be preserved on the basis of pure nature.

21. When the proof is given that their opposites are punishments, I say that they are not but rather natural conditions - just as it is not a punishment but natural for a man to die, and not a punishment but natural that his appetite is drawn to its delightful object; for because man is composed of many organic parts and thus there are many appetites in him, it is natural for each of them to be drawn to its delightful object and natural also for the body to be capable of being used up, unless there are remedies that supply it abundantly so that the using up does not prevail.

22. Against this it is said that these features [sc. rebellion and death] would have been involuntary, therefore they would also have been punishments. I reply and say that although involuntary yet they are not punishments; for death is against the natural inclination of an ox, and yet it is not a punishment for the ox, because there is no punishment save in the will (according to Anselm On the Virginal Conception ch.4, “Only the will is punished, for nothing is a punishment for anything save what is against its will”). But if you mean by ‘involuntary’ that it is against an act of the will, I say that it would not have been an involuntary punishment for someone existing in pure nature; for if the will had not wanted its nature to have had the condition that was natural to it, it would have sinned!

23. To the second [n.3] I say that ‘natural rectitude’ is the liberty innate to the will, which it is necessary for the will to have been made in by God; nor is this rectitude corrupted by sin; and thus original justice, if it is set down as the natural rectitude of the will, will be the will’s very liberty. But this liberty does not have the natural effects that are attributed to original justice [n.18]; and if these effects are attributed to a quality intermediate between nature and infused virtue, there is no necessity to posit that intermediate quality, because all the things with respect to the will that appear unacceptable will be saved without it.

24. To the third [n.4] I say that someone existing in pure nature is not equal to someone who has sinned while existing in justice; not because the latter has some crookedness which the former does not have, but because the latter is in debt for the original justice he received, and the former is not; and so the latter is guilty and the former is not. Even if the vision of God is conferred on neither, yet to one the lack of vision is a punishment and to the other not; for the one who is guilty is deprived of it by his guilt, while the other is deprived of it by the condition of nature.

25. To the fourth [not in the Ordinatio, but in the Lectura and Reportatio, where it is argued that, if original justice was a supernatural gift, it would then have been a sufficient principle for earning merit] I say that even if original justice is a supernatural gift, yet there is no need for it to be a principle of merit; for it is related to grace, which is a principle of merit, as exceeding to exceeded - exceeding indeed because it joined the will more firmly to the ultimate end than grace does. For, according to some [Alexander of Hales, Matthew of Aquasparta, Aquinas], it so joined to the ultimate end that it did not allow for any venial sin along with it, but charity does allow for this [cf. Lectura 2 dd.21-22 nn.9-10]; and according to what was said before [nn.14, 17], it at least so joined the will to the ultimate end that the will found it easier and more delightful to suffer some lower sadness than to rest in any lower delight by departing from the delight of the end; grace does not cause this easiness, since along with it there stands proneness to evil and difficulty in doing good. But grace exceeds in this respect, that it joins to the ultimate end as to a supernatural good and as to attaining such a good supernaturally, by merit; the supernatural gift did not so, but joined to that good only as to something agreeable and delightful.

III. To Certain Statements of Henry of Ghent

26. As to what is touched on in the example about the rod [n.6], the case is not similar; for bodily quantity cannot, as it seems, come to be in anything without some determinate quality of the fourth species [sc. shape]; but essence and spiritual power can come to be without habit [sc. the first species of quality].

27. As for what is touched on about the wounding in nature [n.7], there will be discussion of it below at d.35 [dd.34-37 nn.33, 46, 49], where will be stated which sin is a corruption of good, and of which good, whether of the nature itself in which it is or of something else.a

a. a[Interpolation] About this at the end of that question [sc. d.35].

Thirtieth to Thirty Second Distinctions

Question One. Whether Anyone Propagated according to the Common Law from Adam contracts Original Sin

1. Concerning the thirtieth distinction I ask whether anyone propagated according to the common law from Adam contracts original sin.a

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning the thirtieth distinction, where the Master deals with the transmission of original sin to posterity, two questions are asked: first I ask whether anyone propagated according to the common law from Adam contracts original sin; second whether this sin is lack of original justice. Argument about the firsts

2. That he does not:

Augustine On True Religion ch.14 n.27, “Sin is to such extent voluntary that if it is not voluntary it is not sin;” but nothing is voluntary in small children, who do not have the use of reason; so there is no sin in them.

3. Again, Augustine On Free Choice 3.8 n.171, “No one sins as to what he cannot avoid;” a child cannot avoid what comes to him from his conception; therefore the natural defect that enters in from the beginning is not culpable but penal.

4. Further, there is the argument set down in the text, “He who creates does not sin, nor does he who generates sin. Through what sources then does sin, amid so many protections of innocence, enter in?” [from Julian of Eclanum, in Lombard Sentences 2 d.30 ch.13 n.2].

5. Further, Aristotle Ethics 3.7.1114a25-27, “No one will blame a man born blind, but will rather pity him;” so the natural defect is not culpable but penal.

6. Again, Adam was not nobler than the whole of human nature, so by infecting himself he could not have infected the whole of human nature. The antecedent is plain because any individual had something as noble as Adam, or could have had. The proof of the consequence is that the corruption of a lesser good does not include the corruption of a greater good.

7. On the contrary:

Romans 5.12, “Through one man sin entered into the world, in whom all have sinned;” and ibid. 5.19, “As by the disobedience of one man many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one man will many be made just.”

8. Again Augustine [rather Fulgentius] On the Faith to Peter, and it is contained in the Master’s text, “Hold most firmly and in no way doubt that all men conceived through sexual intercourse of man and woman are born with original sin.”

Question Two. Whether Original Sin is Lack of Original Justice

9. Second I ask whether this sin is lack of original justice.

10. That it is not:

Because an angel lacks it and yet he does not have any sin.

11. Further, Adam lacked it (for he lost original justice by sinning), and yet he did not have original sin but actual.

12. Further, a baptized child lacks original justice and yet he does not have original sin.

13. If it be said that original sin is in some way remitted to him by grace, so in some way he does not have it - on the contrary: someone baptized who has relapsed does not have grace, and so he does not have a reason for that sin to be remitted to him; and he does not have original justice, so original sin returns in him.

14. Lastly, original sin would be in the will as also is justice, of which that sin is the privation, according to Anselm On the Virginal Conception ch.3; the consequent is false, because the will is the most immaterial power, and consequently separate most of all from the body; therefore it cannot be infected by the flesh, because it is separate from the flesh.

15. It is argued to the opposite that original sin cannot be anything other than this privation:

For it is not concupiscence, first because it is natural ([sc. and not voluntary] from d.29 n.12 above); second because it is in the sensitive part (where sin is not, according to

Anselm [ibid. ch.4]); third because it is non-actual, for the concupiscence then would have been actual, not habitual - the habit, left behind in the soul from mortal sin, is not mortal sin (for such habit remains when sin has been forgiven by penance). Nor even is it ignorance, because a baptized child is as ignorant as an unbaptized one.

16. Further, original sin disorders the whole soul; therefore, if it is some single guilt, it is in the power by whose disorder the whole soul is disordered; that power is the will alone, because just as an ordered will orders the other powers, so a disordered will disorders them. Nor is it anything positive; therefore it is a privation of some justice, a justice opposed to this guilt.

Question Three. Whether the Soul contracts Original Sin from Infected Flesh, Sown in Concupiscence

17. Concerning the thirty first distinction I aska whether the soul contracts original sin from infected flesh, sown in concupiscence.

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning this thirty first distinction, where the Master deals with the manner of transmission of original sin, one question is asked.

18. That it is not:

Because matter does not act on form; therefore neither does flesh act on the soul.

19. There is confirmation, because Augustine says, Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.16 n.33, “What acts is more excellent than what is acted on;” and according to him in the same place, “body is not more excellent than spirit;” from which he concludes that “body does not act on spirit” - and from this we have the intended conclusion.

20. Again, if it be said that Augustine’s major [‘what acts is more excellent than what is acted on’] is true of the good, not of the bad, because in the bad the effect can be worse than its cause - on the contrary: the natural cause of the evil of guilt cannot be punishment alone, because punishment is just and guilt precisely does not naturally follow on what is just; but what is in the flesh is punishment only, and if it is the cause of guilt, it is only a natural cause, because it is not free;     therefore etc     .

21. Next: if original sin is contracted from infected flesh [n.17], then it would be contracted from the nearest parent, because by him is such flesh sown. The consequent is false, because then original sin could be increased in the intermediate parents; for more agents of the same idea have power for a more perfect effect, and so the nearest parent along with the intermediate parents can increase original sin in intensity beyond what it would have been in a son generated immediately by the first parent.

22. On the contrary:

The Master in the text adduces authorities to the effect that the soul is infected by the flesh, because unless it were so, no other cause seems able to be assigned whereby this sin should be caused in the soul; not by God, as is plain; nor by Adam himself, because we may posit that he has been annihilated - or if he still exists, at least he does not have any guilt, because he is posited as blessed - so he does not now exist under the idea of a sinner, under which idea the cause of this sin would have to be placed.

23. Further, we contracted this sin insofar as we existed in Adam according to seminal reason, according to Augustine Literal Commentary on Genesis 10.20 n.35; but this was according to the body, not according to the soul; for the soul does not come from the parent, as the Master adduces in the authority in the text On Ecclesiastical Dogmas [Gennadius of Marseilles, “We say that only the Creator of all things knows the creation of the soul, and that the body alone is sown by union of the spouses.. and that the soul is created and infused for an already formed body”].

Question Four. Whether Original Sin is Remitted in Baptism

24. Concerning the thirty second distinction I aska whether original sin is remitted in baptism.

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning this thirty second distinction, where the Master deals with the remission of original sin, the question is asked:

25. That it is not:

The guilt is not remitted unless the opposed justice is restored; original justice is not restored in baptism (as is plain from the effects).

26. To the contrary is the Master in the text [Sentences 2 d.32 ch.1 n.3: “For two reasons, then, is original sin said to be remitted in baptism, that by the grace of baptism the vice of concupiscence is weakened and lessened...and that the one guilty of original sin is set free”], and the Church holds this opposing view [cf. Augustine Against Two Letters of the Pelagians 3.10 n.26, “But this I say: it is very manifest according to the holy Scriptures, confirmed by very great antiquity and authority of the Catholic faith, well known by very clear renown of the Church, that original sin is removed by the laver of regeneration in children, so that whatever is against this.. .cannot be true”].

I. To All the Questions at Once

A. The Opinion of Others

1. Exposition of the Opinion

27. On this topic of original sin, holding that it is present in the way meant by the authorities to the contrary in the first question [nn.7-8], there are two ways of speaking about it - one is that of the Master and of others who follow and expound him [the second at n.48].a

a. a[Interpolation] The other way seems to be Anselm’s, in his book On the Virginal Conception.

28. Now to understand this way, four things must be looked at: first how the infection in the flesh is contracted by the soul; second, how infected flesh is sown; third, how the soul is infected by it; fourth, how the soul is freed from this infection by baptism.

29. As to the first article it is said that the will [sc. of the first man] caused in the flesh by sinning a certain diseased quality consequent to the crookedness of the will [cf. d.29 n.6]. This diseased quality is called ‘kindling’ [fomes] and it is a law in the bodily members, a tyrant;Lombard, Sentences 2 d.30 ch.8 n.2, “Original sin is called the kindling of sin, namely concupiscence... which is called the law of the bodily members, or the languor of nature, or a tyrant..., or the law of the flesh. Hence Augustine [Sermon 30 ch.5 n.6] ‘Now this languor is a tyrant’ that gives motion to evil desires;” Sentences d.31 ch.3 n.2, “Concupiscence itself is the law of the bodily members or of the flesh, which is a certain diseased affection or languor that stimulates illicit desire, that is, carnal concupiscence, which is called the ‘law of sin’ [Romans 7.23].” ⁴⁰ it is also like a certain weight, exciting sensual movements in the flesh and inclining the soul toward taking delight in the flesh and holding the soul back from superior delights, according to Wisdom 9.15, “The corrupting body weighs down the soul.”

30. Because of this diseased quality in the flesh thus weighing down the soul, that is, tending down toward lower things, the soul is drawn and enticed toward likewise tending down into lower things; and according to a certain person [Henry, Quodlibet 5.23, reply to the argument for the opposite], this quality is never reduced in its essence (although it is in its effect) - that is, that although grace could be so great that it inclines to higher things more than the kindling inclines to lower ones, yet grace does not reduce the kindling in its essence because it is not a contrary to the kindling, for the kindling is in the flesh and grace is in the soul. And he posits an example about a stone attached or tied to the wings of a bird: however much the motive power might grow in the wings, the weight would never decrease in the stone, although as to the effect it would drag down less because the contrary force [in the wings] would in its effect prevail.

31. About the second article [n.28] it is said [Lombard, Henry, et al.] that either the whole of the flesh of the first parents was infected with this diseased quality, and thus is the sown flesh infected; or, if not the whole flesh was infected, or if the flesh sown was not the flesh of the father, then the sown flesh is at least infected by the fervor and lust of the inseminating; and this second alternative seems assented to by Augustine [rather Fulgentius On the Faith to Peter, “Not propagation but lust transmits sin to children; nor does the fecundity of human nature make men to be born with sin, but the foulness of lust does, which men have from that most just condemnation of the first sin”], who attributes this infection, not to the propagation, but to the lust (as is plain in d.20 above [not in the Ordinatio, see Lectura 2 d.20 n.30]).

32. As to the third article [n.28] it is said [Henry, Lombard, Bonaventure] that the soul, at the instant of its creation and infusion, is stained by the infected flesh, so that although the infection or stain of the flesh was not guilt formally but the result of guilt, yet it is an occasion for guilt in a soul united to the flesh - because when the soul is united, the infection is of the sort that is of a nature to exist in the soul, and of such sort is guilt. An example is used about the gift of an apple, which is stained and dirtied by the hand of the receiver.

33. About the fourth article [n.28] it is posited [Henry, Lombard] either that the crookedness, which the will incurs by sinning, remains in it, or that, if it does not remain, then at least the kindling in the flesh remains; but whether both or one of them remains, they are not imputed to the soul after baptism the way they were before, because the guiltiness is taken away; however they remain precisely as punishment for the preceding sin and as matter for exercising virtue.

34. In accord with this way [nn.27-28] it is plain what must be said to the questions moved:

For original guilt exists in anyone thus propagated, and this as to the first question [n.1]; as to the third question [n.17], it is said that infected flesh is sown and that by the infected flesh the soul is culpably infected; this guilt, as to the second question [n.9], is either a natural crookedness opposed to rectitude of will, or concupiscence (that is, a proneness to unbridled coveting of delights); and it is remitted, as to the fourth question [n.24], not in itself but as to the guiltiness of the person.

2. Doubts against the Opinion

35. About this way there are certain doubts as concerns the individual articles.

[Doubts against the first article] - As to the first article [nn.29-30] one doubt is how the will has so much dominion over the body that it can immediately alter the whole body to this diseased quality, especially since it does not have the body for object; for the will could with a first sin have sinned by desiring the excellence of God, or by some spiritual sin, and in this act the object of the will was not the body, which however is posited as being altered by the will [n.29]. Or if the way this altering could have happened may be saved, then it seems difficult how the same cause - with also a greater extrinsic help - could not have destroyed the diseased quality; for the will, however much aided by grace, cannot destroy the kindling (according to them [n.30, Henry and his followers]), and any total cause whatever of any effect seems able to destroy that effect, especially if its active power is increased.

36. A second doubt: for what purpose is this kindling posited in the flesh? - None, if it is posited as the principle of rebellion; for the flesh does not per se rebel against the will but the sensitive appetites do, for according to Aristotle Politics 1.5.1254b2-6 “the will dominates the body with despotic rule but the sensitive appetite with political rule.” Therefore the kindling should be principally placed in the sensitive appetite; or, if it is placed in the body, only in what is the organ of the sensitive appetite; and if in this organ, then, since no such flesh is passed on [to children], no flesh infected with kindling is passed on to them.

37. A third doubt is that in pure nature there would be rebellion, as was said in d.29 n.12; therefore one should not posit because of it any diseased quality in the flesh.

38. If it be said that the proper delight of the sensitive appetite in its proper delightful object would exist in pure nature too, but it would not exist along with lust, that is, not with unbridled and immoderate coveting as it does now, and the principle of this sort of lustful delight is the kindling - against this: just as delighting is not in the power of the sensitive appetite (‘because it does not lead but is led’ [according to Damascene d.29 n.12]), so neither is the mode of delighting; therefore it delights supremely in the presence of a supremely delightful sensible object. What lust adds over and above this ‘supremely delighting in the presence of a delightful sensible object’ is not easy to see.

39. [Doubts as to the second article] - As to the second article [n.31] the first doubt seems to be that semen was never animated with the soul of the father; for it is something left over, something which is not necessary for nourishing any member of the body. But what is taken up by a bodily member, with which the semen had the same nature, was not something animated; therefore the semen never contracted infection from a soul by which it was never perfected.

40. There is a confirmation from Anselm On the Virginal Conception ch.7, where he maintains that “the semen is not infected more than spit is or blood;” but if an organic body were formed from these things, there would seem to be no way that the soul would be infected by that body’s infection.

41. The second doubt is that if the semen was infected, then since it is transmuted through many substantial forms before an organic body comes to be from it, and the prior substantial form - the one that constituted the subject of the diseased quality - does not remain, so neither does the diseased quality remain.

42. It will be said [by Henry] that from an infected thing an infected thing is generated; example: from the seed of a leprous father the leprous body of a son is generated. - On the contrary: a lion eating the corpse of a dead man will contract the kindling. Proof of the consequence: for the corpse was infected with the kindling and, according to you, ‘an infected thing is generated from an infected thing’;     therefore etc     . Proof of the assumption: let a dead man be resurrected (as happened with Lazarus, John 11.43-44); the soul united to the flesh will find the flesh rebellious against the spirit; therefore the kindling was then in the body. So by what was it there? Not by the soul because it has been purged of original sin (through baptism, let us suppose, or circumcision); nor must one imagine that it was by God; therefore the kindling remained in the dead corpse.

43. A response could be made to these two doubts [nn.39, 41] by the fact that it is the infected active power of the semen which generates an infected thing from an infected thing, and even an infected thing from a non-infected thing. And so, in answer to the first doubt: from non-infected nutriment the infected active power of the father generates infected semen and passes on original guilt to the offspring. Answer to the second doubt: the infected power generates infected flesh from infected semen; and then the second objection about the lion [n.42] is not valid, because the active power of the lion - which is what converts the corpse into some member of the lion - is not infected.

44. A third doubt about this article [n.31] seems to be that ‘something miraculously formed from the flesh of my finger would contract original sin’ [Henry, but not Aquinas], which seems contrary to Anselm [On the Virginal Conception chs.11, 18, 19] where he maintains that there are two reasons that Christ did not contract original sin [sc. that he was not a natural son of Adam and that he was conceived by a most pure mother], either of which would suffice without the other:a “because he was not a natural son of Adam” and thus was not made guilty in Adam.

a. a[Interpolation ] one, that his flesh was cleansed in the blessed Virgin;Vatican editors: this is false and contrary to Anselm. ⁴¹ seconds

45. [Doubts as to the third article] - About the third article [n.32] there is a doubt as to how flesh causes the infection of the soul. For if the soul has caused this infection in the flesh [nn.28-29] and from the flesh it may be caused in the soul [n.32], then both causes are equivocal to their effect and both are total causes [cf. dd.34-37 n.106] (and it is difficult to avoid a circle in total equivocal causes). It will also be difficult to save the way in which the will, which is a purely immaterial power, is transmuted immediately by something bodily; and since the intellect is not posited as being able immediately to be transmuted by a phantasm except in virtue of the agent intellect [1 d.3 nn.340-345], the result is that the intellect is more immaterial than the will. It would seem to follow too that this sin would be in the essence first, because the essence perfects the flesh first; but the consequent seems false, because in the essence, qua essence, guilt seems neither to exist formally nor to be of a nature to exist formally [guilt exists in a power, d.26 nn.24-26].

46. [Doubt as to all three articles together] - Against all three articles [nn.29-32] there is one common doubt, namely why the first man was able by an act of his will to infect his flesh [n.29] without the second and third man after him being able to do likewise; and thus, since many intermediate fathers sinned mortally, the sown flesh would be more and more infected. But this seems absurd because not everyone generated now is more prone to inordinate delight than any of the ancients born before were; also because it would seem to follow from this that original sin is made more intense; for although original sin, if it is posited as being a total privation [cf. below nn.50-51, 53], does not admit of a more and less, yet if it is posited to be crookedness or concupiscence (according to this opinion [nn.27-33]), it can be greater or lesser [cf. n.21].

47. [Doubts as to the fourth article] - About the fourth article [n.33] the doubt is that sin is not formally removed unless what is formal in sin, and not what is material in it, is destroyed; but the debt of original justice is not the formal debt in original sin, because original justice was only due in the state of innocence because he who had it owed it; therefore it does not seem to be formally remitted unless that deformity or lack is taken away, either in itself or through some having equivalent to the having of the privation.

B. Scotus’ own Opinion, which is taken from Anselm

48. About this topic there is another way, which seems to be that of AnselmThe way also adopted by Scotus here, and which (say the Vatican editors) is close enough, in its main points, to that of Aquinas and several other doctors. ⁴² in the whole of his book On the Virginal Conception where he deals with original sin.

49. To see this way four things again must be touched on: first, what original sin is, and hereby is solved the second question [n.9], second whether such a sin is present [sc. in those propagated from Adam], as regard the first question [n.1]; third, how it is contracted, as to the third questions [n.17]; and fourth, how it is remitted by baptism, and this as to the fourth question [n.24].

1. What Original Sin is

50. As to the first article Anselm says in the cited book [n.48] ch.27, “This sin, which I call ‘original’, I cannot understand to be anything other in infants than the very being stripped naked of an owed justice, a nakedness brought about by Adam’s disobedience, through which all are ‘sons of wrath’ [Ephesians 2.3].”

51. This account of original sin is proved by the fact that [Anselm ibid. ch.3] sin is formally injustice, and that such a sin is such an injustice [cf. below dd.34-37 n.51]; now injustice is nothing but lack of owed justice, according to Anselm ibid. ch.5 (and On the Fall of the Devil ch.16], when he says that original sin - which is lack of original justice - is nothing but lack of owed justice [also Giles of Rome, Roger Marston, Aquinas].

52. And if it is objected that other saints seem to say that concupiscence is original sin, I reply:

Concupiscence can be taken for an act or a habit or a proneness in the sensitive appetite, and none of these is formally sin, because there is no sin in the sensitive part according to Anselm ibid. chs.3-4. Or it can be taken for a proneness in the rational part or appetite (or the rational appetite) for coveting delights inordinately and immoderately, which rational appetite is of a nature to delight with the sensitive appetite to which it is joined; and in this way concupiscence is the material of original sin because, by the lack of original justice (which was as a bridle restraining it from immoderate delight), the rational appetite becomes, not positively but through privation, prone to coveting immoderately delightful things (as Anselm exemplifies, ch.5, about a ship with a broken rudder and about a horse with a broken bridle that falls off it); and from this follows, in the issue at hand, the inordinate motion that the bridle was restraining.

53. Hereby is the second question solved [nn.9, 49], where the question is asked what original sin is. For it is formally a lack of owed original justice - not owed, however, in just any way, but owed because received in the first parent and in him lost; and therefore Adam did not have original sin, because this debt was not passed on to him by any parent, but he received the justice in himself and by his act he lost it.

2. Whether Original Sin is in Everyone Propagated in the Common Way

54. As to the second article, wherein the first question is solved [nn.1, 49].

By holding, according to the authority of the saints [Augustine, Ambrosiaster, Fulgentius, Anselm], that the sin exists in all those propagated in the common way, the point can be made clear from the above account of original sin; for anyone thus propagated has the lack of original justice (as is plain from the effects of original justice stated above, d.29 nn.13-19); and he is a debtor for that justice, because he received it in the parent, by the act of which parent he lost it [n.53]; therefore, according to the above description, he has original sin.

56. The antecedent is plain from Anselm ibid. ch.27, “Because the forsaking of justice accuses, of its own accord, the nature [God] made, nor are persons excused by the inability to recover it,” as he himself explains ch.2, “for nature made itself impotent by the forsaking of justice in the first parents, in whom nature was whole, and nature is always in debt to have the power that it received for always preserving justice.”

57. From these statements a debt seems to be proved in children, on the grounds that Adam received justice for himself and for the whole nature that was then in him; and therefore God justly requires from the whole nature, in whomever it is, the justice which he gave nature - so that, according to Anselm ibid. ch.23, Adam by his personal sin stripped nature of its due justice, and nature stripped naked of such justice makes nature in anyone at all to be naked and debtor.

58. Against this [n.57] it is objected that the numerically individual nature that is in Peter was not in Adam, although it was of the same species in Peter; therefore this nature of Peter did not receive any justice; therefore it is not a debtor.

59. And if you say that ‘as the nature was causally in Adam, so this person was causally in Adam’, then the same thing, as far as the conclusion about being debtor is concerned, is being said of the persons propagated as of the natures of those propagated; for one must show that the person, from the fact he was in Adam causally when Adam received justice formally, is a debtor in the same way that nature is. How then is it that the mode of receiving justice is sufficient for being a debtor for the received justice? For if a natural son of Adam was not in Adam as to the will but only as to the flesh, and if he cannot be a debtor for justice save as to the will (as to which he is able to possess justice), then he is not a debtor for justice because he was causally in someone as in his propagative principle.

60. Response. Without making mention of this nature and this person, I show that someone propagated from Adam is a debtor for justice because Adam received justice formally and the one propagated received it in Adam.

61. And the proof of this is as follows: every gift is due that is given by God himself when he gives it with antecedent will (though not with consequent will), that is, as far as God’s part is concerned, the gift has without special merit or grace now been given; but when Adam receives justice, his son is given justice by God’s antecedent will (that is, as far as the part of God was concerned), because justice would, without special gift, have been conferred on Adam’s son, provided there was no impediment present; so, from this conferring made to the father, the son is debtor for the justice thus given.

62. Proof of the major: for although he who receives will and grace is given no meritorious work in itself without consequent will, yet he is given it in the grace in which it exists by antecedent will and virtually; and, for this reason, he who receives grace is debtor for the good works that are virtually contained in grace, so that he who loses grace and sins frequently is punished not only for the loss of grace but also for the sins committed, because otherwise those who sinned many times and those who sinned few times would be punished equally.

63. The minor is plain from the divine law which establishes that the parent [Adam], not putting an obstacle in the way by sin, gives as it were naturally original justice to his progeny; not indeed that the father transfuses it (for it is a supernatural gift), but that God himself would regularly cooperate with nature in giving justice to the progeny, just as now he creates the intellective soul for a completely organized body.

64. An objection is raised against the proof of the major [n.111], that if works received formally in grace are due, this debt is due from the same will that received the grace, and in this grace those works are virtually contained; but in the issue at hand the will of the son never received justice, and it does not seem that the son’s justice could be virtually received in the justice of another’s will [sc. Adam’s] the way the works are virtually received in the grace given.

65. By removing this objection the reasoning [n.61] is confirmed: the idea of a debt - both on the part of the gift that is due and on the part of the will that owes it - is the very giving of the giver, who gives the gift received and gives to the will receiving; therefore a giving of the same idea suffices for the will to be debtor as it suffices for the gift to be due. But for the gift to be due, a giving by a will giving antecedently or virtually, not in itself formally, suffices; so, for the will to be debtor, a similar giving to the will itself suffices. But when the giving was made to the will of Adam in this way, that with, as it were, the same giving - as far as concerned the giving of itself - it was given simply to the will of any son whatever (if no obstacle were placed in the way), such a giving is a giving with respect to the will of any son; therefore the son’s will by this giving is made debtor. So although things are not similar altogether in the case of meritorious works given virtually in grace and in the issue at hand [n.64], yet there is a similarity in respect of it, because on both sides there is precisely a giving with an antecedent, and not consequent will, on the part of the giver, and this giving is a reason for the will to be debtor just as it is for the gift to be due.a

a. a[Interpolation] The reason is confirmed, because if God had created all men at once and had given original justice to Adam, then if only Adam had sinned, there seems to be no law of justice that the others (who did not receive justice in themselves) were debtors for that justice; so they are not debtors now either, because they could not have been more obliged now through Adam than they were then if God had established a law that, with only Adam sinning, he would have given justice to everyone, because then none would have sinned. The assumption, namely that the rest would not have been debtors, is proved by this, that if God had given them justice and had immediately deprived them of it without their act, they would not have been reputed debtors for the justice they lacked. But they can more receive the idea of debt from God who gives than from the fact that their father received justice. Therefore from the fact that their father received justice formally and lost it by his own act, the sons will not be debtors such that it would be imputed to them for guilt.The Vatican editors regard this interpolation as neither a confirmation nor as consonant with the views of Scotus. They even advert to a marginal note added in one of the manuscripts to the effect that the interpolation is heretical and is believed to have been added by the enemies of Scotus. However, the interpolation can perhaps be saved if it is understood to be arguing, as it does at the end, that the mere gift of original justice to Adam does not entail debt in his progeny, but only a gift does that includes the antecedent willing by the giver to give the same gift to everyone else because of Adam, so that, if Adam sinned, it would not be given them (which is the burden of Scotus’ argument in n.65). The argument in the interpolation, therefore, proceeds by extreme assumption as it were: suppose all Adam’s descendants created at once along with him (which is physically impossible but possible by imaginary hypothesis), then they could not have lost original justice merely because Adam lost it, but only because God willed to give them original justice through giving it first to Adam (first in order, if not in time). Then Adam’s loss of original justice by his own act would entail loss and debt on the part of everyone else, since the giver’s antecedent will was to give them justice through Adam and not independently of him. ⁴³

66. For the purpose of solving the arguments [nn.2-6, the solution is in nn.70-75], one must understand that ‘owed justice’ can be twofold: in one way because it is received in oneself and is lost by the action of oneself as receiver; in another way because it is received in another and lost by the action of that other. In the first way actual sin is injustice and lack of justice; in the second way original sin is; hence original sin is compared rather to sin remaining in the soul after the passing by of the act than compared to an actual sin that is being elicited by the sinning will itself.

