Eleventh Distinction. First Part: About Conversion or Transubstantiation

7. As to the first question one must first ask about the possibility of transubstantiation, and second about the actuality of it.

First Article: About the Possibility of Transubstantiation

8. As to the possibility of transubstantiation I ask two questions: first whether transubstantiation is possible, and second whether it is possible for anything to be converted into anything.

Question One. Whether Transubstantiation is Possible

9. As to the first question, argument is given that transubstantiation is not possible:

Because transubstantiation is the same as change of substance into substance; but such a change is nothing but generation or corruption, according to the Philosopher, Physics 5.1.225a15-18, and neither the one nor the other of these is transubstantiation; therefore transubstantiation is not possible.

10. Again, in the case of every change some common subject remains, from the definition of change in Physics 6.4.234b5-17 “to change is to be differently disposed now than before.” The fact is plain from running through all the species of change, Physics 5.1.225a7-20. But in transubstantiation nothing common remains;     therefore there is no mutation or change; nor can there be anything other than change, because nothing is permanent or also successive other than motion and change (as time and the like); therefore etc     .

11. Again, in the case of every change the terms are incompossible; but the terms of transubstantiation are not incompossible because they can be simultaneous;     therefore transubstantiation is not change, and then, as before, nothing else can be posited; therefore etc     .

12. On the contrary:

Ambrose On the Sacraments (and it is in Gratian Decretum p.3 d.2 ch.69), “To give things new natures is not less than to change them.” From this he concludes that, since God could give new natures to things that before did not exist, he could also change nature into nature, and consequently transubstantiate them.

I. To the Question

13. Here one needs to understand that a question about possibility presupposes nothing but what the name signifies. First then, following the procedure about the sacraments kept to above [IV d.1 nn.174, 262, 269], one must look at the idea of the name; second whether something could exist under that idea; third what that something is in particular, as what genus it belongs to, or what species in the genus it could have the nature of.

A. About the Nature or Definition of Transubstantiation

14. On the first point I say that this is the common idea of this name ‘transubstantiation’: transubstantiation is the total transition of substance into substance.

15. First I explain the term ‘total’; for a whole, a totality, is in one way said to be something completed from parts; in another way for any part categorematically or syncategorematically.William of Sherwood, Syncategoremata: “A ‘whole’ sometimes states the totality of something according as it is a thing, and it is equivalent to that which is integral or complete, and is a category term [a predicate or subject]. Sometimes it states the totality of something with respect to a predicate and is a syncategorematic term [additional to or modifying predicate or subject], and amounts, as is said, to the same as ‘each part whatever’ and is a sign of universality.” ²⁰

16. Accordingly, there can be a transition of a whole into a whole in two ways:

In one way, when taking ‘whole’ for a whole complete with its parts, according as there succeeds to one whole of parts another whole of parts. And in this way the Philosopher, On Generation 1.2.317a20-22, says that generation is the change of a whole into a whole, because the whole of parts that was truly ‘a per se one whole’ does not remain but another whole succeeds to it - not, however, that each part succeeds, because, in his view, the matter remains common.

17. And, by contrast, there is no transition of whole into whole in the case of alteration (because each whole per se one, which precedes the alteration, remains at the term of the alteration), but one whole passes over only in a certain respect, or per accidens, into another whole per accidens (as hot wood passes into cold wood), neither of which is a whole properly speaking but only a whole per accidens, just as it is one per accidens.Hot wood is a combination of a subject, wood, and a property or accident, hot, and the subject does not change when the wood becomes cold but only the property or accident of heat in the subject. ²¹

18. Now each whole, which, namely, is per se one, and consequently is a whole in the genus of substance, remains the same under each term of this sort of change [sc. alteration, n.17].

19. Hereby is plain that this authority of Aristotle [n.16] does not make anything against the position about the plurality of forms [Ord. III d.2 nn.108-113], because however much the first form is posited as remaining (according to material identity) in the generated and corrupted thing, yet the same whole does not remain (even in this way of speaking of whole), because the whole that simply preceded corruption included the specific ultimate form, and that form does not remain in the term of generation but only a part of it does.

20. Therefore was it well said in the definition of transubstantiation [n.14], by way of distinguishing it from transmutation or alteration, not that transubstantiation is the transition of ‘whole into whole’ (for then there could be equivocation over the term ‘whole’Sc. ‘whole’ could mean ‘whole substance’ (e.g. wood) or ‘whole of substance and accidents’ (e.g. hot wood). ²²), but that it is ‘total’ transition.

