Single Question. Whether there was True SorrowThe Latin word is ‘dolor’, which also means ‘pain’ and is sometimes so translated in what follows. ⁹⁵ in Christ’s Soul as to its Higher Part

1. About the fifteenth distinction I ask whethera there was true sorrow in Christ’s soul as to its higher part.St. Augustine On the Trinity 12.3. n.3, “...the part of reason that is turned toward management of temporal things [=lower part], so that the image of God does not remain save in the part with which man’s mind clings to gazing upon eternal reasons and considering them [=higher part].” ⁹⁶

a.a [Interpolation] About the fifteenth distinction, where the Master treats of the defects Christ assumed along with his human nature, a single question is raised, namely whether^

2. That there was not:

‘Contraries cannot exist in the same thing at the same time’ [Metaphysics 10.5.1055a37-38]; joy and sadness are contraries and Christ had supreme joy;     therefore etc     . The proof of the major is, first, that ‘the opposition of contradictories is greater than all other opposites and therefore its idea is included in all the others’ [Metaphysics 10.4.1055a33-b1], and consequently it follows all the others such that contradictories follow on any opposite; second, that the Philosopher gives this meaning in Metaphysics 4.3.1005b19-24, that if contradictories are posited to exist in the same thing then contradictories are true of the same thing.

3. And if it be said to the major that motion includes contraries because the term ‘from which’ is not totally removed at once nor the term ‘to which’ introduced at once; on the contrary what is moved is, while in motion, partly in the term ‘from which’ and partly in the term ‘to which’, from Physics 6.4.234b10-17, Metaphysics 9.9.1051a4-21. Against this is that the terms are not together at the same time in their supreme and complete existence because then they would be incompossible, and even when they are together in some way, the one diminishes the other; but in Christ’s case his joy was not diminished, because it was not fitting that the enjoyment of his soul be diminished on account of a meritorious act that was so acceptable to the Trinity it satisfied for the human race.

4. If it be said to the minor [n.2] that joy and sorrow are not contraries in the matter at hand because they are not in the same subject or about the same object - on the contrary: what contraries concern is the same subject but they need not have the same cause; for white and black if caused by contraries (as hot and cold) are as contrary and incompossible as they would be if able be caused by the same cause; but the object is related to joy and sorrow also as efficient cause;     therefore etc     .

5. Further, the impassibility of the body exists in the body because of God glorifying it, and nevertheless it does not experience any passion of the body because of any lower cause; therefore impassibility and passion - even when from diverse causes - are incompossible; so by parity of reason in the matter at hand.

6. Further and third thus: the impeccability of a soul is inferred principally from the fact that it is joined immediately to the ultimate end; and yet with this coheres that it not be capable of sin about any other object whatever, although there is as great a distinction of objects about which those opposites might be found as exists in the matter at hand.

7. Further, Ethics 7.15.1154b13-14 ‘A strong pleasure expels sadness, not only an opposite pleasure but any chance pleasure’; therefore, even if there were no contrariety, still an excelling joy about one thing would expel all sorrow.

8. Confirmation of this point is that, according to Avicenna On the Soul part 4 chapter 2, natural powers impede each other when their acts are intense (as is plain in the rapture of Paul, who did not know whether he saw the mysteries of God in the body or out of it, as he says in 2 Corinthians 12.1-4); much more then does it seem that the same power, by the strength of its operation or passion about one object, would impede itself in an operation or passion about another.

9. The point is also confirmed by the proposition in On Causes 17, where it is said that ‘every power when united is greater than itself when dispersed’.

10. Further, joy is expansion of heart and sadness constriction of heart; the heart cannot at the same time be constricted and expanded;     therefore etc     .

11. Again Hilary (in the Master’s text) seems expressly to reckon that sadness is true sorrow.

12. To the contrary:

Isaiah 53.4, ‘He truly carried our sorrows’.

13. Again, Lamentations 1.12 says, in the person of Christ, ‘see if there is any sorrow like unto my sorrow’; but there can be sorrow that is greater than any sorrow that does not reach the superior part of the soul, just as there can also be a joy in the higher part (as in the case of the blessed) that is greater than any joy in the lower part.

14. Further, Christ merited through suffering; merit is principally found in the higher part;     therefore etc     .

14. Further, Christ satisfied for the sin of Adam; Adam sinned in his higher part; therefore Christ made satisfaction in that part, for satisfaction should concern that which the sin concerned.

16. Further, Christ’s death was a violent one; therefore it was involuntary and sad. The antecedent is plain, because he did not then die in a natural way, nor is his death altogether natural but is a penalty for fallen nature.

17. Further, Damascene Orthodox Faith 69 (3.23), ‘Fear is natural when the soul is unwillingly separated from the body, because of the natural fellow feeling and association placed in it at the beginning by the Creator’; but an evil that is feared when imminent causes sadness when present; therefore, because of the natural law imposed by the Creator, Christ’s soul was saddened by the passion - and consequently saddened as to its higher part, because to have regard to the law imposed by the Creator belongs to the higher part, for that part judges according to eternal laws.

18. Again Damascene in the same place, ‘Now in no way did the deity assume suffering without a body that suffered, nor did the deity display trouble and sadness without a sad and troubled soul, nor is he afflicted without an afflicted understanding’; the word ‘understanding’ does at least mean something that exceeds everything sensitive.

19. Further on Psalm 87.4 ‘my soul is full of evils’ Augustine says (On Psalms 87.3) ‘not the evils of vice but of punishment’; therefore each part suffered and sorrowed.

I. Brief Reply of Others to the Question and Rejection of it

20. Here someone [Bonaventure] draws a distinction about the higher part: that as this part is a nature Christ did thus grieve, because this part is founded in the soul that was grieving; or, on the other hand, that as this part is the higher part, or is his reason, he did not thus grieve, because not with respect to the object that his reason had regard to.

21. An argument against this distinction is that no predicate is said to be present in anything because of something that is accidental to the reason for the inherence of the predicate/accident (just as a man is not said to build insofar as he is musical, even if someone musical happens to be a builder); therefore Christ’s soul will not be said to grieve according to the higher part if the sorrow is present in some accident that is accidentally joined to the higher part; such is the reason [or higher part] of Christ as it is nature and has to the soul the respect of foundation, as foundation of the sorrow.

22. In confirmation of this reasoning is that the soul could in this way be said to understand according to the will, that is, as the will is nature and not as it is will, for the soul itself, which is a will, does understand.

23. Again, it does not belong to the soul to grieve as it is distinguished from the power or powers, just as neither does it thus belong to the soul to have regard to the object about which it grieves; but the soul itself, taken by itself alone, is a unity in its lower and higher part not as it regards some object but as it is first act; therefore it cannot, as it is a unity in both these parts, be the reason that one or other of the parts should grieve; therefore it does not thus belong to the soul to grieve. Therefore the higher part will not be said to grieve because of the soul (which is the same soul as in the grieving lower part), for it is not the same as it.

24. Again, if the higher part did come to know grief for the soul, this would be most of all because of its separation from the body (and the soul as it is nature does properly perfect the body and does have a natural inclination to the body); but the consequent is false, because the higher part was made impassible in the separation of the soul from the flesh; so it was not then saddened.

II. Fuller Examination of the Question and Solution to it

25. For solution of this question the authority of Augustine in City of God 14.15 n.2 must be put forward first. He says there that “the pain of the flesh is only an offense to the soul coming from the flesh and a certain opposition of the soul to the passion of the body, just as sorrow of mind, which is called sadness, is the opposition of the mind to things that happen to us against our will.” From these words is made plain the distinction between pain properly speaking, which is in the soul from the flesh and primarily as to sensation, and sadness properly speaking, which is in the soul in itself and in it primarily as to the intellective part.

