Second Part. On the Fact of the Incarnation

Single Question. Whether the Formal Reason of Being the Term for the Union of the Human Nature with the Word is the Word’s Relative Property

153. Having looked at the possibility of the incarnation in general [supra q.1] and in particular [supra qq.2-4], I ask about the fact of it, namely about the formal term of the incarnation, and whether the formal reason of being the term for the union of the human nature with the Word is the Word’s relative property.

154. That it is not I show in two ways:

First because not the personal property but the essence does the terminating, for terminating the union belongs to the Word for the reason that containing the perfection of the created supposit belongs to the Word, and for the reason thata created nature is in perfect obedience and potency of obedience to the Word (for these reasons are the ones assigned on the part of the assumer and on the part of the nature assumed for the possibility of the incarnation); but these features belong to the Word through the essence and not through any idea of the person, which is not formally infinite, because the personal property does not contain formally the perfection of every supposit, nor is there in the creature a potency of obedience to the person, but this potency has regard to the omnipotence of the maker, and this is not a personal but an essential property.

a.a [Interpolation] About the fifth question, which presupposes the possibility of the incarnation and asks about the fact of it - the formal term of the incarnation - , whether the formal reason of terminating the union of the human nature at the Word is the relative property of the word; and the argument is that it is not, because terminating the union belongs to the Word through that through which containing the perfection of the created supposit belongs to the Word and through that through which...

155. Further, the one assuming communicates existence to the assumed nature; but existence in divine reality is an essential property; therefore something essential, which is precisely the reason for existing, is the reason for communicating to the human nature its dependence on the Word.

156. Second, I show that the relative property of the Word does not do the terminating because the Word formally terminates the union by that by which the Word is formally ‘this person’ (if the person is the first term of the union); but he is not ‘this person’ by a relative property.a

a.a [Interpolation], because then this person would exist per accidens, for he would be constituted by something in a different category;     therefore etc     .

157. But that a relative property is not ‘this person’ nor terminates it I prove by the reasons that were adduced for this opinion in 1 d.26 nn.32-55, 60-64, 66.

158. On the contrary:

One person and not another does the assuming; therefore he assumes through that by which he is ‘this person’, distinct and determinate. But this property is only a relative one, according to Anselm On the Procession of the Holy Spirit ch.2,“It is openly shown that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son when it is said that ‘he proceeds from God’, because the Son is God. For I ask whether the Holy Spirit is understood to be from the Father for the reason that he is from God, or understood to be from God for the reason that he is from the Father. For although either of these may in turn be proved by the other (for if the Holy Spirit is from the Father, then he is from God, and if he is from God, then he is from the Father, since none of the aforesaid relations prevents this), yet it is not the case that either is in turn the cause of the other... One must believe and confess that the Holy Spirit is for this reason from the Father that he is from God; now the Father is not God more than the Son is, but the one sole true God is Father and Son; therefore, if the Holy Spirit is from the Father because he is from God who is Father, then it cannot be denied that he is also from the Son since he is from the God who is Son.” William of Auxerre, Summa 1 tr.8 ch.7, “Anselm of Canterbury replies that the Holy Spirit does not proceed from the Father and the Son insofar as they are divided but insofar as they are one, because he proceeds from them insofar as they are God. We say with Anselm, therefore, that the Holy Spirit does not proceed from the Father and the Son as they are divided but as they are one able-to-inspirit God.” ¹³ where, in maintaining that the Holy Spirit is from the Son, he argues by way of division: the Holy Spirit is either from the Father or from the essence; if the first is granted, the conclusion is obtained, because nothing is there obtained but the property of the supposit or the common essence; if the division is immediate and, by destroying one member of it the other is inferred, then - if the conclusion does not follow - a fallacy of the consequent is committed [cf. Scotus, Lectura 3 d.1 n.174].

159. If it be said that, just as by the phrase ‘from one God’ he [Anselm] understands something common to the three persons, namely inspiriting power, which was an absolute power for the whole time (as the doctors commonly expound Anselm), so by the phrase ‘from relation’ he understands something proper to the person of the Father (whether something relative or something absolute), and thus, if an absolute property is being posited, then he understands by the phrase ‘from the essence of the Father’ that the Holy Spirit is inspirited from some absolute proper to the Father (if there is one) as from some property of the Father - then on the contrary:

160. Augustine in On the Trinity 7.9 n.11 says that under ‘essence’ is contained whatever is a ‘for itself’, whether it is essential - common to the three - or personal. For he proves there that a person is called ‘person’ and ‘God’ by virtue of the same thing, even though ‘person’ is taken for first substance [cf. 1 d.26 nn.60-61]; but he is not God by that by which he is Father, according to Augustine, but he is God by one thing and Father by another. Therefore a personal property - if it is absolute - is not understood under relation of person but rather under something common that is a ‘for itself’.

161. Further, if the person of the Word is constituted by something absolute, then Arius’ argument will be a demonstrative proof; for when Arius argued that ‘to be unbegotten is one thing and to be begotten another, and both are said according to substance, therefore the first person is different in substance from the second person’ -this conclusion necessarily follows if person is posited as something absolute; for an absolute constitutes substance and not relation, and so that which is other as to this property is other as to substance; but the unbegotten is other as to this property; therefore he is also other as to substance.

162. If it be said that Arius’ argument commits the sophism of figure of speech in two ways:

First because it changes a ‘relative to’ into a ‘what’ by arguing that ‘unbegotten is other than begotten, that is, it is other as unbegotten, therefore it is other in substance’; for it changes a ‘relative to’ [sc. ‘unbegotten’] into a ‘what’ [sc. ‘substance’] (as Augustine shows because ‘unbegotten’ formally states a ‘relative to’, although negatively);

Second because, if ‘unbegotten’ is not taken for the property itself which it signifies but for the absolute property that underlies it (if such a property is posited, let it be called a), and if the argument is: ‘unbegotten is other than begotten in person, therefore it is other than it in substance’, then there is a fallacy of figure of speech, by change of a ‘some this’ [sc. ‘unbegotten’] into a ‘what’ [sc. ‘substance’]; for in the premise otherness in property of first substance is understood, and in the conclusion otherness as second substance or as quiddity is understood, for this is how Arius understood it (because he himself said that the Son of God is a pure creature and has a different substance and a different nature from the Father) - and in this way does Augustine confront him, On the Trinity 5.3 n.4, that if the three persons are a something in substance, then this is only understood of second substance, that is, of quiddity (and in this way do Augustine and the heretics he is speaking against take substance); and therefore to infer otherness in substance, as the Arians do, from otherness of supposit, which is first substance, is to change a ‘some this’ into a ‘what’.

If response is made in either of the above two ways to Arius’ argument, namely that it is sophistical - on the contrary: first substance is substance most of all; therefore, if person is constituted by something absolute, person will thereby be most of all substance - and thus, if a person is other in this respect, he will be most of all other in substance.

163. Further, there are other arguments for this conclusion, which were touched on in 1 d.26 nn.24-27, on behalf of the side that says ‘relations constitute the persons’.

I. To the Question

164. In these question there are two articles: first, what is the property that constitutes a person; second, whether this property is the reason of terminating the union.

A. What the Property is that Constitutes a Person

1. Reasons and Responses of those who Think that the Persons are Constituted by Relations

165. [Special reasons] - This first point was touched on in 1 d.26 nn.15-31; but special reasons are put forward that the persons cannot be absolute properties.

The first is as follows: if this [absolute] property did constitute the persons, it would not exist merely potentially or virtually in God, because then he would not be more ‘this person’ than an ass (for God includes the perfection of an ass virtually in himself); therefore it must be in him actually; therefore it is in him as act (both as that which gives being and as absolute act). So there would be three absolutes in divine reality, which is unacceptable.

166. Further second thus: let the absolute property be called a; therefore, if a makes a unity with the essence, the one is act and the other potency, and the one is the perfection of the other; essence does not perfect the personal property, because it does not presuppose it but vice versa; therefore the absolute personal property will be the perfection of the essence. And then two unacceptable results follow: one, that the essence is not in itself wholly perfect; the other, that one person is not wholly perfect, because he does not have the absolute property of another person (which property, from what was just said, is a perfection).

167. And if this second result may be confirmed, because according to Anselm, Monologion 15, everything else besides relations is either simply better it than not it, or this is not so but in something it is better not it than it; that which is disposed in the second way, according to Anselm, is not in God; therefore everything else in God, once relation is removed, is better it than not it, and is a perfection simply; - then, if so, from this it follows that no person will be simply perfect, because no person has the absolute property of another person; it follows also that two persons are something more perfect than one person, which is contrary to Augustine On the Trinity 8.1 n.2.