21. About the second part added to this idea of the name [n.15], that is, ‘substance into substance’, I say that ‘substance’ there is posited in distinction from ‘accident’ - as is manifest, because transition of accident into accident would be called ‘trans-accidentation’ rather than ‘transubstantiation’. But as to what is said about ‘substance into substance’, it must be understood according to the Philosopher in Physics 1.6.189a34-b16, that in two ways is something said to come to be from something, namely either from a subject that remains or from a term that is corrupted (for fire comes from the matter of fire in one way, and from air or non-fire in another way, according to him ibid.).

22. The partial transition, then, of substance into substance can be either of a subject passing from term to term [sc. fire coming to be from fire] or of a whole term passing into the opposite term [sc. fire coming to be from air].

23. But in the issue at hand [sc. transubstantiation], when ‘total transition’ is spoken of, the first understanding is excluded, for nothing common in this case passes from term to term (for then the transition would not be total but partial); so there is only transition of substance into substance as of a term totally ceasing to be into a term (as into a substance) totally beginning to be.

B. Whether there could be Anything under the Idea of Transubstantiation

24. About the second point [n.13] I say first that it is possible for something to exist under this idea of the name [n.14]; second that this is not possible for any active virtue save divine virtue immediately.

25. Proof of the first statement: it is not repugnant to whatever can be totally new that it succeed to something else that can totally cease to be; but some substance can be totally new, as was expounded above [n.23]; ‘totally’ means not only according to the whole of itself, composed of parts, but also according to anything belonging to it; and the something else can cease to be in the same way. Therefore this new substance can totally succeed to the thing totally ceasing to be, and consequently the former can be totally converted into the latter, and thus be transubstantiated.

26. The assumptions are plain, because neither the total beginning of a substance nor the total ceasing of a substance involve a contradiction, and consequently neither does the total beginning of this toward the total ceasing of that involve a contradiction, and this transition includes transubstantiation.

27. Therefore the first conclusion is true, that transubstantiation is possible.

28. Proof of the second statement [n.24], namely that this is possible for God alone. For he in whose active power is each extreme, both as to total being precisely and as to total non-being precisely, in his active power is also the transition of extreme into extreme, and it belongs precisely to him to convert one into the other. But now the total being of a substance and the total non-being of it fall under active divine virtue and under it alone, because any created virtue requires a subject on which to act. Therefore total transition of substance into substance belongs to this virtue and to this alone.

29. The major and also the whole argument are confirmed through a likeness about partial transition. For he to whose active virtue the partial being and non-being of each extreme are subject, to his virtue is subject the transition of partial extreme into partial extreme (this is plain about generation and corruption, for a virtue that has power over the non-being of a preceding form and over the being of a subsequent form, while another part common to the composite remains, namely the matter, has power over the generation of the latter from the former, and this is partial transition of one into the other). Therefore by similarity, a virtue that has power over the being and non-being of each extreme has power totally over the total transition of one extreme into the other extreme.

C. What Specifically falls under Transubstantiation

1. Opinion of Others

a. Exposition of the Opinion

30. As to the third point [n.13], an answer is given [Richard of Conington, William of Ware] by drawing a distinction between change taken on the part of the subject and change taken on the part of the object. Transubstantiation is not change on the part of the subject but on the part of the object.

31. In favor of the distinction the following probable reason can be given, that a thing can be generated subjectively and a thing can be generated objectively, as was proved in Ord. I d.5 nn.59-63; and, by parity of reasoning, generation can be distinguished as taken subjectively and objectively, and consequently change can too.

b. Rejection of the Opinion

32. Against this:

First that the distinction does not accord with the Philosopher, in Physics 6.4.234b5-17, “change, or what is changed or can be changed, is what can be disposed differently now than before.” This idea belongs only to the subject, not to the term, because the term is not disposed differently now than before. For if it is the term ‘to which’ it now first exists and so is not disposed differently now than before; if it is the term ‘from which’ it does not now exist, and consequently is not disposed differently now than before. Therefore, nothing changes save subjectively.

33. One response [Henry of Ghent] is that the Philosopher said [Physics 5.1.225a25-27] that nothing is produced save from a subject, and therefore change with him requires a subject. But we posit another possible change, and so we can attribute the idea of change to it, though not the one the Philosopher is talking about.

34. Another response [Henry of Ghent] is that if the argument is about the ‘differently’ taken in the definition, that it requires an entity insofar as ‘other’ is a difference of being, as Aristotle says Metaphysics 10.3.1054b25 - this is not conclusive because ‘existing now under privation and earlier under form’ is said to be a case of being differently disposed, and yet ‘being under privation’ is not a case of being disposed in the way an entity is disposed, because privation is not an entity. Therefore, from the fact that the term ‘differently’ is used, one cannot conclude that there is some entity common to both terms.