3. How Original Sin is Contracted

67. As to the third article and the third question [nn.49, 17].

In line with this way [n.48] it is said that the soul contracts original sin by the intermediary of the flesh - not in such a way that the flesh as it were causes the sin by some quality quasi-caused [n.29] in the soul, but by the fact that the flesh is sown with concupiscence, and from this the organic body is formed and the soul infused into it [n.63], constituting a person who is a son of Adam. This person, then, because he is a natural son of Adam, is in debt for original justice (given by God to Adam for all his sons) and lacks it; therefore he has original sin. So the sin is contracted in the flesh insofar as the flesh is a natural reason, and from this reason the person is proved to owe the justice that through Adam’s sin he lacks.

4. How Original Sin is Remitted by Baptism

68. As to the fourth article and the fourth question [nn.49, 24].

It is said that that which is formal in the remission of the sin must in itself destroy what is formal in the sin through the opposite of it - opposite formally or virtually -, and what is formal in the sin is not the debt (as is plain, because justice was due in the state of innocence), but the lack of the justice; this lack then must be destroyed either by the positive proper opposite [nn.47, 53] or by something else which virtually contains the opposite. Now grace, although it does not join to the ultimate end, as far as an accidental end is concerned, as perfectly as original justice does, yet it does join to it more perfectly (as was said in d.29 n.25), and that as to the fact that original sin disjoins from the ultimate end; for grace joins simply to the end - under the idea of end - more eminently than original justice does; and therefore, when grace is given in baptism, the sin is simply remitted more eminently than it would be by its proper positive. And even if the lack of the proper positive remains, yet it is not guilt, because the sin is not the debt; for the debt to have that gift is discharged and changed into a debt to have another gift.

II. To the Principal Arguments

A. To the Arguments of the First Question

69. To the arguments of the questions in order.

70. To the first [n.2] I say that ‘voluntary’ can be taken for what which is in the will, or more properly, as it is commonly taken, for what is in the power of the will as the will is active. In the first way original sin could be called voluntary, because, like any sin, it is in the will, where injustice is, according to the justice opposed to it, alone of a nature to be, as Anselm says On the Virginal Conception chs4-5; in the second way I say that sin need not be voluntary for the one who has the sin but for him or another from whom the sin is contracted - and both suffice for Augustine against the Manichees, who supposed sin to be from the evil soul, and thus, because of that evil soul, necessary and involuntary for everyone.

71. To the statement from Augustine On Free Choice [n.3] I say ‘to sin’ can be either to elicit an act of sinning or to have sin. In the first way the authority from Augustine can be conceded, because children do not elicit an act of sinning, for the sin is not actual in them but only contracted from their parents; in the second way the proposition [‘No one sins as to what he cannot avoid’] is false, unless it be understood in a general way as follows: ‘.. as to what he cannot avoid either in himself or in another through whom he contracts the sin’, and the second is false in the issue at hand; and so the proposition, being thus disjunctively true, suffices for Augustine against the Manichees, as before [n.70].

72. To the third [n.4] I say that two things come together for original sin, namely the lack of justice (as formal in it) and the debt to have it (as material in it) [nn.47, 68], just as in the case of other privations there come together the privation and the aptitude for having it. The debt is from God establishing this law: ‘by giving justice to you, Adam, I give it, as far as my part is concerned, to all your natural sons by the same giving’; and therefore all are by this giving bound to have it, and to have it from a propagated father, by whose action he is a natural son of Adam; so this sin does not enter through ‘unknown sources’ but is present through two positive causes. Now the lack has a cause only negatively, namely someone not giving original justice - and if the further cause of this be asked for, there is only a demeriting cause, namely that Adam deserved original justice not be given; the negative cause (‘not giving’) is God, the demeriting cause (‘not to have justice given’ or ‘why justice is not given’) is Adam sinning.

73. And if it is objected that ‘when the effect is actually being brought about, its causes must then be posited to be in act; but if Adam were annihilated, or if now there were in fact no sin or demerit in Adam’s will, how does this child in this instant contract sin from Adam?’ - I reply: just as merit, when it passes away in itself, yet remains in the knowledge and acceptation of God who repays it as if it were present, so demerit too passes as to the act but remains in the knowledge of God, who punishes it as if it were now present. Thus too in the case of the negation ‘not having original justice’, the ways in which it enters are: God not giving, and the demerit of Adam in God’s knowledge, because of which he does not give.

74. To the statement from Ethics 3 [n.5] I say that no defect contracted from the origin is blamable save this one of original sin; and thus, although all other defects are non-blamable penalties, not so this one.

75. To the final argument [n.6] I say that Adam did not corrupt this singular nature nor this singular person; rather he corrupted himself with personal sin and therein, by demerit, his whole posterity.

B. To the Arguments on both Sides of the Second Question

76. To the arguments of the second question.

As to the first, about Adam [n.11],Actually the second argument in the Ordinatio and the first in the Lectura and Reportatio. The first argument in the Ordinatio is responded to next, n.77. ⁴⁴ it is plain that he had a lack of original justice by his own act, and a lack of an owed justice because it was received in him; such lack is not original sin but that lack is which is had by another’s act and is a lack of justice owed because received by another [nn.53, 66].

77. As to the next about the angel [n.10], it is plain that an angel is not capable of original justice, or if he is, he has it; for if original justice per se respects only the will and not the sensitive appetite, and if it respect the end under the idea of the fitting and delightful [d.29 nn.14, 25], to posit some such gift in an angel is not unacceptable.

78. To the third [n.12] I say that in baptism is discharged the debt of having the gift in itself, and it is changed into a debt of having the equivalent gift, namely grace [n.68]. And this second debt from then on always remains, nor does the first debt return; and he who lacks the second gift owed sins more gravely than if he lacked the first; and yet he is not a sinner with original sin, because the debt of having the original justice does not return.

79. To the fourth [n.13] the response is plain [n.78]. From the solution to the second question [nn.50-53].

80. To the fifth [n.14] I concede that original sin is in the will. And when you say that ‘the will is an immaterial power and therefore cannot be immediately affected by flesh’ - I say that the injustice is not in the will as in a subject changed by flesh changing it, but it is in the will because justice is not there, and yet the justice is due because the will is the will of a son of Adam.

81. To the arguments for the opposite, against concupiscence [n.15], it is plain that they do not conclude to an opposite against the intention of the question [sc. while they prove that concupiscence is not original sin, they do not prove that lack of original justice is not original sin].

C. To the Arguments on both Sides of the Third Question

82. To the arguments of the third question.

To the first [n.18], I say that original sin is not from flesh acting on the soul; and the same serves as response for Augustine On Genesis [n.19]; for all that comes from the flesh is this relation, ‘that he is a natural son of Adam’, in the person produced, and on this relation follows a debt from divine law, and the lack of original justice exists there from negation of the cause [nn.67-72].

83. And when, by taking the argument further back, it is responded [n.20] that punishment is not a cause of guilt, this is true of the principal cause. But if some infection is posited in the flesh (which is not necessary according to the present way [n.48]), it can be an instrumental cause of guilt; or if there is no infection there, the flesh can still be an instrumental cause insofar as an active power exists in the semen for producing a son of Adam, who will thereby be a debtor.

84. To the argument about the nearest parent [n.21] I reply that whoever had received original justice formally in itself or by consequent will would have been debtor for himself and for all his posterity, for whom he had received it virtually; and so, if not Adam but Cain had sinned, the sons of Cain would have contracted original sin not from Adam but from Cain. As it is however, no one received original justice formally save Adam, and therefore everyone else had the same reason for possession with respect to original justice and the same reason for lacking it, that is, by the act of another [nn.53, 60-67, 76]; and so now the lack is not contracted from any nearest parent in such a way that it could be increased by him, just as not in such a way that it could be per se caused by him.

85. As to the arguments for the opposite [nn22-23], it is plain that the authorities which say the soul is infected by the flesh are to be understood in the aforesaid way [nn.82-84], in that the soul is the form of a sinful will and is thereby debtora for having the justice which it lacks.

a. a[Interpolation ] [_ the soul is the form] of the flesh, and from the union of these two comes a son of Adam and so a debtor.

86. But here there is a doubt about the authority of Augustine [Fulgentius, n.31] adduced by the Master in this thirty first distinction, which says that ‘not propagation but lust transmits’ this stain; so it seems that it is not merely from the fact someone is a natural son of Adam because propagated from Adam that he is thus bound to such sin, but it is from the fact he is a son of Adam propagated in lust that he contracts original sin.

87. I reply:

If propagation had taken place in the state of innocence, original sin would not have been contracted, and then propagation would have been wholly without lust, because those propagated would then have had original justice; but now any propagation at all in the common way is lustful by that fact; therefore because propagation is stained, it stains the offspring; but it does not stain because it is propagation, because propagation is not the medium between parent and offspring by which, according to the absolute idea of propagation that would have existed in the state of innocence, the son is stained, but this comes from the lack of original justice in the propagators, and the lust is consequent to this lack; so the authority ‘not propagation but lust infects the offspring’ must be expounded so that ‘lust’ is taken for the lack of original justice in the propagators, which lack is the cause of lust in the act of propagating.

D. To the Argument of the Fourth Question

88. As to the argument of the fourth question [n.25], it is plain that original justice is restored in an equivalent gift, rather in a preeminent gift [n.68].

89. But here there is a doubt; for since original justice is not formally grace, therefore neither is the privation of it formally privation of grace; therefore the privation of original justice can stand along with grace, and so, although grace is given in baptism, original sin remains (unless it be said that the debt of having original justice is discharged, and this falls in with others [nn.47, 68, 78]).

90. I reply:

In the state of innocence there were gifts ordained, so that original justice could have been without grace (but not conversely), and then the privation of original justice included virtually the privation of grace; therefore whoever would have had grace restored to him without original justice - had this happened - would not have had the perfect state of innocence. In the present state original justice and grace do not have this order [sc. original justice first followed by grace], but grace can exist without such justice, and grace is simply a more excellent gift than such justice; so when it exists in man it restores him simply in the present state to the supernatural perfection possible for him, and this without original justice. Although lack of original justice and grace are not, in the present state, absolutely contradictory or repugnant, yet they are repugnant in that the lack is an averting from the ultimate end, because conversion, which is opposed to aversion, is of a nature, in this present state, to be present by grace in a son of Adam without the gift of original justice [d.29 nn.13-14].

Thirty Third Distinction

Single Question. Whether only the Lack of the Divine Vision is Due as Punishment for Original Sin

1. Concerning the thirty third distinction I aska whether only lack of divine vision is due as punishment for original sin.

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning the thirty third distinction where the Master deals with the punishment for original sin, the question is asked:

2. That it is not:

Augustine [Fulgentius] On the Faith to Peter ch.27 n.70, “Hold most firmly and do not at all doubt that children who depart this life without the sacrament of baptism are to be punished with the penalty of eternal fire     etc .”

3. Further, the [unbaptized] children will have bodies capable of suffering, because their bodies will not be glorious; so they will be able to undergo the active power of something present to them; therefore      the active power of fire. Or if you say that they will be preserved so that fire cannot act on them, they seem at any rate capable of suffering interior pain, namely hunger and thirst, and so of suffering the pain of sense.

4. Further, the kindling will not be extinguished in them; therefore they will be able to have in accord with it inordinate lusts; so they will be able to have immediate desires for delightful things and to be sad because of the removal or absence of them and so to suffer interior pain.

5. Further, they will have the use of reason and will know their own nature; so they will be able to know they are ordered to blessedness; and since all who have an appetite so ordered (according to Augustine On the Trinity 13.5) will be able naturally to desire to attain the end to which they are ordered; therefore they will be able to be saddened by the certainty of lacking the end desired.

6. Further, someone in a state of pure nature would suffer this loss [sc. the loss of the blessedness of the beatific vision]; so someone who has the disorder of guilt [sc. original sin], since he has an evil that the former does not have, should have a punishment that the former does not have (otherwise some guilt would be unpunished), and so his punishment should not be this loss alone but something else.

7. The opposite is maintained by the Master in the text (“They will not feel,” he says, “the punishment of material fire or of the worm of conscience, but will perpetually lack the vision of God”), and Augustine Enchiridion ch.23 n.93 (“A most mild punishment, certainly, will they suffer who have added nothing to the original sin that they contracted”).

I. To the Question

8. It seems to be the opinion of the masters here that those damned for original sin alone will have no punishment of exterior sense, to wit fire, because they had no disordered delights, and the harshness of the afflicting fire corresponds, as proper punishment, to that delight.

9. They will also not have interior punishment, as sadness, because they would not be saddened about their state, since sadness (according to Augustine City of God 14.15) is about things that happen to us against our will, and so they would be in that state against their will and would want the opposite; and thus they would murmur against the divine disposition and have as a result a disordered disposition of will [sc. actual sin], which seems absurd, for by the divine sentence things are so disposed that “wherever the wood falls, there it will lie” (Ecclesiastes, above d.7 n.53). Therefore since they had no disordered volition in this present life, they will consequently have no interior sadness. If, further, they were saddened by the lack of blessedness and of the divine vision, they would despair of it (for they have no hope), and so would have the gravest of the sins of all the damned, namely sadness from despair.

10. It seems too that sadness, as it is distinguished from pain, is simply a greater punishment (for man) than any other pain of sense, because as the will is more man’s appetite than is the sensitive appetite, so whatever a man does or suffers as to his will he does or suffers more as he is a man than what he does or suffers simply as to any other appetite; and so a man suffers simply more if he is sad than if he is in pain. So it does not seem that any sadness should be posited for them [sc. those damned for original sin alone].

11. And if a question be asked about their knowledge, one can concede, without asserting, that since they will have an intellect impeded by a corruptible body (to the extent that our intellect too is impeded in this present body) and yet it will not be impeded by torments (of the sort the other damned will have), they will be able to have a natural knowledge of things, and a knowledge newly acquired, because new acquisition is not repugnant to the unchangeableness of their state, since having new understanding of some contingent facts is not repugnant to the unchangeableness of the state of the blessed; so likewise there is no repugnance to the stability of the state of the blessed (which consists in seeing God or the Word) that they should newly understand some necessary truth that they did not understand before, and understand from one necessary truth another necessary truth, and so be able to learn some truths about necessary things within their proper kind. So as to the others too [sc. those damned for original sin alone], since they do not have a knowledge so perfect that they cannot receive more, and since it is not reasonable to posit in them an impediment because of which they cannot acquire more, it seems probable to concede that they can naturally have knowledge of all naturally knowable things (and have it more excellently than other philosophers had it in this present state), and so they can attain to some natural blessedness about God as known in general.

12. But if an objection is raised whether they will have knowledge of blessedness in particular or be saddened about it, I reply:

Just as was said, in Prologue nn.13-18, that particular knowledge is not possible for man unless he is raised supernaturally, so either the supernatural knowledge in particular will not be given to them, because it would be a sadness for them, for they did not fail to merit it as a pagan has (for which reason knowledge of blessedness in particular is allowed to a pagan by way of very grave punishment, namely so that he may be saddened by despairing of being able to reach it); or if they will have knowledge of blessedness in particular, they will not be saddened, because they will be content with their state knowing that God has disposed thus in their regard, and that they did not at any time fail by their own act to merit it.

II. To the Principal Arguments

13. To the argument of Augustine [Fulgentius, n.2] Bonaventure replies that Augustine is speaking by way of excess about those punishments (as the saints often do), because some said [e.g. Pelagians] that [unbaptized children] have no guilt and so no punishment - for just as, according to the Philosopher [Ethics 2.9.1109b4-7], the way of reaching the mean in morals is to proceed in some way beyond the mean toward the extreme, so the saints spoke by way of excess when extirpating the heresies burgeoning against them, wishing to tend toward the other extreme (and thus there is need to consider carefully which heretics the saints spoke against); just as Augustine seems as it were to tend toward Sabellius against Arius and conversely; likewise he seems to tend toward Arius against Sabellius and conversely

14. One could in another way say that [unbaptized children] are to be consumed with the punishment of eternal fire [n.2] in the sense of division, that is, they are to be in that punishment which is in eternal fire, namely they are to be punished with the penalty of loss and not with the eternal penalty of sense.

15. To the second [n.3] it should be said that just as the bodies of the damned will suffer from eternal fire but not be destroyed, so [unbaptized children] will perpetually lack the supernatural vision of God without any such exterior suffering - and also they will not suffer any interior suffering by which they will be able to be consumed, so that their bodies will be impassible by divine disposition (and not by the gift of impassibility), and so that they will suffer neither from within nor from without.

16. To the next [n.4] I say that just as the kindling did not excite in them any disordered movement in this life, so neither will it there excite any.

17. To the next [n.5] I say that natural desire, unless it is by choice, does not cause any sadness.

18. But [as to the last, n.6, one must say it is true] but it does not seem to posit that [an unbaptized child] is per se more punished than the other [someone in a state of pure nature, n.6], because just as it not a per se reward for the intellect to know creatures but rather a reward for it to know God, so neither does it seem a per se penalty of loss for the intellect not to know creatures but rather a loss for it to be per se deprived of the vision of God - and to this extent they are equal [an unbaptized child and someone in a state of pure nature]. And therefore it can be said, as was said in d.29 n.24, that the one is punished and the other not; for the one is a debtor for the justice that he does not have and so he is guilty, and to the other the gift is simply not given, and not because of any guilt or responsibility. It is as if I should first gratuitously accept two people on equal terms for receiving some honor or gift, and afterwards one of them should offend (because of which he fails to merit the honor) and the other does not, and yet the honor is not given to him who did not offend (not because of some lack of merit but because it did not please me to give him the honor); these two would really be unequal, because the first is punished on the ground he is guilty and the other is not. In fact, however, no one will ever be in a state of pure nature, because the rational nature God makes he always produces with a view to the end, provided there is no impediment or defect on the part of the nature itself.

Thirty Fourth to Thirty Seventh Distinctions

Question One. Whether Sin comes from Good as from a Cause

1. Concerning the thirty fourth distinction I aska, as to the cause of sin, whether sin is from good as from a cause.

a. a[Interpolation] About the thirty fourth distinction, where the Master deals with actual sin and first with its original cause, the question is asked:

2. That it is not:

Because in Matthew 7.18 it is said: “A good tree cannot bring forth good fruit;” and the gloss there on it [“There is no intermediate between the cause of good being good and the cause of evil evil”].

3. Further, “every agent makes the effect like itself” (On Generation and Corruption 1.7.324a9-11), at least in the case of the most remote effects; likeness in what is most remote is in what is most common; so at least in the case of the most common perfections the effect is like the cause, and     therefore in goodness too. Sin, then, is not from good as a cause but from evil.

4. Further, whatever is from good as from the efficient cause is directed to good as end; sin is not directed to good as end, because it turns from the end; therefore etc     . Proof of the minor: Aristotle Metaphysics 5.2.1013b9-11 and Physics 2.3.195a8-11, “the efficient and final causes are mutually causes of each other.”

5. Further, what is bad in nature is not in the effect from the efficient cause as cause; for a deformed effect or a morally bad effect is never produced save by a cause that is imperfect; therefore here too.

6. Further, there is some first evil (as I will prove [n.8]), so every other evil comes from it. This consequence is proved about good stated elsewhere [1 d.2 n.43], and by the Philosopher Metaphysics 2.1.993b23-30 about that being most such through which all other things are such [1 d.8 n.79, d.3 n.108].

7. And in addition: if nothing good comes from the first evil, then the evil too that comes from the first evil does not come from any good. The proof of this consequence is that the same thing does not come from diverse causes that are not ordered to each other.

8. The proof of the first proposition [n.6] is that either there is some supreme evil, and then the intended conclusion is gained because this supreme is first; or there is not, and then for every evil a worse evil can be taken ad infinitum; but it is unacceptable for there to be an infinite regress in things that are permanent (Metaphysics 2.2.994a1-11), and this was made clear in 1 d.2 nn.43, 46, 52-53; therefore there can be a single intensively infinite evil, and thus the conclusion.

9. The opposite is maintained by the Master in the text, and he adduces Augustine On Marriage and Concupiscence 2.28 n.48 [“The cause and first origin of sin is some good thing, because before the first sin there was nothing bad from which it might arise. For since it had an origin and cause, it had it either from good or from evil; but there was no evil before;     therefore evil is from good, etc     .”].

Question Two. Whether Sin is per se a Corruption of Good

10. Next, about the thirty fifth distinction,a the question is raised whether sin is per se a corruption of good.

a. a[Interpolation] About the thirty fifth distinction, where the Master deals with the whatness of sin...

11. That it is not:

Augustine Against Faustus 22.27 (and it is in the Master’s text), “Sin is a word or deed or desire against the law of God;” each of these is something positive;     therefore etc     .

12. Further, that by whose distinction sins are distinguished belongs per se to the idea of sin; but sins are distinguished by the distinction of something positive, namely by the turning toward some changeable good or the like; therefore turning toward created good in general is turning toward sin itself in general.

13. Further, I ask what good is evil a corruption of? Not of that in which it is, because an accident does not corrupt its subject since it naturally presupposes its subject, and what naturally presupposes something does not corrupt that something. Nor of some other good, because according to Augustine City of God 12.6, “evil corrupts the good which it harms;” but it only harms what it is in;     therefore etc     .

14. The opposite is maintained by Augustine on the verse of John 1 ‘Without him was not anything made that was made’, where Augustine says, “Sin is nothing.” And Anselm proves this of express purpose in On the Virginal Conception ch.5 and On the Fall of the Devil ch.15; look at him there carefully. [“Injustice is altogether nothing, like blindness. For blindness is nothing other than the absence of sight where sight ought to be, and this does not exist more in the eye where sight ought to be than in a piece of wood where sight ought not to be... By this reasoning we understand that evil is nothing. For, as injustice is nothing other than absence of due justice, so evil is nothing other than absence of due good. But no real being.is nothing, nor is being evil a being something for anything. For evil to any real being is nothing other than its lacking a good it ought to have; but to lack a good that should be present is not to be anything; so being evil is not a being something for any real being. This I have said in brief about evil (which is always indubitably nothing), the evil that is injustice. But that injustice is nothing other than absence of due justice and has no real being.I think I have sufficiently shown in.” On the Fall of the Devil ch.15: “Therefore just as the absence of justice and the not possessing of justice have no real being, so injustice and being unjust have no existence, and therefore they are not anything but are nothing. Injustice then and being unjust are nothing.”]

Question Three. Whether Sin is a Punishment for Sin

15. About the thirty sixth distinction I aska whether sin is a punishment for sin.

a. a[Interpolation] About this thirty sixth distinction, where the Master turns to show that sometimes punishment and guilt are the same thing, the question is asked:

16. That it is not:

Augustine Retractions 1.26, “Every punishment is just, everything just is from God,     therefore every punishment is from God” [more precisely: “The punishment of the bad, therefore , which is from God, is bad indeed for the bad; but it is among the good works of God, since it is just for the bad to be punished”]; but no guilt is from God, therefore no guilt is a punishment of sin.

17. Further, every sin is voluntary, according to Augustine On True Religion ch.4; punishment is involuntary (Anselm, On the Virginal Conception ch.4); therefore etc     .a

a. a[Interpolation] And every punishment saddens.

18. Further, punishment does not exceed guilt, because God always punishes less than is deserved; sometimes a subsequent sin is greater than a preceding one. Likewise too, since there is an end to sins, the last sin is not punished by any sin; so it is not punished in the way any preceding one is; and yet the last sin can be greater than the preceding; therefore it is punished by a lesser punishment, which is unacceptable.

19. To the opposite is the Master in the text [2 d.36 chs.1, 3], and he brings forward many authorities [from Scripture and from Augustine and Gregory] .

Question Four. Whether Sin can be from God

20. Next, about the thirty seventh distinction I ask whether sin can be from God.a

a. a[Interpolation] About the thirty seventh distinction, where the Master records the opinion of those who deny that bad acts - insofar as they are acts - are good and are from God, two questions are asked: first, whether sin can be from God; second, whether the will is the total cause of its act [n.96]. Argument about the first:

21. That it can:

“Anything of which the cause is an inferior cause also has a superior cause;” “whatever too is cause of the cause is a cause of the thing caused” [Book On Causes prop.1, Bacon Questions on the Book on Causes ad loc.]; the created will, which is an inferior cause in respect of God and of which God is cause, is itself cause of sin; therefore God is cause of sin too.

22. If it be said that the will is not the cause of sin insofar as it is from God but insofar as it is from nothing - on the contrary: God acts more along with a higher active created cause than with a lower one; nature is a lower cause than will. But God acts along with nature in such a way that nothing exists in nature that God does not act along with in nature; therefore he acts along with the will in such a way that nothing is willed that he does not act along with in willing.

23. Further to the principal argument [n.21]: the act that is the substrate of sin in the will is from God, so the sin is too.

24. Proof of the antecedent: first because the act is a being that does not exist from itself (for then it would be God); therefore it exists from another, and so from God; second, because giving alms, preaching Christ, performing miracles, generating a son are works of the same idea in being of nature, whether they are done morally well or badly; therefore they have a cause of the same idea as concerns their being of nature; but God is the cause of these acts when they are morally good; so he is also cause when they are morally bad.

25. The antecedent [n.23] is also proved by the saying in Isaiah 10.15 about Sennacherib, “Shall the axe boast itself?”, where the Gloss says, “Just as instruments can do nothing of themselves, so Sennacherib was able to do nothing against the Jews;” therefore Sennacherib was the instrument of God in the act he did [sc. conquering Israel], and yet he sinned mortally as is plain from ibid. 14.24-25. That act, then, which was the substrate of mortal sin, was caused by God.

26. The proof of the consequence [n.23] is that a created will is not cause of sin other than by being cause of the act that is the substrate of the deformity of the sin, because, according to Dionysius Divine Names ch.4, “No one does anything at all by looking to evil.”

27. Further again to the principal argument: God can remove his upholding of grace and then grace will not be present - indeed, whenever grace is not present, it is annihilated; ‘annihilation’ belongs only to God’; therefore by the action of God alone can the soul be without grace. Therefore, in the same way, God can be the per se cause of sin, because the idea of evil seems no more present in sin than in privation of grace.

28. Further, God is the cause of punishment;     therefore he is cause of sin. The proof of the consequence is that punishment is a per se evil just as guilt is - indeed, it seems more to be a per se evil, because it is opposed to the good of nature while guilt is opposed to the good of morals; the good of nature is a prior good to the good of morals. The antecedent [sc. God is cause of punishment] is plain from Augustine Retractions 1.25, “Every punishment is just etc     .” [n.16].

29. To the opposite is Augustine on John 1, ‘Without him was not anything made’, when he says, “Sin was not made through the Word.”

30. Further, there is proof that God cannot be cause of an act that is the substrate of sin:

Because then he would act against his own prohibition; for he prohibited Adam from eating [of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Genesis 2.17] - nor was there anything disordered in that act save that it was prohibited; therefore if God had caused that positive act [sc. of eating by Adam], he would have done it immediately against his own prohibition, which seems to have been a thing of duplicity.

31. Further, whatever God makes he makes for the sake of himself: “The most high has made all things for himself” [Proverbs 16.4]; but he makes with the most perfect charity, because he himself is charity [1 John 4.8]; therefore such an act is most orderly, both from the end and from the operative principle. So if the act is disorderly from a sinning created will, then the same act seems to be orderly and disorderly, which seems impossible.

32. Further, free choice does not err when in its acting it agrees with its rule; its rule in acting is the divine will; therefore if God wills that some free choice will sinfully, then that free choice does not sin when it sins.