168. Further third as follows: when some absolute is multiplied, every other absolute circumstance of it is multiplied (an example: when quantity is multiplied, the whiteness of it is too, and vice versa); therefore, if there are distinct proper absolutes that circumstance the divine essence, they would distinguish the divine essence too.

169. And the major here is confirmed, because several things of the same species cannot exist in the same thing; these absolutes, if they are posited, will be of the same species - for if not, they will be of different species, and so there is need to inquire what makes either of them incommunicable: for just as it is posited that paternity (which differs in species from filiation) cannot be of itself incommunicable [1 d.26 n.46], so the consequence, as to the property a in the Father (if it is an absolute) and the property b in the Son - if they are different in species - , is that neither will be of itself incommunicable, and there will be need to make a stand at some properties of the same idea. This argument is at least confirmed by the fact that there are not several things of the same idea in the same perfect thing (just as there are not several Words or several Fathers in divine reality), because it seems a mark of imperfection that in some nature there can be several things altogether alike; therefore in the simply perfect divine nature there will not be several absolutes of the same nature, nor of a different nature, and so not in any way.

170. Fourth: if the absolute property a and likewise the absolute properly b are expressed by the essence, and if what is expressed exists in the same supposit as that by which it is expressed (according to the way of expressing here set down), then a and b will be in one person, and so no person will be originated by another (because their properties will be in the same person); indeed it follows that there will be no distinction of persons.

171. Fifth: [if persons are absolutes] the consequence is that there is no origin in God, because the originated person receives being through the origin; but the person, if he is an absolute, precedes the relation of origin; therefore the second person would in essence precede passive origination itself, and so would not have being through it.

172. [Response to some reasons for the opposite opinion] - And so those who hold the conclusion of these reasons [nn.165-175, that the persons are not constituted by absolute properties but by relations] would make a response to the opposite reasons touched on for the opposite opinion [1 d.26 nn.32-55]:

To the quote from Augustine about person [1 d.26 n.54] the response is that Augustine is speaking there of the thing that is formally and not materially signified by ‘person’; but ‘person’ formally signifies something in intellectual nature that is non-distinct in itself and distinct from another; but that whereby (whether an absolute or a relation) there is such a distinction is accidental to the formally signified thing; and yet in the case of some nature the absolute necessarily involves a relation. So it is in the issue at hand.

173. To the statement that ‘the supposit of the divine nature is not a one per accidens, therefore it is not constituted by something of another genus in nature’ [1 d.26 n.52], the response is that relation constitutes as it passes over into the essence and not as of a different genus; nor because of this does it follow that the thing constituted is an absolute, because relation preserves what is proper to it - yet the concession is good that ‘what is left from relation’ is an absolute, because what is left is being.

174. To the other claim [1 d.26 nn.45-50], that ‘the property of the person is incommunicable primarily, but relation is not’, the response is that a subsistent relation, of the sort that a divine relation is, is incommunicable primarily, although by the absolute idea of such a relation it is communicable.

175. More or less the same is said to the claim [1 d.26 n.51] that ‘things that distinguish are primarily diverse, but not so paternity and filiation’; the minor is denied, because even if paternity and filiation in creatures communicate in something, yet the divine ones, or those in divine reality, do not.

176. To the claim [1 d.26 n.36] that ‘real relation requires really distinct extremes’ the response is that this is true of relation as accident, and divine relation is not of this sort, but it is substantial relation, constituting the supposit of a substance.

2. Rejection of the Aforesaid Reasons and Responses

177. With respect to this article [n.164] one must examine first the response and objections, and second the conclusion by itself.

a. About the Special Reasons and Responses

178. The argument on the first point is that the reasons are not conclusive and that the responses do not solve the problem.

179. [The special reasons are not conclusive] - I prove this in order:

For the first reason [n.165] rests on the proposition, ‘every absolute is act and consequently is something that gives being’.

180. The rejection of this is multiple:

First, because in the case of creatures, where the proposition most seems to be probable, not every act gives being, for then the human nature in Christ would give being, and it would not have the same being that it would have were it let go (which is against

Augustine, On the Trinity 13.17 n.22), because when let go it would have its own personhood, and personhood states incommunicable act.

181. Likewise, an act that gives being bestows operation, but the hypostatic property in creatures does not bestow operation. This is plain from Damascene Orthodox Faith 3.14, “We say that wills and operations are natural and not hypostatic; for if we were to grant they were hypostatic, those who will being one hypostasis and those who act another, we are compelled to say that the three hypostases of the Holy Trinity...”, where, from the fact the three divine persons do not have three operations, Damascene concludes that operation is not hypostatic, that is, does not come through a hypostatic property, and this he concludes of the property in general, whether it is absolute or relative.See Appendix A at the end of this distinction. ¹⁴

182. Besides, third: in everything that has being from something in some way, there is, besides what gives it being, something else, different from it in nature, which receives being (the thing is plain of a composite of matter and form, and of all other things composed of act and potency); therefore in the case of everything that has being through something that gives it being, there is something that is not an act giving being but a reason for receiving being - and so it seems to be in the supposit of nature, for, since the supposit has the being of nature and nature gives it being, the hypostatic property will be the reason for receiving being.

183. One can then say to the argument [nn.165] that, since there is a twofold idea of entity, namely quidditative and hypostatic, then, just as it belongs to quidditative entity to give being of itself, because it is of itself communicable, so it belongs to hypostatic entity not to be an act giving being, because, as ‘that in which’, it is of itself incommunicable. And although in creatures the individual property gives being, because it is a degree of some positive entity over and above the quidditative entity of nature, yet the property of a supposit does not state any entity over and above the entity of singularity, nay does not state anything positive (from the first question, nn.54-55); and even if it were to add some being, yet it would not be the reason for giving ‘being’ but only for giving ‘incommunicable being’, because ‘this existing nature’ - wherein is included nature and the entity of singularity - is the whole reason for giving being, and so anything understood to be additional to it, whether positively or privatively, whether something positive or a privation, whether absolute or relative, will not give being, because being is given totally by that which is already pre-understood. Therefore, although in divine reality the personal property is not merely negation but some positive property, yet, because the divine nature is of itself a ‘per se existing this’, it will contain the whole reason for giving being; and just as in creatures ‘this existing nature’ gives being totally, and not merely by the fact that the additional property is a negation (rather, if the additional property were positive, nothing would be taken away from ‘this per se existing nature’ to prevent it giving being totally), so neither in divine reality will anything be taken away from this nature - which is existent of itself - to prevent it giving being totally to the person, even if there is understood to be in ‘person’ a positive personal property.

184. In response to the argument [n.165] therefore, when the proof is given that ‘the personal property is act, since it is not there in potency, or is not in God virtually’, I say that it commits the fallacy of equivocation. For in one way ‘act’ is the difference opposed to ‘potency’, and in this way act along with potency divides the whole of being (even matter as well). In another way act along with potency constitutes some whole, the way the Philosopher speaks of act and potency in Metaphysics 8.6.1045a7-29; and here potency is not opposed to act because it does not remain along with act the way ‘this matter’ remains in the composite along with form. So this personal property does not exist only virtually in the divine essence (the way ass does, which is merely in potency there before act), and consequently this property is actually there, in the way that act is opposed to such potency. But it does not follow that ‘therefore it is an act that gives being’ - for there is required for this that it be formal act: because in this way matter might give being, since in the composite it is in act, not in potency before act.

185. The second reason too [n.166] seems defective:

First because the absolute in question is not related to the essence as perfection to perfectible, as was made clear about the relative property of person extensively in 1 d.5 nn.113, 118, 129-138, where it was said that person is not composed of essence and relation or property as of something quasi potential and actual, but rather that essence has more the idea of act. So although the property be understood as in some way posterior to essence, yet not for this reason is it a perfection of essence; for the order of origin and of perfection is there the same, and what is prior in origin is prior in perfection, as was then made extensively clear [1 d.5 nn.130-138].

186. Second, given that the property would in some way be related to the essence as informing it, yet it is not a perfection simply, because according to Anselm Monologion ch.15 ‘a perfection simply in anything is better being it than not being it’, and this is impossible about a hypostatic property, because such a property is by its own nature repugnant to anything contradictorily other than what it belongs to, and thus it cannot in anything else be better being it than not it, for it is contradictorily repugnant to anything else.