35. Against the first response [n.33]: it is one thing to reject the Philosopher as to the idea of the name and another to do so in positing or not positing the existence of the thing signified. For many things he did not posit that however if he had posited he would have spoken of in agreement with us as to the idea that fits them. But universally, when he posited some proper idea of something, he would have said that it only belonged to that in which the idea was preserved, whatever he would have said about the existence or non-existence of the things to which that idea applied. But now there is in the Philosopher this idea of the name “to change is...”, set down above [n.10], and it only belongs where some subject remains. Therefore, were he to suppose with us that transubstantiation is possible, he would yet deny that it was a ‘change’, because the idea of change is repugnant to it.

36. The second response [n.34] does not work, because it does not argue from the ‘differently’ posited in the description of change. For it is true that ‘differently’ is taken generally there for the positive entity in contraries, either privation or form. But the argument proceeds from what is said to be ‘disposed’, for this includes something remaining that is common to what is ‘disposed differently now’ and ‘disposed differently before’, because ‘to be disposed differently’ is affirmed equally on both sides.

37. Again, this distinction does not accord with the sayings of the saints, because according to Gregory Moralia 5 ch.38 n.68, “to change is to go from one to another”, and this belongs only to the subject of change.

38. One could also argue against the stated response [n.34] that, if something is said to change objectively, then that thing is the object, because it is object by distinction from the subject; but the term ‘to which’ here does not change, therefore the transubstantiation cannot be called ‘change’ objectively.

39. If it be said that ‘objectively’ is taken there generally for the term either ‘from which’ or ‘to which’, and in the case of creation objective change is true of the term ‘to which’, but here of the term ‘from which’. And the proof is that it is true to say ‘the bread is converted into the body of Christ, therefore the bread is changed’ because the bread is not disposed in the same way now as before. But this is disproved by examining the reasoning of the Philosopher [n.32], because neither term is disposed differently now than before. For the term ‘from which’ does not remain and so it is not disposed differently, because ‘being disposed differently’ includes in it an entity. And then one can say that this does not follow ‘the bread is converted into the body, therefore it is changed’, because the antecedent only denotes the passing of the term ‘from which’ to the term ‘to which, but the consequent denotes the passing of some subject common to both terms.

40. And if objection is still made that what is corrupted is changed, and not subjectively, because the subject does not remain, therefore objectively - I say that what belongs per se to a part is said per accidens of the whole, Physics 5.1.224a21-34; but the matter of what is corrupted is per se changed from form to privation, and therefore the whole can be said to be changed per accidens. But it is not like this in the matter at issue, because no part of what is transubstantiated per se changes.

41. To the argument, then, adduced for the opinion about being generated objectively and subjectively [n.31], I say that it can be drawn to the opposite. For generation is not distinguished into subjective and objective generation, although something may be said to be generated subjectively and objectively. Therefore, by parity of reasoning, neither will change be distinguished into objective or subjective.

42. And if you say that, if ‘to be generated’ is thus distinguished, then so is ‘to change’; and in addition, how could ‘to be generated’ be thus distinguished and not ‘generation’?

43. To the first I say that generation is only under the genus of change as it belongs to the subject of generation, but as it is compared with its term it has the idea of production, as was said in Ord. I d.5 nn.94-97.

44. To the second I say that from the same abstract term many terms can be imposed denominatively, or the same term can be imposed equivocally. Because a form can have different relations to diverse things, and diverse concrete things; or the same thing taken equivocally can be signified by the form as the form is under this or that relation. An example about health: that since health exists as a single form which yet can have one relation to sign [e.g. blood is called healthy as sign of health], another to cause [e.g. medicine is called healthy as cause of health], another to subject [e.g. an animal is called healthy as subject of health], this concrete term ‘healthy’ is imposed to signify the form of health in different relations, and so it is equivocal. And simply diverse concrete terms could be imposed as healthy, significative etc. Thus, in the matter at issue, when generation exists the same in itself, it can have diverse relations, namely to the subject in which it is and to the term to which it is. And accordingly a concrete term imposed from it can be taken equivocally, so as to denote the informing of this thing or of that, and in this way is a thing equivocally said to be generated, although generation in itself is not thus distinguished but is only in a different way said to be [variously] taken, as it is generation of this thing or of that.

2. Scotus’ own Opinion

45. I say, therefore, that properly speaking transubstantiation is not change. Nor should one labor over it to inquire into the genus of transubstantiation, because although change gives one to understand, or includes, a subject that changes and a form according to which it changes and a relation of subject to form, yet beyond this relation transubstantiation formally imports an immediate succession of being formed to not being formed, and conversely.