I. To the Second Question

A. Sin is Formally the Privation of Good

33. Although these questions, according to the Master, belong to different distinctions, yet their solutions are connected, and because of this connection in this way they can be asked together; and among these questions the first to be solved is the second [n.10], because its solution occupies a place in the others.

And although one could preface here without proof what the word ‘sin’ means (for before any questioning about anything there is need first to have knowledge of what the word means), nevertheless that sin is formally the privation of good is shown by the authorities adduced for the opposite [n.14], and by the following sort of reason, that an inferior agent is bound in its acting to conform itself to the superior agent, because if it is in its power to conform or not conform then not to conform is a sin. For that is why it is called ‘sin’ (speaking of sin whether against divine law or against human law), because the one sinning could have conformed to the law of the superior agent and did not. Therefore the act which is in the power of the non-conformer, and which is thereby voluntary, is not formally sin, because it would not be a sin if it did conform to the superior rule; so the idea of sin in that act is precisely the privation of the conformity.

B. Of which Good Sin is Formally the Privation

34. From this can further be inferred of which good sin is formally the privation.

1. Opinions of Others

35. It is posited [Alexander of Hales, William of Auxerre] that sin is the privation of the good in which it is, because it harms it, as is argued from Augustine City of God 12.6 [n.13]; in another way [Thomas Aquinas] that sin is the privation of a supernatural good, namely grace; or in a third way [Bonaventure] that it is the corruption of the acquired habits to which evil acts are virtually repugnant, as a habit generated from acts formally bad is repugnant formally to habits of virtue.

2. Rejection of the Opinions

36. Against the first of these ways there are four arguments:

First, because since the good, in which the sin is, is finite, it could be wholly consumed by having some finite good taken away from it repeatedly.

37. And if it be said that the taking away is of parts in the same proportion, and so it goes on ad infinitum - on the contrary, a second evil can be equal to the first in malice or worse than it, so it corrupts a part that is of the same or greater amount; therefore, by a process in this way of equal or greater sins, the nature of the good is at length totally consumed.

38. Second, because intellectual nature can be created only by God and, thereby, it is simply incorruptible as regards the creature, so that no creature can destroy it; therefore someone sinning in his act cannot destroy any part of his nature, because the part, as concerns incorruptibility, would be of the same idea as the whole nature, for an incorruptible is not made up of corruptibles.

39. Further, what is formally repugnant to an effect does not destroy a nonnecessary [sc. contingent] cause of that effect; sin states formally a deformity or wrongness repugnant to rightness in an act; so it does not destroy a non-necessary cause of this rightness (the will is a non-necessary cause of rightness, both because it does not cause an act of rightness necessarily but contingently, and because if it causes an act it does not necessarily cause it to be right). The proof of the major is that a contingent cause in respect of something is able not to be and not to cause; so the cause need not be destroyed when the thing caused does not exist. The point is plain by way of likeness from the opposite: for what alters a thing - by introducing something repugnant to a quality in it - corrupts the substantial form for this reason, that the sort of quality in question necessarily follows the substantial form; therefore a thing that is corruptive precisely of some contingent concomitant thing cannot corrupt what it is contingently thus concomitant to.

40. Further sins would not differ in species, because they are privations of a good and privations only get their specific difference from the opposed positives.

41. Further, the same arguments (some of them [the second, third, and fourth, nn.38-40]) prove that sin is not formally privation or corruption of grace [n.35] (although the first argument [n.36] does not prove this), because grace is totally destroyed by a first mortal sin. However there is another specific argument here, namely that a second sin will not be a sin, because it will not corrupt anything that a sin is of a nature per se to corrupt, for the grace that would be corrupted is not present.

42. The second argument [n.38] is conclusive here, because grace is by creation from God alone and is preserved by him alone; and when it is destroyed, it is annihilated - because annihilation is the destruction of that of which creation is the production. The third argument [n.39] is also conclusive here, because grace is a contingent cause with respect to rightness in an act. The fourth [n.40] is also likewise conclusive, because all mortal sins would be of the same nature in formal idea of privation.

43. The same arguments (some of them [the first and third, nn.36, 39]) are also conclusive against acquired justice or virtue [n.35], because although acquired justice does not remain always incorruptible as nature does [nn.36-38], and although it is not corrupted by one mortal sin as grace is [n.41], yet mortal sin is not per se the privation of it, because mortal sin can stand along with it.

44. And if you say about this contention [n.43] that mortal sin cannot stand along with acquired justice - on the contrary: acquired justice can exist more intensely in him who sins mortally than in him who does not sin, namely if the latter has a justice of nine degrees and the former one of ten degrees and the former sins mortally. Let us posit that in the former the tenth degree of justice is corrupted, so he still has a justice equal to him who did not sin mortally; so if the latter had sinned mortally with a like sin, that sin in him would not have been repugnant to his justice of nine degrees [sc. because it is supposed to be repugnant only to the tenth degree], and so would not have corrupted it.

45. The third argument [n.39] is conclusive here, because any such habit is only a contingent cause with respect to an act of sin.

3. Scotus’ own Solution

46. I concede, then, according to the preceding solution of the question [n.33], that sin is a corruption of rightness in second act, and not of natural rightness or of any habitual rightness but of actual moral rightness. But I do not understand the corruption to be that which is a change from being to non-being (for sin can remain after such a change of justice from being to non-being, and can also be present without such change from being to non-being); but I understand the corruption formally, the way privation is said to be formally the corruption of its opposed positive; for in this way the idea of sin is formally the corruption of rightness in second act, because it is opposed to that rectitude as a privation is opposed to its positive; not opposed, to be sure, to a rectitude that is present (because then two opposites would be present at once), nor to a rectitude that was first there in the act (because in order for there to be a change from opposite to opposite no act remains), but to a rectitude that should have been present.

47. For free will is duty bound to elicit all its acts in conformity with a higher rule, namely in accord with divine precept; and so, when it acts against conformity to this rule, it lacks the actual justice that is due (that is, the justice which should have been present in the act and is not present [n.51]); this lack, to the extent it is the act of a deficient will (as shall be said in one of the solutions [n.125]), is formally actual sin.

48. This is clear from authorities:

The first is from Augustine On the Two Souls ch.11 n.15, “Sin is the will to keep or pursue what justice forbids, and from which it is free to abstain;” this is to say in brief: sin is willing something forbidden, so that the will there is the material element (and to this extent the whole is attributed to the will, because the whole is in the will’s power) and the thing forbidden or prohibited is the formal element, because it signifies the disagreement with a higher rule.

49. Ambrose similarly in his book On Paradise ch.8 n.39 (and it is in the Master’s text), “Sin is transgression of heavenly commands etc.”

50. With this agrees what Augustine says City of God 12.8, “The will is made bad in that which would not happen if the will did not will it; and so voluntary failings are followed by just punishment. For the will falls not toward bad things but in a bad way, that is, not toward bad natures but for this reason in a bad way, that it falls against the order of natures from that which is highest toward that which is lower... And thereby he who perversely loves the good of any nature...becomes bad and wretched in a good thing, having been deprived of a better.” It as if he were to say: the positive act of willing a creature is not sin formally, but lack of due order in the act is, an act in which the created good should be loved for the sake of the supreme good - and the will fails of this order by resting in a created good; and this failing is formally sin.

51. With these authorities [nn.48-50] reason agrees, because every sin is formally injustice, and sin of this sort is injustice of this sort and consequently is a privation of justice of this sort [dd.30-32 n.51]; therefore actual sin is formally actual injustice, so it is privation of actual justice, that is, of the justice that should have been present in the act.

4. Four Queries about Sin and their Solution

52. From this solution [nn.46-51] is made plain a solution to the queries raised about sin: first, whether the per se idea of sin is more a matter of aversion from [God] or of conversion to [creatures]; second, how mortal sins can be specifically distinct if the formal idea of sin lies in aversion; third, how one mortal sin can be more serious than another if they are aversions from the same good (for pure privation does not seem to admit the more and less, according to Anselm On the Virginal Conception ch.24). [Fourth query n.63.]

a. To the First Query

53. To the first [n.52] I say that aversion from the ultimate end can be understood in two ways: formally or virtually.

54. Formally either by contrariety or by negation, such that the will refuses the end, or does not wish something when it should wish it; and such refusing is hating while not wishing is to omit the precept [Deuteronomy 6.5, Matthew 22.37], “Love the Lord thy God etc.”

55. Virtually, such that when something is necessary for attaining the ultimate end, the will, having turned away from that necessary thing, thereby turns away virtually from the end (in the way the intellect, when it denies the conclusion,a turns away virtually from the principle of itb).

a. a[Interpolation] some conclusion that follows from some principle.

b. b[Interpolation] and in the way a sick man is said to turn away from health when he turns away from a bitter drink without which health cannot be had.

56. The first aversion [aversion formally, n.54] is, in itself, of the same idea [sc. aversion both by contrariety and by negation]; nor is it included formally in every sin whatever; for hatred of God is a specific sin, and omission of the precept “Love the Lord thy God etc.” is another specific sin.

57. In the second way [virtually, n.55] aversion is common to every mortal sin, because in every such sin the will is disposed in disordered way with respect to something necessary for the end. - Where does this something necessary come from? From the divine will prescribing it to be observed, “if you wish to enter into life” [Matthew 19.17-19]; not from another practical syllogism (for the need here is not to inquire into the doctrine of the philosophers but into the precepts of God in Scripture).

58. This sort of aversion from God is the essential idea of any sin whatever; for as the formal idea of rightness is the proper end in an act about some being that is for the end, so too the proper lack of such rightness is the proper lack of virtue that comes from the end, because it is the proper formal aversion from that which is proper for the end; and in this way aversion is nothing other than disorder of will about something ordained for the end by divine precept, about which thing the will ought to be ordered.

b. To the Second Query

59. From this the second query is clear [n.52], because since privations are made distinct in species by the distinction in species of the opposed positive states, then lackings of rectitude in acts are diverse in species the way that distinction belongs to privations and numbers, by the number of rightnesses in acts that would have to be held to be diverse.a And so sins are not distinguished by the way they turn toward their objects (which are not bad save materially), but their formal idea is distinguished by reference to the specifically different rightnesses that ought to have been present in them.

a. a[Interpolation] and sins that are diverse in number from the numerical distinction of the positive states, these sins, which are certain privations namely privations of the rectitude that should be present in acts, are distinguished formally by the distinctions of such rectitude - as that, since specifically diverse rectitudes ought to have been present, the lackings of these rectitudes are specifically diverse.

60. Thus too there can be several sins of the same species present, and these sins are the privations of the numerically several actual aptitudes that ought to have been present in the successive diverse acts.

c. To the Third Query

61. As to the third [n.52], it is also clear that that sin is more serious in kind which is opposed to a better rightness; now the rightness is better which, ceteris paribus, is more immediate to the end. This point is plain from a likeness in principal premise and conclusion, for the error is greater and more false which redounds more on the premise, or by which a truer conclusion, and one nearer the premise, is denied.

62. But, speaking of the same kind of mortal sin, that sin is more serious where the will sins with greater lust - because the more the will strives, the more perfect the act it would cause, and it is bound to give the act a rightness with the same proportion, if the act is capable of rightness or, if the act is not capable of rightness, it is bound to guard itself from that act more than from another act less repugnant to rightness; and so, by failing to do so, it sins more. An example of this is if the intellect, when erring about one conclusion, has a more necessary object than when erring about another conclusion, then the error of the intellect in the first case is the worse the more the true (opposed) act ought to have been more perfect.

d. To the Fourth Query

63. From this is also easily made plain that, if sins could be continued infinitely, nothing unacceptable would follow; for the sins would corrupt the good infinitely - not by the corruption that is a change, but by the corruption formally that is a privation, and this not privation of a good that was present [n.46] but of a good that ought to have been present. Now infinite goods or infinite right acts are due from the will if it is conserved infinitely, and therefore, without any diminution of the will or of any first act in it, an infinity of such goods can suffer privation.

64. And if it is objected against this way [n.63] and in favor of the other two [n.35], which posit that nature or grace is corrupted:

The proof [Aquinas, Lombard] that nature is corrupted is from Luke 10.30, “and having beaten him with blows [sc. the man journeying to Jericho], the thieves departed,” where the gloss [Nicholas of Lyra] says, “sins wound man in his natural powers” -which would not be true if sin took nothing away from the perfection of nature but only prevented such perfections from existing in second act.

The proof [Aquinas] that grace is corrupted is that grace is destroyed by mortal sin; because if sin were not formally corruptive of grace, then grace could stand along with it, which is absurd.

65. To the first proof I reply that the wounded traveler lost no part of his nature, although its continuity was broken and thereby rendered less fit for its operations, or rather deprived of good use of itself; thus nature “while remaining in its integrity” (according to Dionysius Divine Names ch.4) is wounded when it is made unfit for right use, which is done by repeated lack of actual rightness.

66. To the second proof I say that sin cannot corrupt grace causally [n.42] but only by way of demerit, so that the will naturally averts itself [sc. from rightness] prior in nature to God’s ceasing in nature to conserve grace; now it is necessary that every privation be formally the privation of some positive state, with which the privation cannot stand; sin therefore is not formally the privation of grace, and it destroys grace not by incompossibility but by demerit.

C. To the Principal Arguments

67, To the arguments.

As to the first [n.11], ‘word, deed, desire’ are taken by way of matter, but ‘desire’ states the proximate matter, word and deed the remote matter; ‘against the law of God’ states what is formal in sin.

68. As to the second [n.12], it is plain that sins are distinguished by distinction of privations, in the way privations can be distinguished [n.59].

69. As to the third [n.13], it is plain that corruption is formally this privation of this good, which would be present in the act if the privation were not there and the good not being taken away by it. And as to Augustine, sin does harm the thing it is in - not in itself, by taking away something that belongs to the thing’s nature, but by taking away from it some perfection that befits it, namely actual justice.

70. And if it is objected that ‘the justice was not present, therefore it cannot be corrupted’, the response is plain from what was said; for it follows therefrom that the justice is not corrupted by a corruption that is a change from being to non-being, but it is corrupted formally by the fact that its privation is present and it is not - just as original sin corrupts the original justice that it is the privation of, but not a justice that was previously present [sc. in a new born infant, dd.30-32 nn.50, 53 55].

II. To the First and Fourth Questions

A. To the First Question

1. Sin is from Good

71. To the other question, which was asked first [n.1], about the cause of sin, I say that sin, in the way in which it can have a cause, is from good.

72. The proof is that nothing is a ‘first evil’, otherwise it would lack the supreme perfection belonging to it; but that to which supreme perfection belongs is the supreme good in nature; therefore the supreme evil would be the supreme good in nature.

73. And upon this heresy [sc. there is a first, supreme evil] there follow many other unacceptable things, and not only against the faith but also against philosophy, because the heresy destroys itself and involves a contradiction; for a first evil would be a necessary existence and without partner and independent, if it were posited to be as equally a supreme first as the first good; being a necessary existence and without partner only belong to the most perfect entity.

74. So     therefore , in the way that evil has a cause, it can have no cause but good, speaking of the first created good.

75. This is plain from Augustine City of God 12.6, “He [who consents to the tempter] seems to have made for himself an evil will etc     .” Here Augustine seems to maintain that one’s own will is the cause of falling [sc. into sin], by its immoderate use of some created good - that is, a good that is in the power of the very will, so that just as the will itself can of itself use and not use, so it can enjoy immoderately and not enjoy immoderately some good agreeable to it; and thus this ‘first sin’ is immediately and first from the will alone.

2. How Sin is from Good as from its Cause

a. Opinions of Others

76. But about the way of positing good as cause there are diverse statements.

One way is that good is a per accidens cause of evil, and this can be understood in two ways: that the accidentality is either on the part of the cause or on the part of the effect. On the part of the cause in the way the Philosopher speaks of a cause per accidens in Metaphysics 5.2.1013b34-14a1 and Physics 2.3.195a32-35, as Polycleitus is cause per accidens of a statue; on the part of the effect in the way said in Physics 2.5.197a32-35 and Metaphysics 5.30.1025a14-30, that chance and fortune are causes per accidens, where it is not anything accidentally conjoined with a per se cause that is called a per accidens cause, but something accidently conjoined with a per se effect that is called a per accidens effect of the same cause whose intent is the per se effect.

77. [First opinion] - In the first way [n.76] it is said [Richard of Middleton] that the will is cause of sin not as it is will but as it is fallible; and this is further reduced to the fact that the will is from nothing.

And this seems proved by Augustine above [n.75], where he seems to say that “let him ask why he made the will evil, and he will find that the evil will does not begin from the fact it was a made nature, but from the fact it was a nature made from nothing.”

78. [Second opinion] - In another way accidentality is posited on the part of the effect [n.76], namely [Richard of Middleton] that the will per se intends what is positive in the effect, and with this is deformity per accidens conjoined; but the will does not per se intend the deformity (like in fortuitous happeningsa), as is plain from Dionysius Divine Names ch.4, “No one acts looking toward evil” (and many like things there, [n.27]).

And a similar authority is found in the Philosopher “Each chooses such things as appear to him” (Ethics 3.6.1113a23-24), and for this reason does the virtuous man choose good things, and the things that seem good to him are simply good.

a. a[Interpolation] and in a natural agent that per se intends to generate something like itself, as fire generates fire, but per accidens it intends the corruption that is the bad of the contrary [e.g. the corruption of water].

79. [Rejection of the first and second opinion] - Against the first way [n.77] the argument is as follows:

Is fallibility in the will a per se cause of sin or a per accidens cause [n.76]? If per accidens then it is posited in vain [sc. because the will is already by itself supposed to be a per accidens cause of sin, n.78]. If per se, and if fallibility is in the will from God as from the per se efficient cause, and if whatever is per se from a cause insofar as it causes is per se from the cause of that cause, then sin would be per se from God (proof of this assumption: for although fallibility follows nature because ‘nature is from nothing’, yet it is not an efficient cause from nothing, because the term ‘from which’ does not give by efficient causality any property of itself to the thing produced; therefore fallibility has a nature from God himself as from the efficient cause itselfa).

a. a[Interpolation] for what is cause of the subject is cause of the proper accident or of the consequent natural property.

80. If it be said that a fallible will is a per accidens cause of sin but a closer per accidens cause absolutely than the will is (in the way that, according to the Philosopher Metaphysics 5.2.1014a4-6, there is an order in per accidens causes; for Polycleitus is closer with respect to the statue than white is) - against this:

First, because a created will seems to be convertibly a cause with respect to sin, though a contingent one; but fallibility, which belongs to something insofar as it is from nothing, is not convertible; therefore the will as such is more properly a cause with respect to sin than fallible will is.

81. There is a confirmation of the reason, because the same thing under the same idea is the proper subject of the privation and of the opposed positive state, and even in a free cause - which has power for opposites - the same thing under the same idea is cause of opposites, although of one per se and of the other contingently and per accidens, or of both contingently; but the will, as will, is the proper subject and cause of good volition; therefore of bad volition too.a

a. a[Interpolation] Or the argument is as follows: a cause that, under the same idea on its own part, is contingent with respect to two things, is a contingent cause with respect to each; but a created will is a contingent cause of willing well just as of willing badly. But this will, insofar as it is this will, is a contingent cause of willing well; therefore it is as such a cause of willing badly.

82. There is again a confirmation of the reason [n.80], because if the will sins insofar as it is fallible, and if insofar as it is fallible it cannot will well, so that the fallibility is the per se reason or the proximate reason for sinning (though per accidens), then insofar as it is fallible it cannot will well, and so, if it sins, it does not sin, because “no one sins as to something he cannot avoid” [dd.30-32 n.3].

83. Further, one cannot posit [Thomas Aquinas] ‘an actual defect’ to be a per accidens cause, because then there would be a defect of the will before the first defect of the will; so the defect is only potential; but it is not a defect of an idea different from the actual defect that will be present, because a potential defect is not the proximate per accidens cause with respect to an actual defect of a different idea; so the actual defect will be the same defect as the potential defect with respect to its per accidens potential cause.

84. A response [Richard of Middleton]: the cause of sin is not a potential defect but ‘a potentiality for being defective’, and these are not the same, just as neither is whiteness in potency the same as the potentiality in a surface for whiteness. - On the contrary: this ‘potentiality’ in the will is either active or passive. Not passive, because the will insofar as it is passive does not work as cause for evil but as subject. If the potentiality is active, and this is only its created liberty, then the intended conclusion returns, that such liberty, proper to the will, would be the per accidens cause of sin; but to say that this will is the per accidens cause of sin amounts to saying that the liberty of it is the per accidens proximate reason for sin.

85. The argument against the second way [n.78] is as follows, that then sin would seem to be by chance, but what is by chance is not sin.

86. Further, if the will only sins per accidens ‘because it wills precisely the positive thing on which the deformity follows’, and if God per se wills that positive thing on which the deformity follows, then it no more follows that the created will sins than that the divine will does.

87. [Third opinion] - In a third way it is posited [Bonaventure, Alexander of Hales, William of Auxerre] that sin does not have an efficient but a deficient cause, and so it has the will as deficient not as efficient cause.

88. This is confirmed by the authority of Augustine City of God 12.7, “Let no one seek for an efficient cause of an evil will, for there is no efficient cause but a deficient cause, no effect but a defect; for to fall away from what is supreme to what is lesser is to begin to have an evil will. Further, to wish to find causes for these defections, since they are not efficient causes, is the same as if one wanted to see darkness or hear silence;” and at the end of the chapter, “They do evil insofar as they are deficient; and what do they do but vain things that have deficient causes?” And again ibid. ch.9 at the beginning, “Nothing makes the will such save the defection whereby God is deserted, of which defection too the cause is deficient.”

89. [Rejection of the third opinion] - Against this, that then [sc. if the created will is a deficient cause of sin] it follows that God is the cause of sin just as the created will is; for this ‘being defective’ is a ‘not effecting’, as the Philosopher says Metaphysics 5.2.1013b13-16, that “just as the presence of the sailor is the cause of the safety of the ship, so his absence is the cause of its running into danger, and both are in the same genus of cause;” thus therefore, not to effect the rightness that ought to be effected is as it were to cause sin effectively or defectively; but this belongs to God just as it does to the created will.

90. I give a double proof:

First, because God does not necessarily give rectitude to an act, for he causes necessarily nothing other than himself; therefore he is able not to give, and so he can be a defective cause with respect to sin, that is, by not effecting the positive reality that had excluded the sin.

91. Second, because he would naturally cause this rectitude - were it present -before the created will did (for a naturally prior cause causes naturally first); therefore when the rectitude is not present, God fails to cause it before the created will fails to cause it, and thus the created will defects because God defects, that is, God fails to cause by causing something.

92. Hereby [n.91] is excluded a certain response [Alexander of Hales, Bonaventure] that could be given to the first reason [n.90], that ‘God does not defect when he does not cause unless the created will deserved it first’; for this response proves that the non-causing on the part of God is not first [sc. which is contrary to the conclusion of n.91].

93. And if it be said, according to Anselm On the Fall of the Devil ch.3, that although God did not give when the angel did not accept, yet it is not the case that ‘the reason the angel did not accept was because God did not give’, but the reverse; so here.

On the contrary: I take the time when the will sins, and I divide it into two instants of nature, a and b; at a God is compared to the will as prior cause; at b the will is compared to him as posterior cause. Then I ask: either God causes rightness at a [or he does not; if he does] it follows that [at b] the will is right - otherwise, if the will causes at b the sin opposite to the rightness, the sin would be in the will simultaneously, and consequently the sin and the rightness opposite to it would be in the will simultaneously. Therefore one has to say that God does not cause the rightness, and consequently that the will at b does not cause it; for this [sc. the will not causing at b] naturally pre-requires that God at a does not cause it.

94. Besides, in the case of precise causes, if the negation is the cause of negation, the affirmation is also the cause of affirmation; God’s causing rightness is the precise cause of the will’s causing rightness in its own order of causing; therefore negation there is cause of negation.The form of this hypothetical syllogism appears fallacious, because it affirms the antecedent of the conditional by first affirming the consequent. The syllogism can be made valid if the conditional is understood to be a bi-conditional (‘if and only if’), as the term ‘precise cause’ seems to require, and as the example form Aristotle also seems to require. For the absence of one feature (breathing) could only be caused by the absence of another feature (not being an animal, or not having lungs) if the latter feature were the precise and only cause of the former feature. For if some other feature could also cause the former, then the absence of the latter feature alone could not explain the absence of the former. ⁴⁵ - The major is plain from the Philosopher Posterior Analytics 1.13.78b14-18, about having lungs and breathing [“For the cause is not stated in this case: ‘Why does a wall not breath? Because it is not an animal’; for if this is the cause of not breathing, then animal must be the cause of breathing - because if negation is the cause of not-being, then affirmation is the cause of being”].

b. Possible Solution

95. From these three ways together [nn.77, 78, 87], provided they are well understood, a solution can be collected about the way in which a created will causes sin.

Question Five. Whether the Created Will is the Total and Immediate Cause with Respect to its Willing, such that God does not Have, with Respect to that Willing, any Immediate Efficient Causality but only a Mediate One

96. Because this solution, however, and the solution to the fourth question (namely whether God is the cause of sin [n.20]) depend on knowledge of the activity of a created will with respect to its own act, therefore I ask (without arguments) whether the created will is the total and immediate cause with respect to its willing, such that God does not have, with respect to that willing, any immediate efficient causality but only a mediate one.

α. Opinion of Others

97. To this question one could say [Peter OliviSumma IIa q.116: “Some say that the essence of all actions, both natural and vicious, are as immediately from God as are the essences that he creates... But others say that the actions of created agents, at least those that are bad, are not at all immediately from God, because he does not make them except by the fact he makes and holds and conserves in being all active and passive causes, or all causes cooperating and concurring in any way to the production of such actions. Because therefore this second way seems to me it should be altogether held, for I do not see that God could otherwise appear altogether guiltless in the case of our guilt and vices, for this reason - without prejudice to any better opinion - I will subjoin the things that seem capable of being adduced for this side. That therefore the aforesaid actions are from God not in the first way but in the second is proved thus: first, that they are totally and immediately from second causes; second, that they are from free will; third, that they are vicious; fourth, that they are culpable, or that the agent or recipient is guilty because of them.” ⁴⁶ and others] that the will is the total and immediate cause with respect to its own volition.

98. [Proof by reason] - This is proved by reason:

First, because otherwise the will would not be free; second, because otherwise it could cause nothing contingently; third, because otherwise it could not sin; fourth, because otherwise it could have altogether no action; fifth, from comparison of it with other created causes.

99. In the first way [n.98] the proof is twofold:

First as follows: no power has perfectly in its control [power] an effect that cannot be caused by it immediately or that cannot be caused by any cause whose causation is not in the control of that power; but the causation of God is not in the control of a created will (as is plain), just as the virtue of a higher agent is not in the control of any lower agent; therefore if God is necessarily immediately concurrent - as immediate cause - in respect of a created volition, the created will does not have the volition fully in its control. The assumed major premise is plain, because what has an effect perfectly in its control either has from itself alone power over the effect, or the causation of any concurring cause is in its control, namely as to the causing or not causing by that concurring cause; there is an example about the intellect which, if it concurs in causing a volition (according to the third opinion in 2 d.25 [not in the Ordinatio but the Lectura, where it is Scotus’ own opinion]), yet does not cause it save with the will’s causing, so that the intellect’s causing is in the power of the will.

100. The second argument according to this way is as follows: what is determined to something by another does not have that something perfectly in its control; the created will is determined to this something - ex hypothesi - by the divine will;     therefore etc     .

The proof of the minor is that either one of the wills determines the other or vice versa (and our will does not determine the divine will, because the temporal is not the cause of the eternal), or neither will determines the other, and then neither of them will be a moved mover, and there would be no essential order between them; rather, if the divine will does not determine our will (as the second reason argues [n.101]), the divine will could will something that, because of the disagreement of our will, would not come about.

101. Further, from the second way [n.98] the argument is as follows: a thing is not contingent because of its relation to some cause if a higher cause is determined to the thing’s coming about, and if the determination of this higher cause is necessarily followed by the determination of all the lower causes. An example: if my will were now determined to the affirmative option about writing tomorrow, and if my will were not subject to impediment or change, then my writing tomorrow would not be contingent (now, however, it is contingent to either option because of its relation to my hand), for as the will is determined now to one option, so there are contained virtually in it all the lower causes for the same effect, and simply so (because, if a thing by whose determination the effect would be determined is determined, the happening of the effect is not simply indeterminate as to either side - at any rate its existence is not contingent because of the power of a lower cause). But if the divine will is the immediate cause of my willing, there is now some cause determinate with respect to my willing, because God’s will is eternally determined to one of the contradictories, and the determination of this divine cause is necessarily followed by the determination of my will with respect to the same willing (otherwise ‘God willing this’ and ‘this not going to happen’ would stand together); therefore this willing is not contingent to either side because of the power of my will.