187. Thus as to the reason [n.166], then, it is plain that something false is assumed if the supposition is made that the absolute perfects the essence. Nor is the proof made valid by the fact that the absolute ‘in some way follows and does not precede’, because in divine reality - insofar as precedence can be posited there - act and form are first. Second, even given that one did get the result that it informs the essence, the conclusion would not be that it is a perfection of it simply; nor do the conclusions follow that are further inferred, namely that ‘the divine essence is not simply perfect’ or that ‘one person is not simply perfect in himself’.

188. Moreover, the argument [n.166] would conclude better against relation [sc. than for it], because it seems more probable that a hypostatic absolute is not a perfection than that a relation is not a perfection, because being a perfection belongs to no hypostatic property (either in creatures or in anything else), but being a perfection does belong to some relation as to the relation’s proper idea: for one relation is more perfect than another and yet none is a perfection simply, according to Augustine On the Quantity of the Soul ch.9 n.15, “we rightly prefer equality to inequality, and there is not anyone at all endowed with human sense etc.” who would not prefer equality to inequality [cf. 1 d.19 n.25]. And this is not just because of the base of the [geometrical] figure, for inequality can be founded on more perfect bases than some equality is; it is even clear that, if it were just because of the base of the figure, Augustine would be begging the question; for he is intending to prove the nobility of one figure over another (as of a circle over rectilinear figures), and he does so using equality and inequality; so if the excellence [of one figure over another] were only deduced from the base of the figure, or if the excellence of the figure were deduced from this, then he would be arguing in a circle.

189. If it be said that Augustine’s statement is true by reason of proximate and not remote bases, and that the proximate foundation of equality is quantity - this reply is false and nothing to the purpose of the minor [n.188]. For I ask: when it is said that ‘a quantity is equal or on a par with another quantity’, does this mean the relation or something absolute? If it means an absolute, then something can be understood to be equal without being equal to anything; and similarly, how will the perfection of equality in respect of inequality be got in this way? - and then in a triangle there must be two quantities. Or you may imagine some other way in which equality can be an absolute, more perfect than inequality in some way and different from quantity. - But if it means the relation, as seems manifest, then a relation will be per se founded on a relation; nay, it seems to mean the same relation as the relation of equality: for a quantity is equal to and on a par with a quantity.The point seems to be that if one tries to avoid the argument in n.188 by saying that the relation of equality is not better than the relation of inequality qua relation, but rather what is better is the absolute on which the relation is founded, save that this absolute is not the figure [as was supposed in n.188] but the quantity of the figure, then the statement ‘this quantity is equal to that’, which is alleged to be what really justifies Augustine’s saying that equality is better than inequality, will either state an absolute (namely the quantity itself), which has the problems Scotus notes here in n.189; or it will state a relation, and then the relation ‘this quantity is equal to that’ will be founded on this other relation (whatever it is); in fact, however, there is no such other relation, but only that very relation itself of equality between the quantities. So Augustine’s argument stands. ¹⁵

190. As to the statement of Anselm in the Monologion [n.167], the response is that he is speaking of quiddities, not of hypostatic properties. This is proved first by his examples of wisdom and truth on the one side and gold and lead on the other side.Monologion ch.15, “By ‘it’ and ‘not it’ I understand here nothing other than ‘true’, ‘not true’, ‘body’, ‘not body’, and the like. There is something indeed that is altogether better it than not it, as wise than not wise...and just than not just...But not it is better than it in something’s case, as not gold than gold, for it is better for a man not to be gold than to be gold, although perhaps for something (as for lead) gold would be better than not gold.” ¹⁶ Second it is proved by reason, because that alone is a perfection simply which can be infinite in something, just as that which is of itself finite is better ‘not it’ in a thing than ‘it’; these features [sc. better not it than it, or better it than not it] belong to quiddity as to its ‘being finite’ or ‘being infinite’, but not to a hypostatic property, because a divine personal property - of whatever sort it is - is formally neither finite nor infinite; likewise, a hypostatic property is repugnant to everything else beside the one thing it belongs to; so for everything else it cannot be better than not it, rather not even for anything at all. Therefore Anselm is excluding relation according to quiddity from the whole range of quiddity, and then every absolute quiddity is either a perfection simply or limited; but the intended conclusion about hypostatic property [sc. it is a relation and not an absolute] does not follow from this.See Appendix B at the end of this distinction. ¹⁷

191. The third reason [n.168] has, in the case of all things essentially ordered and similarly in the case of all things not equally unlimited, a major that is false in form (although it may sometimes be true because of the matter); for in the case of no essential order does there have to be any multiplication because of the proper idea of prior and posterior, but multiplication of the posterior can stand without multiplication of the prior, although not conversely; similarly, when two things are compared to a third that is unlimited, the third does not have to be co-distinguished after the manner of the unlimitedness of the two things (an example: the intellective soul is compared with the parts of the body, because it is in some way unlimited with respect to them; the soul does not have to be distinct in distinct parts after the manner of the unlimitedness of the parts). The major then is, as to the issue at hand, false in two ways: first because the essence, in the way priority in person exists there, is in some way prior to the properties, but not conversely, according to them [cf. n.166] - therefore it is not necessary for the essence to be distinguished following the distinction of the properties; second because the essence is formally infinite, and the properties are not formally infinite - and therefore there is no need for what is formally infinite to be distinguished following the distinction of things that are not formally infinite.

192. Even if the major [n.168] were taken generally about any absolutes at all that circumstance the same thing, it still has a manifest instance against it in the soul and its power, because the powers of the soul are multiplied when the soul is not multiplied.

But if this instance could be got round by specifying that the major is about things that are of the same species (the way the first confirmation of the major takes it), not even then is the major universally true in the case of relations, as will be plain below in d.8 nn.21-29. Several things of the same idea existing in the same thing - even in the case of absolutes - is not a contradiction, if any of them is not an act adequate to what it is in.

193. When the major, then, is made clear through an induction [sc. the example in n.168], there is a fallacy of the consequent, because certain singulars are taken that are not similar to the issue at hand, namely singulars in which a distinction of the posterior does constitute a distinction of the prior, or in which there is a similar limitation on all sides and no unlimitedness of one in respect of the other; and from these singulars only a universal proposition that is false can be inferred, one where the conditions already stated [sc. the conditions required to make the inferred conclusion true, n.191] are lacking, just as they are lacking in the issue at hand.

194. But as for the final point added to confirm the major [n.169], that ‘there are not several things of the same idea in the same perfect thing’, it could be replied that, just as a thing perfect simply - being numerically the same - is communicable to several supposits of the same idea (such that this is not repugnant to it because of its perfection simply, but it does belong to it that it exist in several supposits of the same idea), so there belongs to it from the perfection of its nature that several things of the same idea can exist in it as supposits in a nature, and consequently that several hypostatic properties too of the same idea can exist in it; but this is not possible about the other things that are given in the example [n.169] (namely about the Father and the Word), because the perfection of what is simply perfect requires that any production have an adequate term, but does not in this way require that some hypostatic property be adequate to the nature in constituting a supposit.

195. The same point [n.194] can be made in reply to the first confirmation of the major [n.169], by applying this confirmation to the issue at hand, because there is a fallacy there of equivocation: for the major [sc. of the first confirmation, ‘several things of the same species cannot exist in the same thing’], if it were true, would have to be understood of things existing in something the way act exists in that which is informed by it. But in this way the minor [sc. ‘these absolutes, if they are posited, will be of the same species’] is not true; for the [hypostatic] property does not exist in the essence as informing it but as constituting a supposit in it.

196. However to both confirmations [n.169] it can be said that these [hypostatic] properties are not of the same idea formally, just as the individual properties in creatures are diverse primarily and not of the same idea. And if from this is inferred that they are of a different species, or that each of them has the idea of a quasi different species, and that therefore each would have to be determined to incommunicability by something else -this does not follow, just as it does not follow in the case of individual properties in creatures, where these properties are the ultimate determinations of the nature: although, in the case of creatures, these properties are not of the same idea in anything, yet none is a common and quidditative entity, but each is of itself a ‘this’.