46. Just as, therefore, in baptism something is said to be material (as washing) and something formal (as the words), even though both are material simply with respect to what is formal simply (that is the signification), yet this is said to the extent that the words are more formal with respect to the washing - so, in like manner, in the matter at issue, the subject is imported materially and the term of the change formally, but the term is more formal among these two than the subject. Therefore is the term said to be imported more formally and also more truly than the respect of succession (although the relation is truly more formal), for the term is something more true in itself because it is an absolute form, or at least a positive thing. But the order of posteriority and succession is only a relation in a certain respect. There would not then be a genus of transubstantiation (if it were a change), save as to that formal element which adds relation over and above the term, which relation is an immediate order of something to something else that precedes.

47. But if you altogether want to extend the term ‘change’ so as to assert it of transubstantiation, one can say that just as, according to the Philosopher in Physics 5.1.225a7-10, change is threefold, namely “from a non-subject to a subject, from a subject to a subject, from a subject to a non-subject” (and here ‘subject’ is taken for a positive entity and ‘non-subject’ for its privation). So in the same way one can make ‘turning round’ a distinction by extending this term to supernatural change, so a ‘turning round’ from non-subject to subject is called ‘creation’, a ‘turning round’ from subject to non-subject ‘annihilation’, a ‘turning round’ from subject to subject ‘transubstantiation’. But one does not get from this anything about a remote genus of transubstantiation (namely a genus of ‘turning round’), save in that each falls formally under a certain relation of order or succession.

II. To the Initial Arguments

48. To the first argument [n.9] the answer is plain from the last section [nn.45-47].

49. And the same to the second argument [n.10].

50. As to the third [n.11] I say that this is true of change properly speaking, because opposite succeeds to opposite in the same receptive subject. For there is a partial transition there, namely of form to the opposite while the same subject remains; and therefore the first terms there are incompossible. But this is not the idea in the matter at issue; for here it suffices that the being of this term and of that be disparate - although they could be compatible in the entity together, because in their succeeding to each other they are not compared to any same subject that needs to receive a form. Or one could concede that they were simply incompatible in the same numerical thing, though they are not absolutely incompossible in being (just as white and black are in the same entity together, and indeed are truly contraries, according to the species in which they are, but they are not together in any same receptive subject [sc. black and white are in the same species of quality that is color, and in the same subject, namely surfaces, but not in the same surface, or part of the surface, at the same time]).

Question Two. Whether it is Possible for any Being to be Converted into Any Being

51. Proceeding thus to the second question - it is argued that anything could be converted into anything.

First that a creature can be converted into divinity, because it is not repugnant to a Divine Person to be the term of some real action, as is plain in the Incarnation, whose term was the Word;     therefore by similarity in the matter at issue.

52. Second as follows: it is not repugnant to the divine nature to be the term of that action which does not require changeability or possibility or limitation in the term. But transubstantiation is of this sort, because it does not require its term to change nor consequently does it require any possibility in the term; nor does it require anything to be added to its term, and consequently not limitation or composition either; therefore etc     . A confirmation of the major is that it is not repugnant to the divine nature to be the term of understanding and volition, to the extent these actions do not require change or possibility or limitation.

53. Third thus: no creature is able to be converted into another because of the agreement of the term ‘from which’ with the term ‘to which’, for in this conversion no agreement of any abiding common subject is required; therefore, however much one creature does not agree with another, it is none the less convertible into it.

54. To the opposite:

First, it is plain that nothing can be converted into the divine nature, because then the divine nature could be converted into something else, for the terms of this change can be mutually terms for each other. Also, the divine nature could then begin to be somewhere it was not before or in a way it was not before - which seems unacceptable.

55. Again, then the quantity of the body of bread would be converted into the quantity of Christ’s body, and consequently Christ’s body quantum would be where the bread was before. The consequent is impossible because then a larger body would be in a smaller place.

56. Again, Augustine in Literal Commentary on Genesis 7 ch.12 n.19 and Boethius On Person and Two Natures ch.6, “in no way can a body be converted into a spirit or conversely.”

57. Again, then an absolute could be converted into a relative, and consequently a relation could per se be without a foundation and without a term, just as the absolute is which is converted into it. The consequent is impossible, as is manifest, because it is a contradiction for a relation to be without a foundation and a term.

II. To the Question

58. This question, as is plain from the arguments, contains two articles, namely about the conversion of deity into a creature and of a creature into a creature.

59. About the first I answer no.

60. And the reason was touched on in the preceding question [nn.28-29], because nothing can be converted, whether as term ‘from which’ or as term ‘to which’, unless its being and non-being are totally subject to the power of what does the converting; but nothing intrinsic to God is subject to the divine power, because that power has for object only what is possible, but what is intrinsic to God is necessarily existent.