26. For the solution, then, one needs first to see what pain and what sadness are when these terms are taken properly; second to see how there was true pain in Christ’s soul and as to which power and about what object; and third to see about sadness, and here to see first whether it was present in the higher part, and second whether it was present in the lower part and about what objects.

A. What Pain and Sadness are

1. Pain

a. Opinion of Henry of Ghent

27. As to the first matter, one assertion is [Henry of Ghent, Quodlibet 11 q.8] that “the first root of pain is an alteration in a fitting natural disposition that offends and corrupts it; the second and proximate root of pain is apprehension of this alteration.” The second root is not sufficient without the first, since otherwise the blessed could feel pain after the resurrection; for if one of the blessed were in fire he would apprehend the supreme heat perfectly but would not be harmed by it, and so, if mere apprehension without an alteration first were sufficient, someone blessed could be in pain while in a fire that was afflicting him.

28. But a distinction is made about apprehension, that apprehension is one thing and perception another; for sense apprehension has the sensible thing itself for object (as the apprehension of sight has color for object and the apprehension of hearing has sound for object), but the perception annexed to apprehension has an agreeable or harmful sense condition for object. This perception of what is agreeable or harmful has the power to move us to the experiencing of it that the thing itself has, as is plain from De Motu Animalium 7.701b16-32, that “phantasms sometimes, like things, move us to being warmed and cooled, and a small change in the heart causes a big one in the body; for just as a small change in the ship’s wheel causes a big change in the prow, so these sense intentions, possessing the power of the object, can move us to passions in the soul, namely pain; and they also accompany the body’s changes in its natural undergoings of hot and cold.”

29. In this way, then, apprehension is said to be only a cause sine qua non, as being the second root of pain; but perception, as the first root, is cause as to why there is pain. Because there is in a sense-intention of something agreeable and harmful the idea of being able to be moved to some passion in the soul (as being the object that the intention concerns), so the idea of moving power exists also in perception as to causing in the body the real undergoing that the perception in the soul accompanies.

b. Rejection of the Opinion

30. Against these assertions.

First, it seems that the first root [n.27] is no root, because just as (according to him) “the first root of pain is an alteration in a fitting natural disposition that offends and corrupts it,” so the first root in pleasure is “an alteration in a fitting natural disposition that induces and preserves it.” But this alteration seems to be no alteration, for I ask what the term of the alteration is. Not the sensation itself because the alteration precedes the sensation as the first root precedes the second; nor much less can it be the sensation which follows the passion, because this sensation follows both roots; therefore the proper term is the disposition of both, which naturally precedes both every act of sense and every act of the delighting or sorrowing power. But nothing such seems necessary for pleasure, for nothing precedes the two of them save perhaps the species of the object; but if the species had thus pre-existed in the imaginative power, which conserves the species, there could no less be a new alteration, and every root necessary for pleasure should now be kept preserved. But if the sensation alone existed, there could no less be some pleasure, because there would no less be some perfect operation which, according to the Philosopher (Ethics 10.4.1174b18-23), is necessarily followed by pleasure.

31. Further, that the second root is sufficient without the first is proved by the fact that, although the organ of sense is a natural body (and so capable of undergoing a real passion), yet it is, as an organ of sense, so balanced that it is in proportion between the sense objects; in this way indeed is it of a nature to receive alterations in intention from the object as the object is a sense object; and in this way some object is agreeable to sense and another is disagreeable, and so is something that delights or pains. Therefore, even if every action prior to the intentional act were removed, still, provided the intentional act were of some thus disagreeable object in the organ (as it is a sense organ), or in the sense, pain would follow.

32. And this seems to be clear in the case of some of the senses, for although a disposition really preservative of an individual’s nature be induced by certain sense objects, yet these sense objects cause the feeling of pain if they are disagreeable to the senses as they are sense organs (as in the case of bitter medicine that pains the sense of taste, although it is healthy for the sick person [Ethics 10.2.1173b20-28]). For only the sense of touch is so bestowed by nature on animals that what disagrees with this sense as a sense accompanies what disagrees with it as a nature. And that is why the two alterations in the other senses go together even though one is of a different idea from the other, and even though the one that is sensed in the sense organ could be without the other (and conversely), and so the disagreeableness in the one could be without the disagreeableness in the other - and so pain without the first root.

33. As to the objection about the blessed [n.27], it will be touched on in Ord.4 d.44 p.2 q.2 nn.2-9, about how the bodies of the damned are made by corporeal fire to suffer.

34. As to the point about the difference between apprehension and perception [n.28], it seems that one power has only one perfect act at the same time; therefore the senses should not be posited as having two acts about their object at the same time, even though the same act qua ‘perfect’ could be called perception and qua ‘imperfect’ be called apprehension. So it is called apprehension when, namely, the operation of the senses is imperfect because the one sensing is distracted, being busied in his intention about the action of the other powers. Also, if apprehension and perception should be distinguished, perception seems more removed from pain than apprehension, because the operation that perception expresses seems to be more pleasant than the passion that apprehension expresses.

35. Also, what Henry seems to say of objects of sensitive perception as to their relations [sc. that they involve the idea of the agreeable and disagreeable, n.28] is not correct, because no sense can perceive the relations but perceives only certain non-relational or absolute things that are the principles which move the senses; but relations are not principles of moving any sense to any act.

36. Likewise, if the relations are posited to be objects of an act other than apprehension, it seems one should posit two acts of sight and two acts of hearing (and so on of each sense), one of which would apprehend color or sound and the other of which would perceive the intentions that circumstance them, because powers get their distinctions from distinct first objects.

37. What is cited from De Motu Animalium [n.28] does not serve to show that the intentions of agreeable and disagreeable cause the first bodily passions in the heart that the animal passions follow, nor even that they cause those very animal passions - rather it serves to show that the very sense objects, which are displayed in imagination (and which Aristotle is there talking about), or the imaginations themselves by virtue of the objects, cause such passions; and so the text serves to show that one must posit as causing pain ideas that are objective and are different from relational ones.

c. Scotus’ own Response

38. One can reply in another way as follows. Active and passive power are, in general, the same in absolute nature (namely, some hot thing is the same as the heating power and another hot thing the same as the heatable power), and on these absolute natures are founded certain relations such that ‘this passive thing’ is disposed to ‘this active thing’ so as to receive from it the form for which it is in passive potency; and when a power thus proportioned or disposed comes close to the active thing, there is then a relation of coming close together, a mutual relation, on which it follows that the passive thing receives a form from the active thing -not however that the relation of action in the active thing and of passion in the passive thing, or their tendencies prior to their coming together (or the relation of coming close in the active and passive thing), are causes of such a form; rather these relations will be causes ‘sine qua non’. So, in like manner, one can say as to the matter at hand that this absolute thing, e.g. sight, is disposed to some visible thing as to something perfective of it (e.g. to some perfect or beautiful white thing) and, conversely, to a contrary visible thing as to something corruptive of it (or it is not disposed to it but disposed from it), and then the relation that is the term of the relation of the disposing to the disposed is called ‘agreement’ and the contrary is called ‘disagreement’ (because there is no relation of equality in the sense objects but of inequality), insofar as the ‘agreeable’ is said to be that to which it is dispositionally inclined (that is, to something extrinsic which is perfective of it), and the ‘disagreeable’ that from which it is dispositionally disinclined as from something extrinsic that is corruptive and offensive to it. Nor is there any other reason that sight is disposed with such an inclination to something white save that sight is the sort of passive thing it is and white the sort of active thing it is; just as there is no other reason that matter is inclined to form as to an intrinsic perfection save that matter is the sort of absolute entity it is and form the sort of absolute entity it is. Now upon this relation, which is founded on these absolute terms, there follows a coming together, which coming together is greatest when the white thing in its very presence is seen or perceived by sight.