197. The fourth reason [n.170] proceeds from a false imagination, namely that these properties are expressed by the essence as through an origin - which is not what was said. But, just as some concede that relations burgeon in the essence [cf. Ord. 1 d.5 n.131, d.26 n.28] (if however this is properly said), so it could be said and conceded (against them [sc. Henry and his followers]) that these properties - if they are absolutes -burgeon in the essence; and although each of them is in the same essence from which it burgeons (because the essence is in the three persons), yet one or other is not in the same person as that from which it is got by origin. Nor is there any repugnance in one person with one property having true origination from a person having another property, even though all these properties burgeon from the essence, not as origins, but in some other way - just as the others [sc. those who say the persons are not absolutes] have to say about origination through relation, because the Son burgeons from the Father by origin and yet filiation burgeons in some way in the divine essence or from the divine essence.

198. The fifth reason [n.171] is defective, because it seems more difficult to sustain origination by positing that the extremes are only formally relatives than by positing that they are absolutes. For if they are only relatives then to say that ‘person originates person’ will be nothing other than to say that a relative has a correlative; but a relative, once posited, seems to have a correlative without any further action. But if absolutes are posited, there does not seem to be as much difficulty in the way one supposit is generated by another, since in creatures - according to everybody - the supposits are absolute, and yet origination of one from another is not there denied.

199. So when it is argued [n.171] that absolute precedes relative and consequently precedes origination [cf. Ord. 1 d.26 n.58], I reply: it was said that origination belongs to the genus of efficient cause [supra nn.172-176] - and just as in the case of creatures the term does not exist by origination formally but as it were by effect (nor from the fact that it exists formally by effect does it follow that it precedes it), so could it be said in the issue at hand; nor does there seem to be greater difficulty in the priority of an absolute than in the priority of a relative, nor in divine reality more than in creatures.

200. [The responses do not solve the problem, n.178] - That the responses assigned by them [nn.172-176] do not solve the problem I prove thus:

First from the reasoning of Augustine [n.172]. Either Augustine is understanding by the formal object signified by ‘person’ something non-distinct in itself and distinct from another in essence - and then he no more has to concede that there are three persons than that there are three essences (or three things distinct in essence), which seems manifestly against his intention when he maintains that we use the word ‘substance’ in one way and the Greeks in another; the Greeks then are using ‘person’ or ‘substance’ for ‘first substance’, and they allow three substances in the way that we allow three persons [n.160]; therefore we are, according to Augustine, not properly conceding that there are three persons. Or he is understanding by ‘person’ something indistinct in itself according to incommunicable substance (and thus something distinct from another), and then that thing, according to what it formally signifies, is for itself, and the intended conclusion is gained [sc. ‘person’ is an absolute and not just a relative].

201. Against the next one [n.173]: I ask whether relation constitutes as it is formally the same as essence or not. If it does, two absurdities follow: first, that relation will not be relation, because, according to Augustine On the Trinity 7.5 n.9, ‘if substance is related to another it is no longer substance’, and so relation, if it is formally substance, is no longer related to another; second likewise, that whatever is constituted formally by something, as this something is an absolute, is itself formally absolute, and so the supposit constituted would be formally absolute. Or the supposit is constituted by relation insofar as relation passes over to the divine essence, or as it is the same, not formally but really, as the divine essence - and along with this goes that the supposit is constituted properly by relation as relation is relation, because relation cannot be considered in divine reality without its being the same really (whether it is a thing or a relation) as the essence. So if relation ‘in some way considered’ constituted the supposit per accidens, supposing it were so to constitute it, and if relation ‘when considered in every way’ is really (though not formally) the same as the essence, then from the fact that - as really the same as the essence - it constitutes the supposit, then the thing constituted is not prevented from being an entity per accidens; but relation cannot constitute as it is more than really the same as essence, because it cannot do so as formally the same.

202. Further, the statement [n.173] that ‘what relation leaves behind is an absolute’ seems to be repugnant to itself, because a form does not leave behind an existence other than itself (just as whiteness does not leave behind in the white thing any being other than itself by which the white thing is white); therefore the constituting property, if it preserves what is proper to itself, leaves behind what is proper to itself and nothing else. Likewise, how could an absolute be left from a relative property if the absolute precedes the relative property in the person?

203. Against what is replied next [n.174] about subsistent relation, that it is incommunicable, I ask: since one must first understand relation as a something before one understands it as subsistent, I ask how paternity is a ‘this’? It is not a ‘this’ of itself since it is not formally infinite, and so even more will it not be subsistent of itself; therefore it is not incommunicable of itself either. Against the other part, that ‘it is incommunicable insofar as it is divine’ [n.174], I argue as follows: when two things constitute per se some third thing, neither of the two gets from the other what accords with its own proper idea (as matter does not get from form the potentiality that belongs to it in causing the composite, and as form does not get from matter any of the actuality that belongs to it in composing the composite along with the matter; so too in the case of definition, genus does not get from the difference any determinable concept, nor does the difference get from the genus a specific act that is indivisible into things several in species); therefore if person is constituted from essence and incommunicable property, neither of these latter will have from the other what is proper to it; accordingly, therefore, just as the essence does not get communicability from the property, because (when one prescinds in thought from the property) the essence is communicable of itself, so the property will not get incommunicability from the essence, but will of itself, once the essence is per impossibile removed, be incommunicable primarily.

204. Further, essence as it is purely essence does not give incommunicability to the Father, because essence is of itself communicable; therefore it gives incommunicability to the Father as it is understood to have paternity virtually in itself, and so the same thing ‘as it is in the essence virtually’ will be the reason for itself ‘as it is formally such’!

205. Against the next one [n.275], namely that divine relations are primarily diverse, the argument is as has frequently been made [cf. Ord. 1 d.26 n.51], and one of the middle terms can be repeated: that then someone who knows one origination in divine reality, and who does not know whether that origination is filiation or inspiriting, would have a concept only about the word used [cf. 1 d.23 n.9]. Therefore the problems would be empty that are raised about generation in general and that are solved through their own middle terms before the question about productions in particular is raised [cf. 1 d.23 nn.19-16].

206. Against the next [n.176], namely that to relation, as it is relation, there belongs its being to some other distinct thing, because otherwise, if it is not to some other distinct thing, one would be able to say that paternity could be a real relation without the Son, on the supposition that the extremes of the relation would not have to be in some way distinct (just as would be true of identity too [sc. that identity could be said to be a real relation in divine reality without a real and sufficient distinction between the persons, 1 d.31 n.18]). Therefore ‘this’ paternity is related either to something else distinct by filiation alone or to something else distinct by a distinction prior to the one that would be from the Son. If in the second way, the intended conclusion is got [sc. person is distinct by something absolute prior to relation]. If in the first way, then to argue ‘paternity is not related to some other distinct thing, therefore it is not real’ is to argue ‘to this relation no real relation is opposed, therefore it is not real’; but this seems to be a manifest begging of the question, because the antecedent seems no more manifest than the consequent. Therefore no argument in the case of many relations could be made to the effect that they are not real on the basis of the premise that these relations are not between extremes really distinct, but there would be a general begging of the question.

b. About the Conclusion in Itself

207. As to the other point, namely about the conclusion [n.177], the authorities of the saints seem to speak in favor of relations as doing the constituting rather than absolute properties.

108. I also adduce one reason for this, that if the first person is an absolute (let him be a), and if the second is an absolute (let him be b), then in the first moment of origin a is not the Father or a ‘this’ having a real relation, because he does not have a Son; in the second instant of nature he generates, and then there is a Son and a real relation in a; therefore the first person would acquire by the act of generation something formally existing in himself, just as does the second person - which seems unacceptable, because, just as whatever the Son has he has through generation, according to Hilary [cf. Ord. 1 d.28 n.13], so the Father has nothing by generation but has everything from himself without any beget-ability.

209. However this argument could be stated and solved by distinction of priority and posteriority of origin, so that in the first instant of origin a is posted as being the Father and in the second b is posited as being the Son, and yet a would be Father and b would be Son in nature simultaneously. And this distinction of priority and posteriority was touched on in 1 d 20 n.34.

210. Let the other reasons be examined into, those that prove this inference, ‘three persons are one God, of which persons one is from one by generation and one is from two by inspiriting; therefore the first things constituting and distinguishing these persons are relations’; if the conclusion be asserted it is something that is to be believed; for nothing that is not expressly an article of faith is to be held as simply to be believed unless it follows from something that is simply to be believed [cf. Ord. 4 d.11, Lectura 1 d.2 n.164]. Many of the reasons adduced [e.g. supra nn.165-176] to prove this inference are soluble, and many have already been solved [e.g. supra nn.178-206, Ord. 1 d.26 nn.73-94].