61. About the second [n.58] I say that anything can be converted into anything for the same reason, that each extreme in creatures is subject to the divine power both as to total being and as to total non-being.

II. To the Initial Arguments of the First Part

62. [To the first argument] - To the first argument [n.51] I say that ‘the Word is Incarnate’ does not state that the Word is the term of any action of the genus of action.

63. And when it is said that ‘the Incarnation has the Person of the Son as term’ [n.51] I say that that union (speaking of a union that introduces relation) introduces the Word as term, because in the human nature there is a real relation to the Word, and only a relation of reason on the other side. But a term of action of the genus of action is something that receives being through the action; but this is the real union of the human nature with the Word.

64. And if it is argued that “the Son of God is incarnate,     therefore he is the subject or term of the action, because ‘to be incarnated’ signifies an undergoing that one must indeed place in the subject or the term;” - and further, “to any action there responds its proper passive undergoing; the Three Persons were carrying out the Incarnation by action properly speaking; therefore what responds to it is passive undergoing properly speaking [Ord. III d.1 nn.74-83]; but this is ‘to be incarnate’, therefore etc     .”

65. Solution: to the first point I say that ‘to be incarnated’ is ‘to be united to flesh in unity of person’, and this according as ‘united’ states a relation of reason, not a real relation.

66. To the second point [n.64] I say that to the action of the Trinity there corresponds some real passive undergoing; but the object of it is the human nature and the term is something in the human nature, namely formal unity of that nature with the Word, so that the union of the Trinity, or rather the uniting, which is the action of the

Trinity, is for the union formally of the human nature with the Word, which union is really in the human nature.

67. And when it is said that ‘to be incarnate’ states a passive undergoing as ‘to incarnate’ states an action, I say that if ‘to be incarnate’ or ‘to be incarnated’ grammatically introduces passive undergoing because of the mode of signifying, yet not in reality in that of which it is said, but only in something else that connotes being united to it; and this other thing is said to be the subject of the undergoing really introduced by ‘to be incarnated’, which namely corresponds to the action that ‘to incarnate’ introduces.

68. [The second argument] - To the second argument [n.52] I say on the contrary that unchangeability, necessity, and infinity belong to anything that can be the term of some action of the genus of action properly speaking.

69. And when the actions of understanding and willing are spoken of [n.52], I say that this is not to the purpose, because (as was said in Ord. I d.3 n.501, Rep. IA d.3 nn.191-195) these are called actions because they are operations, for by actions of the genus of action some term receives ‘being simply’ (if it is produced), or ‘being in some way’; but through intellection the object understood in no way receives being; rather being is altogether presupposed to the intellection. And this is for the reason that these operations, which are called actions, are ultimate terms, and are not for the sake of other terms.

70. But there still remains the argument that action of the genus of action does not require the term to change.

I say that it does not seem easy how an action of the genus of action could be posited whereby the term does not receive being; rather, the way such action is posited in divine reality, the Son does receive being by active generation. But whether something could be the term of action or generation thus taken and yet in no way receive being will be stated in a section of the following question [nn.180, 189-190, 192-196].

III. To the Arguments for the Opposite

72. To the arguments for the opposite.

[To the first] - The first [n.54] I concede.

73. [To the second] - To the second [n.55] I say that if the bread were converted into the quantity of Christ’s body yet Christ’s body would not be here nor its quantity, as was touched on in the first question of distinction 10 [nn.39-41].

74. To the proof touched on above but not solved [d.10 n.29], namely that ‘the thing generated is where the thing corrupted was’, I say that for this reason is it the case there, because the matter remains common, which in generation is not moved from there in place; and consequently the matter receives the form where it is, and hence what is generated from the matter and the form is where the thing corrupted was.

75. On the contrary: the matter is not the reason for being located in place, but quantity is; and the same quantity does not remain in the thing generated and the thing corrupted save as it is in the matter; therefore matter is not the reason why the generated thing is where the corrupted thing was before.

76. I say that matter by itself is disposed to be in place definitively, just as is any limited substance; but it has being in place circumscriptively as it is under quantity. So because it remains definitively where it was, therefore does it receive form there, and for this reason is the generated substance definitively there where the corrupted substance was before; and where a substance is definitively, there is it circumscriptively as it is a quantum. And therefore does it follow that the generated thing, as possessing quantity circumscriptively, is where the corrupted thing was circumscriptively. But one must not think that sometimes it was a substance here or there definitively and not circumscriptively anywhere; because it was never without the quantity that was the idea of circumscription.