102. From the third way [n.98] the argument is as follows: if God is the immediate cause of volition, it is clear he will be a cause prior to the will; therefore he will have an influence on the effect prior in nature to my will. I take then this moment of nature wherein God causes a willing, insofar as it is prior to the moment in which the will acts for the willing; either God in that moment immediately causes perfect rightness in the willing, and consequently in the second moment the will does not sin, because it does not cause in the effect the opposite of what the first cause causes; or in that first moment God does not cause rightness in the willing, and then it follows that in the second moment the will does not sin, because it then has no power to will rightly (for in the second moment it only has power for what the prior cause produces in the first moment); but the will does not sin by not having a right willing if it cannot have a right willing;     therefore etc     .

103. From the fourth way [n.98] the argument is: if God is the cause of the volition, he will be the total cause of it, because he will cause it by willing it (but he is, by his willing, the total cause of a more perfect creature, namely an angel, or of anything created from nothing; and if he was the cause of it by willing it, he would be the total cause of it); but nothing else along with the total cause of something can, in any genus of cause, co-cause that something along with it; so the will would have no causality with respect to its own volition.

104. From the fifth way [n.98] the argument is: if any [creature] is the total active cause with respect to its effect, this must be conceded most of all about the will, because the will is supreme among active causes; but some [creature] can be the total cause with respect to its effect.

105. I prove [the minor] in two ways:

First, because this [sc. being total active cause] is not repugnant to creatures. For though there is something that is the total efficient cause of heat, this does not posit in that something any infinity or perfection repugnant to a creature; for if the thing is a univocal cause, it need not excel the effect in perfection, and if it is an equivocal cause, it need not excel the effect infinitely but in some determinate degree.

106. There is a second proof of the minor, for that thing is total cause of something which, if it existed while everything else was per impossibile removed, would perfectly cause the effect; but a subject, if it existed while everything else was removed, would cause its proper accident; therefore the subject is the total cause with respect to its proper accident.

107. From this minor, proved in two ways [nn.105, 106], the conclusion is drawn that the will can be the total cause with respect to its volition; and further, since nothing else beside the total cause causes in the same genus of cause (otherwise the same thing would be caused twice, or would be caused by something without which it would not be able not to be), then God will not immediately cause this volition.

108. [Proof from authorities] The intended conclusion [n.97] is proved by authorities:

First from Ecclesiasticus 15.14-18, where it is said that God “made man from the beginning and left him in the hand of his own counsel. And gave him his commandments and precepts: ‘If you wish to keep the commandments, they will keep you’. For he has put before you fire and water; stretch out your hand to what you want. In front of man is good and bad, life and death; what has pleased him will be given him.”

109. Augustine too, City of God 7.30, says, “God so administers the things he has made that he permits them to make their own motions.”

110. Anselm too, On Concord 1.7, “God has made all actions and all movements, because he himself made the things by which and in which and from which they come to be; and no thing has any power of willing or doing but he himself gives it.”

111. The same again, 2.3, “God does not do the things he predestines, by compelling or resisting the will, but by giving power to its being.”

112. To this effect also is the Commentator [Averroes] Metaphysics 9 com.7 (on the remark, “So it is possible for something to have power”): “The moderns posit that one agent, namely God, causes all things without intermediary. And it happens that no being has naturally its own action; and since beings do not have their own actions, they will not have their own essences (for actions are not distinguished save by diverse essences). And this opinion is very far from the nature of man, etc.” a

a. a[Interpolation] These two reasons [from Averroes] seem to make the opinion [n.97] more compelling than those that are put for the opinion [nn.98-107].

β. The Response to the Fourth Question that Falls out from the Aforesaid Opinion of Others

113. If this way [n.97] were true, one could easily assign in accord with it how God is not the cause of sin [n.20]; for, whether speaking about the material or the formal element in sin, the whole would be from the created will as from the total cause, and so would in no way be from God save mediately, because God produced the will such that it could will in this way or in that.

γ. Instances against the Opinion of Others and Solutions to them

114. But it is objected against this way [n.97] that it would not save God’s being the cause of merit, since merit is as free as sin.

115. Likewise, it would not save the essential order of causes, because, according to the first proposition in On Causes, “Every primary cause has a greater influence on what it causes than does a second universal cause;” but, according to this way, the primary cause would have no influence on the effect save that it produced the other cause of it [sc. the will as cause of the willing this way or that, n.113].

116. To the first of these [n.114] it can be said that God is in some way cause of merit (in a way that he is not cause of sin), because he causes grace (or charity) immediately in the soul, which inclines it by way of nature toward meriting; and whenever a form active by way of nature is from some agent, the action of the form is also from that agent. From this too would be plain how the effects of certain causes would be from God differently from how the effects of the will are, because those determinate causes have received from God an inclination - even a necessitating inclination - to their effects; not so the will.

117. To the second [n.115] it might be said that, although sometimes the order of principal and less principal causes, neither of which moves the other (the way the object and the cognitive power are disposed with respect to the act of knowing, 1 d.3 n.498) -that although this order is such that the principal cause moves the less principal one either to second act or to first act (but so that the two are partial causes and make together with each other one total cause, as hand and stick do with respect to the motion of a ball [1 d.3 n.496], or as sun and father do with respect to a son) - nevertheless, in the case of causes that are total with respect to their immediate effects, there can also be an essential order, such that the second cause is total and immediate with respect to its effect just as the first cause is with respect to its own effect; and although the second cause is second and depends essentially on the first as regards its causation just as also regards its being, yet not in such a way that there is some immediate dependence of its effect on it and on a prior cause.

118. And when the proposition [from On Causes, n.115] says that “the first cause causes more” - this is true, because the first causes the second. An example of this can be posited in the case of essentially ordered causes, by the different way of causing; for if several material elements are posited in order in a composite thing with respect to the ultimate form, the first material element is not material with respect to the ultimate form (such that any part of it is perfected by the ultimate form), but only the ultimate material element is; for every prior material element is perfected by some prior form, which constitutes it as material with respect to a later form.

δ. Rejection of the Opinion

119. Against this opinion [n.97] the argument is twofold: first, because therefrom it follows that God does not naturally foreknow the future; second, that he is not omnipotent.

120. The proof of the first consequence is that God only has knowledge of future contingents if he knows with certitude the determination of his will with respect to things for which he has an immutable and irresistible will; but if the created will is the total cause with respect to its willing, and it is contingently disposed to its willing, then, however much the divine will is posited to be determinate as to one side of the things that depend on the created will, the created will is going to be able to will differently, and thus no certitude follows from knowledge of the determination of the divine will.

121. The proof of the second consequence [n.119] is threefold:

First, because everything that an omnipotent being wills happens; but if God wills my volition to be, and this is in the power of my will as a cause contingently disposed toward it, then my will can, of itself, be determined indifferently to one side or the other, and so that to which the divine will has determined my will is able not to come about.

122. Second, because, if my will is determined of itself to one side, the divine will cannot impede it without violating it (for, from the fact my will is determined to one side, it cannot be impeded unless it is violated); but violation of the will involves a contradiction; therefore God cannot impede my will.

123. Third, because an omnipotent will produces the willed thing into existence for the time when that will wants it to exist (for there is no other act of the divine will with respect to an angel or any other creature by which such creature is produced into existence); but if my will is the total cause of this volition, the divine will in no way produces that volition into existence.a

a. a[Interpolation] Note that the force of these arguments [nn.119-123] rests on three propositions, a, b, c - a: the fact of the action of the first cause being required for the causing of the second cause takes away freedom from the second cause; b: the fact of the determination of the first cause being followed also by the second in its acting takes away contingency from the action of the second cause. Again, on behalf of a: the cited fact takes away freedom most of all if the first cause determines the second; again, on behalf of b: the fact that the action of the first cause naturally precedes the action of the second takes away sin too from the second cause. The other proposition, c - which stands opposed to the reasons [nn.98-107] and the authorities [nn.108-112] - is that God is omnipotent and omniscient.

3. How Sin is from the Created Will

124. Rejecting this way [n.97], then, because of the two arguments about the omnipotence and omniscience of God [n.119], it remains to ask how sin can be from the created will, as to the first question [n.1], and how not be from God, as to the fourth question [n.20].

125. As to the first, I say that from the three ways (namely the two that posit a per accidens cause with respect to evil, and the third that posits a defective cause with respect to it [nn.77-78, 87]) a single integrated solution can be collected of the following sort:

In the case of sin there come together a positive act as the material element and a privation of due justice as the formal element. There is no efficient cause with respect to this privation but only a deficient cause, according to the third way [n.87]; for the will, which is duty bound to give rightness to its act and does not give it, sins by being deficient. But this ‘being deficient’ (namely not causing or not giving to its act the rightness that is due) is from a cause that could then freely cause it, namely freely give rightness to its act. This then is what it is to sin formally, that such a free cause does not give the due rightness that it could then give.

126. Hereby the [second] way about the per accidens cause [n.78] is evident. Although this cause does not cause what is formally in sin by effecting something but by failing to effect something, yet it does cause it by effecting something positive to which is annexed the deficiency caused by its failure, and on this point stand the authorities from Dionysius [n.78] about accidentality on the part of the effect.

127. There is also accidentality on the part of the cause not properly (properly is when the white is said to be a cause accidentally of understanding, and generally when something is properly an accident of a per se cause such that the cause makes a per accidens unity along with it [n.76]), but by extending the term ‘accident’ to anything that is outside the idea of something, in the way that the difference is said to be an accident of the genus. For, in this way, that by which our will is specifically ‘this will’ is an accident of ‘will in general’, because ‘will in general’ is a perfection simply (which is why it is posited formally in God), and will in this sense is not the proximate cause, even contingently, with respect to sin, because then any lower instance under it would have such a sense of causality, and the divine will would also. But will when it is through some difference contracted to created will (which we describe loosely by saying it is ‘limited’) is the proximate defective and per accidens cause with respect to sin; and so on the part of the cause too, when will in general is taken for the cause to which this difference is understood to be added, this accidentally happens to it per accidens, as if one were to say that animal is not per se but per accidens the cause of understanding because ‘the most perfect animal’ understands; indeed ‘most perfect’ is not the proper idea of understanding what is an accident of animal simply, but ‘rational’ is, because rational is an accident of animal as the difference is of the genus - for we indicate ‘rational’ loosely by saying ‘most perfect’.

128. So it is in the issue at hand. The specific difference, by which ‘will in general’ is contracted to created will (which contraction or difference is now hidden from us), we refer to loosely by the terms ‘limited or defectible being’ or by ‘from nothing’, and to this whole is attributed the act of volition in respect of sin as to a more proper cause than to will of itself; and this is true if it is understand of this substrate, namely of this specific will; and being the cause of sin belongs to this will not only per accidens (as it does to will in general), but also as to proximate cause, so that it can belong to any such will and to no other. And in this way should be understood the first opinion about the defectibility of the will [n.77].

B. To the Fourth Question

129. But now it remains to see how a defectible will is a deficient cause with respect to sin otherwise than the divine will is, or rather that it is the cause and the divine will is not the cause - and this as to the solution of the fourth question [n.20].

1. The Opinion of Others

130. Here it is said and held [Lombard 2 d.37 ch.2 n.4, and references] that the divine will cannot be the cause of sin.

131. For which three reasons of theirs can be set down.

The first is of the following sort - Augustine 83 Questions q.3, “A man becomes worse without any wise man being responsible; for this guilt in a man is so great that in no wise man may it happen; but God is more excelling than a wise man;” therefore a man becomes worse without God being responsible, as Augustine maintains in q.4.

132. Again in the same book q.21 Augustine says, “One who is for every being the cause that it exists, is not cause of not-being for anything to make it not exist, because what comes from him is, insofar as it is, good. Now God is cause of all good; God therefore is not cause of not-being for anything; therefore neither is he cause of sin for anything, because sin is formally not-being.”

133. The third reason is from Anselm On Free Choice ch.8, “Teacher: ‘[God] can reduce to nothing all the substance he has made from nothing - but he cannot separate rightness from a will that has rightness... Now no will is just save one that wills what God wills it to will. Therefore to keep rightness of will for the sake of rightness itself is - for anyone who keeps it - to will what God wills him to will. If God separates this rightness from anyone’s will, he does it either willingly or unwillingly.’ Student: ‘He cannot do it unwillingly.’ Teacher: ‘So if he takes the aforesaid rightness away from anyone’s will, he wills what he does.’ Student: ‘Without doubt he wills.’ Teacher: ‘Certainly, then, whosever will he wills to remove the same rightness from, he does not will him to keep rightness for the sake of rightness.’ Student: ‘It so follows.’ Teacher: ‘But it was already set down that to keep rightness of will in this way is - for anyone who keeps it - to will what God wills him to will. Therefore if God takes the oft stated rightness away from anyone, he does not will him to will what he wills him to will.’

Student: ‘Nothing is more logical, and nothing is more impossible.’ Teacher: ‘Therefore nothing is more impossible than for God to take away rightness of will.’”

2. Objections to the Reasons for the Opinion of Others

134. Objections to these reasons [nn.131-33]:

First against the first [n.131], because a wise man is bound to keep the precept of God, and therefore a wise man cannot make another to be worse unless he sins and so becomes non-wise. For it is not in a wise man’s power freely to cooperate or not cooperate in another’s acting well; because if it was in his power, he would be able not to cooperate while remaining wise, and thus he could make another to be worse - that is, by his not causing goodness in the other’s act, the other would not act well. But it is in God’s power freely to cooperate or not cooperate in a created will’s acting well; therefore, with his will remaining right, God is able not to cooperate with a created will, and the created will thus will commit sin.

135. The reason is confirmed by the fact that, just as God naturally acts for the right action before the created will does (provided the action be right), so the divine will, it would seem, fails to act before the created will fails to act.

136. The argument against the second reason [n.132] is as follows, that a cause that is only necessary (or natural) with respect to some entity is not a cause of not-being, because such a cause acts according to the utmost of its power, and so it cannot not do what it is of a nature to do; but God is not this sort of cause of being for creatures as regard any being with respect to which he can be the principle of acting (where the lack of this ultimate being is evil); therefore God can, by failing to act, be the cause of evil.

137. Further, how can God be more the cause of punishment than of guilt, since punishment, just like guilt, is formally evil? For it is as simply evil not to enjoy God -both with respect to the good that it takes away and with respect to the nature that it harms - as it is not to love God, while a wayfarer, by a meritorious act; and yet this is conceded to be a punishment from God, according to Augustine Retractions 1.25.

138. Further, the privation of grace is as much an evil in itself and in the nature that is deprived as is the privation of the rightness of justice; but God can be the immediate cause of this privation; indeed he is the cause of it whenever grace is annihilated; he alone can annihilate something, and especially something that he himself immediately preserves. So, just as by refraining from action (that is by not preserving grace) he can be the cause of the non-being of grace, so he can by not acting be the cause of the lack of rightness in an elicited act.

139. Against the third reason [n.133]: it seems to have as conclusion that man cannot sin, and this result is false; therefore the reason is not conclusive.

140. Proof that the result does follow from the reason: I am able to sin at [time] a; therefore God can will me not to be right at a. For this follows in the case of non-modal propositions: ‘if I sin at a, then God does not will me to be right at a’, because from the opposite the opposite follows: ‘if he wills me to be right at a, I am right at a’ and so I do not sin; but if he does not will me to be right at a, he does not will me to will at a what he wills me to will at a (for this, according to the reason [n.133], is what it is to be right, ‘to will what God wills me to will’); therefore God is able not to will me to will at a what he wills me to will at a - which is impossible.

140. But if it be said that the reason [n.133] concludes that God, by ordained power [as opposed to absolute power], cannot take away rightness from the will without an act of the willa - on the contrary: this reason does show absolutely that the result of the reason is that my will cannot sin; in like manner, if the reason were to prove that [God can take away rightness] without an act of my will, it would prove it about God as to his absolute power. For the conclusion aims to infer a contradiction: hence is added the words ‘nothing is more impossible’ [n.133], or at any rate, if the contradiction does not follow, nothing is as equally impossible; nor is it possible for the absolute power of God either; for God contingently wills anything other than himself, and he contingently preserves it, because he is able not to preserve it.

a. a[Interpolation] Response: Thomas, Bonaventure: a better use of that which second perfection uses is a more perfect good of an angel than is first perfection.

3. Scotus’ own Opinion and Solution of the Objections

142. As to the solution of these objections [nn.134-141] and the solution of the principal question [sc. the fourth, n.20], I say that when two partial causes come together for an effect common to both of them, there can be a defect in the producing of the effect because of a defect of either concurring cause; an example: an act of willing (according to the third opinion of d.25 [not in the Ordinatio; see Lectura 2 d.25 n.69]) requires the coming together of intellect and free will, and there can be a defect in this act from a defect of the will although a defect in knowledge does not precede.

143. So therefore, if an act of willing of a created will require the coming together of the created will and the divine will, there can be a defect in this act of willing from a defect of the former cause; and this because that cause could give rightness to the act, and is bound to give it, and yet does not give it; but the latter cause, although it is not bound to give the rightness, yet it would give it, as far as depends on itself, if the created will cooperated. For, universally, whatever God has given antecedently he would give consequently (as far as depends on himself) provided there were no impediment; but by giving free will, he has antecedently given right acts, which are in the power of the will; and therefore, as far as concerns his own part, he has given rightness to every act of the will - and he would give it consequently to the will if the will itself were, on its own part, to do rightly any elicited act.

144. There is a defect, then, in the effect of the two causes, not because of a defect in the higher cause, but because of one in the lower cause; not because the higher cause causes rightness in fact and the inferior one causes wrongness, but because the higher cause - as far as depends on itself - would cause rightness if the lower cause were, according to its own causality, to cause it. And therefore, the fact that rightness is not caused is because the second cause - as far as belongs to itself - does not cause it.a

a. a[Interpolation] On the contrary: the prior cause is determined first to causing rightness or not. Response: let it be that it is determined to causing rightness when the second cause determines itself to not acting rightly. It is also truly the case that what is necessary [sc. God giving rightness] is sometimes voluntary [sc. the created will choosing not to give rightness].

145. And if objection is made (as it was made [n.93]) about the two instants of nature, that in the first instant God would give rightness to the act - I reply:

I say that the priority that includes, without contradiction, ‘able to exist in the absence of each other’ is not an order in causes as causes cause a common effect but as they cause simultaneously. For just as, when speaking of diverse kinds of cause, the matter does not act as matter prior in time to the efficient cause acting on it (as if a thing could without contradiction have acted as matter and not have been acted on, or conversely), but only prior in nature, that is, the one causes more perfectly before the other causes - so although, in the same kind of cause, ordered diverse causes have an order according to causing more or less perfectly, yet they do not have a priority of nature that would mean ‘being able to be in the absence of the other’ in respect of some third thing; rather, just as the matter acts as matter and the efficient cause acts on it in one instant of nature, so two ordered efficient causes cause the common effect in one instant of nature, so that neither then causes without the other. But that a non-right effect is caused, this is not then because of the prior cause (which, as far as depends on itself, would cause rightly if the second would), but because of a defect of the second cause, which has it in its power to cause or not to cause along with the first cause - and if it does not cause along with the first cause the way it is bound to do, there is no rectitude in the effect common to both of them.

146. From this comes response to the objections.

To the first [n.134] that not only is the wise man wise because he is bound by the precept not to destroy his neighbor, and so he cannot be one to make his neighbor worse, but from the wise man’s perfection it also follows that, while he remains wise, he cannot be the first reason for his neighbor falling, and to this extent Augustine’s reason [n.131] does hold; for God is “more excelling than any efficient cause” - that is, his will is simply more perfect, because it is not the first reason for the failing of anyone whom it can act along with.

147. To the second [n.136] the reply is that although God does not necessarily cause the entity belonging to this act, yet he has so disposed things that, whatever he gave antecedently, he gives consequently - as far as concerns his own part [n.136].

148. But then a doubt arises about the principal question. For although the point is saved that sin is not ascribed to God as cause but to the created will [nn.142-145], yet it is not shown that God cannot be the first cause of the failing of the created will; for from the fact that he causes rightness freely and prior to the created will doing so, it seems still to be the case that he could first fail to cause rightness before the created will fails to cause it [nn.91, 135] - and thus he can be the first reason for failure, although this is not because of that law of his which God gave (‘whatever he gave antecedently he gives consequently’) [n.147].

149. I reply. That God cannot in himself sin is plain from the fact that neither can he be turned away from himself formally, because he cannot fail to love himself supremely and in ordered way and with all the required circumstances (otherwise either he could love himself in disordered way or he could change, both of which are impossible); nor even can he be turned virtually from himself, because nothing other than himself is a necessary thing for him to love [n.147]; for anything other than himself, because it is willed by him and willed thus (as for this time, and from this, and so), is willed in ordered way.

150. But why cannot God be the first reason for failing in a created will?

I reply: if God freely does not cause the rightness that should exist in the act of a created will - and this because of his own will’s freedom and not because of a defect in the created will not voluntarily cooperating - then there is no cause of sin in the created will, because there is no lack of due justice; for justice is not due from the created will save insofar as this will has the power to act rightly, such that no removal is presupposed of a prior cause, whose removal would make the will not able to act rightly. If God then were the first cause not making rightness, the non-right act would not be sin.

151. To the other objection, about punishment [n.137], the answer will be plain in the third [nn.185-88] of these four questions [nn.1, 10, 15, 20].

152. To the next objection [n.138], about grace, the answer is plain from what has been said [n.150], because if God, by immediately withdrawing his support, were to annihilate grace without a defect by the will in its operating, the lack of grace would not be a sin, because it would not be a lack of due justice; for the will is not debtor for the justice save as the will has it in its power to preserve justice, namely so as not to corrupt it by demerit. So, although privation of grace is a greater evil than privation of actual justice, yet the privation of grace can come from God’s not acting, that is, from his not preserving it - but not first from his not acting, but from his not acting for this reason, that the will demerited, and because of this demeriting God removes the maintenance of his preservation from the grace; however, as to the actual rectitude, if there is a first sin, there is no sin or demerit preceding it whereby God could withdraw himself so that the rectitude, as far as concerns God’s part, is not present. Therefore, the privation of grace is now a sin insofar as it is a privation of due justice, which the will has deprived itself of by demerit, although the annihilation of the grace is from God’s not causing grace; but if the privation of grace were not because of some prior wrongness in the will, it would not be sin.

153. As to the objection to the reasoning of Anselm [nn.139-40], it could be said that the reasoning does not involve a contradiction, because it equivocates over the term ‘willing’ - for ‘being right’ includes the will’s willing what God wills it to will [n.140]; so God wills with signifying will and antecedently, not with well-pleased will and consequently - because at the instant at which the created will sins, God does not, by consequent will or will of being well pleased, will the created will to will this. So when the inference is drawn that God ‘does not will me to will what he wills me to will’ [n.140], there is no contradiction, because will of being well pleased and consequently is denied but signifying will and antecedently is affirmed; for otherwise (as was argued) it does absolutely seem that the created will could not sin, which is false, and that God cannot by his absolute power take away rightness without demerit of the will, and thus that he cannot by his absolute power make rightness without merit of the created will, both of which are false.

154. However it is possible, by expounding Anselm’s argument there [n.139], to say that his reason proves that God cannot by a positive act take rightness away from the will, because then he would take it away willingly, and so he willingly wills, by will of being well pleased, that I do not will what, by antecedent will, he wills that I will; but this result, although it does not involve a contradiction, is nevertheless false: whatever he wills by antecedent will he wills also by will of being well pleased and consequently (as far as concerns himself), provided no impediment in the created will is put in the way [n.143]. But if rightness is removed without act of mine then I am not putting any impediment in the way; so, in the case posited, God’s ‘willing by will of being well pleased that I do not will what he wills by antecedent will that I will’ is false, even though it does not include a contradiction; and then Anselm’s reason proves no more than that without demerit of the created will God cannot by his ordained power take rightness away from the will [n.141]; but it does not prove this of God’s absolute power - nor even does it prove that God cannot take rightness away negatively, and that because of the demerit of the created will.

C. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question

155. To the principal arguments of the first question [nn.2-8].

The savior [n.2] understands by ‘tree’ the internal act and by ‘fruit’ the external act, and he rebukes the hypocrites (that is, the Pharisees) by warning them to conform internal acts to external ones and external acts to internal ones, namely so that they may appear as they are and conversely.

156. To the second [n.3]: when there is an efficient cause, there is a likeness in the case of equivocal causes - though a remote one. Here the cause [sc. the will] with respect to sin is a deficient and not an efficient cause.

157. To the next [n.4]This reply is placed after n.161 in the mss., following the parallel positioning in the Lectura and not the changed position in the Ordinatio. Further, the fourth argument in the Ordinatio [n.5] is not here responded to, and neither it nor its response is found in the Lectura. ⁴⁷ I say that what comes from the deficiency and not from the efficiency of an efficient cause is not directed to a due end.

158. To the next [n.6] I say that no evil is from evil.

159. As to the proof [sc. that there is some first evil, n.8], I say that ‘evil’ can be understood in one way through privation of parts of the same nature, and in another way through privation of perfections that befit such a nature.

160. In the first way there is an infinite regress in the case of parts of the same proportion according as the infinite is divided into the infinite by proportion and quantity; for in this way one part after another could be taken away from some nature and could be thus taken away continually according to parts of the same proportion - and so infinitely; but according to parts of the same quantity there is a stop, not at evil but at nothing - in the way in which there is a stop in the division of the continuous at nothing, if the divided parts are destroyed.

161. As to the second way, I say that although the thing that is good for someone (whose lack is an evil for him) could be taken away from the substrate nature in two ways according to what has been said [n.160] (namely according to parts either of the same proportion, and thus the process goes on infinitely, or of the same quantity, and thus it stops when there is nothing left), yet there is a further process there [sc. the second, n.159], according to which a perfectible nature can be better and the perfection corresponding to it is better and yet the nature lacks this perfection. And in this way there is a stand at evil, when a supreme good lacks the supreme perfection proper to it; and in this way the supreme devil (or some noblest makeable nature that lacks the perfection proportionate to it) is said to be supremely evil; but there are beside such supreme evil no evils positively, nor evils beside something positive, nor privation beside privation.

D. To the Principal Arguments of the Fourth Question

1. To the Arguments of the First Part

162. To the arguments of the fourth question [nn.21-28].

I say [n.21] that although sin is from the created will, yet it is not from God; for God does not fail first but, as far as concerns his own part, he altogether does not fail, and there is only a defect in the action because of a defecting in the acting of the second cause [nn.44, 145]. Nor even can God fail first such that his defect in the effect is a sin, because, if he himself did not first act, the lack of rightness in the act would not be a debt [n.150].

163. When proof is given about the inferior and superior cause [n.21], I reply that this is true of an efficient cause but not of a deficient cause.

164. When confirmation is given from other things, as from natural causes [n.22], I say that natural causes cannot cause save in accord with the inclination they have received from the higher cause and that they are conformed to; but the will has received freedom so as to be able to act in agreement or disagreement with the higher cause, that is, that - as far as concerns itself - it may cause what the superior cause causes, agreeing or disagreeing with it.

165. As to the second argument [n.23], I concede the antecedent [nn.23-25] and deny the consequence.

166. As to the proof of the consequence [n.26], the response is that sin is imputed to the created will, not merely for the reason that it per accidens causes the defect, but because it is bound (to the extent the act is under its power) to act rightly, and it does not act rightly. The divine will is not bound in this way, and so in itself it cannot sin [n.149]; nor can it even by not causing be first to fail in respect of the rightness due in the act, such that the rightness would then become due when it is not present because of the defect of the created will.

2. To the Arguments of the Second Part

167. To the arguments for the opposite [nn.30-32], which prove that the act substrate to sin is not from God, I reply:

To the first [n.30] I say that God wills many things by well-pleased will that he has prohibited by signifying will, and that he did not will all the things to be done that he prescribed, as he did not will Isaac to be sacrificed, and yet he prescribed it [Genesis 22.2, 12]. Nor did he prescribe the opposite when willing something by well-pleased will, because this is a sign of a duplicitous will - and it is simplicity when there is some end of the precept consonant to right reason, as the announcement was of the precept there to Abram, as is clear: “God tempted Abram” [Genesis 22.1-2, 16-18].

168. To the next [n.31] I say that what is formally an act of my will (namely an act by which my will wills) is not an act of the divine will but an effect of it, because the divine will is always ordered and its act always right - and the act of my will is disordered because it lacks the rightness due, but it is willed by God in ordered fashion as he is cause, being material with respect to his causing the way that in us our act is materially good; therefore it follows that the divine act of willing is simply perfect, because it is elicited by charity and has the best end; and thus the external work of the divine willing (which work is my act of willing) is ordered materially or in a certain respect, but disordered simply, to the extent it is the act by which my will simply wills.