39. From this coming together it follows that the inclined thing receives (from the perfective thing to which it is inclined) some perfection; and this perfection is pleasure, which, because it only moves in the presence of the agent cause, is called a ‘passion’, though it is really a quality and not of the genus of ‘passion’ as passion is a category (as I said elsewhere [On the Categories qq. 3036 nn.54-60]). For a like reason intellection is called an ‘action’, though it is really a quality; also, just as intellection possesses something additional to this idea of action (namely that, like action, it has regard to an object), so this additional something has regard to an efficient cause by which it is produced as a passion is. And by these two facts one says ‘it [intellection] is an action’ and ‘it is a passion’.

40. The idea then of being cause of this pleasure is not the agreement that was the relation, nor either is it the presence of the object in perception, which is a different relation (a sort of coming together of agent and passive thing); rather the absolute form alone (on which the relation of being active object is founded) has the idea of causing also the absolute (which is the pleasure) in the absolute that is inclined to this absolute (the absolute form) as to an extrinsic cause of perfection.

41. So too from the opposite side about pain, that the absolute which is disposed against the corruptive object called ‘disagreeable’ (as the object is referred to the power) is followed by a coming together, and this is followed, third, by the impression of the passion which is the pain; and this pain is, as an intrinsic form, contrary to the disposition of the receiver of pain, just as the passive thing is, as extrinsic, contrary to the receiver’s disposition.

42. As to the commonly stated remark that ‘the agreeable pleases and the disagreeable saddens’, it must not be understood causally, as if the agreeableness or disagreeableness were the reasons for causing pleasure and pain in the power; but we abstract certain general reasons from the distinct absolute things (to which causing those effects belongs), and from those reasons (to which it belongs to be efficient cause of pleasure and pain) we abstract reasons of agreeable and disagreeable, as that we abstract the idea of disagreeable from that which is efficient cause of pain, and we take the idea of agreeable from that which is efficient cause of pleasure. It is as if we were to say that every active thing when close at hand acts on the passive thing; ‘active’ and ‘passive thing’ spoken of as relations are not the reasons for acting and undergoing, but rather the absolute things are that those relations refer to.

43. But if it be asked on what the form is impressed - as on what disposed perfectible thing the form called ‘pleasure’ is impressed and on what counterdisposed perfectible thing the form called ‘pain’ is impressed, whether on the sense power as apprehending things or as appetite - it seems more to be on the appetite, because we can distinguish the power by which the soul can apprehend something from the power by which the soul is inclined to some extrinsic thing that is perfective of it [n.38], and the inclination naturally has the preceding apprehension as term. And so, just as we attribute apprehension per se to sense, so it seems that the inclination (the inclination namely whose term follows on the apprehension) belongs to the sensitive appetite; for we posit a sensitive appetite only because of such a term and the pleasure that follows apprehension; and so, since the form that terminates the inclination belongs to the same thing that the being inclined belongs to, pleasure will be in the appetite that was inclined.

44. This is confirmed from Damascene Orthodox Faith ch.38 [2.22], “the term, that is, the definition, of the animal passions is this: ‘Passion is a movement of the sensible appetitive power in imagination of good and evil.’” ‘Sensible’ is put for ‘perceptible’ because a non-perceptible passion is not properly an animal passion; ‘in imagination of good and evil’ is put there as cause, for ‘good’ and ‘evil’ are put there as something absolute; but ‘agreeable’ or ‘disagreeable’ is the cause of the passion, and ‘imagination’, that is sensation in general, is a sort of coming together of agent and passive thing.

45. Further, the moral virtues are located in appetite and not in the cognitive part as it is distinguished from appetite, and they are located thus most of all because of pleasure, for they concern pleasures and sadnesses [cf. Ord. 3 d.33]. So the passions seem to be in the same part and not in the sensitive [cognitive] part. Therefore does Avicenna say in his Metaphyics 8.7 that “pleasure is the conjunction of any power/virtue with what is agreeable to it.”

46. Alternatively, Avicenna takes ‘virtue’ there as it includes the cognitive part as well as its own appetitive part, for any proper cognitive part has its own appetitive part and cannot be conjoined perfectly with anything agreeable to it unless conjoined according to both parts. And because of this closeness they are taken to be one power; for they are more inseparably conjoined than operation and pleasure, which the Philosopher says, Ethics 10.5.1175a19-21, seem to be the same because they cannot be separated from each other. Now such predications are causal, so that the sense is “pleasure belongs to any power agreeing with its agreeable object, for it is caused by an object agreeable to sense.”

2. On Sadness

a. On the First Mode or Way of being Sad, that is, on Sadness as it Arises from an Object that is not Wanted

47. Further, the like things must to some extent be said about sadness and to some extent not. Sense appetite, indeed, has something absolute that is of its nature agreeable to it (as an extrinsic perfective thing) and something disagreeable to it (as an extrinsic corruptive thing); and in this respect the like holds true of the will. But in another respect there is a difference, because the sense appetite is drawn naturally to its object (hence, according to Damascene, ch. 38, 2.22, “[sense appetite] is led and does not lead”), whereas the same is not true of an object taken in relation to the will, which is free. Still, there is an object that is of its nature agreeable to the will, namely the ultimate end, since this end is in ultimate agreement with the will through an act of the will accepting it and being pleased with it. And such agreement occurs through wanting the object, or disagreement occurs through not wanting the object; and thus the relations of agreement and disagreement (which accompany the ideas of the willed and the unwanted object) are followed by coming close to this object, namely the apprehension that the thing wanted or not wanted really exists; and from this last fact there seems to follow in the will a passion caused by the object by its very presence, namely joy and sadness.

48. Now the fact that sadness properly taken is a passion of the will seems to be because sadness is not an action or operation of the will; for that it is not an act of willing is plain, and the proof that it is not a not wanting or a not willing is that God and the blessed can supremely not want and not will something, but they cannot be saddened, for that with respect to which they have a not wanting or a not willing cannot come about; “but sadness is about things that happen to us against our will,” according to Augustine [n.25]. The point is clear from the fact that God, when he supremely does not want something, prohibits it from ever happening; but when such a not wanting something exists in a wayfarer and the thing happens, the wayfarer will be saddened, and he will be the more saddened the more his will is against it (from Augustine’s definition of sadness). There will then be something in the wayfarer that was not there before, because he was not saddened before. But there is no operation in the wayfarer, either simply so or to any degree that it was not present before. Nor again does the passion exist in the will as something brought about by the will, for then the will would have immediate power over it, just as it has power over willing and not willing. But the will does not have such power; for when something unwanted happens to someone who does not will it, he seems not to have the resulting sadness in his immediate power. Further, if the sadness were from the will as from an active power, it would be an operation of the will, just as ‘willing’ is, which is an operation from the will and in the will.

49. If it be objected that then the object is necessarily acting on the will by imposing passion on it (which seems to be against the will’s freedom), my response is that the will is not simply necessitated by the object, but rather that, between the things that are shown to it, there can be a necessity of consequence, as with ‘if I will, I will’. Thus, if there is a not wanting some object and that not wanted object comes about, then it necessarily follows, by the necessity of consequence, that there can be sadness in the will. An example is a free man who voluntarily holds land burdened by a duty of service. It is not immediately in this man’s power not to fulfill the service but on the contrary to fulfill it - or it is immediately in his power to give up holding the land and, thereby, not to be bound to service, or not to serve. So in the issue at hand, it is immediately in the will’s power not to will against the object and, thereby, not to be saddened by the object if it comes about, for then the object would not be something he does not want; but if there is something he does not want and that something comes about, then, as long as his not wanting it remains, sadness follows necessarily by the necessity of consequence.