77. Nevertheless, by not positing any quantity that remains the same (which I believe to be more true), one does not have to posit something remaining circumscriptively the same, nor posit the idea of being in the same place in the generated thing and in the corrupted thing; but the matter remaining in the place definitively where the thing corrupted was is sufficient.

78. It could be said,     therefore , that where also an agent finds a passive subject it gives it form there; but the agent generates, and in generating does not change place; therefore it gives being to the passive subject there; and where the passive subject receives form, there it is a composite of passive subject and introduced form; therefore etc     .

79. Having conceded, then, according to the common opinion that ‘the term of conversion could be there where the thing converted was’, I say that the ‘where’ should not be understood precisely, but in this way or that way part by part; and thus, where the bread was before, the body of Christ could be as a quantum precisely, or as in a part of its ‘where’, so that a part would be there and a part in the surrounding ‘where’. Let it also be that the principle common to some people [Aquinas, Richard of Middleton] were maintained, that ‘the term of conversion is where the thing converted was before’, yet it is not located there in place.

80. And thus one could concede that, if the quantity were the first term of the conversion, it would be where the substance of the bread was before, yet it would not be located there in place. And this is the argument against the other way [Richard of Middleton, Giles of Rome, Godfrey of Fontaines], which posits that for this reason is the quantity of Christ not here as in a place, because it is the second term and not the first -for let it be that it was the first, still it would not necessarily be here in place; for this mode could as much be separated from the first term of the conversion as from the second.

81. [To the third] - To the third [n.56] the answer is made that Augustine and Boethius are speaking by comparison with created potency.

82. But this is nothing, because no created virtue can convert any body whatever into any body whatever.

83. Therefore I say differently that there are as many reasons for impossibility as there are reasons for repugnance, and when some of these are removed there is a possibility that there was not before - not indeed a possibility simply, but from a part of it. For example, sight cannot receive intellection, both because intellection is not extended while sight is extended, and because sight knows something only under the idea of a singular and intellect understands not precisely under the idea of a singular. Take away one impossibility, namely if sight were a power that could have an object under the idea of a universal, and yet another idea of impossibility were to remain, this latter case would be impossible just as the former would be. And yet the latter would be said to be possible in reference to the former, not simply but because the idea of impossibility in the latter is not the idea of impossibility in the former.

84. To the matter at issue: each body has some non-repugnance to being converted into a body, namely because it has a quantum of matter and the like concurring ideas for being convertible; every spirit has opposite reasons to these. Therefore, although it is impossible simply for a celestial body to be converted into an elemental body, in the way it is impossible for a spirit to be converted into fire, because with respect to any created agent both are impossible, yet, with respect to an uncreated agent, just as one is possible so is the other. However, the one is said to be possible and the other impossible, because there is an idea of impossibility here that there is not there.

85. [To the fourth] - To the fourth [n.57] I concede that an absolute could be converted into a relative and conversely, but it does not further follow that there would be a relative without a foundation and term, because a term of conversion receives being through conversion in the way that it can have being; but a relation cannot have being without a foundation and term.

86. Nor does it follow that if the term ‘from which’ was without these therefore the term ‘to which’ can be without them, just as this is not the case in other things where one term requires different things for its being that the other term does not require.

87. I say, therefore, that if an absolute were converted into a relative, the relative would require a foundation and a term - and it would have them, whether the old ones that preceded the conversion or new ones. An example of this response in the case of other things: This inference does not hold: ‘a stone can be converted into knowledge and conversely, and a stone does not inform any intellect, therefore neither does knowledge inform it’. For however much something is converted, the term of the conversion will always have its proper mode of existing, just as the term ‘from which’ of conversion had its own proper mode of existing before the conversion.

Second Article: About the Actuality of Transubstantiation

88. About the second main article [n.7] I ask two questions: first, whether the bread is converted into the body of Christ, and second whether in this conversion the bread is annihilated.

Question One. Whether the Bread is Converted into the Body of Christ

89. Proceeding thus to the first question [n.88], argument is given for a negative answer.

Augustine On the Trinity 3.4.10 “We say the body of Christ is what, received from the fruits of the earth, we take up.” But there is nothing received from the fruits of the earth but bread or wine; so there is no transubstantiation.