169. To the last argument [n.32] I say that the divine will is not the rule of the created will in respect of rightness as to the thing willed (so that the will, when agreeing with the divine will and in the thing willed, would be right), but the divine will needs to be the rule for the created will to the extent it wills the created will to will thus and so -and that too when the divine will is willing with signifying and antecedent will, not with well-pleased and consequent will.

III. To the Third Question

A. Solution

170. To the question third in order [n.15] I say that every sin is a punishment, and that one sin can be the punishment of another.

171. [Every sin is a punishment] - First I prove, because punishment is formally the lack of a good suiting the will, that, if in the will we distinguish affection for the just and affection for the good of advantage [d.6 n.40; Anselm On Concord 3.11], it is plain that the taking away of the good of advantage is a punishment; but the good of justice more suits the will than the good of advantage; therefore the taking away of it is per se a punishment.

172. Proof of the minor:

The more perfect something perfectible is, and consequently the more perfect the perfection corresponding to it is, the greater is the fittingness of them and the worse the privation of them; but the will as it has the affection for justice (that is, as it is free, speaking of innate justice) is simply nobler than the will as it has the affection for advantage - and this belongs to it simply; therefore there is a greater suitability of justice to the will absolutely than of the good of advantage to the will. Therefore the taking away of justice is a punishment simply, and a greater punishment than the taking away of any advantage whatever that is different from justice.

173. And herein is well verified what Augustine says in Confessions 1.12 n.19, “You have commanded, Lord, and so it is, that every disordered spirit should be for itself its own punishment;” [Free Choice of the Will 3.15 nn.152-53] “for not even for a moment is the disgrace of guilt without the grace of justice,” namely that the will itself -by depriving itself of justice - does in this deprive itself of the greatest good suitable to it, the lack of which is for it formally a greater punishment than the lack of any good of advantage that is inflicted on it because of the guilt. And hence it is that punishment is said ‘to bring order to guilt’, because, from when God does not will to take the guilt away, the guilty soul cannot be in better or more ordered condition than to be in punishment -which punishment is not as great an evil formally as is the guilt, because it brings order to the nature that remains in guilt.Augustine, On the Nature of Good ch.7, “Therefore are sinners brought to order when undergoing punishment; which order is a punishment for the reason that it does not suit their nature, but is justice for the reason that it suits their guilt;” ch.9, “Nature is in better order when it suffers justly in punishment than when it rejoices without punishment in sin.” ⁴⁸

174. And if the objection is made as to how the same lack of justice can be formally guilt and formally punishment, the Master responds by distinguishing ‘lack’ as it is a privation of good actively or passively; in the first way it is guilt and in the second punishment.

175. This can be explained as follows, that guilt is from the will as will is the active cause, though however a deficient one, and punishment is in the will as will is the subject that is by guilt deprived of the fitting good - and this good was indeed due to the extent that the will according to its primary idea [sc. freedom] could have acted for the rectitude due to it and did not.

176. Guilt exists in the first way [n.175] and is thus voluntary, because it is in the power of the will as in the active cause - just as the prow is said to be in the power of the sailor whereby he could preserve the ship if, when present, he were to work diligently.

177. Punishment exists formally in the second way [n.175], because it is the corruption or privation in the will of the good that is due and most suited for it; and as such it is not formally voluntary [n.17], because the will - as it is subject - does not have the form inhering within it in its power. And this privation of due justice, inhering in the will, is more contrary to the natural inclination of the will than any lack of a non-just advantageous good or than the presence of something disadvantageous.

178. [Whether sin can be the punishment for another sin] - Second I prove [n.171] that, just as the taking away of grace is a punishment for sin (in that, as soon as a defect exists in a will failing to act for due rectitude, God removes his sustaining hand because of the demerit of this defect so that grace is not preserved [n.152]), thus too can God, because of the demerit of one defect of the will, remove himself from it so that in a second act the will does not act for the rectitude that it would act for if no demerit had preceded; and so, because of this removing of himself by God, there will be a lack of rectitude in the second act and this rectitude will still be due, because although giving this rectitude to the act is not now in the will’s power - for it has deprived itself of the divine assistance whereby God was ready to cooperate in rectitude with it - yet it was in the will’s power to give it before (prior to the first sin); and therefore is this failure imputed to the will as sin, just as is also imputed to it that it does not act with grace in the second act after it has lost grace; because, although the will does not then have grace, nor can it then by itself possess grace, yet it has by itself fallen into this powerlessness; for it could have kept grace, and the ability to keep grace was - for this purpose - given to it.

179. But this way [of explaining things] is, as it seems, very difficult, namely that the lack of rectitude in some elicited act could be on the part of God not causing it (that is, his not giving it because of the demerit of some sin); for then, although the will was able before not to demerit (and God would then have assisted it), and although God - as far as his own part is concerned - would have acted for rectitude in the will’s second act if the will had not turned aside in its first act, yet when once the will has sinned, it seems that, if God does not in the second act assist in causing a right act of the will, the sin is not then in the power of the will such that the will would then be able not to be defective; and this seems unacceptable.

180. So one can say in a different way [sc. different from n.178] that, although God - as far as concerns himself - does assist the will in the second act as he also did in the first, and although in any act the first deficient cause (that is, the first cause not acting justly or rightly) is the created will, yet the second defect is a punishment for the first sin insofar as the will deprives itself of the good most suited to it.

181. Nor is there a likeness in the second act between privation of grace and privation of rectitude, because, namely, just as God, on account of the demerit, does not assist in causing grace in the soul, so he does not assist either in causing rightness in the will - for he himself did not give grace antecedently, as he did give rectitude antecedently, and so he is able not to give rectitude consequently.

182. Also, the lack of grace is a single injustice habitual in the soul, not through sin after sin. But in the case of evil acts succeeding each other there is always a new evil, and so there is a need in their case that they all be in the power of the created will; however there is no need that the lack of grace - once grace has been annihilated - be in the power of the will, because this lack is not a new injustice but only a single habitual malice residing in the soul.

B. To the Principal Arguments

183. However, the first argument to the question [n.16] contains the difficulty how sin is a punishment, since every punishment is from God.

184. One response [Bonaventure] is that although what punishment is is not always from God, yet, insofar as punishment brings order to guilt, it is in this way from God, because the order itself is from God.

185. On the contrary: if punishment is not some being that can be from God, then neither is guilt; therefore neither is the relation founded on either extreme from God, and so there is no order there that can be from God.

186. Further, by parity of reasoning guilt could be from God and be an effect of God; for guilt is set in order by punishment as punishment is set in order by guilt, and yet no one allows that punishment is nothing.

187. Therefore one can give a different response [from that in n.184], that a punishment is merely the lack of a good suited to an intellectual nature, just as also is the lack of the vision and enjoyment of God; punishment can in another sense be said to be something positive and yet something unsuited to such a nature, just as excessive heat is something positive and yet is unsuited to flesh.

188. All punishments can in this second sense [n.187] be posited as from God, because they are something positive. And it is about these that the citation from Retractions 1.26 [n.16] must be understood; for it says “among the good works of God,” and good works are those positive things, although they are bad for the punished because they are disagreeable to them.

189. But punishments in the first way [n.187] are not from God as efficient cause (for they cannot have efficient causes), nor from him as deficient cause first but only because of a defect of the created will in some act of sin, God’s will not now acting along with the created will so that it have the good which, as far as depends on himself, he would have cooperated with it for. Such punishment therefore is from God, not by inflicting or effecting it, nor by being first deficient, but by desertion - that is, by deserting the nature that is deficient and leaving it in its defect and in everything consequent to the defect, wherein are included many lackings of perfections suited to such a nature. So the punishment, therefore, that is sin is not from God as efficient cause or as first deficient, but only from him as deserting the will by reason of the will’s first demerit, and the will - deserted by God - falls into a second demerit.

190. To the third argument [n.18; the second argument, n.17, has no response in the Ordinatio] the answer is plain from the same point, that if punishment were inflicted by God it would not be a greater evil but a lesser one - so that the second sin is a punishment that is inflicted by the will sinning and by God only as by his deserting the will.

Thirty Eighth Distinction

Single Question. Whether Intention is an Act of Will only

1. Concerning the thirty eighth distinction the question is raised about intention,awhether intention is an act of will only.

a. a[Interpolation] About this thirty eighth distinction, where the Master treats of the things that are concurrent to sin (of which sort are will and intention for an end), the question is raised:

2. That it is not:

All per se agents act for an end, from Physics 2.5.196b17-22; therefore they act from intention.

3. Further, there is no distinct vision without intention joined to it, according to Augustine On the Trinity 11.2 n.2; but there can be a distinct vision preceding an act of intellect, and consequently preceding any act of the will; therefore intention is not an act of will only.

4. Further, Luke 11.34-35, “If your eye is simple your whole body will be light;” and, “See to it therefore that the light in you is not darkness.” The Gloss expounds ‘eye’ and ‘light’ of intention; eye and light pertain to the intellect.

5. Further, intention involves the relating of one thing to another; relating, like comparing, belongs to the intellect.

6. On the contrary:

The Master in the text, “Now intention is taken sometimes for the will, sometimes for the end of the will... So the end of the will is said to be both that which we will and that for the sake of which we will; and intention regards that for the sake of which we will, and will regards that which we will.”

7. And further Augustine On the Trinity 14.3. n.5, “We find the first trinity in the body which is seen, and in the glance of the seer which, when he sees, is formed by it, and in the intention of the will which conjoins both. In the trinity of bodily vision, the form of the body that is seen and the conformity with it that comes about by the looking of the seer are conjoined by the intention of the will.”

I. To the Question

8. I reply:

First we must see what is meant by this term ‘intention’.

For ‘to intend’ states ‘to tend to another’. This can be taken generally, either that a thing has from another that it tends toward it, or that it has it from itself ‘moving itself toward it’. - A thing can also tend toward something as toward a present object or as toward a distant or absent limit.

9. In the first way intending belongs to any power with respect to its object.

10. In the second way intending is more properly taken for that, namely, which tends toward another and is not drawn to it but draws itself to it; and in this way intending cannot belong to any natural power but only to a free one, because - according to Damascene Orthodox Faith chs.36, 41 - “a non-free appetite is drawn and does not draw,” and so it is in the case of every natural power.

11. Taking ‘to intend’ more properly in this [second] way, then, namely as it states ‘to tend of oneself to another’, it will belong principally to a free power; but since to will freely belongs to the whole of free choice, which includes intellect and will (according to the third opinion in d.25 [not in the Ordinatio but the Lectura]), to intend will also belong to the whole of it (and this if to intend is taken most properly), and it will not belong to anything with respect to its object but with respect to its end. And since in the case of every volition - according to Anselm [On Truth ch.12, “Just as every will wills something, so it wills for the sake of something... So every will has a ‘what’ and a ‘why’.”] - it is possible to take a ‘what’ and a ‘why’, to intend does not regard the ‘what’ but the ‘why’, namely to the extent it states a tending toward something as distant through something as through a means.

12. Intention therefore will be an act of free choice by reason of will, and it will be an act of it with respect to what it wills. And if there is the same act of willing for what is willed and for that because of which it is willed, the same act will be use and intention; but if there is a different act, intention will state formally the act by which it tends to the end and materially the act of using by which it refers another thing toward that end.

II. To the Principal Arguments

13. As to the first argument [n.2], it is plain that it proceeds of intending as intending states the tending of something determined and limited by another.

14. As to the second [n.3] I say that the first vision is not caused by the conjoining intention of the will, but the whole of it [sc. vision and the thing seen] can be, if one concedes that it happens in the same instant of time and thus by confirmation of the vision; but once the first intellection has been posited, the will can turn toward or away from it in respect of other operations and so join them in diverse ways. The major, then, that ‘no distinct vision can be had without conjoining intention’ must be denied, unless the conjoining is understood not to be actually concomitant; and in this way must the proposition be denied that ‘a discrete vision precedes in time every intellection’, though it does precede in nature. Or if the vision - which is without concomitant intellection and intention - can be without the conjoining intention of the will, as that vision can be with which intellection and volition are concomitant, then the proposition must be absolutely deniedh that ‘a discrete vision cannot be without conjoining intention’. Nor is the denial of this proposition contrary to Augustine, for Augustine himself means that the will can turn the pupil to the object and tend toward the object, but he does not mean that no vision could come to be unless an intention tends in this way and turns it.

15. To the last argument [n.5; no response is given to the third argument, n.4] I say that to compare by way of judgment belongs to the intellect alone, just as does also the act of understanding - but to relate things by using or ordering one lovable thing to another belongs to the will; for just as the will is reflexive, because it is immaterial, so it is also collative or capable in its own way of relating things in its own way.

Thirty Ninth Distinction

Question One. Whether Synderesis is in the Will

1. Concerning the thirty ninth distinction the question about conscience and synderesisThe term ‘synderesis’ was first introduced to the West by Jerome, on Ezekiel 1.6-7, “And the philosophers set down a fourth power of the soul, which the Greeks call ‘sunteresis’, and this spark of conscience is not extinct in Cain even as a sinner after he was ejected from paradise.” ⁴⁹ is raised, and first whether synderesis is in the will.a

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning the thirty ninth question, where the Master asks why goodness and malice are more in the will than in other powers of the soul, two questions are raised: first whether synderesis is in the will, and second whether conscience is in the will. Argument about the first:

2. That it is:

For synderesis always murmurs against evil; to murmur against belongs to the will;     therefore etc     .

3. Further, the will necessarily wills advantageous things, according to Anselm On Concord 3.13, “No one is able not to will advantageous things;” therefore the will equally necessarily wills justice, because justice is a perfection as equally fitting to the soul as advantage is. But that whereby a man is necessarily inclined toward justice is posited as synderesis; therefore there is something in the will that can be posited as synderesis.

4. Again, natural will necessarily wills that toward which it tends, as is plain from On the Trinity 13.5 where Augustine maintains that “it is certain everyone wills blessedness because of a natural inclination toward it,” and this would not be certain unless the will itself necessarily willed it;     therefore the naturally willed is the ‘necessarily willed’. But justice is something naturally willed by the will, because it is a perfection as natural to the will as advantage is; so it is necessarily willed. Therefore what is posited as the necessary principle for inclining the will to justice should be posited as in the will; this necessary principle is synderesis; therefore etc     .

5. Again, lower nature - namely irrational nature - has a principle of necessarily tending toward what rightly befits it according to its nature; therefore the will too will have a principle of necessarily tending toward justice, which befits it from its nature.

6. The opposite is maintained by the Master in the text, when he adduces Jerome On Ezekiel to the effect that the higher part of reason is synderesis; therefore synderesis is in the higher part of reason; therefore it is in the intellect, which intends contemplation.

Question Two. Whether Conscience is in the Will

7. Second I ask whether conscience is in the will.

8. That it is:

Hebrews 13.18, “We are confident that we have a good conscience, wishing to walk well in all things;” goodness belongs to the will, so conscience does too.

9. Further, if conscience were in the intellect, someone who knows more about doable things would be more conscientious; the consequent is false,     therefore the antecedent is false as well.

10. For the opposite side:

Ecclesiastes 7.23, “For your conscience knows that you have often cursed others.”

11. This is also plain from the acts of conscience, which are to testify, to accuse, to judge etc     ., and all these belong to reason and intellect;     therefore etc     .

I. To both Questions

A. Opinion of Henry of Ghent

1. Statement of the Opinion

12. Here it is said [by Henry, Quodlibet 1.18] that “the law of nature contains the natural principles of things to be done^” Look at Henry there: [“For just as in the cognitive power there is natural law as universal rule of the things to be done and right reason as particular rule, so on the part of the will there is a certain universal mover, which stimulates to action according to the universal rules of the law of nature (and it is called ‘synderesis’, which is a certain natural choice in the will agreeing with the natural dictate of the law of nature), and a certain particular mover, which stimulates to action according to the dictate of right reason (and it is called conscience, which is a certain deliberative choice in the will always agreeing with the dictate of right reason). And conscience is always formed by the consent and choice of free will in line with the judgment and sentence of reason, so that if reason is right, conscience is right too...but if reason is erroneous, conscience is erroneous too. And because conscience is only formed from the free choice of him who wills, although in line with the knowledge of reason, it happens as a result that some who have much knowledge of things to be done possess in themselves no or a slight conscience about acting according to knowledge, and this either because they do not deliberate about action but do everything precipitately, or because, if they do deliberate, yet they choose freely against conscience and altogether reject it, or they follow it weakly in their choosing and act against what they know; hence all these sorts act against knowledge, with no or a little sting of conscience, and have only remorse of synderesis, which cannot be wholly extinguished.”]

2. Rejection of the Opinion

13. Argument against this view:

First about synderesis, that if it has an elicited act necessarily tending toward good and resisting evil, and there is no such thing in the will, then synderesis is not in the will.

- The proof of the assumption is that in 1 d.1 n.80 it was shown that the will does not necessarily enjoy the end shown to it, and that no power or force or habit in the will can be a principle of necessarily enjoying; so neither can it be a necessary principle for willing in conformity with practical principles, which are taken from the end.

14. Further, if there were some such power or force or part in the will that would necessarily tend by an elicited act toward good and resist evil, then it would be supreme in the whole will, because it would have regard to the ultimate end that the first practical principles are taken from; therefore the will, according to any force or inferior part of it whatever, would be in its power so that, when it moved, the lower part or force would obey it and be moved in conformity with it. So it would prevent all sins in the will, because, as it would be moved necessarily, so it would necessarily move the whole will; for the whole will would be moved as it moves, and if the whole will were right, there would be no sin.

15. Argument against the other part, about conscience:

First because an appetitive habit is not generated from one act [Ethics 1.6.1098a18-19, 2.1.1103b21-22]; but conscience comes from one practical syllogism, by evident deduction of some conclusion from the first practical principles; so conscience is not an acquired appetitive habit. Plain too is that it is not innate, nor a part, nor a force.

16. Further, what is of a nature to be caused by some cause cannot be caused by another cause unless this other cause virtually contains the perfection of the first cause; a habit of the will is of a nature to be caused by an act of will as by its proper cause; therefore it cannot be caused by another act unless this other act contains an act of will virtually in itself. But an act of intellect does not contain an act of will virtually in itself according to Henry, because ‘the act of will is more perfect’;Quodlibet 1 q.14, “One must simply say that that power is preeminent over another whose habit, act, and object are preeminent over the habit, act, and object of that other. Now so it is in the present case, that the habit, act, and object of the will are altogether preeminent over the act, habit, and object of the intellect. Therefore one must absolutely say that the will is preeminent over the intellect and is a higher power than it is.” ⁵⁰ therefore the intellect cannot by its own act cause in the will the sort of weight that would be a quasi habit of the will.Quodlibet 9 q.5, “I say that although the will is in no way moved by the practical intellect as to its act of willing...yet it is moved by it as to some passion, which passion is as it were a weight in the will as the will is free, inclining it into a mode of habit so as to will [accordingly].” ⁵¹

17. Further, either the will is able not to accept the weight, and then the intellect will not be a sufficient cause of it - for when a sufficient cause acts the effect exists once the passive recipient is in due proximity to the cause. But if the will is not able not to accept it, then - when the consideration in question is actually present in reason - the will is not able to put the weight aside, because reason does not have a lesser necessity in causing the caused weight than in preserving it.

18. Further, the will must act either according to the given weight or not. If it must, then it is not free, because the agent of this weight is a natural cause so its effect too will be a natural form;     therefore an agent necessarily acting according to this weight does not act freely, because acting thus or otherwise is not in its power. If the will does not need to act according to this weight (which even the Apostle manifestly seems to mean, from the gloss on Romans, ‘Whatever is against conscience etc     .’,Henry, Quodlibet 1 q.18, “The objection about the gloss on Romans, that ‘everything which is not of faith (that is, of conscience) is sin’, proceeds correctly save that ‘conscience’ is not there taken properly but in extended sense for a thinking of reason.” Romans 14.23, “Everything that is not of faith is sin.;” gloss, “What is done against faith (that is, so as to be believed against conscience) is evil.” ⁵² which makes it plain that some sin can be committed against conscience), then the result is that, when a perfect conscience is present, the will is able to will the opposite of what conscience dictates, and so this habit is never corrupted by an act of will, which seems absurd when positing that it is a habit of will.

B. Scotus’ own Response

19. To these questions [nn.1, 7].

If synderesis is posited as something having an elicited act, always tending to the just act and resisting sin, then, since no such thing is in the will, it cannot be posited there; therefore it is in the intellect. And it cannot be posited as something other than a habit of principles, and it is always right because, from the idea of the terms, the intellect, by virtue of its natural light, at once rests in the principles; and then, as far as the part of intellect is concerned, free choice is of a nature to will in agreement with those principles, even if - to the extent the remaining partial cause fails - it does not freely will, because there is no necessitating cause there.

20. Accordingly conscience too can be posited as a habit proper to practical conclusions, with whose act right reason in doable things is of a nature to agree; and so conscience is said to stimulate toward good, insofar as the whole of free choice [d.38 n.11] has one partial cause rightly disposed; and a right and good volition follows, unless there is a defect of the other partial cause concurring with respect to the will.

II. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question

21. To the first argument [n.2] I say that synderesis murmurs ostensively, because it shows that the good is to be willed, and there is occasion in this for murmuring against evil.

22. To the other [n.3] I say that the will, which is a freely acting power, does not necessarily will advantage by an elicited act, just as neither does it thus necessarily will what is just; however if this single power is considered as it has an affection for advantage and does not have an affection for the just, that is, insofar as it is a non-free appetite, then not to will advantageous things would not thus be in its power, because it would thus be precisely only the natural appetite of an intellectual nature, just as the appetite of a brute is the natural appetite of a sensitive nature.

23. I say therefore that Anselm’s proposition, “No one is able not to will advantageous things” [n.3], must be understood of the power when not speaking of the whole of it, which whole power can freely not-will not only advantageous things but also just ones, because it can freely not-will both the latter and the former; instead it must be understood of the power insofar as it is affected precisely by the affection for advantage, that is, as it is considered under the idea of such appetite yet without including freedom in such appetite; but synderesis does not elicit any act in us in this way; for this reason I said in the solution [n.19] ‘if synderesis is posited as something having an elicited act’.

24. The answer to the third argument [n.4] comes from the same point, that natural will, the way it necessarily tends to the thing willed, does not have an elicited act about that thing but is only in such a nature a certain inclination toward the perfection most suited to it; and this inclination exists necessarily in the nature, although the act in conformity with this inclination and nature is not necessarily elicited; for the act (whether it is in conformity with the inclination and then it is called natural, or not in conformity with it and then it is called against nature) is only elicited by free will, and however much free will may want the opposite of what the inclination is toward, the inclination toward what the inclination was toward is no less necessary, because it remains as long as the nature remains.

25. To the final argument [n.5] I say that this nature alone is free, and it has a mode of acting superior to every other created nature.

III. To the Principal Arguments of the Second Question

26. To the arguments of the second question [nn.8-9].

I say that the habits of the practical intellect are called good or bad because of their agreement with the will, just as - contrariwise - the will can be called right or bent because of its agreement with a right speculative act or a non-right speculative act, which acts are formally in the intellect; however goodness belongs to the will as rightness belongs to the intellect, but goodness is more appropriated to the practical intellect than to the speculative.

27. To the next argument [n.9] response can be made through the remark of the Philosopher in Ethics 7.5.1147a19-22 that “some people, when in a state of passion, speak the words of Empedocles, but they do not at all know them.” And so one can concede that he who simply knows with practical knowledge, not he who knows merely how ‘to say the words’, is conscientious - and the more he knows the more conscientious he is; this would seem it ought most to be said by him whose opinion has already been rejected [Henry’s, n.8, 12-18], because, according to him, in the same instant of time when will is bad reason is blinded, so that no one would in this way have conscience the less even if conscience belongs to the will. The argument then is common to this as to the other part [sc. about synderesis], and it can be solved as in the aforesaid way [sc. by distinguishing elicited act from habit or inclination, nn.23-24].

Fortieth Distinction

Single Question. Whether Every Act gets Goodness from the End

1. Concerning the fortieth distinction I ask whether every act gets goodness from the end.a

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning this fortieth distinction, where the Master deals with the comparison of the exterior act to the end and to intention, two questions are asked: first whether every act gets goodness from the end, second whether any act can be indifferent. Argument about the first:

2. That it does:

Augustine on Psalm 31, narration 2 n.4, and in the Master’s text, “Intention makes the work good^ [faith directs intention. Do not attend much to what a man does but to what he looks to when he does it].”

3. Further, an act of understanding gets truth from the principle; but the end here is as the principle is there;     therefore etc     .

4. Again, the goodness of an act comes from some single cause; no other cause can be posited but the end;     therefore etc     .

5. On the contrary:

Augustine Against Lying 7 n.18 (and it is in the Master’s text) says that, “there are many acts that cannot be good though they are done for a good end.”

I. To the Question

6. Response. One must speak first of natural goodness and then of moral goodness.

7. About the first I say that, just as beauty in the body comes from the combination of all the things befitting the body and each other, namely quantity, color, and shape (as Augustine maintains On the Trinity 8.4, “A man’s face is good when it is similar in dimensions, happily disposed, and bright in color”), so natural goodness - not the goodness that converts with being but the goodness that has bad as opposite - is the second perfection of a thing, complete with all things befitting the thing and each other. And goodness is perfect when all these come together, according to the remark of Dionysius Divine Names ch.4, “Goodness comes from a perfect and complete cause;” but when all of them are lacking, and the nature that is naturally perfected by them remains, it is perfectly bad; when some are removed, there is badness but not perfect badness - as is the case with beauty and ugliness of body. Now a natural act is of a nature to agree with its efficient cause, its object, its end, and its form; for it is naturally then good when it has all befitting things, to the extent they are of a nature to come together for its being.

8. About the second [cf. 1 d.17 n.62] I say that the goodness of a moral act comes from the combination of all the things befitting the act (not from its nature absolutely), but the things befitting it according to right reason; so because right reason dictates that a determinate object befits the act, and a determinate mode as well as other circumstances, complete goodness does not come from the end alone.

9. But the first reason for an act’s goodness comes from the act’s fitting the efficient cause, which the act is called ‘moral’ by, because it is freely elicited; and this cause is common both to a good act and to a bad act, for the one is not laudable nor the other blamable unless it is from the will. The second condition comes from the object; and if the object is fitting, the act is good in its kind; but goodness in kind is indifferent as to the goodnesses beyond it, which are taken from the specific circumstances, just as a genus is indifferent to the many differences.

10. The first circumstance after the object is the primary end; nor is this end sufficient without the other circumstances, as the circumstance of form (namely that the act is done in due manner, which pertains to the fourth circumstance), and following it the more extrinsic circumstances, namely when and where.

11. It is plain, then, that the goodness of the end alone, even as intended according to right reason, is not sufficient for the goodness of an act, but other circumstances - in the order stated - are required for an act to be good.Aristotle Ethics 3.2.1111a3-6 has this list of circumstances: “who, what, about what or in what, sometimes also by what (as by what instrument) and for what end (as health) and how (as calmly or vehemently).” Ps.-Augustine Principles of Rhetoric ch.4 lists the circumstances as: “who, what, when, where, why, how, by what instruments.” ⁵³

II. To the Principal Arguments

12. As to Augustine [n.2] the answer is plain from his authority to the opposite [n.5], because although the end is the more principal condition belonging to the goodness of an act, it is however not sufficient; and yet speaking simply of the goodness of merit (which adds over and above moral goodness), this comes principally from the end, because, when complete moral goodness is presupposed, meritorious goodness is a further addition coming from due relation of the act to the end, and this ‘due relation’ happens to the extent the act is elicited by charity; and in reference to this can the authorities about the end be expounded, because, namely, meritorious goodness comes from the end.

13. To the second argument [n.3] I say that the efficient cause of the act of understanding - the one that is on the side of the act of understanding - acts naturally and cannot act in a way not conformed to the object, and so it always acts rightly; the will does not always in this way act in conformity with its object, because it is a free cause and not a natural one. So when there is rightness on the part of the moving principle, the whole act [sc. of the intellect] is right; not so here [sc. in an act of the will] on the part of the end.

14. To the third [n.4] I say that the single goodness integrates together in itself all the perfections befitting the act - and there is not some one single perfection, just as neither is there some one beauty in the body [n.7]..

Forty First Distinction

Single Question. Whether any Act of Ours can be Indifferent

1. Concerning the forty first distinction I ask whether any act of ours can be indifferent.

2. Argument that none can be:

Because between habit and privation there is no middle; good and bad are opposed by way of privation [sc. bad is privation of good];     therefore etc     . The major is plain because, from Metaphysics 10.4.1055b1-6, things opposed by way of privation are opposites that, in a naturally fitting subject, are contradictory; between contradictories there is no middle, Metaphysics 4.7.1011b23-24;     therefore etc     .

3. Further, habits are generated from acts [Ethics 2.1.1103b21-22]; therefore if there were some middle between a good and a bad act, there would be some habit that was neither good nor bad.