50. And if it be asked ‘why then can the will not receive a passion from the object as it receives the volition itself from the willed object?’ - I reply that the will as will is free but as not wanting it is not free formally, because it then has a form determined to one particular thing, which form is that very not wanting. But although what is free does not, as free, immediately receive a passion from the object, yet as determined to one of the opposites (which determination is a natural form for it) it can be determinately disposed by that form to one of the objects and not be open to both, and so it can suffer.

b. On the Second Mode or Way of being Said, that is, on Sadness as it Arises from an Object naturally Disagreeable or from an Object Disagreeable to Sense Appetite

51. Apart from the first mode of being sad, namely when the object is disagreeable through the will’s not wanting it [nn.47-50], there seems to be a doubt whether any other disagreeableness of an object is sufficient to cause sadness, namely when the object is disagreeable naturally (and is not something freely willed) - or alternatively whether, when the object is disagreeable to and saddens sense appetite, it is sufficiently disagreeable to the will (provided however it is shown to the will by the intellect) because of the connection of the will with the sensitive appetite.

52. As to the first alternative [n.50], one could say that a natural object’s disagreeableness to the will (as the will is a natural power) suffices for causing sadness in the will, quite apart from the object’s being not wanted because of an elicited act of will against it.

53. The point can be made clear from Augustine in his Enchiridion [ch.28 n.105, or ch.105 n.28] that “the will so wills happiness that it cannot will misery.” Now this willing of happiness is natural, as was said in Ord.1 d.1 n.152; therefore the natural willing of something suffices for not being able naturally to will the opposite of it, and consequently for not being able naturally to enjoy the opposite and to being necessarily saddened by it, just as the willing of natural happiness suffices for being saddened by natural misery.

54. And if it be objected against this that virtue and nature are distinguished against each other and nevertheless acting virtuously is without sadness, therefore, notwithstanding the natural disagreement of the object to the power, there can be an agreement more truly through the virtue and so the disagreement alone does not suffice [sc. for sadness] - I reply: natural inclination is double, and one is toward the advantageous and the other toward the just, each of which is a perfection of the free will; however the former inclination is said to be natural more than the latter, because the advantageous more immediately follows nature (as nature is distinguished from freedom) than the just does; and so there cannot be a natural inclination to the advantageous without this inclination being sufficient for not wanting the opposite and being saddened because of it, but there can be a natural inclination to the just that is not sufficient for a free not willing of the opposite and for accordingly being saddened because of it.

55. As to the second alternative [n.51], one can say that the connection of the will with sense appetite (provided however that a thing desirable to appetite be understood and be able to be presented by the intellect to the will) also suffices for the agreeable to sense appetite to be agreeable to the will and for the disagreeable to sense to be disagreeable and sad to the will; for it is in this way that a surrepticious pleasure is supposed to be in the will before any free act of the will.

56. And what happens in the case of surrepticious pleasures can also happen in the case of sadnesses or pains as regard sad things. Just as the intellect (when it is not distracted by something) is necessarily affected by the senses when these are strongly moved, so one could suppose that the will does not cooperate necessarily but rather is affected along with the affected sense appetite, and is so about the same object, provided the will is not impeded by the intellect’s nonconsideration of the affection or by some other impediment that overcomes it.

57. In this way is it said that a virgin who is forcefully violated does not sin, even if in her will she feels delight along with the delight of her sense appetite, because delight and the delightful can be against one’s will as far as every elicited act of will is concerned. According to the other way [the first alternative, nn.52-53], one should say that although she delights as to her sense of touch yet she does not do so as to her will - unless, that is, she freely wills the delightful object.

c. On the Third Mode or Way of being Sad, that is, because of a Conditioned not-Wanting

58. Besides the two preceding ways of being sad (or three ways, if the second way is divided into two) [nn.47-57], there seems to be a third (or fourth) way of being sad that can be posited. This way is according to conditioned not-wanting, namely when someone would not want a thing as it would be in itself but does want it in a certain case. An example is that of a merchant in peril on the sea who would not want to throw his merchandise overboard if he could avoid it; but this not wanting is conditioned, namely in that he would not want to do it as it is in itself but yet he does simply want to do it, because he throws the merchandise overboard without being extrinsically forced to do so. For although he throws it overboard because of something he does not want, namely the peril, yet he is not coerced into doing it unwillingly. His absolute volition would be expressed by ‘I will it’, but the conditioned not wanting by ‘I would not will it if I could do something else.’ This sort of conditioned not wanting seems to suffice for being saddened by the unwanted event (the way the merchant is saddened when he throws the merchandise overboard); nor does the willing there of the opposite cause as much joy as the conditioned not wanting causes sadness.

59. Such willing and conditioned not wanting suffices for the sort of mortal sin that was in the angels perhaps, and those who were not deceived before they sinned, for they did not, as far as was in themselves, want to be equal to God, but their not wanting it was simply because they saw it to be impossible [sc. and not because they saw it to be unjust?]. The same willing and conditioned not wanting also suffices for the sort of merit that is in someone who pities his neighbor in his heart but is not able to aid him in deed; just as it also suffices for the passions that follow willing and not wanting, especially when the willing and not wanting, that is, the conditioned act of will, is intense. Therefore it suffices for being saddened.

d. Conclusion

60. Bringing together this point [the second member of the first article, nn.47, 26] in this way, then, it seems that being sad properly concerns a fourfold disagreeableness to the will: in one way [nn.47-48], the habit simply and the not wanted act that comes about; in a second way [nn.58-59], what is habitually not wanted and the conditioned act, even though this act against habitual inclination is wanted in an absolute sense; in a third way [nn.52-53], because of what is disagreeable to the will as it is a nature; in a fourth way [nn.55-56], because of what is disagreeable to the sense appetite, with which disagreeable thing a ‘will not inclined to the [agreeable] opposite’ is conjoined more strongly than is its inclination to sense appetite.

B. In Christ there was True Sorrow

61. As to the second article [n.26], I say that in Christ there was true sorrow in his sensitive part because the object approximate to touch and sense appetite was disagreeable to that sense - and the sense had perfect perception, because a disposition of good excellence in touch follows the proportion of good disposition of the body (from On the Soul 2.9.421a19-23), and Christ’s body had the finest complexion, just as his body’s soul was most perfect.

62. Next, an exceeding sorrow in the sense part is of a nature to impede the use of reason. The proof is that a strong pain impedes the use of reason more than does a strong pleasure, for according to Augustine 83 Questions q.36 n.1, “there is no one who would not flee pain more than he would seek pleasure, since we see the most savage beasts terrified with pain and fear in desperate situations.” But there is a certain strong pleasure of sense that totally impedes the use of reason, as is proved by Augustine City of God 14.16, “there is no pleasure in the body greater than it; in the very moment when the extreme point of it is reached, almost the whole sharpness and, as it were, wakefulness of thought is overturned.” And the Philosopher in Ethics 7.8.1149b15-18 says “the delight of the Cyprus born [Aphrodite] steals the mind of the firmest of wise men.” Therefore, much more does a strong pain of sense have a nature, by common law, to impede the use of reason. From this it follows that if, in the case of martyrs when exposed to the greatest torments, their intellect had its use of reason, this was because of a special grace from the Creator.

63. And if it be objected that a firm upstanding politician does not use his virtue to expose himself to such exceeding passions, because he will not be able to use his virtue in them (due to their vehemence) and so is deprived of his use of virtue - I reply that ‘to suffer such pains’ is a good object worth choosing for a good end, and so a choice that has this suffering for object is good because of the due circumstances that surround it, even though the formally good act - which is the choice of the will - does not abide along with the torments and conjoined passions to which the good man chooses to expose himself. So too, someone who exposes himself to fornication, though he does not have the use of reason nor consequently of will in the moment of supreme pleasure, yet he sins mortally in exposing himself willingly to the sort of passion in which he will not be able to use reason; for the object of fornication cannot be a good that by its circumstances (such as the end and other factors) is worth choosing. Likewise, someone can also meritoriously, or un-meritoriously, expose himself to sleep because of a good end, though he will not be able to use reason while asleep.