90. Again Damascene Orthodox Faith ch.86, “As in the case of baptism where, because of men’s custom to wash with water and anoint with oil, the Spirit has joined grace to oil and water and made it ‘the laver of regeneration’, so also, because it is the custom of men to eat bread and drink wine and water, the Spirit has joined to them his deity and made them his body and blood so that through what is customary and natural we might come to exist in things that are above nature.” He means to say that as in baptism we are washed in water, and that this was instituted for the reason that men’s custom is to be washed in water, so in the Eucharist we eat and drink bread and wine, because these are the accustomed food and drink of men. Therefore just as in baptism there is truly water of the same idea as the common water that we are washed with, so in the Eucharist there is truly bread and wine of the same idea as the common food and drink of men.

91. Third as follows: Augustine [John’s Gospel tr.26 n.17] on I Corinthians 10.17 “One breads” says “Just as one bread is made of many grains and Christ’s body made of many members, so the Church is made of many persons;” therefore the Eucharist, because of this likeness, signifies the true body of Christ and the mystical body of Christ. But nothing is gathered from many grains that signifies something in this way save the bread; therefore the bread remains in the Eucharist.

92. Fourth thus: in every positive change the term ‘to which’ receives being; but the body of Christ does not receive being through this action [of confecting the Eucharist], because it would be frequently receiving being; nor too does it receive any being, because then it would often be increased from the frequency of Eucharists; therefore the body of Christ is not here the term of any change or positive action.

93. Fifth thus: if bread were converted into the body of Christ, there would have to be some first and per se term of the change; in the matter at hand this could not be the deity (from the preceding question [nn.59-60]); nor can it be the intellective soul, because according to everyone that is not here save concomitantly; nor can it be any accident or accidents, because then there would not be transubstantiation but trans-accidentation. So all that remains is the matter alone. But conversion into matter alone is not transubstantiation, for it would be called reduction into matter rather than transubstantiation. And the fact is plain, because according to everyone the form of bread is converted into some form, just as the matter is converted into matter. And no form can be found that would be the term, as is plain from the division set down [just above here];     therefore etc     . And if you say that there is some substantial form other than the intellective soul into which the form of the bread is converted - against this: of one thing there is only one ‘to be’; therefore there is only one substantial form at the same time.

94. To the contrary:

Ambrose On the Sacraments IV 4 n.14 (and it is in Gratian, Decretum p.3 d.2 ch.55) says, “The bread is on the altar; when consecration occurs, from bread is made the body of Christ.” Again in On the Mysteries (and it is in Decretum p.3 d.2 n.69) he says, “The words that could make things that were not, can they not change things that are into things that they were not?” - as though he were to say ‘yes’.

95. Again Eusebius (Gallicanus) Homily 17 on the Pasch 6 n.2 (and it is in Decretum p.3 d.2 ch.35), “The invisible priest by secret power changes visible creatures into the substance of his body and blood.”

96. And many authorities for this point are contained in Decretum p.3 d.2, and the Master adduces some of them in this distinction and the preceding one.

I. To the Question

97. Here, as in the case of other matters of faith, two things must be looked at: first, what must be maintained; second how it will be possible to make it clear.

A. What Must be Maintained about the Conversion of the Bread into the Body of Christ

1. Three Opinions of the Ancients

98. On the first point [n.97], as Innocent III reports (On the Sacred Mystery of the Altar IV ch.9), there were three opinions: one, that the bread remains and yet the body of Christ is truly with it; second, that the bread does not remain and yet is not converted but ceases to be through annihilation or reduction to matter or corruption into something else; third, that the bread is transubstantiated into the body and wine into the blood.

99. Each of these opinions were meant to save the common conviction that the substance of Christ’s body is really there, because to deny this is plainly against the faith, as is clear in d.10 q.1 n.15. For from the beginning of the institution of the Eucharist it was expressly part of the truth of faith that the body of Christ is truly contained there.

a. Reasons for the First Opinion

100. Argument for the first opinion is as follows:

[First reason] - As is the case in natural things, one should not posit more than natural reason proves necessarily, for more is superfluous (as is plain from Physics 1.4.188a17-18 and other places in the Philosopher [as Physics 6.189a15-16, 8.6.259a8-9]). So in matters of faith one should not posit more than can be proved from the truth of the matters of faith. But the truth of the Eucharist can be saved without transubstantiation;     therefore etc     .

101. The proof of the minor is that what is required for the truth of the Eucharist is a sign and a thing really contained signified by it; the substance of bread with its accidents can as well be the sign as the accidents alone can, indeed more so because the substance of bread under the species is nutriment more than the accidents are; therefore it is more representative of the body of Christ as to the idea of spiritual nutriment. Now the thing contained, namely the body of Christ, can be as well saved with the substance of the bread as with the accidents, because it is not more repugnant for a substance to be together with a substance than to be with a quantity of that substance.