4. On the contrary:

Ambrose On Offices 1.30 n.147, in the Master’s text, “Your condition puts its name on what you do;” but if no act were of itself indifferent, no act could be per se good from one act and per se bad from another.

I. To the Question

A. Opinion of Others

5. It is said here [Bonaventure, Aquinas] that no individual act is indifferent, but an act in general can be indifferent; see Bonaventure [rather Aquinas].Aquinas On Evil q.2 a.5, “So if we speak of moral acts according to their species, then in this way not every moral act is good or bad but some are indifferent... Now some objects there are that do not involve either anything agreeing with reason or anything disagreeing with reason, as picking up a sod of earth from the ground., and acts of this sort are indifferent. But if we speak of moral acts as they are individual, then in this way any particular moral act whatever must, because of some circumstance, be either good or bad . So, therefore, acts good and bad in their kind are mediate opposites and there is some act that - considered in its species - is indifferent. Now this [individual] goodness and badness are proper to individual acts, and so no individual human act is indifferent; and I mean by ‘human act’ one that comes from deliberate will. For if some act is done without deliberation, coming from imagination alone, as stroking one’s beard.this sort of act is outside the genus of morals; hence it does not participate in moral goodness or badness.” ⁵⁴

II. Scotus’ own Opinion

6. There can be a different view about moral goodness and badness and about meritorious goodness and demeritorious badness:

7. In the case of the first goodness and badness [sc. moral], it seems that, by comparison to a natural act, indifferent acts can be found, namely those that, by comparison to all their causes, have a determinate species in kind of nature, and yet could have moral goodness and badness indifferently.

8. The proof is:

First because - according to the Philosopher Ethics 2.1.1103a31-b8 [“We first act and then get the virtues...; thus indeed do we become just by doing just things”] - the habit of justice is generated by just acts but not by acts justly done; these acts are not morally good because not done from virtue.

8. Similarly as to acts elicited after acquisition of virtue, for there seems to be no necessity that the will, when possessed of virtue, should necessarily always use it, but only when a passion so vehement occurs as to overthrow reason if the will were not to use virtue.

9. Also when speaking of good and evil in the second way [sc. meritorious, n.6], there seems to be a middle between good act and bad act. For if we understand moral goodness in the way stated in the preceding question [d.40 nn.8-9], merit seems to come from relation to the due end, and this relation comes about through charity existing within us.

10. Now an act can be referred by charity to the due end in three ways: in one way actually, as when someone actually thinking of the end loves it and wants something for its sake; in another way virtually, as when from knowledge and love of the end one descends to willing this thing for the end - for example, from knowledge and love of God, which pertains to the superior part [of the intellect], the inferior part considers that such an act (to wit, penance) is to be adopted, and then carries it out willing to do so but yet not then referring it to the end, because not then actually knowing and loving the end; in a third way habitually, for example when any act referable to the end and abiding in charity (which is the principle of referring) is said to be habitually referred.

11. In three ways too can an act be said not to be referred; in one way simply negatively, because the act is not referred actually or virtually [alt. habitually]; in another way by privation, because it is not of a nature to be referred - as venial sin, because although venial sin may stand along with charity, yet it is not of a nature to be referred by charity to the end; in the third way by contrariety, namely because the act destroys the principle of referring (namely charity), as mortal sin.

12. As to the last two members [sc. by privation and contrariety, n.11], it is certain that these acts are bad, namely venial and mortal sin. As to the first two [sc. actually and virtually, n.10], it is certain that the first act is meritorious and it is sufficiently probable that the second one is too.

13. As to the two in the middle, namely acts that are referred only habitually [n.10] and negatively [n.11], which are referred neither actually nor virtually, there is doubt whether such acts are meritorious or - if not - venial sins (because they cannot be posited as mortal sins), or whether such acts are indifferent.

If either of the first two members is posited [sc. the act is meritorious or a venial sin], it seems that a man who exists continually in grace either continually merits or mortally sins (or at least venially sins), because he elicits continually many acts that are neither actually nor virtually referred.

14. Positing that such acts, according to the aforesaid division [n.13], are indifferent seems probable, because they do not have that sufficient idea of badness which belongs to venial sin, for it is possible that there is in them no disorder sufficient for the idea of sin; for a man is not bound, either by the bond of necessity (against which sin is mortal) or by a lesser bond (against which sin is venial), always to refer every one of his acts to God actually or virtually, because God has not bound us to this. Nor does there seem to be in these acts a sufficient idea of goodness for them to be meritorious, because no referring less than virtual referring seems sufficient for merit, and there is no such referring here.

15. There are, then, many indifferent acts, not only according to the being they have in species of nature, but also according to the being they have in moral being; and they are indifferent as to meritorious good and to demeritorious bad, because one individual act can be of this sort and of that sort.

16. Many individual elicited acts also are indifferent, which are of neither one sort nor the other; and not only non-human acts, which the discussion is not now about (as stroking the beard, picking up a sod, and the like, that proceed only from imagination and not from impulse of free choice), but also freely elicited acts [nn.6-16, cf. d.7 nn.27-39].

II. To the Principal Arguments

17. To the arguments.

To the first [n.2] I say that good and bad in acts are not opposed by way of privation, either when speaking of moral goodness and badness or when speaking of meritorious or demeritorious goodness and badness; for an act is not bad merely from the fact it lacks this or that sort of goodness, but because it lacks the goodness it ought to have; but not every act ought to have such goodness.

18. To the other argument [n.3] I concede that like habits are generated from like acts, and thus that from many indifferent acts a like habit can be generated that stably inclines to acts similar in kind; yet it does not incline to them as good or as bad acts, just as the habit too is in itself neither good nor bad - as it is also not generated from acts good or bad; and so the unacceptable result that the reason adduces is not unacceptable but should be conceded as true.

Forty Second Distinction

Single Question. Whether there is a Distinction of Sins into Capital Sins

1. Concerning the forty second distinction a question can be raised about the distinction of the seven capital sinsThe seven are: wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony. ⁵⁵ - but the solution of this questiona is plain from d.6 n.73 above, where the question about the sin of the angel was raised. For a will conjoined to a sensitive appetite is of a nature to tend toward things delightful to the sensitive appetite, and most to things most delightful and desirable to a more excelling appetite -as the conjoined intellect too is of a nature to understand sensibles, and those first that are sensible first.

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning this forty second distinction, where the Master quotes the statement of Jerome [On Ezekiel 13.43] in which is indicated that sin consists in thought, speech, and deed, five questions are raised: first whether there can be sin in thought; second whether in speech; third whether in deed; fourth whether Jerome’s division of sins is sufficient; fifth can be asked a question about the division of the seven capital sins. About the first the argument is... [here the text from Willliam of Alnwick’s Additiones Magnae d.42 qq.1-4 follows]. About the fifth, namely the distinction of the capital sins, one should know that the solution of it.

2. Our will, then, because of its conjoining with the sensitive appetite, is of a nature to tend to things delightful to such appetite, and the capital sins that are carnal [sc. lust and gluttony] can be assigned according to these delightful things; but the capital sins that are spiritual [sc. the other five] can be assigned according to what is delightful to the will in itself, not to the will through the sensitive appetite. But the sin of greed seems only to be about the useful desirable, which is ordered to what is desirable in itself in either of these stated ways, namely ordered to pleasure or to honor [sc. greed could be either carnal or spiritual].

3. However, according to the formal idea of sins, this sevenfold division is not sufficient; rather the per se distinction of sins is to be taken either from lacking or deviating from the precepts (just as there are ten first precepts so there are ten capital sins), or from opposition to the virtues - and there was discussion of this in the aforementioned d.6 n.73.

Forty Third Distinction

Single Question. Whether a Created will can Sin from Malice

1. Concerning the forty third distinction the question is raised whethera a created will can sin from malice, by wanting something not shown to it under the idea of true good, that is, of good simply, or of apparent good or good in a certain respect.

a. a[Interpolation] Concerning this forty third distinction, where the Master deals with the sin against the Holy Spirit, two questions are raised: first whether a will can sin against the Holy Spirit; second whether a created will can sin from malice, by wanting something not shown to it under the idea of true good, that is of good simply, or of apparent good or good in a certain respect. Argument about the first [here the text from William of Alnwick follows, Additiones Magnae d.43 q.un]. About the second, namely whether...

I. Opinion of Others

A. Statement of the Opinion

2. Here the statement is made [Bonaventure, Aquinas, Richard of Middleton]Bonaventure, Sentences 2 d.34 a.1 q.3, “One must say that it is possible to speak about evil in two ways, either about that which is bad or about bad under the idea of bad... If intention is compared to bad under the idea of bad, it can be so in two ways: either such that it intends to do this as bad simply or as bad for itself, and no one intends in this way, because nothing is desired by the will save under the idea of good simply or good for itself; or such that it intends this as bad simply but as good for itself, and in this way bad can be done by intention and is sometimes so done, though not by all but by the malicious, who, because of the corruption of their inner palate, taste bad things as good.” ⁵⁶ that it cannot, following the authority of Dionysius Divine Names ch.4, “No one acts looking to what is bad.”

B. Rejection of the Opinion

3. But against this it seems that then a created will could not tend toward an object under the idea [sc. of badness] under which the divine will cannot tend to it; for the divine will can tend toward any good subtracted from the above deformity, though not toward the accompanying idea of badness [dd.34-37 n.168]. And even if it be conceded that anything willable by one will is willable by another (because every will has an object equally common), nevertheless what is willed in ordered fashion by one will is not willed in ordered fashion by another will, because ordered willing does not come from the object alone but from the agreement of act and object about the power; for some act about some object can agree with one will and not agree with another.

4. There is another argument against this opinion, because let hatred of God be apprehended by some created intellective power that is not erring and that consequently is not showing it under the idea of good but only of evil - if a will can will this hatred the proposed conclusion is evident, because there is no goodness in this act prior to the act of willing itself; for if some goodness is assigned because of the act of willing, this is not in the object as it precedes the act but in it as it follows the act of willing. If a will cannot tend toward this shown evil save under some idea of good and not of evil, then either it simply cannot tend toward it, or reason must first have been naturally blinded - and this seems unacceptable and against the argument of Ethics 7.5.1147a24-33.In the passage referred to Aristotle is explaining how the incontinent can know and yet act against their knowledge, and he gives the case where someone has two universal propositions, ‘such things should not be tasted’ and ‘everything sweet is delightful to taste’, and one particular proposition, ‘this thing is sweet’. The incontinent man acts on the particular proposition and the second universal, not the first. But he still knows the first universal. The view Scotus is criticizing seems to require that, in the case of a will where reason is not in error but knows hatred of God is evil, either the will simply cannot hate God or, if it does hate God, reason must first have been so blinded that it no longer naturally knows that hatred of God is evil, which is absurd and contrary to Aristotle. ⁵⁷

II. Scotus’ own Opinion

5. If the affirmative answer is held on this question [n.1], it is easy to distinguish the sin against the Holy Spirit from other sins. For because the will is conjoined to the sensitive appetite, it is of a nature to delight along with it, and so, by sinning under the effect of the sensitive appetite’s inclination toward what pleases it, it sins from passion, and this is called sinning from infirmity or impotence and is appropriately against the Father, to whom power is appropriated. The will also acts through intellectual knowledge and so, when reason is erring, it does not will rightly and its sin from an error of reason is called sinning from ignorance, and is against the Son, to whom wisdom is appropriated. The third sin would belong to the will according to itself, being from its own freedom and not from taking delight along with the sensitive appetite or from an error of reason; and this would be sinning from malice and is appropriately against the Holy Spirit, to whom goodness is appropriated.Master Lombard, Sentences 2 d.43 ch.1 n.11, “This distinction of wording [Matthew 12.31-32, about the sin against the Holy Spirit] is not so to be taken as if there are different offenses according to the three persons, but a distinction is being drawn there between kinds of sins. For the sin against the Father is understood to be what is done through infirmity, because Scripture frequently attributes power to the Father; the sin against the Son is understood to be what is done through ignorance, because wisdom is attributed to the Son; the third sin (against the Holy Spirit) is expounded here -n.2: Those are rightly said to sin against the Holy Spirit who think their malice overcomes the goodness of God, and who cling to their iniquity with such stubborn mind that they propose never to abandon it and never to return to the goodness of the Holy Spirit...who delight in malice for its own sake. - He then who sins through infirmity or through ignorance easily obtains pardon, but not he who sins against the Holy Spirit.” ⁵⁸

6. Nevertheless, even if a created will is not posited as being able to will evil under the idea of evil, a sin from fixed malice can still be assigned, namely when the will sins from its own liberty, without passion in the sensitive appetite or error in reason; for the most complete idea of sin exists there, because nothing other than the will is enticing the will to evil; and this sin will so far be from malice that the will, without any extrinsic occasion, is choosing from its full liberty to will evil for itself (but not so from malice that the sinning will is tending toward evil insofar as it is evil).

Forty Fourth Distinction.

Single Question. Whether the Power to Sin is from God

1. Concerning the forty fourth distinction I ask whether the power to sin is from God.a

a. a[Interpolation] About this forty fourth distinction, whether the Master deals with the power to sin, the question asked is:

2. It seems that it is not:

Accordinga to Anselm OnFreeChoice ch.1 “being able to sin is neither freedom nor part of freedom;” so, as free choice is from God, the power to sin is not from him. But it is not from God as it is something other than free choice; therefore in no way is it from God.b

a. a[Interpolation] Because what is not a power is not a power from God; but the power to sin is not a power; the proof is that if it were a power, it would be a free power; but according to Anselm...

b. b[Interpolation] Further, if the power to sin were from God, then it would exist in God. Proof of the consequence: God is the equivocal cause with respect to everything created by him; but the effect is contained more eminently in an equivocal cause (and especially in the first cause) than in itself; therefore if God were the cause of the power to sin, this power will exist more in God, which is unacceptable.

Further, every power in the universe that is from God has some order to the other powers of the universe, because what is from God is ordered; but the power to sin cannot have any order to the other powers - for I ask whether it is a higher power, or an intermediate one, or the lowest one; it is not a higher power because it does not belong to God to whom supreme power belongs (likewise, since it is a defective power it is not the supreme power); nor is it an intermediate power or the lowest one, because then it could have a superior power commanding it, and so it would not be free.

3. On the contrary:

The Master adduces authorities in the text, as [Romans 13, where the Apostle maintains that “there is no power but from God;” and, after having adduced authorities from Scripture, Augustine (“there is no power, not even for sin, save from God,” Sermon 62.8 n.13), and Gregory, the Master concludes, “By these and several other authorities it is evidently shown that there is no power of good or evil in anything save from God, even if the justice of it escapes you.”]

I. To the Question

4. Response.

The power to sin means either a direct ordering to an act of sin or the foundation of this ordering, by reason of which he who has it is said to be able to sin.

5. If in the former way the ordering is either to the act substrate [sc. to sin] or to the deformity in the act. If in the first of these, the order is from God,a as are both the extremes of the order; and God too, and not just the created will, has power over the substrate act, because he himself causes it [dd.34-37 nn.22-26], according to one opinion [sc. Scotus’ own, dd.34-37 nn.119-123, 97]. If in the second of these, this ordering to sin is nothing, just as the term of it too is nothing; and so it is not from God.b

a. a[Interpolation] The power to sin can be taken either for the power that is the principle of the act, or for the power as it states an order to the act of sin, just as in other cases the power to see can be taken for the principle of vision or for the order to the act of seeing. If it is taken in the second way, then the order is to the act substrate to the deformity, and thus such order is from God.

b. b[Interpolation] Or this order is to the deformity that is in the act of sin; and because such order is nothing, just as its term - namely ‘to sin’ - is also nothing, so it is not from God.

6. But if we speak of the foundation of the order, I say that something positive is the foundation of this order, taking order in both ways of taking it.a For just as in the case of passive powers the proximate subject of the habit and of the privation is the same, so too a free active power that is defectible is - in acting and in failing - immediate to opposites: to rectitude certainly when acting and to sin when failing; and this absolute subject is, in respect of both, the proper power, in the way that a power can exist in respect of both, namely by being effective or defective.

In this way is the power to sin from God, that is, the nature whereby the one who has the nature is able to sin; being able to sin indeed not by effecting but by defecting, of which defecting the absolute subject is the proximate reason.

a. a[Interpolation] But if the power to sin is taken for the power as principle, which is the foundation of this order and respect, I say that there are distinct ideas in it as it is such, ideas corresponding to two things in the act, namely the substance of the act and the deformity; for by reason of the freedom that is in it, the power as principle founds an order to an act really positive, but there is a limitation attached to freedom of choice in a creature, by reason of which it founds an order to deformity in the act; for this limitation takes from freedom the perfection that freedom has in God, where it is a perfection simply, simply in the sense that it cannot fail. I say therefore that this totality, namely ‘limited free power’, is the foundation of this order in both ways of taking the order, namely to the act in itself and to the deformity - and such foundation is called the power to sin.

7. And if the objection is made that the will is always deficient as it is from nothing, not from anything positive in it, I reply that being defectible, that is, being able to return to nothing, is consequent to every creature, because every creature is from nothing; but to be defectible like this, namely by sinning, is proper to this nature and is consequent to it by the reason whereby it is this specific nature, which nature is able to be a principle of opposites (namely by acting and by defecting).Cf. Bonaventure Sentences 2 d.44 a.1 q.1, “When I say ‘power to sin’, I am asserting two things: I am asserting both some power and a power orderable to such an act. If then we are speaking of the power to sin as it is a power, since this power is free choice, then without doubt it is from God. But if we are speaking of the power’s ability to be ordered to sin...then it is possible to speak in two ways of this ability: either in respect of the deformity or in respect of the substrate action. If in respect of the substrate action, then such ability is from God, as the action substrate to sin is also from God. But if we are speaking of it in respect of deformity, then, since the deformity is nothing other than a privation and a defect, such ability is nothing other than an ability to defect; and so, just as the defect of deformity is not from God, so neither is from God the ability to defect, but it exists in the rational creature itself, because the rational creature is from nothing.” ⁵⁹

II. To the Principal Argument

8. To Anselm [n.2]a I say that freedom absolutely is a perfection simply; so, according to him, it is posited as existing formally in God. Freedom in us is limited, but it can be considered according to its formal reason without the limitation, and then it is not a limited perfection but a perfection simply (an example: wisdom is a perfection simply and the idea of it is also absolutely in us; and yet not only so, but with a limitation, in the sense that our wisdom includes two things, one of which is a perfection simply and the other not, but includes the limitation). Thus I say that this will of this species, which is in us, includes liberty, which is a perfection simply; but it does not include it alone but with a limitation, and this limitation is not a perfection simply; by reason of the first the ability to sin does not belong to it, nor is it the proximate foundation of the order to being actually deficient, but by reason of the second.

a. a[Interpolation] The answer to the first argument can be clear from what was said. But as to the intention of Anselm:

9. The authority of Anselm must therefore be expounded in this way, that being able to sin is not part of freedom as freedom is a perfection simply, nor is anything else proved by Anselm’s argument about the ability to sin not existing in God. But if this created freedom is taken according to its own order, the ability to sin is not part of it; however, as it states the proximate foundation of this order, then the ability to sin is part of it.a But as this power is some positive being, thusb is it from God, “for from him and in him and through him all things are; to whom be honor and glory for every and ever. Amen” [Romans 11.36].

a. a[Interpolation] To the second [n.2 interpolation b] I say that the power to sin, which is the foundation, is more eminently in God than in the creature. But that this power is thus more eminently in God is not because it is a power for immediately causing that act [sc. sin] in himself, just as the power to run is in God, but not so that he can cause an act of running in himself immediately, but in another in whom running is of a nature to exist.

You will say that by the same reason the act of sinning can exist eminently in God.

One must reply that the act of sinning as concerns what is positive in it (namely the substrate act) is in God.

To the third [n.2 interpolation b] one must say that the power to sin has an order to other powers as it is the foundation of the order to act, and it is a higher power; but if the discussion is about the totality of it, then, by reason of the privation, it would be last in order.

But of what sort is it by reason of the positive element in it?

One can say that order is found in three ways in powers: either by reason of the terms that they are powers for, or from themselves considered in themselves, or from their mode of operating.

By reason of the terms I say that the power is not higher, because there is a power in nature for substantial form, but this power is for an accidental form; but every substantial form is more perfect than an accidental form.

In the other two ways the power can be higher:

In the first way as it is in itself, as to the nature it exists in, because it exists in a nobler nature (namely an intellectual nature), and in a supreme nature (as the angelic nature); and it is the supreme power in that nature.

But as to the mode of operation it can be said to be a more perfect power; for the more something is more absolute in relation to a posterior, the more perfect it is; hence because God is most perfect, there is in him no real respect to a posterior. Also, the more something is more absolute in relation to a posterior, the more the posterior depends on it - as is plain in the case of God, because he has such perfection. Now the will is, among the other powers, more absolute in relation to a posterior; for the other powers depend on it in their acts, but it, in its idea of cause, depends on none.

b. b[Interpolation] Therefore it is plain from what has been said that the power to sin is from God in every way in which it is something positive.

Appendix. [From Antonius Andreas, one of Scotus’ most faithful students]. Twelfth Distinction

First Question. Whether there is in generable and corruptible things any positive substantial entity really distinct from the form

Scotus, Sent. 2 d.12 q.1
Richard of St. Victor Quodlibet 4 q.5 a.1

1. As to the twelfth distinction the question is first raised whether there is in generable and corruptible things any positive substantial entity really distinct from the form

2. That there is not: Metaphysics 7 text 8, matter is not a what nor a what-sort-of and so on with the other categories; therefore it is nothing. You will say it is being in potency. But to the contrary: matter is not in potency, for matter does not come from matter; nor is matter form, nor is it the composite; therefore, by elimination, it is nothing.

3. Again Physics 5 text 8: What is changed exists, what is generated does not exist. Hereby Aristotle means to distinguish between the subject of generation and that of other changes. So in the same way he removes from the subject of generation that which is matter, just as he attributes what is matter to the subject of change; but what changes is being in potency in the sense of potency in Physics 3 text 6; therefore being in potency is taken away from matter, and so, by elimination, matter is a pure nothing.

4. Again if matter were a per se being it would, according to the Philosopher, be per se knowable; but matter is not knowable save by analogy with form, Physics 1 text 69

5. Again if matter were a per se being it would be an act, and then the composite would not be per se one.

6. To the contrary is Aristotle Physics 2 text 28, that matter is what, present in a thing, a thing is made of. From the phrase ‘made of’ it is plain that matter is not form; from the added phrase ‘present in a thing’ it is plain that matter is not privation.

To the Question

7. I reply by saying that in a generable and corruptible thing there is only one positive reality, which some of them [Richard of Middleton, Albert the Great] call matter and some form, differing only in the term used. The reason is that just as an unlimited quantity is limited by an intrinsic and not extrinsic term that really differs from it, so matter without form is unlimited and is limited by a form as by a term intrinsic to it and not really different from it. And this same entity, considered as unlimited, is called the matter; considered as term it is called the form; considered as a whole, that is as terminated, it is called the composite, and yet it is really one and the same whole. There is a confirmation from the Philosopher On Generation 1 text 10, 23, where he distinguishes generation from alteration and says that generation is the making of the whole and corruption is the destruction of the whole, and that when one thing is generated from another the whole of the one is converted into the whole of the other, but not so in the case of alteration. So there is not anything common that remains the same in the thing generated and the thing corrupted, for then what has just been said would not be true, as is plain.

8. On the contrary: This position is contrary to the teaching of the Philosopher when he maintains that there are four per se causes, because in this case there would only be two, namely the efficient and final causes. That there would not be the fourth is plain because you do not posit that there is a difference between matter and form; and that there would not be the third is also plain because the same thing is precisely not cause of itself. Hence each of the intrinsic causes in the composition is in some way different from that of which it is the cause; for the composite at any rate states more than form per se states or than matter per se states. And I say this according to the position of the Commentator, who maintained this on the ground that the same thing is precisely not the cause of itself.

9. Again, substance is divided into simple and composite substance, so not every substance is equally simple really, as this position says.

10. Again, it then follows that a natural agent can create. For the principles of a contrary do not increase but diminish the virtue of a natural agent; therefore if fire can generate fire from air, it will be able to do the same much more quickly when it presupposes nothing, because you say that generation is the production of the whole such that nothing common to the corrupted thing remains in the generated thing. For the presence of air does not strengthen but rather weakens the power of fire, since air has a certain repugnance to fire.

11. I say     therefore that matter is a certain positive entity in the composite.

12. I prove this as follows: a per se principle of nature, a per se cause, a per se foundation of forms, a per se subject of generation, a per se part of a composite, is some per se positive thing; but matter is of this sort; therefore etc     . The major is plain because principle depends on principle, and effect on per se cause, and foundation on foundation, and thing generated on subject of generation, and whole on part; but it is impossible that some true being should depend really on a non-being. Proof of the minor: for matter is a per se principle of nature, is thereby also a per se cause (Physics 2 text 7), is a per se foundation of forms (Metaphysics 5 text 2), and is a per se subject of generation, and a per se part of the composite (Metaphysics 7 text 28). I say, therefore, that matter is some positive being in act and not only in subjective potency, as the other opinion maintains; indeed it is an objective potency, and although it is called potency with respect to the form or the composite, it is yet in itself some act (though rather imperfectly), as is plain, because whatever is outside its efficient cause is some act.

13. To the reason for the opinion [n.7], therefore, I say that form is not an intrinsic degree of matter, because if it was then, since matter has the same nature in all generable and corruptible things, the result would be that all generable and corruptible things would belong to the same species, which is absurd; nor even is it necessary that quantity be always limited by an intrinsic grade, but on the contrary there is an extrinsic limit, as point is in the case of line and line in the case of surface and so on.

14. To the authority from the Philosopher [n.7], which for them is merely verbal, I say that generation terminates per se at the composite not only simply but also in a certain respect. The philosopher states one of these because whiteness is not produced but only a white thing is; but because it is produced from matter and form it is per se one; from accident and subject, however, something one per accidens comes to be; and consequently the former is a true whole and the latter a whole in a certain respect. For this reason is generation said to be the making of a whole.

To the Arguments

15. To the first main argument [n.2] I say that because act and form are what distinguish, and because matter does not have form of itself as an intrinsic term,     therefore does the Philosopher say that matter is not a what nor a what-sort-of etc     ; and this is distinctly and per se true.

16. To the second [n.3] the reply is that the statement ‘what is changed exists’ holds to this extent, that though what is proximate to motion is a potential entity (as the Philosopher says), yet it is necessarily so connected to an entity simply that what is changed is necessarily a complete being simply, but what is generated does not immediately have complete being simply but gets being from what is connected to it.

17. To the third [n.4] I say that matter is in itself per se knowable, just as it has per se its proper being and has its proper idea in God; but it is not per se knowable to us because of the weakness of our intellect, which is not able to grasp what has little and imperfect being; and matter is of this sort being, according to Augustine Confessions 12.32, properly nothing.

18. To the fourth [n.5] I say that matter is not act as act means what forms and perfects but as it is the potency that is informed and perfected; but it is act in the way that act is a difference of being, because it falls under the member of the division that is act. For matter is not merely objective matter, for in this way whatever is outside its cause and is posited in fact is act; and then from such act, and from the act simply that form is, it is indeed a one per se; and this is necessary, otherwise every substance is substance simply, or is a composite of being and nothing etc.

Second Question. Whether matter can, by any power, exist without form

Bonaventure, Sent. 2 d.12 q.1 a.1
Scotus, Sent. 2 d.12 q.2
Thomas, ST Ia q.66 a.1
Richard of St. Victor, Sent. 2 d.12 q.4
Francis of Meyronne, Sent. 2 d.12 q.2
Durandus, Sent. 2 d.12 q.2
John Bacconitanus, Sent.2 d.12 q.un.

1. The question, secondly, is whether matter can, by any power, exist without form.

2. That it cannot, from being and nothing: things that are more the same are less separable; but matter and form are more the same than property and subject. The proof is that the latter make a single thing in the second mode [sc. of per se predication], and yet a property cannot be without a subject (as the having of three angles cannot be without triangle).

3. Further there would be logical implication, which I prove as follows: All existence states act; but every act is form. Further all existence is either act or participant in act; but matter is not act because, in its proper idea, it is being in potency; therefore it is participant in act. But act participated by matter can only be form.

4. Again secondly as follows: Everything that can exist per se has some inferior the same as it, namely something that cannot exist per se;     therefore if matter can be a per se proper accident (which cannot exist per se), there will be something inferior to it, and it will not be nothing but something, which is contrary to Augustine Confessions 12.32.

5. On the contrary: quantity, since it is an accident, is no less dependent naturally posterior to substance than matter to form, since form is substance and naturally prior; but quantity without substance can, by divine power, exist in the sacrament [sc. of the altar]; therefore etc     .