B. Whether a Personal Property is the Formal Reason of Terminating the Union of the Human Nature with the Word

211. As to the other principal article [n.164] of the question, namely the formal reason of terminating this union, those who would say that this union exists because of the assumer containing in himself the perfection of the reality of the created supposit [e.g. William of Ware, supra n.18] and because of the obediential potency in the assumed nature [an opinion Scotus favors, supra nn.46-47, 138], would have to say that the essence is the proper reason of terminating this union, as was argued in relation to this question in the first argument [n.154].

212. But this supposition seems false, because this dependence is of a different idea from the dependence of caused on cause; and the virtual containing that is in the term and the obediential potency that is in the dependent nature pertain to the dependence of caused on cause. Hence for these reasons I did not posit in the first question that the Word can terminate this dependence, but that it is because of independent subsistence [n.84].

213. I say     therefore that the essence is not the formal reason of terminating this union; rather the personal property is.

214. I prove this as follows: in whatever supposit there exists the formal reason of terminating this union, that supposit terminates it; the Father, in whom is the divine essence, does not terminate it; therefore etc     . - Proof of the major: a supposit only terminates because it has the formal reason of terminating, just as a supposit only creates because the formal reason of creating belongs to it; and for this reason any supposit that has in it the proximate formal reason of creating creates; hence the three persons necessarily create simultaneously.

215. The statement is made [by Giovanni de Mincio] that the property is the reason of terminating as the sine qua non.

216. Against this: whatever supposit has in it the formal reason of acting acts according to that reason, or at least can act according to that reason, and prior in nature to the action being actually elicited or to the term being produced; and this is, for it, the reason and principle of acting,a as was made clear frequently in Ord. 1 [d.2 nn.221, 226, 235, 237, 300, 302]; and, on this account, it is in this way that the Father and the Son inspirit the Holy Spirit, because they have inspiriting force, and both are prior in origin to the Holy Spirit’s being inspirited [cf. Ord. 1 d.12 nn.36, 62]; and for this reason too the three persons create, so that the power of creating is also for each person the reason of creating and of being able to create, because each of them has it naturally before the creature is produced [cf. Ord. 2 d.1 nn.17-22]. -     Therefore , by similarity: that which is the reason of terminating this union will be, for the one who has it, the reason of terminating before it does terminate, if this reason is naturally had before the union is terminated; but it is certain that this reason is not naturally had by the three persons before this union is brought about; therefore etc     .

a.a [Interpolated note] And it is understood that as the formal reason terminates so does the supposit terminate: if the former terminates actually, then the latter terminates actually, if the former aptitudinally, then the latter aptitudinally, if the former in potency, then the latter in potency. And thus is the conclusion understood. Therefore, by similarity, that it is prior in nature, because the term of one [extreme], especially in the case of [the relation] that is dependence, is not simultaneous, nor is it union, nor is it with the foundation.

     [Second interpolated note] That is precisely: if [the formal reason] is got posteriorly, then [the supposit] does not act by it; similarly, not even if [the supposit] is got simultaneously in nature with the foundation; for then the Son would generate himself.

217. One can respond to the reason [n.214] in another way, that the three persons have the essence in different ways, and because of this different way of having the essence, one person can terminate the union such that the essence is for him the reason of terminating but is not so for the others.

218. Against this [n.217] one can argue in two ways:

First as follows: because since this union is real, it has a real term and has it under a real idea; therefore a relation of reason is not the formal reason of terminating the union (but this way of having the formal reason is only a relation of reason in the essence itself, for otherwise the essence would be really related to itself or to the person); therefore the essence, as so possessed, is not formally the reason for terminating the union, such that the essence, as so possessed, should be the proper reason for terminating the union.

219. Second: because the only distinction in way of possessing the essence is one that pertains to origin; but it is not because of this distinction that one person terminates the union and another person does not, because the distinction would be the same if the Father had been incarnated and not the Son, and yet the Son would not, in that case, have terminated the union as he does now; therefore, because of this distinction (which is necessary), the essence is not for one person the reason of terminating the union (which is contingent) and not for another.

C. Solution of the Question

220. The solution of the question, therefore, is plain from these two articles [n.164; nn.165-210, nn.215-219], namely that the property of the Word is the reason of terminating, and that, according to the authorities, it seems to be a relative or a relation of origin n.207], although the reasons adduced [nn.165-171] do not prove this [nn.179-199].The Vatican editors say that Scotus’ answer here is more motivated by the authorities of the saints than by the arguments adduced (which he has just been criticizing). One might also add that Scotus himself, while allowing that the persons are in some sense relatives, seems nevertheless inclined to the view that their primary constituting factors are absolutes, nn.207, 210. ¹⁸

II. To the Principal Arguments

221. To the arguments.

As to the first [n.154], it is plain that the major is false, and that the reasons are not reasons for proving the possibility of the incarnation.

222. To the next [n.155] I say that to communicate being is not the same as for the divine being to inform human nature formally, nor even to communicate it as efficient cause, namely as if the person assuming, by efficient causality, give some being to the assumed nature from the fact of assuming it - but this ‘to communicate’ is to terminate the dependence of existing of the assumed actual nature, and this not because the ‘real existence’ of the nature assuming is the reason of terminating but because the ‘subsistence’ is, that is, the ‘incommunicable existence’. I concede that it communicates being into the form, that is, that ‘its incommunicable existence as incommunicable existence’ does so, not that existence as existence is the reason of terminating the dependence of the assumed nature.

223. As to the next [n.156] I concede the major; and the minor, when one holds to the common opinion that the persons are relatives [nn.174, 203], is denied.

III. To the Reasons Adduced for the Opinion that Holds the Persons to be Constituted by Absolutes

224. To the reasons adduced for this opinion, some of which were let go, in book 1 [d.26 nn.33-55, 60-64; those let go, nn.93-94].

225. For the response to Augustine [supra nn.53-54] see Appendix B below [last few paragraphs].

226. To the other one [Ord. 1 d.26 n.52“Again, third: the first constitutive element of a supposit in any nature seems to make something that is per se one with that nature, because it does not seem that the per accidens could be ‘first simply’ in any genus, according to the Philosopher Physics 2.1.192b20-23; but just as in creatures relation is of a different kind from the absolute and so does not make something per se one with it, so in divine reality there does not seem to be one concept per se of the absolute and of relation; therefore if person includes these two things, namely essence and relation, essentially, then person does not seem to be a supposit per se and first of such a nature but is a supposit as it were per accidens, and so it seems that some prior thing could exist that is constitutive per se of the supposit in that nature.” ¹⁹], about supposit per accidens, I say that a metaphysician speaks about ‘per accidens’ in one way and a logician in another; for the metaphysician calls ‘an entity per accidens’ what includes in it things of diverse genera, as is plain from Metaphysics 5.7.1017a7-22 ‘about being’, and 6.1015b16-36 ‘about one’; but the logician says that ‘a proposition is per accidens’ whose subject does not include the reason for inherence of the predicate, and if one concept is made from two such things - neither of which is per se determinative of the other - he says that the concept is ‘one per accidens’. There is no example in creatures of a logical concept ‘one per accidens’ save of a concept to which a ‘one per accidens metaphysically’ corresponds, because although this proposition is per accidens ‘the rational is animal’, yet, by joining one to the other, one of them is determinative of the other; therefore the whole concept is not a one per accidens, but only some concept that brings together the concepts of two genera.

To the issue at hand, then, I say that the proposition ‘paternity is deity’ can be conceded to be per accidens - logically speaking -, because the subject as it is subject does not include the reason for inherence of the predicate as it is predicate, because the subject is not the predicate formally. Also, by joining the concept of the subject to the concept of the predicate (by saying ‘God is Father’) one concept does not per se determine the other, because, according to Damascene (Orthodox Faith 3.6), the properties determine the hypostases, not the nature; therefore this concept is not in itself per se one, and so it does not state a concept per se one with respect to any supposit; for what is not per se one in itself in things is not the per se supposit of anything - and so it is in the case of concepts. Thus therefore, speaking logically, it could be conceded that the Father is not the per se supposit of God.

227. But I argue against this, because a primary identity cannot be per accidens, and as not in the case of things so not in the case of concepts either; but there seems to be a primary identity of a primary nature with its supposit; therefore this identity is not per accidens but per se.