64. I say third [n.62 was second] to this article [n.26] that if the intellect can exercise its act when the senses are having a vehement experience of something pleasant or sad, it seems natural that the intellect would vehemently cooperate with the lower powers and that the will would suffer delight or sadness along with the sense appetite, according to the third mode touched on in the third way (in the first article, on the sadness of the will, n.55).

65. So, therefore, it can be said to the matter in hand that since Christ’s reason remained wholly in use through the dispensation and special grace of the Creator, his will was not absorbed in the pain of sense appetite and his intellect did as a result intuitively apprehend the pain. The intellect showed the pain to the will, the will grieved along with it, because (in a first way, [n.67]) the will was naturally inclined to the opposite, and this inclination was sufficient for sadness (according to the second way stated in the first article [nn.52-57]).

66. The fact is clear because the affection for the advantageous (which is concupiscence) presupposes the affection for friendship and justice, because everyone who desires some good for someone wants well-being in itself first for that someone before he desires something else for him. Therefore, if in any inclination to a desired advantage there can be a necessary reason for being saddened by the opposite, much more can the inclination to love that for which the desired good is desired be a cause of sadness about the opposite of the good of the thing loved. But since the will is a person’s principal appetite, it is supremely inclined naturally to an advantageous good and desires it. For when there are many parts to the same thing, the higher one is said to be principal among those that belong to the supposit in question (just as, since there are several cognitive powers in man, the supreme one is most of all said to be the cognitive power of man qua man, so too the supreme appetite in man will be said to be the appetite of man qua man). Therefore, the will supremely desires naturally the good of the person it belongs to as being what it loves with love of friendship, and on love of friendship is founded all love of concupiscence. And so the love of friendship is necessarily followed by sadness about the opposite, and thus the destruction of the person will necessarily be sad to his will.

67. In a second way [the will is grieved along with the sensible pain, n.65], because the will is necessarily tied to sense appetite (according to the opinion that was the third way in the first article [nn.58-59]); and this tie was most perfect in Christ, and the intellect apprehended the sad-making object (for it was not impeded), and thus does it follow that there was the suffering of sadness and pain in his will.

68. So there appear to be two ways in which Christ can be posited to have grieved in his will or in his rational appetite: first because of the will’s natural inclination to the good of the person, second because of its tie to sense appetite.

69. If it be objected against the first way [n.68] that then Christ’s soul was supremely saddened in death (for there was then supreme sadness in the sensitive part), one can say that, if his soul was impassible at that moment, it was not saddened at that moment but was sad beforehand, when it was still capable of sadness, because of foreseeing the sad event.

70. On the contrary: Christ’s soul did not know this future contingent save by vision in the Word (from d.14 nn.145-152), so it was only saddened in will to the extent that the thing was shown to it in the Word; but the will taken in this way belongs to the higher part of the intellect.

71. I reply that the lower part of the intellect did indeed display the future suffering, and likewise (which is less apparent) the imagination could have imagined it as frightening and saddening, and so the appetite of the imaginative apprehensive power could have feared - and this appetite is called sense appetite when virtues and vices are discussed [Ord. 3 d.22].

C. Whether Christ was Saddened in the Higher and Lower part of the Intellect

1. Of the Objects and Ways as to which each Part is Saddened

72. As to the third principal article [n.26], namely about the sadness that concerns something not wanted by free will (and not only what arises from the flesh), one needs first to consider what Christ in his higher part was saddened by.

73. This part can be taken in two ways: in one way strictly, for the intellect and will as they regard eternal things alone, and in another way more broadly, for the intellect as it judges something according to eternal rules and for the will as it wills each thing by referring it to eternal things (Augustine speaks of this second way in On the Trinity 12 ch.2 n.2).

74. In the first way the higher part of the will cannot have a sadness that is disordered, because such a sadness would be consequent to not wanting God in himself or not wanting some perfection to be intrinsic to God. This sort of not wanting is so disordered in itself that it is perhaps the sin against the Holy Spirit, and scarcely do the damned thus sin, for though they do not want God to be just, yet it is not perhaps that they do not want this absolutely but that they do not want the effect of justice, namely the punishment that they feel; and this does not belong to the higher part taken strictly.

75. As to the higher part understood in the second way, there are three things that this part could be saddened by: namely, first, by lacking enjoyment of the eternal object; second by the sin of its own or another’s will; third by other evils disagreeable to its own supposit or to other persons dear to it. The order is plain. For just as the higher part, taken broadly, wills first its own enjoyment of God, wills second any justice that is ordered to enjoyment (and this whether in itself or in another), and wills third intermediate and lesser goods, in accord with eternal rules, for itself and others in their ordering to the greatest goods - so the same higher part has a not-wanting with respect to the opposite of these things, and is saddened by the opposites if they happen.

76. As to the first of the three [lack of enjoyment of God, n.75], the soul of Christ did not have sadness about it, because no non-enjoyment or non-perfection that was unwanted happened to him in death; for it was not fitting that he should be joined less to the end by that through which he merited to join others to the end.

77. As to the second [n.75], Christ’s soul was not saddened by his own sin because he had none; but he was saddened by others’ sin, as about the unfaithfulness of the doubting disciples and the cruelty of the persecuting Jews. Hence Ambrose, On Luke [On Faith 2 ch.7 n.54] (and it is in the text), says, “You are grieved, Lord, not over your wounds but mine,” that is, you are saddened by my sins that wound my nature, not by any of your own.

78. But there is a doubt here: since Christ merited for no one save because he paid back his passion for them by his act of will, and since he wanted his disciples’ innocence more than the innocence of the others (otherwise he would not seem to have been saddened), how is it that he did not merit that his disciples be preserved from a fall that was not wanted? There is a confirmation: he merited that they should rise from their fall, so he could have preserved them from it     etc .The editors put this doubt in brackets, noting that there is no response given to it later by Scotus. ⁹⁷

79. As to the third [n.75], one must reply diversely according to the four ways set down in the first article about the disagreeable and the sorrowful [nn.47-60].

80. For by making a beginning here from what was last there, as being more manifest [nn.60, 55-56], it is plain that Christ’s will was conjoined with his pained sense appetite, therefore      his will was of a nature to be pained along with it.

81. Next, as to what was second to last there [nn.60, 52-53], it is plain that the will as it is a nature desires the good of the whole person, just as it is an appetite of the whole person; for just as the more universal and higher cognitive power in man is the cognitive power of man qua man, so the supreme appetite in man is most of all the appetite of man, and this appetite, as it is a nature, is inclined to the natural good of man; and the destruction of nature, or the separation of the parts of the whole nature, was against this inclination. Similarly, the will as it is a nature strongly desires the good of any lower power; therefore what is disagreeable to any power is as a result disagreeable to the will as it is a nature.

82. As to the third from last there [nn.60, 58-59], one can reply in accord with Augustine On the Trinity 13.7 n.10, when he proves that no one is blessed here [in this life] because no one has what he wants in wanting nothing bad, for although perhaps he is ready to bear with equanimity the adversities that befall him, yet he is not blessed because, as far as it is in him, he does not want them.

83. And as to the two first objects, namely enjoyment and justice [n.75], no distinction should be drawn here between the higher and lower parts, for just as the lower intellect can have enjoyment and justice for its object, so the lower will, like the higher, was not saddened in some respects, for the unwanted things did not come about, and saddened in other respects, as by the sins, for they were thus unwanted too. For since Christ’s will was right, the sins of sinners neither pleased him nor were neutral to him but were presented to him as bad.