To the Question

6. I reply by saying that, for those who say form is an intrinsic degree of matter, it is no surprise if they say matter cannot exist without form, for the same thing cannot exist without itself; but this position was rejected in the preceding question.

7. Other says that matter is really distinct from form, and they save thereby the reality of composition in generable and corruptible things; and yet they say that matter cannot exist without form. The reason is that everything that exists per se is either act or possesses act;     therefore etc     . The proof of the minor is from the Commentator on the substance of the sphere: ‘Matter,’ he says, ‘exists under possibility.’

8. Again the point is proved by Boethius [On the Trinity 1.3]

9. On the contrary: it was shown above that matter, since it is a real positive entity, exists outside its cause and possesses some act, albeit imperfect act.

10. To the Commentator [n.7] I say, therefore that matter is under subjective but not objective possibility, that is, that matter is by its essence immediately susceptive of forms.

11. To Boethius [n.8] I say that it is true of specific and complete being, and it is true de facto and by nature of every being.

12. I say to the question,     therefore , that on the supposition that matter states some positive entity outside its potency (as is plain from the preceding question), then by divine power it can come to exist per se and be preserved in its proper being without any absolute substantial or accidental form.

13. I prove this in three ways. First as follows: everything absolute naturally prior can exist without any absolute really distinct from it; but matter is such with respect to every absolute form; therefore etc     . The major is plain because there is no contradiction involved in affirming being of what is natural prior and denying it of something naturally posterior that is really different from it. The minor is plain too because matter is an absolute entity, otherwise it would not make an absolute composite; and it is also plain because it is substance (On the Soul 2), and is prior by nature to substantial form because it is the foundation of substantial form; also much more so is it prior to accidental form, and it is really distinct from accidental form (from the preceding question).

14. Again, whatever God can do by means of an extrinsic second cause he can do immediately; but form, although it is intrinsic with respect to the composite, is yet extrinsic with respect to the matter, because it is really distinct from it;     therefore etc     .

15. Again, what is contingent with respect to something can exist without that something; but matter is contingent with respect to every form, because it determines no form for itself;     therefore etc     .

16. If you say that at any rate it cannot exist without a respect to God, I say that this respect is not a superadded form but the same as it, but remote, as is plain from the first distinction of this book 2.

17. If you ask further where it exists, I say that it exists somewhere, but not circumscriptively (for it does not have quantity), but definitively, the way an angel does.

18. If you ask whether it has parts, I say that it would have substantial parts, because it does not get these from quantity.

To the Arguments

19. To the first principal argument [nn.2-3] I say that, when speaking of identity between them [sc. matter and form], the major is true and the minor false. For things that are not the same are not more the same but really distinct. When speaking, however, of identity in third resultant [sc. matter and form when combined produce a third, namely the substantial material thing], the minor is true but the major is false. The thing is plain because form is even naturally corrupted when the matter remains the same, albeit under a different form; but the subject does not remain the same when the proper feature is corrupted.

20. As to the second [n.4] I concede that every accident is inferior in entity to the entity of matter, since matter is true substance.

21. To Augustine [n.4] I say that he is speaking about things that are in the genus of substance;     therefore etc     .

[Appendix] Fifteenth Distinction

Single Question. Whether the elements remain in a mixed body in their substance

Scotus, Sent. 2 d.15 q.1
Thomas, ST Ia q.76 a.4
Francis of Meyronne, Sent. 2 d.15 q.1
John Bacconitanus, Sent.3 d.16 q.1

1. About the fifteenth distinction the question is asked whether the elements remain in a mixed body in their substance.

2. That they do not. Because any mixed body is generated from the elements, but the generation of one thing is the corruption of another; therefore since a mixed body is generated from the elements, the elements are corrupted, otherwise the generation of it would be an alteration.

3. Again because the elements have inclinations to opposite places, then a mixed body is moved by force wherever it is moved, and it would rest by force because of something else, namely some other element.

4. Again everything composed of contraries is corrupted of itself and from within; but not every mixed body is corrupted from within, as stone and metals and that sort of thing, which are not nourished; therefore not every mixed body is composed of elements remaining in it in substance.

5. On the contrary, from Aristotle On Generation ch.90 (on mixture), who says, ‘A mixture is the union of altered things.’ From this comes a twofold argument: because he says it is a union of altered, not corrupted, things, and second because he says it is a union, but a union is only of existing entities.

6. Again, a proper feature only exists in its proper subject; but the features of the elements exist in the mixed body, as is plain;     therefore etc     .

To the Question

7. I reply that Avicenna’s opinion, as the Commentator cites it in On Generation 1 ch. on mixture and On the Heavens 3 com.67, was that the elements remain in the mixed body not in diminished substantial forms but in diminished qualities.

8. Against this the Commentator himself argues as follows: The parts of quality are of the same idea as the whole quality; if therefore a part of quality can be diminished when the substantial form of the element is not diminished, by parity of reasoning the whole quality can be diminished, and so the element will remain without its natural quality, as fire without heat, which is impossible. The Commentator therefore posits that the elements remain in the mixed body both in substance and in accidents.

9. But he argues against himself in three ways: first, that then the form of the mixed body will be accidental, because it will come to a being in act that is composed of matter and substantial form; second, because then the form of the element would receive the more and less, which is against the Philosopher in the Categories; third, he says that the receptive thing must lack the form of what is received; therefore matter must lack every substantial form when it receives the form of a mixed body. To this last argument I say that it is enough for the matter to lack the form of the species.

10. On the contrary: when water remains water it will be able to receive the nature of fire, although fire is of another species. Therefore at the end of his comment the Commentator suggests another reason by saying that the forms of the elements are of a different idea and order from the forms of mixed bodies; he then says that the receptive thing must lack the whole nature of a received thing of the same order.

11. To his second argument [n.9] I say that the forms of the elements are intermediate between accidental and substantial forms, and so they can receive the more and the less. The response to the first argument is plain from the same point. For from the fact that they are intermediate they do not fully constitute an actual being. I say also that the argument against Avicenna [n.8] does not conclude. For I concede that a part of quality and the whole quality are of the same idea with each other, but not in comparison with a third thing, namely the subject, because the part can have a contingent relation to the subject that the whole does not have. An example: this body has a contingent relation to this place and that, because it can exist without this place and without that, but it cannot exist without any pace at all.

12. I reply to the question therefore by contradicting both Avicenna and the Commentator. For I say that the elements do not remain in the mixed body, either as to diminished forms and qualities or as to undiminished ones. The reason is that any substantial corporeal form is accompanied by its proper quality; therefore, if the forms of the elements exist in a mixed body, then, since they are substantial and corporeal, either no part of the mixed body will be mixed or two bodies will be together at the same time, as is plain.

13. Again a mixed body is generated from the elements by true generation; therefore the form of the element, which is the term from-which, is incompossible with the form of the mixed body, which is the term to-which. For the formal terms of generation are incompossible.

14. Again, any substantial form naturally produces a proper supposit with its proper matter, unless it is a form subordinate to another and more perfect form, as the vegetative and sensitive forms; but the forms of the elements are not subordinate to each other, although all are subordinate to the form of the mixed body; therefore there would in one mixed body be four supposits just as there would be four elements, because any form of an element would, along with the form of the mixed body it is subordinate to, constitute one supposit.

15. I say that just as red is said to be mixed from white and black - not because white and black remain in red in their proper forms, however diminished (for everyone holds that an intermediate color is simple like the extremes) - but because of a certain agreement that red has with the extremes, which agreement the extremes do not have with each other. In this way is a mixed body said to be composed of elements, because of an agreement it has with the elements that the elements do not have with each other.

16. And I also say that the form of a mixed body contains the elements virtually, just as the intellect contains in its own way the vegetative and the sensitive, and from this containing arises the said agreement.

17. This is Aristotle’s meaning, since after he has first said that the elements remain in the mixed body, he at once adds an explanation as to how their power is preserved.

18. I say accordingly also that a mixed body is not generated from all the elements. Hence in On Generation 1.2 it is said that water is productive. Hence fish are sometimes generated from water alone, and likewise one mixed body is generated only from another, as is plain. I say of the qualities of the elements the same as was said of their substantial forms.

To the Arguments

19. There is no need to respond to the first initial arguments [nn.2-4], although the last one does pose a difficulty and the second one does not conclude much.

20. To the first argument for the opposite [n.5] I say that, in the ultimate instant of the coming to be of generation, the mixable elements are corrupted, but up to that point they are altered, otherwise things would not be generated. But ‘union’ is meant there as union in a single resultant effect, because the mixable elements, which are contained there virtually, are united in the form of the mixed body which, when the others are corrupted, is introduced.

21. To the second [n.6] I say that not the properties of the elements are there but ones similar to them.

[Appendix] Sixteenth Distinction

Single Question. Whether the Image of the Trinity consists in three powers of the rational soul really distinct

Bonaventure, Sent. 2 d.16 q.1
Scotus, Sent. 2 d.16 q.1
Thomas, ST Ia q.77 a.1
Richard of St. Victor, Sent. 2 d.16 q.1

1. About the sixteenth distinction the question asked is whether the image of the Trinity in the soul consists in three powers really distinct.

2. That it does. The divine persons are really distinct from each other; but an image of the Trinity is in the soul;     therefore there are three really distinct things in the soul; but not in act, therefore in power.

3. Further, powers are distinguished by their acts (On the Soul 2 text 33); but the acts of the soul are really distinct; therefore etc     .

4. Again, where a real identity is, there an identical predication can be made; so one can say ‘the intellect is the will’ and vice versa, which is false.

5. On the contrary: the soul is in its essence immaterial,     therefore it is in its essence immediately an understanding and a willing. The proof of the consequence is that, according to Proclus, everything immaterial turns back on itself. Therefore understanding and intellect are really the same in the soul. Therefore etc     .

To the Question

6. Reply. One opinion [Thomas ST Ia q.77 a.1] says that the powers of the soul are absolute accidents superadded to the essence of the soul, being really distinct from each other and from the soul. The reason is that power and act belong to the same genus; but to will and to understand are accidents and acts in us.     Therefore their powers will also be accidents. Therefore etc     .

7. Again, a variable accident, of which sort are willing and understanding, is present in a substance not immediately but by an intermediate invariable accident; for a greater distinction does not proceed from a unity save by means of another lesser one.

8. Again if the soul were to understand and will immediately through its essence, then, just as it is a principle of life but lives through act, so it would always be understanding and willing, which is plainly false.

9. Again the Philosopher in the Categories and Simplicius on the same place (chapter on quality), and Damascene, put the natural powers in the second species of quality.

10. Again the Commentator says that the soul is divided into its natural powers in the second species of quality, as an apple is divided into color and flavor.

11. These reasons [nn.6-8] are not compelling.

12. To the first of them [n.6] I say that there is an equivocation over the term ‘power’; for power as it is divided from act does not just belong to the same genus as act but adds numerically to it; for, from Metaphysics 9 text 13, the same thing that was in potency was and becomes act, but a power that is the first principle of operation (which is what is here being dealt with) does not necessarily belong to the same genus as its act, because it is first a principle of change. For the substance of fire is immediately the principle of generation, for by its heat it immediately heats; so by its substance it immediately generates. For heat cannot be the immediate formal principle of two diverse acts.

13. From this is also apparent that the assumption of the second argument [n.7] is false.

14. The response to the third [n.8] is plain, for the likeness does not hold. Living is not an elicited second act but a first act, and so the soul, which in essence is life by informing the body, gives the body living existence just as the form of fire gives to matter fire existence; but to understand and to will are elicited second acts, for which objects too are required. And so there is no similarity.

15. To the authorities [n.9] I say that a natural ability, as the ability to lift a weight, is not a distinct quality but an innate quality for being naturally and easily able, and it is in the second species of quality, as is plain there from the example of being able to box and the like [see Richard of St. Victor, Quodlibet q.1, about whether the powers of souls and angels are accidents].

16. To the Commentator [n.10] I say that, just as the color of an apple does not formally contain the perfection of flavor, or conversely, so the will is not formally the intellect, or conversely (as will be said), yet they are not accidents as the former are.

17. Another opinion [Bonaventure Sent.2 d.24 a.3 q.1] says that the powers of the soul add to the essence only a real respect, because the soul of itself is indeterminate as to act but is determined to this act and to that by this respect and by that, and so a power formally states a real respect added to the soul; and thus are the powers of the soul really distinct from each other, not by an absolute reality but by a respective one

18. To answer this we ask about the power that is the formal and immediate principle of second acts, of which sort are understanding and willing. It is also plain that a relation is not the formal principle of a real and absolute act; rather a power of something prior in nature turns to the principle of the act before a relation to act arises.

19. There is another opinion [Henry of Ghent, Quodlibet 3 q.14] that the powers of the soul are essential parts of the soul; so in this way they are really distinct from each other but not from the soul. This is confirmed by the Philosopher On the Soul 3 text 1 where, intending to treat of the soul’s power, he says ‘Now of the soul’s part...’

20. Again Boethius in his book Divisions says that the soul is divided into its powers as a whole into its virtual parts.

21. On the contrary: a part precedes its whole in order and in origin; but the will and intellect do not precede the substance of the soul but rather conversely;     therefore etc     .

22. Besides, Augustine On the Trinity 9.5 says that each of the powers embraces its whole, but a part is not like this.

23. To the Philosopher and to Boethius [nn.19-20] I say that the powers are so far called virtual powers, not because such parts constitute the essence, as the opinion imagines, but because they are certain partial perfections of the soul, as will be made plain.

24. To the question, therefore, I say that the view can be maintained that the powers of the soul are distinct neither from the soul nor from each other, neither really nor formally on the part of the thing. But the soul is a sort of essence that is simple and unlimited as to the diverse potential acts immediately elicited by it as by an immediate formal principle that is altogether without distinction; nor will the soul for this reason be infinite, because it is not unlimited as to infinite acts. And if you hold that the soul has distinctions at least in idea, this is nothing to the purpose, for it is to conceive the soul because it is an intermediary: as a principle of willing let it be called will and, as conceived, as a principle of intellection let it be called intellect - a soul because of this sort of conceiving is nothing more nor less than a power to elicit such acts, and so never will such an idea belong to the formal idea of a power, nor accordingly would it distinguish the powers, save conventionally.

25. But because many authorities from the saints and prophets seem to hold that the powers in some way arise and flow from the essence of the soul and that they are like certain perfections of the soul - for this reason I say that they are not absolute accidents or relations added to the soul, but that they are certain intrinsic perfections of it, not really distinct from it or from each other, but formally not the same as the soul or as each other, in the sort of way I spoke in the first book about the attributes in relation to the divine essence.

26. To understand this, I say that, according to Dionysius On Divine Names, virtual containing does not belong to things that are altogether distinct but to things that are really and formally and quidditatively the same. But this containing is double: one that of superiors, in the way that this whiteness is said to contain virtually, by formal identity, the idea of whiteness, of body, of quality, and of all superior genera; another is that of quasi inferiors and quasi properties, in the way that being is said to contain its properties, as good, true, and the like; but these properties are not really distinct, as the Philosopher proves in Metaphysics 4 text 3 and 5, but formally and quidditatively distinct, I mean by a real and quidditative formality. Otherwise metaphysics, which proves these properties of being, would not be a real science.

27. In this way, then, I say that the soul virtually contains its properties, and contains them in the intellect conjointly, but it is not contained by any of them. And so one of them does not contain the other. From this it follows that they are formally distinct from each other, but are really the same per accidens, namely by reason of the essence of the soul, which is the other extreme of this combining.

To the Arguments

28. Hereby is plain the answer about the principal issue, as to how the idea of the image is more properly preserved in the powers, although there is no total likeness with the Trinity of persons. And hereby too is plain the response to the first argument [n.2].

29. To the second argument [nn.3-4] I say that for predication in the abstract a real identity without formal identity is not sufficient, especially in the case of creatures; hence this predication is not true, ‘humanity is animality’. But it is sufficient for predication in the concrete, and hence we say, ‘man is an animal’; and thus one can say, ‘the intellective is volitional’ and vice versa.

[Appendix] Seventeenth Distinction

First Question. Whether Adam’s soul was created in the body

Bonaventure, Sent. 2 d.17 q.3 a.1
Scotus, Sent. 2 d.17 q.1
Thomas, ST Ia q.91 a.4
Richard of St. Victor, Sent. 2 d.17 q.2

1. About the seventeenth distinction the question asked is whether the soul of Adam was created.

2. That it was not: the form is produced by the same production by which the composite is produced, for the form is only produced because the composite is produced, Metaphysics 7 text 22, 27; but man was not created but formed from the mud of the earth.

3. Against this is the Master in the text.

To the Question

4. I reply that here there was an error that the soul would be of the substance of God, the error taking its origin from a badly understood remark of Augustine, Literal Commentary on Genesis 7 on the verse ‘He breathed the breath of life into his face’, which says that it seems that this breath was of the substance of the breather. This error is empty, as is plain, because what is of the substance of God is indivisible and unchangeable, but the soul changes from vice to virtue, from ignorance to knowledge.     Therefore etc     .

5. But I say that the soul is created, and created in the body, though it is capable of being created per se. For here one may consider two instants of nature, and in the first instant of nature the soul is created, so that creation terminates at the soul precisely in the first instant, and thus there is then a creation of the particular man, that is, creation in part. But in the second instant of nature the soul, having been created in the first instant, is infused into the body, and so this second action is not properly creation; and in the second instant the whole man is said to be produced.

6. I say then that the soul is created and not educed from matter, and that it is immortal and not subject to any natural agent either as to production or as to corruption, and that this is not a conclusion from demonstration but purely something believed.

7. I say also that souls were not produced before bodies, as some have said, according to what is clear expressly from Augustine On Ecclesiastical Dogmas, and it is contained in the Master’s text in the following distinction.

8. To the principal argument [n.2] I say that it is true of a natural composite which is naturally produced wholly.

Second Question. Whether paradise is a suitable place for human habitation

Scotus, Sent.2 d.17 q.2
Thomas, ST Ia q.102 a.2
Richard of St. Victor, Sent.2 d.17 q.5

1. The question is asked secondly whether earthly paradise is a place fit for human habitation.

2. That it is not: because the Master says at the end of this distinction that it is a place so high it reaches to the sphere of fire, but there is no fit habitation for men in fire;     therefore etc     .

3. On the contrary: Genesis 2, God created man and placed him in a paradise of pleasure.

To the Question

4. I reply by saying [Alexander of Hales, Albert the Great, Master Lombard] that paradise as to its height reaches to the globe of the moon, and therefore the waters of the deluge did not rise up to it. As to its location, the saying is that it is in the East and is directly under the equinoctial, and they say that the equinoctial place is the most habitable, because although it has the sun twice a year above the zenith of our heads, yet it causes heat there because it has there its quickest motion and consequently causes fewer reflections there.

5. I say that it is a place habitable both for the state of innocence (as was plain of Adam and Eve, Genesis 5), and for the state of fallen nature (as is plain of Enoch, Ecclesiasticus 44, and of Elias, Kings 4); and there is no need to posit miracles, since these are not necessary. I say however that its location is not next to the globe of the moon, because next to that is the sphere of fire and so the place would not be habitable; nor is its location in the intervening middle sphere of the air, because it would not then be a habitable place because of the extreme cold. For that place is very cold for two reasons, namely a positive and a privative one; the positive one is that there are always very cold clouds there; the privative one is double, namely lack of the heat that is caused by reflection of the rays from the earth, and lack of the heat that is caused by the sphere of fire, for the intermediate place of air is at extreme distance from both of them. The location of paradise then is either above the intervening middle sphere of the air in the sort of disposition that it has in the time of heat caused by the sphere of fire, and yet its place is inaccessible because of the cold of the intervening middle sphere of the air; or the location of paradise is below the intervening middle sphere of the air, and then, to the point about the water of the deluge, I say that there was absence of a miracle, for so great an amount of water does not rise up to it naturally but miraculously.

6. I say also against the opinion [n.4] that a location below the equinoctial is not fit on account of the excessive heat, the reason for which is that when we are in the depth of winter the sun is nearer to them than it is to us in the height of summer; for it is then 24 degrees distant from them but it is 25 degrees distant from us in the height of summer. And the argument about the speed of the sun’s motion is rather to the opposite effect, because motion is of itself a cause of heat.

7. To the principal argument [n.2] I say that the words are metaphorical or false, as is plain from what has been said.

[Appendix] Eighteenth Distinction

Single Question. Whether there are seminal reasons in matter

Bonaventure, Sent. 2 d.18 q.2 a.1
Scotus, Sent. 2 d.18 q.1
Thomas, ST Ia q.115 a.2
Richard of St. Victor, Sent. 2 d.18 q.3
Durandus, Sent.2 d.18 q.2
John Bacconitanus, Sent.2 d.18 q.1

1. About the eighteenth distinction the question asked is whether there is in matter a seminal reason for the form that is to be educed from it.

2. That there is: because otherwise the form would be created, for its formal term ‘from which’ would be nothing and would be simply annihilated in corruption, for it returns to that from which it began; therefore a natural agent would be able to annihilate and create.

3. Again generation is natural; nature is a principle of change in that in which it is, Physics 2 text 3, and the form is more nature than matter is; therefore there is something inchoative in matter, which was the form.

4. On the contrary: no inchoative principle is the same with respect to diverse and opposed forms, and this because opposite forms would then agree in something - for they differ in this inchoative principle and in that one and thereby are they opposite - and so neither form will be simple in its composite essence. Or there are different inchoative principles - and not this either, because several specific substantial forms, whether in diminished or intense being, are not able to inform the same matter at the same time.

To the Question

5. I reply that some [Albert the Great, see Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 4 q.14], wanting to avoid the creation of natural forms, posit seminal reasons in matter, which they say are not the essence of the matter, nor a potency susceptive of matter that is the same really as the matter, because neither of these is form; but they say the seminal reason is a certain potential co-created with matter, which becomes act and works from within, along with the natural agent, to educe the form.

6. This is confirmed by the Philosopher, Physics 2[3] text 3, where he distinguishes between natural and artificial things, and says that natural things have truly a principle of change within, but artificial things do not; but this cannot be understood of the passive principle, because artificial things have that.

7. Again, in Ethics 3.1, he says that the violent is that whose principle is from without, when the passive thing contributes none of the force, and so it is formally from without;     therefore , contrariwise, natural change, while formally from without, has in the passive thing a principle from within acting with it and contributing some of the force. Again the Commentator on Metaphysics 8 text 15 says that a generator does not bestow manyness but perfection; nor would it bestow manyness unless there were something preexistent in the matter, which would be the form; therefore etc     .

8. On the contrary: there are two motives for this opinion: one to avoid a creator of form, the other to save the difference between natural and artificial things.

9. Against the first motive I argue as follows: the whole form preexists in the matter either in the way it has being after it has been educed, or after a part of it has been educed; or the whole form preexists in another way, namely in potency. The first is impossible because then nothing would be acquired by generation. The second too is impossible because then creation of the part of the form would not be avoided, for the part does not preexist. The third also is impossible because then creation of the mode that the form has after it has been educed would not be avoided, for the mode was not preexistent; for if it was preexistent, I ask how it was so, and then I argue as before. And the point is plain because then generation will be a modification only.

10. Again, the second motive takes away the first, because from the second motive is plain that nothing of artificial form preexists in the mater, so it is created.

11. Again, it would then be necessary that in any matter there were infinite such potential forms, for matter is in potency to infinite forms.

12. Again, there is a confirmation of the first [n.9]: if nothing altogether new is educed by generation that did not preexist in the matter, then generation and the actuation of second natural agents would be pointless.

13. To the second [n.10] it might perhaps be said that the substantial form also exists in the subject in potency but does not work along with the artisan, and hereby the difference is preserved. But this is not valid, because no reason is apparent why it would not work along with it just as the other does, if it were to preexist like the other.

14. To the second [n.11] it might be said that only as many forms, and no more, exist as there are species of things for which it is in potency; for it is not in potency to any new form that is not in the universe, for one form suffices for the whole species. But this does not seem natural. For I ask: either the forms that preexist are nothing, and then     etc .; or they are an accident, and this is not the case because accident is not substance; or they are substance, and this is not the case because diverse forms of diverse ideas, however diminished, are not compossible together in the same thing, unless they are subordinate; therefore          etc .

15. I say therefore      that the first motive provides no necessity to posit that anything of the form preexists that may become the total form (on the ground that creation and annihilation mean that that is created which nothing of preexists). But, as it is, things are such that the form does not generate, either per se or in matter, but the composite is generated, and generation terminates per se at the composite, Metaphysics 7 text 26. Something, however, of the composite preexists, because the matter preexists; and likewise the composite is corrupted, some part of which does remain, namely the matter. For there is no difficulty on the part of soul or substance, because, as was said in the previous distinction [d.17 q.1], the soul is per se created in the first instant of nature and is infused in the second instant of nature, although the whole comes to be in the same instant of duration.

16. Against the second motive I argue as follows: the preexistent form is of the same idea as the educed form, otherwise the form educed would be a composite of entities of diverse ideas, and the preexistent form would be more imperfect than the educed form, otherwise it would be educed to no purpose. But it is impossible that an imperfect being is a co-agent in the production of a perfect being of the same idea, or in the production of itself into perfect existence.

17. Again, if the agent contains in its power the form in its perfect being, then it contains it in its imperfect being, since it is of the same idea.

18. Again, the inchoative principle of form, which you posit to be acting, only acts if excited by an extrinsic natural agent, otherwise generation would always act; in the first instant in which the extrinsic agent begins to act, the intrinsic agent, namely the inchoative form, does not act; and afterwards there is natural action.

19. To the point brought in from Physics 2 text 3 [n.6], I say that the difference between artificial things and natural things is taken from the side both of the active principle and of the passive principle; because a natural agent acts necessarily and uniformly, as is said of fire, but a deliberately choosing agent does not, but is able not to act and to act differently. On the part of the passive principle too, because a natural passive principle is naturally inclined to act thus and not otherwise, but an artificial passive principle is in neutral potency and is sometimes inclined to the opposite, as is plain about wood in making a chest or ship out of it.

20. To the point from Ethics 3.1 [n.7] I say that the condition ‘the passive thing contributing none of the force’ must be understood of natural inclination and not of active doing, such that the principle of forced motion is so disposed to the passive thing that it does not violently give it an inclination for that motion, for then the motion would not be violent.

21. To the point from the Commentator [n.7], I say that the generator does not bestow manyness but perfection, for it does not produce the form in matter but produces a perfect whole composite.

22. We need now therefore to see what a seminal reason is. I say that in nature there is a triple production. One is equivocal, as when the sun produces a frog, and in this case a seminal reason in respect of the thing produced is not required. Another is immediate univocal production, as when fire produces fire, and a seminal reason is not required in this case. Another one is mediate univocal production, namely by means of propagation, and a seminal reason is needed in this case. And then I say that the seminal reason is the substantial form either of the seed of the man or of the woman or of neither, as in plants. Or it is some natural quality naturally containing the substantial form of the seed, and it is called a seminal reason because it is not what is per se intended by the agent but it is a seminary or preliminary to further form - as is plain, because the form of the seed in the mother is ordained to the form of blood, and this to the form of the embryo, and thus is there a containing of it.

23. But that this seminal reason is not an active principle with respect to the form, but only a passive one, I show chiefly as follows: what does not exist cannot act; but, in the instant in which the form is generated, the further form of the seed is corrupted and consequently does not exist (for a thing does not exist when it is corrupted);     therefore the form of the seed is not an agent for the generation.

24. Again the formal active principle is not imperfect in the formal term produced; but a further form is always more imperfect than the former one; therefore etc     .

25. You will say to this that it acts in virtue of the principal agent. On the contrary: nothing can act in virtue of what does not exist, but the principal agent can be dead after the seed has been deposited;     therefore etc     .

26. You will say that it acts in virtue of the heavens, or that the heavens act. On the contrary: some produced forms are more perfect than the form of the heavens;     therefore etc     .

27. Recourse then must be had to an angel or to God, but more so to God. Hence I say that, once seed has been deposited and the principal agent is dead, there are active dispositions, and from then on every form that is introduced is effectively from God; but there is no need that creation happens, because not every action of God need be creation. For he can produce a natural composite by producing the form from the potency of matter in just the way a natural agent would do; for he can do by himself immediately what he can also do by means of a secondary efficient cause; therefore only the intellective soul, which is the most perfect soul, is created; and the fact that recourse must be had to God in such cases is plain from the Commentator On the Heavens 2 text 69ff.

28. Galen in his solution to these difficult questions also calls the virtues of the seeds divine. The point is plain from what has been said, because there was in the rib of Adam no seminal reason for drawing Eve out of it.

To the Arguments

29. The response to the principal arguments is plain from what has been said. But note that according to Avicenna the seed itself acts. For he says that the seed is the virtue of the principal agent, and so the principal agent acts by acting it. And hereby does he solve the aforesaid arguments. For if the principal agent dies after depositing seed there is no problem, because his virtue remains; and hereby is also plain that the produced term is not more perfect than the producer etc.