228. I reply: primary identity in the case of predication is when anything is said of itself, as ‘man is man’ and ‘God is God’. But, when speaking of real things, according to the metaphysician, since here [sc. in the case of ‘God is Father’ or ‘Paternity is Deity’] there are no genera nor anything of any genus (from Ord. 1 d.8 nn.95-115), there will here be no being per accidens; nor does the inference hold, ‘the supposit is logically per accidens, therefore the supposit is metaphysically per accidens’, because ‘to be a supposit’ states the disposition of something as subject to something as predicate - and thus the supposit can be said to be ‘per accidens’ because of accidentality on the part of the inherence but not on the part of the extremes or the terms.

229. And if it be objected that ‘here things are conceded that are as it were of two genera, namely substance and relation’ [sc. therefore the extremes or the terms must be per accidens]- I reply: the proper idea of things, as to genera or quasi genera, does not make the whole to be a per accidens being, but rather the disposition of thing to thing does, namely non-identity simply; but as it is, although the proper and formal idea of relation - which remains here - does not include formally the idea of essence, yet in reality one of them is most truly the same as the other [sc. ‘relation’ and ‘essence’], and because of this identity there is no disposition of reality to reality of the sort required of things that constitute a per accidens being.

230. And if it be objected against the first part [n.228, ‘and thus the supposit can be said to be ‘per accidens’ because of accidentality on the part of the inherence’] that ‘since in creatures the supposit of a nature can be per se one, why not here [in divine reality] in the same way?’, one can reply that some imperfect absolute thing can be incommunicable, and universally something that per se contracts in some genus can be incommunicable, just as it can be communicable - and thus that which in any created thing pertains to some genus can be something that belongs to the genus and that constitutes an incommunicable; but a simply perfect thing cannot be incommunicable nor can it be something of the same idea (and of this sort, according to this opinion, everything is that is absolute in divine reality), and so nothing ‘as it were of the same genus as the essence’ can constitute a person or a supposit there, but only something which is as it were of a different genus. An example: if anything in the genus of substance, up to the furthest point where it is constituted as ‘this substance’, were a perfection simply and so communicable, ‘this substance’ could not be further contracted by anything (because what is of itself a ‘this’ is not further determinable in itself), but only through something in the genus of quality or quantity could it constitute something incommunicable, because the quality or quantity would not be a perfection simply; then the thing constituted of substance and accident would be a being per accidens, and so it would exist per accidens if one of these realities was not perfectly the same as the other.

231. Thus is it set down in the issue at hand, that the essence is a perfection simply, and that whatever is of the same genus or idea is a for itself along with the essence; and therefore anything such is communicable and yet is of itself a ‘this’. And further: that which is of itself a ‘this’ cannot be contracted, but can - by the fact it is a ‘this’ - only be constituted as something incommunicable through something that is not a perfection simply, and that therefore is not of the same genus as the essence but is as it were of a different genus.

232. To the other one [Ord. 1 d.26 n.45“Whatever constitutes existence in something, and in the unity corresponding to such existence, is wholly first repugnant to a distinction opposite to that unity (example: if rational first constitutes man in his being and specific unity, rational is wholly first repugnant to a specific distinction such that, when removing if possible or per impossibile everything other than rational that is not part of the meaning of rational and keeping only the meaning of rational, a division into diverse specific natures will be repugnant to it). And the proof of this proposition is that if such a distinction is repugnant to the constituted whole, then it is repugnant to it by something; let that something be a; if it is wholly repugnant to the a itself then the intended conclusion is gained, - if not but it is repugnant to the a itself through b, there will be a process ad infinitum or, wherever a stand is made, that will be the ultimate constituent in such a unity and a distinction opposed to such unity will be wholly repugnant to it. Therefore if paternity constitutes the first supposit in its personal being under the idea of its being incommunicable, then communicability must of its own idea be first repugnant to paternity.” ²⁰] I say that ‘paternity’ is of itself formally incommunicable; not indeed the concept, which - according to what was said elsewhere [Ord. 1 d.8 nn.236-150] - cannot be abstracted from divine and created paternity as univocal, but the reality that exists in divinity (and that is not formally the essence itself) is formally incommunicable and not as it were through an extrinsic determination (namely the determination ‘because it is divine’). The reason for its incommunicability is as follows: that just as the essence is ultimate act, and therefore cannot be determined by anything with respect to which it is as it were potential, so whatever is in it is ultimate, with the ultimate actuality possible for it, such that in the instant of nature in which ‘wisdom’ burgeons in the essence, it burgeons according to the ultimate determination that it is able to have; hence too the reality that is wisdom formally is not determinable. Likewise, whatever can be incommunicable in the first instant of nature in which it burgeons in the nature is incommunicable and burgeons as incommunicable (and not first as communicable, because then it would be determinable through something by which it would be made incommunicable).

233. And if you say that ‘paternity’ is only incommunicable because it is in the divine essence (for this reality of [divine] paternity only has the fact that it is of itself ultimately determinate because it is in the divine essence) - I say that whatever is as it were originally and fundamentally intrinsic to divine reality is from the essence, because the essence of God, according to Damascene [Orthodox Faith 1.9], is a certain sea of infinite substance; but yet these other things possess formally their own ideas and are by themselves formally such primarily, so that ‘wisdom’, although it gets as it were originally and fundamentally from the essence that it is a perfection simply, is yet formally a perfection simply and is in itself formally infinite, such that in the same instant of nature in which wisdom is now actually in the essence it will, after the removal per impossibile of the essence itself, remain the understanding of wisdom simply and of infinite wisdom. Thus, in the ‘now’ of nature in which ‘paternity’ is understood to be in the essence, it is by itself formally incommunicable, with the essence then per impossibile removed.

Nor is it here a contradiction that something should as it were originally or causally have from another that which belongs to it formally, the way the hot is of itself formally contrary to cold although it is causally this from fire, to which it is not formally contrary. So it is in the case of other things, that the entity by which something is constituted in its specific being is of itself formally indivisible into several species, even given per impossibile that it is uncaused, although as it is it has this indivision causally from there from where it causally is.

234. And if you object, ‘why does some entity arise communicable in the essence and this one incommunicable?’ - I say that there is no formal reason for this save that this entity is ‘this’ and that entity is ‘that’, and that this entity, because it is ‘this’, is communicable and that that entity, because it is ‘that’, is incommunicable, so that it could not arise unless it arose formally incommunicable, and so that the other could not arise unless it arose formally communicable. But the extrinsic reason for this - as it were the original and fundamental reason - is that the essence is radically infinite, wherefrom can arise intrinsically not only communicable perfections simply but also incommunicable properties; but any one of these arises, when it arises, determinate with the highest determination possible for it.

235. From this [nn.232-234] is plain the response to all the proofs that show paternity is not of itself incommunicable [Ord. 1 d.26 nn.45-50].

For when you say ‘it is not of itself a this’ [ibid., n.47], I say this is false, when one understands it formally of the reality that is ‘paternity’ and not of a concept common to this paternity and to that, because (as was expounded in 1 d.8 nn.136-150, d.23 n.9 [nothing in 2 d.23 referred to by Scotus]) there can be a common concept when there is no order of realities intrinsically of which one is contractive or determinative of the other. But this paternity or that is not of itself a ‘this’, that is, is not a ‘this’ fundamentally, but is so from the essence, and paternity is incommunicable from the same essence itself because it is not a ‘this’ before it is incommunicable; but there arises, without any order of singularity toward incommunicability in this reality, a reality supremely determinate in the first instant of nature in which it arises.

236. Nor is the proposition true [Ord. 1 d.26 n.46] that ‘every quiddity is communicable’, but only that quiddity is which is a perfection simply or is divisible (for the first is communicated in unity of nature without division of itself, and the second is communicated with division of itself); this quiddity [sc. paternity, n.235] is not a perfection simply nor is it divisible, because it exists in a nature perfect simply.

237. Nor is the proposition true [ibid., d.26 nn.48-49] that ‘opposite relations are of themselves equally communicable’, but rather active inspiriting arises as communicable to two and can never become incommunicable by anything determining it; but passive inspiriting is of itself, in the same instant in which it arises in divine reality, formally incommunicable.

238. Also as to the statement [ibid., d.26 n.50] that ‘with anything whatever posited - possible or impossible -, and while its idea stands, it remains incommunicable’, I concede it as to ‘while its idea stands’ and ‘with nothing posited that is repugnant to its idea’. But if what is posited is that its idea remains and that there is something repugnant to it, then from opposites in the antecedent follow opposites in the consequent, namely that it is incommunicable formally of itself and also that it can be communicated. So it is in the issue at hand: if inspiriting is posited as preceding active generation, then something is posited incompatible with the paternity of the Father and yet the idea of paternity remains - and thus from the first would follow that paternity is communicable and yet from the second that it is incommunicable; hence there is formally a contradiction in generation being the second production in divine reality.