84. As to the third object, namely the passion of Christ [n.75], one must speak in different ways about the two parts [the higher and lower parts]; and one must do so according to the four ways set down in the first article about the disagreeable and saddening [nn.47-59]. One must consider if all of them can be posited to exist in each part.

85. In this regard there seems to be a double sadness: one that does not follow an actual not-wanting nor a habitual or conditioned not-wanting, but a natural one as it were, which concerns the will as it is a nature [nn.52-53]; and another which concerns the conjoining of the will to the sense appetite that is suffering [nn.55-56]. This double sadness, I say, seems to be appropriated to the two parts, such that the natural not-wanting, and so the being saddened, belongs to the will only in its higher part, while the being saddened only by a suffering along with the sense appetite belongs precisely to the will in its lower part.

86. Proof of the first point [n.85]: the higher part broadly taken (as said before according to Augustine [n.73]) has regard to that which is regarded in its order to the eternal, and this both in the reason, as that from which reason takes its principle of knowing, and in the will, as that for which as ultimate end the will wills it. But the will naturally wills nothing first and for itself save the ultimate end, and so it wills everything else not first and in order to what is first;     therefore etc     . [sc. the will as it is a nature is the will of the higher part]. The minor is plain from the rightness of natural inclination, which would not be right if it were inclined most and ultimately to a lesser and non-ultimate good. But if someone were to say that the will as it is a nature is only inclined to its own proper good first, he would be in disagreement with what has been said in this argument. But let the contrary be supposed here, from the question dealt with elsewhere [Reportatio IV A d.49 q.8-9 nn.4-5, 18].

87. Proof of the second point [n.85]: the intellect insofar as it understands something because the sense (with which it is conjoined) senses it, is the lower part alone; therefore the same holds of the appetites. The antecedent is plain because, insofar as the intellect does thus know, it knows nothing through eternal rules, for it would know in the same way if it could not judge according to those rules.

88. Against these arguments: the second argument [n.87] seems to be in conflict with the first [n.86], for the will suffers along with sense appetite as the will is a nature, because it does not do so as it is free, for the sudden suffering it has because of the natural connection of the higher appetite with the lower is not in its power; therefore the will as it is a nature does not concur precisely with the higher part and does concur, as suffering along with the sense appetite, precisely with the lower part.

89. Response: will as nature is taken in two ways.

In one way as it tends naturally to objects proper to this power as it is this power, all other things being excluded and this power being understood only as it is perfectible by certain objects and these its own objects. It is in this way that the first argument [n.86] is being understood, because the will is in that way inclined to its objects (ordered according to the natural order of the objects) insofar as the objects are in some way perfective of it.

90. Will as it is a nature is spoken of in another way when any order of it to anything consequent to the will’s nature is understood - this properly not as it is free but only as it is intellective appetite, or as it possesses the love of advantage and not of justice. And thus taken it has an order toward feeling along with the lower appetite not only in the order that the desired object has to the first object of the will as it is a will, but, setting aside this order, as the will thus feels along with the lower appetite about anything, and is as disposed toward this anything as if it could not be referred to what is eternal. But not like this is the natural inclination of the will (as the will is a power) that is precisely ordered to its own proper objects, because this inclination is not to any object at all save insofar as it is a further inclination to the eternal (just as matter is not inclined to a preceding disposition save as further inclined to perfect form).

91. Briefly, then, the will as nature in the first way is the will as only naturally inclined to its own proper objects; in the second way it is the will inclined to the objects of the other appetite with which it is conjoined by means of that inclination. In the first way it is the higher part only; in the second the lower part only. Thus in general, the will as nature can be taken as it includes both, and thus does it belong to both parts.

92. About the other two sadnesses, which follow absolute actual volition or conditional (or habitual) volition [nn.58-59], it seems that since both parts are able in both ways not to want anything that happens, both will be able to be saddened in both ways.

93. Of the four ways, then, of being saddened set down in the first article, two are common to both parts and two are proper to the two, such that both parts can be saddened by an object that is in a triple way unwanted.

2. Of the Passion as it is the Object of Sadness in the Higher Part

94. Next, by still applying to the matter at hand the object of Christ’s will that is the passion, one must look at which part could have been saddened by this object, and according to which of the three ways of being saddened possible for it.

95. And first, as to the higher part, it is plain of the will as it is a nature that it did will the good of the person of Christ and did so in its order to what is eternal; and in this way something unwanted did come about, and it was unwanted as being against the affection for advantage but not as being against the affection for justice. But something unwanted in this way, namely as against the affection for advantage, is a sufficient cause for being saddened (from the first article [n.54]); therefore the higher will as it is a nature was in this way saddened by the passion.

96. Nor is it an obstacle that the good to which Christ’s death was ordered was greater than the preservation of his life for a time; for although in this regard the good was to be more freely willed according to the affection for justice, yet not so by the will according to the affection for advantage - unless it could have been shown that the salvation of man was then a greater advantage to the person of Christ than the preservation of his life, and shown to be a greater advantage naturally, and not just from its ordering as being more useful to a good end.

97. If it then be objected that the will as it is a nature is not in that case the higher part, because it does not regard everything in its order to the eternal, nor in its order to the eternal first, for something else (namely its own being) seems naturally more advantageous to this person than any other extrinsic thing - one must deny this last point, for the eternal is not only the supreme good that is to be loved with justice, but it is also the supreme advantage of every will as it is intellective appetite (when this appetite is taken in abstraction from freedom and justice). And therefore, in each natural ordering of objects the eternal is first.

98. But, second, one must consider the higher part of the will insofar as it is free, and consider the sadness in it consequent to the actual not wanting of what was happening. It seems, on the basis of principles taken from the ultimate end, that one cannot conclude about his passion and its opposite (as they are referred to the end) that the passion was to be wanted; for as opposite things cannot be demonstrated, if one simply draws, by reference to the end, the conclusion that at that moment life was not to be wanted and death was to be wanted, then the divine will would not rightly have wanted the passion because it was against right reason; nor would Christ’s will have rightly wanted it, nor would he have obtained merit in wanting it - which results are absurd. It seems then that, just as the higher reason could not, by reference to the ultimate end, judge that death was bad at that moment but rather was definitely good (either because the willingness to die was ordered immediately to the ultimate end on account of its truth, or was so ordered mediately, namely by way of the salvation of man, for the procuring of which death was willed) - so, in the same way, the higher will as free and ordered was not able not to want death at that moment but rather to want it determinately, and so not to be saddened by it with the sadness consequent to a free absolute not-wanting.

99. On the contrary: therefore the higher part does not then have joy in Christ’s being alive, for there is no reason to conclude that his life is or should be simply wanted as referred to what is eternal, because the same reason would have concluded the same thing at the moment of the passion.

100. Reply: the conclusion of a practical demonstration concerns the act with its circumstances, and just as ‘wanting to die’ was simply good at that moment (for it was wanted by the Trinity at that moment, namely as to be undergone at that moment for confirming justice and procuring salvation), so life is good for the present moment now. But as to the point adverted to, that a demonstration always concludes the same thing [n.99], it is true that a demonstration has the same conclusion also in practical matters when it is circumstanced in the same way; but not so if one concludes ‘I have drawn the conclusion for this moment as this moment states a circumstance, therefore I have drawn it for every moment’, for the conclusion ‘composition, therefore also division’ is not the same when the ‘for this moment’ determines the inference or the thing inferred.