[Appendix] Nineteenth Distinction

Single Question. Whether in the state of innocence we would have had immortal bodies

Bonaventure, Sent. 2 d.18 q.2 a.1
Scotus, Sent. 2 d.18 q.1
Thomas, ST Ia q.115 a.2
Richard of St. Victor, Sent. 2 d.18 q.3
Durandus, Sent.2 d.18 q.2
John Bacconitanus, Sent.2 d.18 q.1

1. About the nineteenth distinction the first question asked is whether in the state of innocence we would have had immortal bodies.

2. That we would not: from On the Heavens 1 text 18, everything generable is of necessity corrupted. But our bodies would have been generable then as now;     therefore , etc     .

3. Further, nothing violent endures or is perpetual; but a generable body is mixed of the elements, which are not in their places, and thus they are there violently;     therefore , etc     .

4. On the contrary: Paul in Romans 5. ‘Death came to all through one man;’ he also says that the body is dead because of sin;     therefore , etc     .

To the Question

5. Reply. [Bonaventure] I say that either the body is corrupted from within, because of a defect in root moisture, and not in this way for our bodies would have been restored by eating of the tree of life; hence Genesis 2, ‘Lest perhaps you eat of the tree of life and live for ever.’ Or from without too the body could not have been corrupted, because original justice, as they say, was a certain innate quality in bodies preserving and conserving them from everything wearying, whereby the soul would afterwards have had full dominion over the body so that the inferior powers would be obedient to the superior ones.

6. Again, punishment is not inflicted without guilt, but death is punishment for sin; now in that state there would not have been sin; therefore.

7. I say that in the state of innocence our bodies would of themselves have been corruptible, but this potency would never have been reduced to act so that they would never have been corrupted.

8. To understand this note that a mixed body is not corruptible from within because of the natures of the contrary elements and contrary qualities, because it was shown above [2 d.15] that these do not remain in the mixed body. But the animal body is corruptible from within because of the action of one organic part on another, which leads to a loss of root moisture. Hence note that natural heat acts continually on the root moisture necessary for life and consumes life, so that unless it is restored through orderly conversion through nourishment, the animal body would be dissolved. And now so it is, because the conserving power, since it is a physical power, always suffers a reaction in acting, and so it is always weakened, and the generated blood and flesh become always more impure. Aristotle’s example for this [On Generation text 42] is wine with which water is being mixed little by little     etc .

9. It is plain therefore      that the conserving power is little by little weakened, and then the dissolution of the animal body necessarily follows. Nor was the tree of life fully sufficient to escape this result, because the tree only restored by being converted into food, for it was taken up as food, and so what was just said would finally have followed, although a food of greater nutriment would be more slowly consumed.

10. I say,     therefore , that our bodies in the state of innocence were of themselves corruptible from within, although more slowly than our present bodies because of the better nutriment they would have had; nor did the state of innocence of itself take away the stated cause of corruption without some new miracle. But this potency would not have been reduced to act, because we would have been translated into glory before the time of dissolution. And this reason agrees with the one stated above [n.6], namely that death is a punishment for sin, etc     .

11. But as to corruption from without, note that corruption from without is said in three ways. In one way by efficient causality, when something is corrupted by fire or sword or the like. In another way by privation, namely when something takes away what is necessary for life, the way water destroys the body of man because it prevents him breathing (which is necessary for the life of man), and the like. The body is also corrupted by not providing it with food etc. and in the first way too the body is corrupted, and corrupts, although not as quickly as fire does. In the second way too will earth so corrupt.

12. I then say that, while original justice was present in everyone, our bodies would not have been destroyed by any external agent - not by fire or water or earth and the like, because everyone would have taken precautions for himself, otherwise they would not have been innocent. But I am talking of when original justice was present.

[Appendix] Twentieth Distinction

Question One. Whether in the state of innocence procreated sons would at once have been confirmed in justice

Scotus, Sent.2 d.20 q.1
Thomas, ST Ia q.100
Richard of St. Victor, Sent.2 d.20 q.3
Durandus, Sent.2 d.20 q.5

1. About the twentieth distinction the first question to ask is whether in the state of innocence everyone would have been confirmed in good.

2. That we would have been: from Anselm Why God Man 1.18, ‘If the first parents had so lived that they would not have sinned at the start, they would, along with their progeny, have been so confirmed in good that they could no longer sin.’

3. On the contrary: they would have been wayfarers, therefore they were not confirmed [in good]. The antecedent is plain, because the good angels and our first parents were all wayfarers. For there is a state of meriting only while one is on the way, and merit precedes reward. The consequence is plain, because only that act is meritorious which is right and yet could have failed to be right. About Christ however there is a special difficulty, which will be discussed in Book 3.

To the Question

4. I reply by saying that there is a double confirmation [in good]. One is perfect where no one can sin, and only the blessed have it. The other is less perfect, which those had who were sanctified in the womb, and the Apostles had it after the sending of the Holy Spirit. But since in this way there is no sinning in fact, though the potency for sinning remains, there could be a doubt whether original justice would have been infused by Adam into his sons. I say that it would not have been, but that it would have been given to anyone by God’s free generosity, since it is a supernatural gift. But would the son have had this justice because of the merit of the parents? I say not by proportional merit, although God would so have ordained it that, if the first parents had overcome the first temptation, God would, of his own free generosity, have given this justice to all of Adam’s descendants.

5. To Anselm [n.2] I say that either he is expressing an opinion and not asserting, or he is speaking of the second sort of confirmation stated above [n.4],     etc .

Question Two. Whether in the state of innocence only those would have been born who are now the elect.

Scotus, Sent.2 d.20 q.2

1. The second question to ask is whether only those would then have been born who are truly elect.

2. That not so: because many now are born elect from parents who are not elect, therefore      etc.

3. To the contrary is Gregory Moralia 4 at the end.

To the Question

4. I reply by saying that no one now reprobate would have been then produced, and that no one now elect would have not then been produced.

5. I prove the first as follows: God foresaw from eternity all the men capable of being produced, and all the final merits and demerits of each one. Therefore these propositions are incompossible, namely that God foresaw that Judas must act with final badness, that John would abide in innocence, and that he accidentally produced Judas [sc. in the state of innocence].

6. I prove the second thus: God foresaw that the Blessed Virgin had to be acting with final goodness if he produced her, and in fact things are such that he did produce her accidentally.     Therefore then too he would have produced her accidentally, otherwise the state of innocence would have harmed her without her guilt etc     .

7. But would children have grown up as they do now? I say that they would at first have been ignorant, and that they would have increased in knowledge and also in virtue; and so they would at first have been weak and incapable of local motion, and they would have increased in strength of body.

To the Argument

8. To the first objection [n.2] I say that numerical unity of efficient cause is not of necessity required for numerical unity of effect; the fact is plain because, as to the numerically same body that nature produces, God can repair what was not present; and I do not say that those who are now born elect and of reprobate parents would have been born of their same parents as elect, etc.

[Appendix] Twenty First Distinction

Single Question. Whether Adam’s Sin was the Gravest Sin

Bonaventure, Sent.2 d.21 q.3 a.3
Scotus, Sent.2 d.21 q.1
Richard of St. Victor, Sent.2 d.21 q.2
Durandus, Sent.2 d.21 q.3
Francis of Meyronnes, Sent.2 d.31 single question

1. About the twenty first distinction the question asked is whether the sin of Adam was the greatest.

2. That it was: that sin is greatest for which the greatest punishment is inflicted; but the sin of Adam was such. Proof: because death of the body and loss of blessedness was inflicted on him and his posterity.

3. Again on Psalm 68 ‘Whom I took not away, I then paid back,’ Augustine says, ‘Because [the devil] desired equality with God, therefore did he lose happiness.’ But the desire for divinity is the greatest sin in the angel, and it is much more so in man, for whom divinity is less proportionate.

4. Against this is what Augustine says Literal Commentary on Genesis last chapter (and it is in the text of Lombard), where Augustine expressly maintains that Adam did not sin by being overcome with carnal concupiscence but by being encompassed with a certain friendly benevolence toward this wife. He says that Eve’s sin was greater.

To the Question

5. I reply by saying first that Adam’s sin per se and per accidens was less than the sin of the angel. I say second that it was per se less than the sin of Eve. I say third that it was per accidens greater.

6. Note about the first that, as was said above, the first sin of the first parent cannot be found in an act of love of concupiscence but in an act of love of friendship. Love of friendship is twofold, namely toward oneself and toward one’s neighbor; now sin cannot be greatest toward one’s neighbor but toward oneself, and that because it is against the first commandment, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God etc.’ And the first sin of the angel is found in such love, namely love of friendship for oneself, and so it was the greatest. But the sin of Adam is not found in love of friendship for himself, as is plain from Augustine above [n.4], but in love of friendship for his neighbor, namely Eve, whom he loved too much, as is plain there from Augustine. So his sin was not directly against the first and greatest commandment, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God,’ because it was not a hatred of God; nor was his sin directly against the second commandment, which is about love of neighbor, because it was not a hatred of neighbor but an excessive love of neighbor.     Therefore it was not against the greatest commandment absolutely speaking; nor was it an inordinate love of self, as was said; therefore it was not the greatest sin per se, as the sin of the angel was, nor the greatest per accidens, as by circumstance of person, for Adam did not then have as great an excellence in gifts of nature or grace as the angel did. Therefore etc     .

7. Note too that eating of the tree was in itself indifferent and was only wrong because forbidden; and so it is per se graver to act against those commandments of the Decalogue whose infringement is an infringement of a law of nature.

8. On the second point [n.5], the truth of what Augustine says is plain because Eve sinned in love of friendship for herself and desired equality of knowledge with God; and she violated the divine commandment by eating the apple; and third she suggested to her husband that he should eat, and therefore she sinned more gravely and in more ways. But Adam, according to Augustine’s meaning, sinned only in that he so much loved his wife, because she ate of the forbidden apple. Hence he was not directly moved by contempt for God, nor by desire for knowledge, nor by greed for the apple, but by inordinate love for Eve, whom he did not wish to sadden by not agreeing with her. So per se Adam’s sin was less than Eve’s sin.

9. But it was per accidens greater in that Adam had more notable natural gifts and more perfect gifts of grace; and so he and not Eve received original justice on behalf of everyone, and he lost it for himself and for everyone; and so in its consequences and per accidens his sin was greater.     Therefore etc     .

To the Arguments

10. To the first objection [n.2] I say that directly per se a greater punishment is due to many mortal sins than is due to Adam’s sin. Hence if Adam would have had to be damned for that sin, he would have had a less intense punishment in hell than would be due now for one damned sinner for one mortal sin. Such there sin could be; indeed there are many such. Per accidens however Adam’s sin was more gravely punished, namely by removal of favors; for because he had received justice for everyone, justice was taken away from everyone; hence the infliction of death was only the taking away of a favor, because, as was made plain above, Adam was immortal before. But loss of blessedness is due also to any mortal sin.

11. To the second objection [n.3] the answer is plain from what has been said, because Adam did not directly desire equality with God.

[Appendix] Twenty Second Distinction

Single Question. Whether the Sin of the First Man came from Ignorance

Bonaventure, Sent.2 d.22 q.1 a.2
Scotus, Sent.2 d.22 q.1
Richard of St. Victor, Sent.2 d.22 q.1
John Bacconitanus, Sent.2 d.22 q.1

1. About the twenty second distinction the question asked is whether Adam sinned from ignorance.

2. That he did: Augustine, City of God 11 and Literal Commentary on Genesis 4, says that Adam believed he was then sinning venially.

3. Again, Adam did not sin from passion, because there was no disordered passion before sin; nor from choice, because choice follows deliberation, and bad choice follows false deliberation. But Adam himself was most prudent in deliberating.     Therefore etc     .

4. Again, because Adam was unable, at all events, to deliberate erroneously; therefore he sinned from the ignorance that is a not knowing.

5. On the contrary is St. Paul in I Timothy 2, ‘Adam was not seduced but Eve.’

To the Question

6. I reply that there is an ignorance that is a pure not knowing and an ignorance that is error. Again there is an ignorance of the fact and an ignorance of the circumstances. Also an ignorance that is cause of sin, and an ignorance that accompanies sin, and an ignorance that follows sin.

7. I say then that neither an ignorance that is error nor an ignorance of the fact or an ignorance of the circumstances was the cause of the first sin of Adam; and neither was there an ignorance accompanying sin, because then punishment would have preceded guilt. For there is such an ignorance that is punishment, although there is guilt along with it, and such ignorance could have followed sin, because sin involves a blinded reason.

8. I say also that ignorance neither of the fact nor of the circumstances was the cause of Adam’s first sin, because he was not so lacking in knowledge that he did not know that God, who forbade him the eating of the tree, was more to be obeyed than his wife to be agreed with. But the sort of ignorance that was, not of the fact, but of the circumstances could have been a concomitant. For Adam did not see all the evils that had to follow for himself and his posterity because of the sin; and if he had seen them his sin would have been greater.

To the Arguments

9. To the first argument [n.2] therefore I say that it was possible for sin to accompany the ignorance that is a not knowing of some circumstance, or rather of every circumstance. Hence such an act could be a mortal sin. For Adam saw that the eating of the tree was of itself an indifferent act, and perhaps did not know that God had given an altogether effective prohibition against it; and in that case Adam had the ignorance of not knowing this circumstance. So such an act did have wherewith to be a mortal sin, but it was not ignorance of the fact but of the circumstance; for, as was said, he well knew that God was more to be obeyed than his wife to be agreed with.

10. The response to the second argument [n.3] is     therefore plain, because Adam could have believed it was a venial sin. Or one can say that this believe was an erroneous one consequent to the sin.

11. To the third [n.4] I say that Adam sinned by choice, not indeed by the choice that is the conclusion of a practical syllogism, but by the choice of simply choosing and pleasing his wife, for love of whom he was aroused and whose act prompted him, etc     .

[Appendix] Twenty Third Distinction

Single Question. Whether God could make the Will of a Rational Creature to be naturally Incapable of Sin

Bonaventure, Sent.2 d.23 q.1 a.2
Scotus, Sent.2 d.23 q.1
Richard of St. Victor, Sent.2 d.23 q.1
Durandus, Sent.2 d.23 q.1
John Bacconitanus, Sent.2 d.23 q.1

1. About the twenty third distinction the question asked is whether God can make a created will to be incapable of sin.

2. That he can: for Anselm says, On Free Will 2, that being able to sin is not freedom nor part of freedom; but God can make a thing to be without that which is not part of its essence;     therefore etc     .

3. Again the will necessarily wills the end; so there can be a will that necessarily wills what is necessary for the end;     therefore etc     . The antecedent is plain from Augustine, On the Trinity 13, when he says that everyone wants blessedness. The proof of the consequence is that the tendency to the end and to what is necessary for the end is the same.

4. Again God can make a creature to be incapable of sin by grace; therefore he can make it to be so by nature. The antecedent is plain about the blessed. The proof of the consequence is that there is no contradiction in there being a single nature that contains true perfection of will and of grace at the same time. For it would not for this reason be infinite

5. To the contrary is Anselm, Why God Man 2.10, and Augustine, Against Maximinus 3.13, and Jerome, Tractate on the Prodigal Son, for all three agree in the conclusion that God is by nature incapable of sin.

To the Question

6. I reply by conceding, because of Master Lombard’s authority, a negative answer to the question. There is a probable reason for this: every will that is not right of its own understanding, but has a superior right understanding different from itself, can be discrepant from the first right understanding, if it is left to itself; but every created will is of this sort. The reason is that the adequate object of the will is the common good convertible with being; now such good is indifferent as to real good and apparent good; but a power left to itself has power also for whatever is per se conceived under its per se object; therefore every created will left to itself has power for the right good and for the apparent good, and consequently is able to will wrongly.

To the Arguments

7. To the first main argument [n.2] I say that having power for what is formally a sin, namely for privation of rectitude or of due circumstance in an act, is not part of freedom; but having power for the substance of an act to which such privation and deformity is annexed is part of freedom.

8. As to the second [n.3], one can deny the antecedent, because the will does not will the end necessarily, at least in not having the ability not to will, as was said above in book 1 d.1 q.4. However the consequence does not hold of the end and of what is for the end. Nor is the proof of the antecedent and consequence valid.

9. To the third I say that, although a blessed created will is by grace incapable of sin (which will be discussed in book 4 d.1 q.6), yet the consequence is false; for whenever things are so disposed to each other that they are primarily diverse, one of them can never be intensified in its essence so much, short of infinity, that it contain the unity of the other. An example about matter and form and about accident and subject: a subject formally finite in its essence can never contain the function or office of an accident; but the will and grace are disposed to each other as subject and accident; for the will has in its formal idea that it is perfectible by grace, and grace has that it is perfecting, etc.

[Appendix] Twenty Fourth Distinction

Single Question. Whether the higher Part of the Intellect is a Power distinct from the inferior Power

Scotus, Sent.2 d.24 q.1
Aquinas, ST Ia q.79 a.9
Richard of St. Victor, Sent.2 d.24 q.4
Durandus, Sent.2 d.24 q.4

1. About the twenty fourth distinction the question asked is whether the higher and lower parts [of the intellect] are two distinct powers.

2. That they are: Powers are distinguished by their objects, On the Soul 2; but the objects of these powers are most distinct, namely the temporal and the eternal;     therefore etc     .

3. On the contrary is Augustine On the Trinity 12.4, that we divide the soul into these two, namely the higher and lower part, only by their offices.

To the Question

4. I reply: one understanding can be and is that the higher part is a single power and the lower part is a single power, and that these are distinct; and this understanding is impossible, because, according to Augustine above, the whole image of the Trinity is in the higher part alone, and the nature of the image according to him consists in intellective memory and will, which are two powers, as is plain.

5. There is a confirmation, because the higher part, according to Augustine, has respect to higher things. And it is plain that the intellective memory and the will have respect to eternal things. Therefore likewise the lower power embraces two powers, namely the same powers, and it has respect to temporal things in their order to eternal ones.

6. There is another understanding, which says that it can be and is the case that the memory that is in the lower part is different from the one in the higher part, and the intellective power and the will are likewise different. This understanding too is false, because it belongs to the same power to regard the end and what is for the end. But, as was said, the lower part has respect to temporal things in their order to eternal ones.     Therefore etc     .

To the Argument

7. To the main argument [n.2], therefore, I say that a formal distinction of objects proves a distinction of powers whereas a material distinction does not. But the latter is how things are, because temporal and eternal are material contradictions with respect to the formal object of the intellective and voluntative powers, since such powers abstract from these contradictions, as is plain; for there is a common power for both of them, and therefore such contradictions only materially vary the object. An example: color is the adequate object of sight and is the formal object of sight; but whiteness, since it is not the adequate object of sight, is the material object; and so, whatever does not perceive color is not sight, but not whatever does not perceive whiteness, for sight also perceives blackness.

8. On the contrary: this solution begs the question, as is plain if one considers it, and it also assumes something false. For I say that whiteness and this whiteness are the formal object of sight; for if sight were an intellect abstracting color from this whiteness and from this blackness and the like, the eye of an ox would still see this whiteness as its formal object, but the eye never sees this or that color. There is a fallacy then over adequacy and formality, for these ideas are not equivalent save only in the object of the divine intellect and will; for in their case the formal idea of [the divine] essence is the formal and the adequate object, and the reason is that this formal idea contains all intelligible and willable things. But there is nothing that contains all colors, and so on in other cases; therefore contraction and particularization do not take away the formal idea of the object, but they do take away the idea of adequation.

9. To the argument [n.2], then, it is sufficient to say that, although the temporal and eternal are distinct formal ideas, yet it does not follow that they distinguish the powers, as is plain of whiteness and blackness with respect to the same power of sight. However, to find a precise reason for distinction in powers is very difficult; but more was said on this topic in book one.

[Appendix] Twenty Fifth Distinction

Single Question. Whether anything other than the Will is the effective Cause of an Act of Willing in the Will

Scotus, Sent.2 d.2r q.1
Aquinas, ST Ia q.77 & ;IaIIae q.9 & IIIa q.32

1. About the twenty fifth distinction the question asked is whether the will is passive with respect to volition, or whether something other than the will is the effective cause of an act of willing in the will.

2. That it is: the Philosopher On the Soul 3 sets down an order of eternal motions: that the desirable thing is an unmoved mover, the appetite is a moved mover, and the act is a moved non-mover; therefore appetite or will is moved by the desirable thing.

3. You will say that this is metaphysically true only as to idea of end.

4. But on the contrary, for then the Philosopher would be equivocating, because it is certain that the second in fact moves the third as to idea of efficient cause.

5. Again Metaphysics 5.17, an active power is a principle for changing something other insofar as it is other;     therefore every active power has an act that passes over into another; but the will does not; therefore the will is not active but passive with respect to volition.

6. Again, an indifferent and indeterminate power is not determined to act save by some agent; but the will is indeterminate as to willing and not willing; therefore it is determined by the object as by what acts on volition; therefore etc     .

7. To the contrary is Augustine, Retractions 1.11, when he says that nothing is so in our power as the will is. But it is plain he is not talking about the will, which is a power, but about volition, which is an act. Then the argument goes as follows: if the whole of volition were from the object and the will were passive, volition would not be in our power; for what is passive undergoes necessarily, and the object acts naturally, and the acting of the object cannot be in the power of the will, for the prior, as prior, is not in the power of the posterior, but the active, as active, is naturally prior to the passive;     therefore etc     .

8. Again, the will is the noblest power; therefore it cannot be purely passive.

To the Question

9. Reply. One opinion says that the will does not cause volition but that the known object causes volition in the will. Confirmation comes from the Commentator, Metaphysics 12 com.36, when he says that the baths in reality move the sensitive powers, but the baths in the soul, that is, in the intellect, move the intellective appetite.

10. If it be said to the contrary that what is not a being cannot move the will, but the intellective object can be a non being,     therefore etc     ., the response is made by saying that the understanding of a non existent object is not a non being; they say well that the intellect along with understanding of the object causes intellection in the will.

11. Another opinion says that the agent intellect neither moves the possible intellect nor does it move the will; and neither does the intellective object move the will. Rather a phantasm actually given in imagination immediately moves the intellect first and then moves the will. The reason is that in everything there must be a mover and moved, and that these are always distinct in subject; but in the intellective part of the soul nothing can be distinct in subject from the will. Therefore the mover must be something outside the intellective part, namely the phantasm that is in the imagination. The proof of the minor here is multiple.

12. The first proof is as follows: To say that mover and moved are not distinct in subject is to say that the same thing moves itself; but it is impossible that the same thing should move itself, because then the same thing would be at once in potency and in act with respect to the same thing.

13. The second proof is thus: In Physics 2 text 70 it is said that matter and efficient cause do not combine in the numerically same thing;     therefore the same thing does not move itself, because they would combine in the same thing.

14. The third is: In Metaphysics 5 text 20 it is said that the mover is relative to the movable; but there cannot be a real relation of the same thing to itself, primarily because the extremes of a real relation are opposite, but the same thing is not really opposed to itself; therefore etc     . The minor of this reasoning is manifest of itself.

15. Against the conclusion of both opinions I argue in common thus: A natural agent cannot be a per se cause of contraries about the same passive subject (so as to exclude an objection about the dissolving of ice and the hardening of mud, which come about from the same natural agent, namely the sun, but not about the same passive subject); willing and refusing are opposite acts, and the will can have them about the same object; therefore these acts do not come effectively from a phantasm or an intellective object, since these are precisely natural agents. There is a confirmation in that, if refusing comes from the object, then it comes from a bad object, because the will has an act of refusing only ever about an object under the idea of evil; but evil, since it is a privation, cannot be a positive act.

16. To the consequent of the first opinion [n.9], I say that if one holds that volition is not naturally but partially from the will, then the whole argument can be conceded; for then it is true that the baths as actually understood move the will by partially causing volition. But if one holds that volition is totally from the will, then it can be said that the baths as actually understood move the will metaphorically under the idea of end, just as the baths outside in reality move the sensitive appetite.

17. As to the argument for the second opinion [n.11], I deny the major and say that it is altogether false in the case at least of spiritual things. For if an angel exists in a state of pure nature without any species or habit, he would still understand himself; but he does at least understand himself when he has species and habit co-created with him, and so mover and moved are in that case not distinct in subject; and I say similarly that angel and separated soul can move themselves locally to diverse ‘wheres’.

18. To the first proof [n.12], then, I say that act and potency are, in one way, differences of being; in another way they divide active and passive principle in the case of univocal things; and in another way they do so in the case of equivocal things. I then say that in the first way act and potency are incompossible in the same thing. For it is incompossible that a piece of wood be actually white as long as it is potentially white. Act and potency are also incompossible in the second way, for it is impossible that fire, which is formally hot, should make itself formally hot by causting heat in itself. In the third way act and potency are compossible, for what is virtually and eminently such can make itself to be formally such. Hence the will, which is virtually and not formally willing, can make itself to be formally willing by causing volition in itself. The thing is plain in the case of water when heated to the maximum, which is not formally but virtually cold. And so, when heating by the external heating agent ceases, the water makes itself to be formally cold, for it returns to coldness, as is plain; and it is certain that this return is from some agent, because a new effect is not without a cause, as is plain. But the effect is not from the heavens and the like for it happens whatever condition the heavens are in; therefore the effect would be from the water itself.

19. On the contrary: What is universally such and eminently such can[not] now be really and formally such. An example: the sun cannot be formally hot, nor can God be formally stone, although they are virtually and eminently such.

20. I reply that in such cases there is a fallacy of putting non-cause for cause; for it is not because the sun is virtually and eminently hot that it is unable to make itself formally hot. The proof is that if the given premise is cause of the given conclusion, then the opposite premise is cause of the opposite conclusion; therefore Saturn, which is not virtually hot, will be able to make itself formally hot, which however is false. The correct reason then is that, since heat is a sensible quality, it cannot be received save in an elementary or mixed body, and the sun is not of this sort. God too cannot be formally stone, not indeed because he is virtually such, but because he is pure act, infinite, simple and the like.

21. To the second proof [n.13] I say that the Philosopher is speaking there about prime matter, which is the subject of real change, and since it excludes every idea of perfect act it cannot have belonging to it any acting.

22. To the third proof [n.14] I say that a real relation is found in a threefold difference: some are between things that are essentially dependent, as caused on cause; some are between things that are not essentially or accidentally dependent, as are relations of origin in divine reality; some are between things that are only accidentally dependent, as moved on mover - for the whole of what is subject to motion is presupposed to the accident of motion as prior to it, and so the moved does not depend on the mover save by reason of this accident, which is motion.

23. I then say that the first two opposite relations are not mutually compatible, either in the same nature or in the same supposit; for no single univocal and numerically the same thing causes itself in the same unlimited nature, as is plain there, nor in the same supposit, because the same thing does not produce itself. But relations said in the third way are mutually compatible in the same nature and in the same subject, for it is not unacceptable that the same thing should depend on itself accidentally by reason of some accident really added to it; and so it is in the case at issue. Hence opposite relations are not incompossible in the same thing as opposites but only as they make for essential dependence. And then also I say that if there was in the case at issue a real relation between the extremes, yet not simply so but because it is not founded on altogether the same thing; rather it is between the will absolutely taken and the will as formally willing in actual volition. Or it could perhaps be said, and better said, that there is only a real opposition between the extremes of the relation and not between the substrates; for it does not follow that if a thing is active therefore it is not passive, but rather it follows that if it is action then it is not passion, or that if it is active motion then it is not passive motion (in the third way).

To the Arguments

24. To the first principal argument [nn.2-4], if one holds that the will causes volition, not totally, but partially, there will be no difficulty there in the argument, as is plain. But if one holds that the will causes volition totally, I say that the desirable thing is a mover metaphorically in idea of end and not properly in idea of efficient cause. And when you say that then the Philosopher is thereby equivocating, I say that it is not true, because when where is a combination of diverse causes, as are the beings of different genera, they cause in different ways. Hence too it is commonly said that the end moves the efficient cause and the efficient cause introduces the form, and the latter is said properly and the former metaphorically.

25. To the second argument [n.5] I concede it insofar as it doubles the formal idea and need not always double the subject, as is plain there in the Philosopher’s example: a doctor heals himself insofar as he is a doctor but is healed insofar as he is sick; and so there is a doubling there not of the subject but of the formal idea, because the formal idea of the doctor, which is insofar as he is a healer, is different from the formal idea of him insofar as he is healed; and so it is in its own way in the case at issue, as is plain from what has been said. There is no need, then, that every active power have an act passing over to another, thought there is such a need in the case of a making power, for nothing makes itself. Hence some commentators say that what the Philosopher is defining there is the power of making.

26. To the third argument [n.6] I say that a free, perfect, active power, which is the will, is so in potency to both sides of a contradiction that it can determine itself of itself to action, and for this reason is it said to be free; for otherwise it would not be free, as is plain upon consideration;     therefore etc   .