The paternity, therefore, because it is divine, is incommunicable, such that the ‘because’ is the circumstance of original or fundamental principle and not of principle contracting or determining in the way that white is contracted when ‘white man’ or ‘human whiteness’ is said; for here this whiteness is understood beforehand as existing in itself and, as such, it would be indeterminate and determinable so as to belong to a man; and it is determined when ‘human whiteness’ is said, but not because whiteness arises from the nature of man and is, in the instant in which it arises, of itself indeterminate. So it is, oppositely, in the issue at hand, because, just as a cause would not give being to an effect unless it gave to it ‘an existence agreeing with the effect’, and just as it would not produce this effect unless it produced something that was of a nature to have such an effect (for instance, no cause would cause a triangle formally unless it produced something that was of a nature to have three angles equal to two right angles, and if it could produce something that did not necessarily have three such angles, it would not produce a triangle but something else; nor is there any reason for this save that the formal idea of a triangle is such that it be a triangle), so I say that deity would not be the formal idea of any intrinsic reality unless this reality arose such that - in the first instant in which it is - it be determinate with ultimate determination; therefore, if it produced something determinable by some reality that came to it as it were from outside after it was already produced, it would not produce something intrinsic in divine reality - also, if it produced something incommunicable, it would not produce a personal property but something in some way different from it.

239. To the other argument [Ord. 1 d.26 n.51] I say that, although some common concept could be got that is said quidditatively of divine paternity and divine inspiriting (rather perhaps some common concept that is said quidditatively of divine paternity and created paternity [supra n.232]), yet no reality can be distinct in the deity in any way on the part of the thing (from which this concept said quidditatively may be taken), which reality would be determinable by another reality (in the way that a common concept in the intellect is determinable by another concept); and the possibility and reason for this was touched on above, 1 d.8 n.135-150.

240. I say therefore that paternity and filiation are not diverse primarily as to understanding such that it not be possible for the intellect to abstract some common concept from them [cf. Rep. IA d.26 n.105], but they are diverse primarily as to reality and reality, so that they include no single degree of reality that is quasi potential and determinable by proper differences (in the way that whiteness and blackness include some reality of the same idea determinable by their proper specific differences, from which their specific differences are taken). And then the major proposition, which is that ‘the first distinguishing factors are primarily diverse’ [Ord. 1 d.26 n.51] must only be understood of the realities themselves that primarily constitute them as to a nonagreement, which they formally include, in some single formal reality.

241. To the other argument [ibid., d.26 n.36] I say that every real relation is between extremes really distinct, but sometimes with a distinction that precedes the relations and sometimes not but only with a distinction formally caused by the relations; and this is not only true in divine reality but also in creatures and even in accidental relations. For the will moves itself and is moved by itself, and there is not only a real relation of the will to volition but also of will as active to itself as passive (just as father is not only said really to son but also to mother, and a heating thing is not only said really to the generated heat but also to that which it heats - and universally an effect dependent on an active and passive principle necessarily requires a real relation, of the sort that is ‘of passive to active’, and this either a single or a mutual relation so that there be a relation of one or other of the principles to the effect and conversely). And yet the will, which is the foundation of these opposed relations of ‘mover and moved’ and is denominated by both of them, is itself not distinguished by any distinction of these relations but only by a distinction made by them.

242. When the argument is made [Ord. 1 d.26 n.37] against this part, that then there will be no proof by a proof that this relation is real because the extremes are really distinct - I say that one must prove by inferring the conclusion on the ground that the extremes are distinct neither by a distinction preceding the relation nor by a distinction caused by the relations. And for proving the second part [sc. ‘nor by a distinction caused by the relations’] it is not enough to take the premise that these opposed relations are said of the same thing; so the inference does not follow, ‘they are said of the same thing, therefore they are not distinguished formally by a distinction pertaining to the genus of relation’, just as the inference does not follow, ‘they are said of the same thing, therefore they are not real’ - as in the issue at hand, where mover and moved are said of the same thing and yet they are real; but one must prove it because the distinction that they cause, if they do not presuppose any distinction, is only made by them from the nature of the thing along with an act of intellect. Hence one can well concede that the argument for destroying the reality of relations, on the ground of a lack of real distinction in the extremes, frequently begs the question, and it is difficult to prove everything that is needed for that argument to be conclusive. If however everything is proved, the consequence is good. But one must eventually end up at the point that the extremes do not make the distinction they make from the nature of the thing (as with identity and identity) but rather along with an act of intellect; and one can at once argue from that middle term, passing over the middle term about the distinction of extremes; for the inference at once follows, ‘if the relation is not consequent to the nature of the thing, it is not real’. And on this way does the Philosopher rely in Metaphysics 5.9.1018a2-4 to show that identity is not a real relation, because the intellect uses the same thing twice, and not because the extremes are not distinct. But if this latter argument were accepted, one should expound the antecedent as saying that the extremes are not distinct by a distinction preceding the relation, nor by relations distinct by distinction of incompossibles, nor by a distinction of compossibles that are from the nature of the thing; and one must prove all these parts so that the enthymeme [sc. ‘the extremes are not real, therefore the relation is not real’] may prove the inferred conclusion.

243. Hence the argument about primary substance [Ord.1 d.26 nn.60-64], that it is not constituted by relation, coincides with the argument about per se supposit [ibid., d.26 n.43], and it can be similarly solved, because ‘this essence’ has this from the idea of primary substance, because it is ‘of itself a this’; yet anything that is for itself cannot have incommunicability, but rather any entity for itself is there a perfection simply; so one can find in what is posited in divine reality that it has the idea of substance in the ultimate coordination insofar as concerns its not being repugnant to perfection, namely insofar as it is a ‘this’, but not insofar as concerns incommuicability, which is something repugnant to perfection.

244. The other arguments for the opinion about constitutive absolutes were solved in 1 d.26 nn.84-92.

Appendix A

[Note by Duns Scotus] Again as follows: every relation is terminated at an absolute; but the first term of relation - in a person - is some person or some property, not the essence, but, just as essence is not related to anything, so it does not terminate a relation (for the term of a relation is distinguished as the thing related is); therefore a person, as he is distinct from another person and terminates the relation of that person to himself, is an absolute. The major is made clear in 1 d.30 nn.35-38, in the discussion about the relation of God to creatures.

Appendix B

[Note by Duns Scotus]The Vatican editors say about this note, which seems out of place where it is added, that it was written by Scotus on pieces of paper some of which were lost. So what remains is partial. ²¹ To the third [see Appendix A above] one can well say that an absolute can terminate a relation, and an absolute always does terminate in the case of relations in the mode of measure [sc. the relation of measured to measure], and this principally, as is sufficiently maintained in 1 d.30 nn.30-34, because the relations of creatures are terminated at God insofar as he is absolute; but, speaking universally [cf. ibid. n.35], one should not concede that the term of a relation is an absolute save in unlike relations, about which the argument is there [ibid. nn.35-38], namely relations that are in the genus of quality (and divine relations are not of this sort), or about the formal term (namely by reason of which the first term terminates), but not about the first term; for just as the foundation in the relatum is absolute but not always that which is related (according to this opinion [sc. Scotus’ own, about constitutive absolutes, 1 d.26 nn.57, 59, 72]), so too that which is the reason for terminating a relation is always absolute, and this is pre-required on the part of the relative term the way the foundation is required on the part of a created substance.

...The Vatican editors say that there were probably before this, but now lost, three confirmations about some statement or argument, since Scotus next immediately responds to the two final confirmations. Most likely these confirmations were drawn from Rep. IA d.26 nn.45-58, 77-82. ²²

Using the same pointNamely the point made in response to a preceding confirmation, now lost. ²³ one can reply to the next confirmation, whereby it is inferred that ‘the identity of a created substance with its supposit would be truer than the identity of the divine nature with its supposit’ [cf. Rep. IA d.26 nn.45, 79-80]; this does not follow if it is understood on the part of the thing, because although individual entity in a creature per se determines the nature and makes something per se one with it, yet that something one is a composite with some composition, even real composition; but a relation, although it does not per se determine the divine nature, is yet so truly the same as it that no composition arises in it. And therefore, speaking really or metaphysically, the identity of the divine supposit is much truer, both in itself and with the nature, than the identity of a created supposit is in itself or with its nature; but speaking logically, one can well concede that a created substance is more formally predicated of its supposit (because it is predicated in the first mode of per se), but not so is ‘God’ predicated of the Father, because ‘Father’ does not have a concept in the intellect that is as per se one as ‘Socrates’ is. - If you infer, ‘therefore the latter predication is truer than the former’, the consequence can be denied, because some less formal predication, or one that is not as per se, can be truer than some more formal and per se predication; but there is a greater identity in reality in the case of extremes that have a lesser or less formal inclination or inherence conceptually.