101. Third, one must consider the higher part as it is free and consider conditional or habitual not-wanting [nn.58-59] (and I mean by ‘habitual’ that whose act the will is inclined of itself to issue in, unless something stands in the way). On this point one must, it seems, say that the higher part did not want the passion, that is, it would not have wanted it as it would have been in itself if all the advantageous and just things that are desirable in themselves had been equally present without the passion.

102. The proof is by a twofold authority and a twofold reason:

One authority is from Augustine On the Trinity 13.7 n.10, “Although a just man is, though fortitude, ready to accept and bear with calm mind whatever adversity may happen, yet he prefers it not to happen, and if he can he does so; and he is ready for either event such that, as far as is in him, he chooses the one and avoids the other; and if he falls into what he is avoiding, he bears it willingly, because what he wanted could not be done” (understand: as far as is in him). Now it is clear that Augustine means what his words say, because through them he proves that no one, however virtuous, can be blessed here, for he can suffer adversity here and so does not have what he wants; because, as was already said, ‘he chooses, as far as he can, one of the alternatives’, namely the advantageous one.

103. The other authority is from the Philosopher Ethics 3.12.1117b7-11, “Death and wounds are sad for the courageous man; but he endures them because it is good or not base to do so. And the more he has the whole of virtue and the happier he is, the greater will his sadness be in death;” which is only because, as far as is in him, he wants the opposite. And Aristotle’s authority manifests what was said in the first point [n.95], that such not wanting suffices for being saddened.

104. The reason with respect to this point is that an object of patience does not seem to be choiceworthy in itself, for then patience would not in that case be required, and the blessed choose no such things.

105. If it be said in response to the authorities [nn.102-103] that they are speaking of fortitude in the moral sense, which is a disposition of the lower and not the higher part - there is no impediment here, because the higher part seems to judge nothing to be eligible according to eternal rules, as far as concerns itself, without judging the opposite to be more eligible provided justice do not forbid; otherwise why do those who are bound tightly to the ultimate end, as the blessed, choose nothing contrary to it?

3. About the Passion as it is an Object of Sadness in the Lower Part

106. Finally one must consider the lower part with respect to the object which is the Passion. That this part, as it is a nature or is conjoined to sense appetite, did suffer by being saddened is clear.

107. But there is a doubt about the lower part as it is free, whether it suffered because of an absolute free not-wanting or of a conditioned not-wanting.

As to conditioned not-wanting, one should, it seems, say something similar to was said of the higher part [n.101]; and the authorities [nn.102-103] prove it as much, or more so.

108. All that is left, then, is whether the lower reason could conclude that the Passion was absolutely not to be wanted, and thus whether the lower will could, with due order, absolutely not want it and so be saddened.

a. First Possible Solution and the Weighing of it

109. With respect to this question it seems one should say no as to the lower reason, and consequently as to the lower will too.

110. The proof is multiple:

The first is that the same power cannot have opposite acts about the same object when one of these acts is exercised to its fullest, for one opposite, when at its fullest, is not compatible with the other. But the lower and higher part are one power (according to Augustine On the Trinity 12, and it was shown in Lectura 2 d.24 nn.7-12), and the higher part at its fullest in intellect prescribes the passion to be wanted, and at its fullest in will supremely wants it;     therefore the lower part could not not-want it.

111. Again, from a principle and conclusion opposite results do not follow; the principle of lower practical reason is a conclusion of higher reason; therefore etc     . Proof of the minor: practical first principles are taken from the ultimate end; directed to that end are other ends from which are taken the principles of the lower reason, so that the goodness of these other ends comes from that end; therefore the principles taken from the other ends are proved from those taken from that end.

112. Again: in whatever way the principles of the lower reason are disposed (namely whether they are conclusions, as the preceding argument assumed [n.111], or are immediate, though posterior to the immediate first principles taken from the ultimate end; for there can, as it seems, be an order of dignity between the practical and theoretical immediate principles), this at any rate is certain, that opposites cannot both be demonstrated but one of them would be the result of sophistical argument. Therefore, if the higher reason demonstrates that ‘this thing is to be willed’, then from no principles save sophistical ones can the lower reason argue that it is to be absolutely not willed. Now we are supposing that Christ’s right reason was not in error through sophisms, and that his will was in conformity with right reason and not sophistical reason.

113. Again, the reason which judges about the acts of the political virtues is lower reason; but it judges that ‘death is to be endured willingly’ for the common good; so Christ’s lower reason could not have concluded that death was not to be willed, but rather would have concluded the opposite.

114. If it be said that right reason judges that death is to be endured but not that it is not to be willed, so that its being not to be willed, and thus its being sad, is a conclusion drawn from something else (and even Aristotle seems to agree with this in the citation above [n.103] about the brave man, and Augustine too [n.102] and his reason, that an act of the virtue of patience is willingly chosen but the object the act concerns is not) — on the contrary: the conclusion that death is now to be endured is drawn by reason, and either the will does not will what is concluded now and then it is not right, or it does will and then it seems not absolutely not to will death; for an absolute and efficacious volition of a does not stand along with an absolute and efficacious not wanting of that without which a cannot be, for then it would flee and not flee the same thing at the same time. For an absolute and efficacious not-wanting is the cause of fleeing from what is not wanted, just as an absolute and efficacious wanting is the cause of pursuing what is wanted.

115. Again, there are authorities that seem to be for the principal conclusion [n.109]:

Augustine On Psalms ps.21, “Is the soldier who is to be crowned not afraid, namely Paul, and the Lord who is going to be crowned is afraid...?” meaning to say ‘not so’; fear is about something not wanted which is known or believed to be in future;     therefore etc     .

116. Again, the Master in the text (and he is quoting Jerome) maintains there is not passion in Christ but pro-passion; but if Christ did absolutely not want it then, since such not wanting follows the full apprehension of reason, the sadness following such not wanting would seem to possess the full idea of passion.

117. Anyone who would be pleased with the conclusion of these arguments and authorities could say that Christ’s lower will, as it is free, did not absolutely not want death but was nevertheless saddened because he conditionally did not want it, namely as far as was in himself, provided God’s good pleasure could be fulfilled in some other way.

118. Now some people say, that in this sort of case there is a combination of the voluntary and involuntary, and that what is willed simply is what someone wills as far as is in himself, and that what is not willed in a certain respect is what someone wills because of a present necessity (for example: what is voluntary simply for someone in danger at sea is not to cast his merchandise overboard; or alternatively, what is involuntary simply for someone in such danger is to cast his merchandise overboard, so his casting overboard causes him sadness, and is voluntary in a certain respect); and so these people would say that in the matter at hand Christ did absolutely not want death but that insofar as it concerned him and in a certain respect he did will it. As to this view I say it is false both generally and in the matter at hand.

119. First, generally, the point is shown by the case of the man in danger at sea; for since he is lord of his acts by his will, in whose power it is to use his motive force or to not use it to throw his goods overboard, and that this is as much in his power in danger as otherwise, therefore he then casts his goods overboard simply voluntarily, because he is not then coerced by anyone to use his motive force for the purpose. For it is plain that his will could love the merchandise so inordinately that it would not want to throw them overboard even to avoid danger.

120. Next, as to the matter in hand, Christ does not seem not to want death, save with a diminishing determination, namely ‘if something else could be well done instead’; and this determination is a diminishing one because the condition in question does not exist.

121. Now, according to this way, a ‘willing to die’ without any diminishing condition is conceded; for if the addition is made that he willed to die ‘for the honor of God’ or ‘for the sake of justice’ or ‘for the salvation of men’, then the end of the action does not, in these cases, diminish the act; therefore what someone does or suffers in this way does not make the act to be simply unwilled but to be so in a certain respect, namely insofar as it is up to him.

122. But a motive perhaps for taking the opposite side is that such a determination is sad simply — just as ‘throwing overboard’ is sad for a man in danger on the sea and ‘dying’ sad for a brave man.