As to the last confirmation, one can concede as a matter of logic that of neither quiddity is there a per se supposit; in reality, however, the supposit is supposit of the nature, not of the relation, because relation there is an incommunicable property while the nature is not [Rep. IA d.26 nn.48, 81-82]. Similarly, relation passes over into the essence and not conversely, because of the infinity of the essence.

To the fourth [Rep. IA d.26 n.60, the fourth after those in nn.45, 51, 52]. Primary substance in creatures does have something of perfection to it, namely final unity (and so it is indivisible), and this is consequent to final actuality, and because of this ‘per se existence’ belongs to it; two opposites come together in secondary substance, which is both divisible and does not have ‘per se existence’ save in primary substance. These conditions of primary substance the divine essence has of itself and not formally by relation; for the essence is of itself a ‘this’ and it per se subsists, or at least it is the whole reason for subsisting, according to Augustine On the Trinity 7.6 n.11, who says that the Father is not Father by that by which he is God. In addition to this, created primary substance -because it is limited - has incommunicabilitiy, because the numerically same limited thing is not communicable; and this property does not state perfection, and so this property of primary substance does not belong to the divine essence.

Hereby is plain the response to the first argument touched on there [Ord. 1 d.26 n.60], because I concede that primary substance in divine reality, as to its being ‘most of all substance and per se subsistent’, is not constituted formally by relation, but divinity or ‘this God’ is that by which it is most of all substance and subsists.

Likewise to the second [Ord. 1 d.26 n.60] I say that the proposition ‘primary substance does not include non-substance’ is true, because of the conditions of perfection that belong to it - and so, wherever these conditions are preserved, the thing will not exist through non-substance. But as to something where this condition cannot exist through substance, which is a condition of imperfection, namely incommunicability (unlike what is posited in God, where everything that is a ‘for himself’ is posited as a perfection simply and so as communicable), there primary substance - as concerns its having this condition [sc. incommunicability] - must include non-substance.

To the third argument there touched on [Ord. 1 d.26 n.62] my reply is that paternity and this incommunicable paternity - whatever may be true of them conceptually - are in reality altogether the same, so that there is no distinction, whether real or formal, between them; and therefore that reality, in the first instant it is or burgeons in the essence, exists there under the idea of the ultimate determination possible for it. So, because determination to incommunicability is not repugnant to relation, therefore it is not only quiddity and ‘this’ but also incommunicable, and it is not at all in reality a ‘this’ before it is incommunicable; but ‘this deity’ is communicable, so that, according to this opinion [sc. the one which says the persons are constituted by relations], it is repugnant for ‘this deity’ to be incommunicable through something of its genus as it were. Therefore I deny the inference, ‘in relation there is quiddity, and this is incommunicable insofar as it is relation, therefore these cannot be found in what is for itself’, because the last one [incommunicability] is repugnant to anything that is ‘for itself’; in God, according to this opinion, incommunicability is not repugnant to relation, and therefore relation immediately has it.

To the fourth there touched on [Ord. 1 d.26 n.63]: ‘per se existence’ is conceded to ‘this essence’ or to God ‘as he is God’, but not a ‘per se existence’ by which formally something is incommunicably per se; and this latter does belong to a created person on the grounds of his limitation, because of which he is incommunicable both as ‘what’ and as ‘in which’ (this double incommunicability was spoken about in 1 d.23 n.16). It is true, then, that created substance has ‘per se existence’ and not per accidens existence, and this belongs to the substance on the grounds of its perfection - but that a created substance cannot communicate this ‘per se existence’ to anything in which it is, this is a mark of limitation. I concede here, then, that [the divine] essence is determined of itself to ‘per se existence’ (whether as to ‘what’ or as to ‘in what’), but that, along with this, it is communicable to a relative person, as being that in which the relative person has the same ‘per se existence’.

To the arguments about the fourth way [Ord. 1 d.26 nn.53-55]

To the first, from Augustine [ibid. n.53], I reply that Augustine there (On the Trinity 7.4 n.7) is saying how ‘one essence’ is spoken about, and how ‘three substances’ is said by the Greeks and ‘three persons’ by the Latins;“By our Greeks ‘one essence, three substances’ is said, but by the Latins ‘one essence or substance, three persons’, because...in our speech, that is in Latin, ‘essence’ is not usually understood differently from ‘substance’.” ²⁴ and in the text from 7.4 n.9 there adduced [Ord. 1 d.26 n.54], he says that ‘substance exists for itself’,“But it is absurd for substance to be said relatively; for every thing subsists for itself. How much more God!” ²⁵ and that ‘three substances are not properly spoken of, because substance (as is conceded in the case of divine reality) exists for itself’,On the Trinity 7.5 n.10, “However, whether essence is said (which is what is properly said) or substance (which is abusively said), both are said ‘for itself’ and not relatively to anything. Hence for God to exist is for him to subsist; and therefore if the Trinity is one essence, it is also one substance.” ²⁶ and he is taking essence and substance to be the same. Therefore he says, “one should not say ‘there are three substances’, so as not to say ‘three essences’.” Therefore he himself is not intending that substance as the Greeks take it (namely as person) exist for itself, but that he himself is not conceding that there are three substances properly, but he is only using the phrase because of necessity of speech;Ibid., 7.6 n.11, “The Greeks have preferred to say this (namely ‘three substances’), which is perhaps the more fitting expression in the custom of their speech.” ²⁷ hence he seems to prefer the Latin way of speaking, that there are ‘three persons’;Ibid., 7.5 n.10, “Perhaps therefore ‘three persons’ is a more suitable expression than ‘three substances’.” ²⁸ but this too he proves subsequently not to be proper, showing that ‘person’ is said simply ‘for itself’ as essence is.Ibid., 7.6 n.11, “For it is not one thing to be God and another to be person, but altogether the same thing. Indeed ‘person’ is said for itself.just as God is said for itself.” ²⁹ Finally, then, he draws his conclusion from this material [7.6 n.11], “We want some single word to serve for signifying what is meant by the Trinity, so that we may not be altogether silent when asked ‘three what?’” And whether ‘three persons’ is said by the Latins or ‘three substances’ by the Greeks, Augustine would say that this is said improperly and only because of the necessity of speaking. - One cannot, therefore, get from his intention that some term, signifying ‘incommunicable subsistence’ in divine reality, is for itself, but only that the names (which some adapt for expressing such an incommunicable) are in themselves absolute names, indeed are purely absolute, so that they are essentials. But one ought to have got the first point from him [sc. just above, ‘that some term.. .is for itself’] in order to get the proposed conclusion for the third opinion [sc. about absolutes, Ord. 1 d.26 n.56] in this question (which posits that in reality ‘this incommunicable subsistent’ is for itself [ibid. nn.59, 62]), and not merely that it can be expressed by some essential name, accommodated to the purpose from usage or the need to speak.

Hereby is response made to everything adduced from Augustine for this opinion [ibid., nn.54, 73-75].

To the third argument, from Richard and Boethius [ibid., n.55] the response is that just as something quidditatively common can be abstracted from an absolute and a relative - speaking of them quidditatively - , so also is something common abstracted from such and such an incommunicable, and this common thing is of itself neither an incommunicable absolute nor an incommunicable relative; something like this is described by Richard and Boethius, with this addition, that it is in an intellectual nature, so that, just as the description of a higher should not include the proper idea of something lower, so too the description of person - which states an incommunicable in intellectual nature - should not include anything that properly pertains either to an incommunicable absolute or to an incommunicable relative, but should be indifferent to both; and in this way do both describe person. I concede therefore that neither in the definition of person assigned by Richard nor in that assigned by Boethius is anything relative posited; and so I concede that there is given to person - as it is defined -neither absolute being nor relative being but something indifferent to both, so that, just as in the case of some nature (as in that of a creature) the idea is only in particular found in an absolute or in the idea of an absolute, so in the case of the divine nature it is only found in a relative.