123. But this is not compelling (for the opposite side), because a conditioned not-wanting, when the condition is not wanted, is sufficient for being sad simply, and so the wanting consequent to some unwanted condition is not sufficient for being glad, as in the case of the merchant where a ‘willing to throw overboard’ follows on ‘there will be a storm’, which is something he does not want.

124. But then Christ’s death does not seem sad, for it is not the case that it was unwanted because of some pre-supposed unwanted thing.

125. I reply: just as a brave citizen would not want his city to undergo a necessity of such sort that the city’s being freed from it would require his own death (and so the necessity is here pre-supposed as something he does not want), so Christ did not want his hearers to be such that they could not have the truth preached to them without being scandalized into mortal hatred. Therefore, if he wanted to die for the truth of his teaching, something he did not want is presupposed on the part of his hearers. And if he wanted to die for the salvation of the human race, something else he did not want is pre-supposed, namely that men are in the sort of state that his death was needed to snatch them from it. And if he wanted to die because of the divine good pleasure, there too something Christ did not want seems to be pre-supposed, for the divine good pleasure had his death for object and for the sake, as it seems, of some end to which this object was ordained, and this end is either the preaching of the truth or the procuring of men’s salvation.

126. So then, if these last arguments be sound [nn.119-125], one would have to say, in brief, that Christ did not, in his lower part, want death or the passion — and did not want it both by his will as it is a nature (that is, as it is conjoined with the suffering sense appetite [n.106]) and by his will as it is free, insofar as it thus only conditionally and not absolutely did not want it [n.117] — the way said before about the higher part, that this part as it is a nature did not want it [n.95-97], and that as free it only conditionally and not absolutely did not want it [nn.101, 98]. And so he was saddened in both parts in the same ways. Nor is it valid to say, ‘he did not want it absolutely,     therefore he was not saddened’, since a conditional not-wanting suffices for being saddened simply; hence, one can only argue, ‘he did not want it absolutely, therefore he was not saddened for this reason’ — but compatible with this is that he was saddened simply for some other reason (a single reason or a double one).

127. Thus is the gloss fulfilled [Lombard, Commentary on the Psalms, psalm 87.4] “‘My soul is filled with evils etc     .,’ that is with sadnesses and pains,” because his whole soul was saddened in will as to both respects, both as will is nature and as it is free (with a conditional not-wanting, namely as far as it was up to him), and his whole soul as to its intellect in both its parts apprehended something naturally and conditionally disagreeable to will.

b. Second Possible Solution and the Weighing of it

128. However, if anyone wants to assign in the lower will a cause of sadness that was not in the higher will (by saying that the lower will did absolutely not want the pain, which was not the case for the higher will), he can posit that the lower part considers the Passion in abstraction from its order to the ultimate end, because to consider the Passion under the circumstance of the ultimate end belongs to the higher reason; but when that circumstance is removed, the Passion is not something wanted, for it was only to be wanted because of the ultimate end; therefore the lower reason does not say the Passion is to be willed, and so neither does the lower will want it.

129. Against this way of proceeding [n.128] one can argue as follows:

First that the reason on which it rests only shows the possibility of the lower will not wanting what the higher will absolutely wants, which is not the point at issue, for ‘not wanting it absolutely to be’ does not imply ‘absolutely wanting it not to be’, and the latter is what the other way of proceeding denies [n. 117].

130. Again, one can argue that the intended conclusion about ‘wanting it not to be’ cannot be inferred; for if a circumstance that the lower reason considers is enough for concluding that ‘this thing is not to be wanted’, then the circumstance in question is not determinable by the other circumstance [the circumstance of the ultimate end] whereby it is concluded that the Passion is to be willed; for something that is ‘per se not to be willed’ cannot be made ‘to be willed’ by anything else. The point is clear as follows: if the lower reason shows an object a without the circumstance of the ultimate end (because of which circumstance it is something to be willed), then it does not show the object is either to be willed or not to be willed but that it is as it were neutral; for an object that can be made by circumstances into something to be willed is not an object that is determinately not to be willed, for then nothing could make it into something to be willed.

131. Third, it also seems that the lower reason could display the Passion along with the circumstance that makes it to be wanted [the circumstance of the ultimate end]; for otherwise the practical lower reason could not be directed by principles taken from a nobler end (because ‘being directed by those principles’ means to consider the end from which they are taken); and so someone who is morally brave could not, insofar as he is prudent (for prudence belongs to the lower reason), direct himself in acts of courage by considering happiness. But if this result is unacceptable, then the lower reason, when, as far as it can, it shows the object completely and does not show a part of it (with the circumstance of the ultimate end removed), it will show it as something to be willed.

132. There is also a fourth argument — about the morally brave man, that an absolute not-willing seems to be a reason to avoid the thing not willed so as to prevent it happening, and the determination is not ‘so as to prevent it happening through himself’ but ‘so as to prevent it happening to himself’.

c. Scotus’ own Conclusion

133. As to this article and its treatment [nn.106-132], it does not seem one has to keep the idea that the inferior part absolutely did not want the Passion [n. 108], for even without this idea one can keep the fact that the lower part was saddened by the Passion both as this part is a nature and as it is free, for it was saddened because of conditional not-wanting, as was said above [nn.117, 123,126].

d. To the Arguments for the First Solution

134. As a solution to the arguments [nn.110-116], one can say that ‘moral good’ is a per accidens being, containing in itself an act of some sort together with many circumstances additional to the act, so that one can conclude, by reason of one of the circumstances, that the whole is worth choosing, and yet conclude that, with the circumstance removed, the remainder will, because of some other circumstance, not be worth choosing.

135. So by reliance on this point [n.134] for the first argument for the first way [n.110], the major is granted about the same per se object, but here the object is only per accidens the same and not per se.

136. Using the same point [n.134] for the second argument [n.111], I say that the conclusions of the higher reason are principles for drawing further conclusions when taken per se and as inferred from the principles of the higher reason; and in this way opposite minor premises can well be assumed under a principle about a thing that is per accidens the same, one of which minors may be true by virtue of one part of the whole and the other by reason of another part.

137. The reply to the third argument [n.112] is clear again from the same point, that there would be a sophism if opposite conclusions were drawn, but when the whole is ‘per accidens the same’ a predicate is proved of it because of one circumstance that is opposite to a predicate proved of it because of another circumstance.

138. To the argument about a brave man enduring death [n.113], I say that it proceeds of circumstances that belong to the lower reason, and so the reply made above [n.131] can be applied directly to it.

139. To the argument to the contrary [n.114] one can say that ‘absolutely not wanting a’ and ‘absolutely willing to undergo a’ are mutually compatible provided one assumes some unwanted thing, namely the necessity of undergoing a. And when you say [n.114] that ‘an absolute not-wanting is cause of fleeing what is not wanted’, this is true in itself, not as inferred by someone other than the one by whom ‘do not want’ is inferred.

140. As to Augustine [n.115] I say that Christ did not have the same reason for fearing that we have, because he did not have sins to make him fear as ours do us. Thus can the words of Ambrose be understood, “You are grieved, Lord, not over your wounds but mine,” [n.77].

141. To the Master and Jerome [n.116]: if the will suffered not only because of a surreptitious movement preceding consent (and this sort of passion — which can be called ‘pro-passion’ — belongs to the will as it is a nature), but also because of a movement following a freely elicited not-wanting, then the propassion in question must be understood to be distinct from passion that overthrows reason, of which sort there was none in Christ.No reply is given by Scotus to the principal arguments posed at the beginning, nn.2-19, but answers can perhaps be supplied, mutatis mutandis, from the parallel passage in the Lectura 3 d.15 nn.108-121 ⁹⁸