102. And a confirmation of the above reason [n.100] is that one should, as far as possible, always posit fewer miracles; but by positing that the bread remains with its accidents, and that the body of Christ is really there, posits fewer miracles than positing that the bread is not there; for in the former case no accident would be posited without a substance.

103. [Second reason] - The second reason is as follows, and it more or less returns to the same: in matters of belief handed on to us according to universal understanding, it seems that a way of understanding should not be determined which is more difficult to understand and on which many unacceptable results seem to follow. But that the body of Christ is in the Eucharist is a truth thus universally handed on to us, and the understanding that no substance of bread is there seems more difficult to sustain there, and on it follow more unacceptable things than if one posits that the substance of bread is there;     therefore etc     .

104. The proof of the major is that, from the fact that the faith is given us for salvation, it should be determined and held by the Church in such way as is more suitable for salvation. But by positing such an immoderately difficult understanding, and one on which unacceptable things seem manifestly to follow, occasion is given for turning away from the faith all the philosophers, or rather almost all, who as it were follow natural reason; or at any rate occasion is given for impeding them from converting to the faith, if they are told that such things belong to the faith. Indeed, it seems that a philosopher, or anyone else who follows natural reason, would have a greater difficulty about what is posited here in the denial of the substance of bread than he would have about all the articles we hold about the Incarnation. And it seems a cause for wonder why in the case of one article, which is not a main article of the faith, such an understanding should be so asserted that thereby it lies open to the contempt of all who follow reason.

105. [Third reason] - The third reason is as follows: nothing is to be held as belonging to the substance of the faith save what can be had expressly from the Scriptures, or is expressly declared or expressed by the Church, or evidently follows from what is plainly contained in Scripture or plainly determined by the Church. This major seems sufficient, because for nothing else would anyone have cause to expose himself to death; and he would laudably expose himself to death for everything that is of the substance of the faith; and also it seems a levity to believe firmly what in none of these ways would be held as certain, because there is no sufficient authority or reason if none of these ways is found. Now it does not seem to be expressly obtained in these ways that the substance of bread is not there. For in John 6, where the truth of the Eucharist is much proved, the thing is plain when Christ says, vv.51-52, “I am the living bread; whoever eats of this bread     etc .” and in I Corinthians 10.16 Paul says, “The bread which we break, is it not a communion in the body of Christ?” Nor is there found anywhere that the Church has solemnly declared this truth, nor even how it could be evidently inferred from anything manifestly believed. Therefore      etc.

106. If you say, as one doctor says [Aquinas], that in Matthew 26.26 when Christ says “This is my body” he is insinuating that the bread does not remain, because otherwise that proposition would be false - this argument is not cogent:

Because, given that the bread did remain, the substance of bread would not be pointed to [sc. by ‘this is my body’] but what is contained under the bread would be; just as now the accidents are not pointed to, because then the proposition would be false. But the sense is: ‘this being, contained under this perceptible sign, is my body’.

107. Again, in sacraments of truth there should be no falsity; but the accidents naturally signify the substances which they affect, and if they (that is their substances) were not underneath them, the natural signification of the accidents would be false; so this is unacceptable.

If you say they signify the body and blood of Christ and that this signification is true - on the contrary:

Natural signification does not change because of a signification instituted at pleasure; therefore the accidents signify the same as what they were signifying before; so there would, on this score, be falsity in the natural signification if the things signified were not under the signs. But when one posits that these signified things are underneath the signs, truth in the natural signification of the accidents is secured.

Truth could also be had in signification at pleasure, because the things signified at pleasure by institution could be contained within those substances.

And thus in every way would truth be obtained in the case of each signification; but according to that other way [sc. signification at pleasure] there is falsity in the natural signification; therefore the other way is more appropriate than this one.

b. Reasons for the Second Opinion

108. For the second opinion [n.98] one can argue by reasons similar to some of the preceding ones, because the first three [nn.100-105] seem sufficiently able to be adduced in its favor. First because more miracles are posited if one posits transubstantiation than if one denies it [n.102]; next because transubstantiation is as difficult to understand, and seems as repugnant to natural reason, because it seems to everyone who follows natural reason to be irrationally posited, and consequently it would more turn them from the faith than would saying that the bread, through annihilation or some other way [nn.103-104], absolutely did not remain; next, third, because transubstantiation is not more proved, or rather is less proved, by Scripture than the bread’s not remaining is.

c. Thomas Aquinas’ Reasons against the First and Second Opinion

109. Against these opinions a certain person [Aquinas, Sent. IV d.11 a.1 q.1] argues:

Against the first opinion [n.98] as follows: that it is unacceptable, impossible, and heretical.

110. The first claim [sc. unacceptability] is proved in three ways:

First because it takes away the reverence due to Christ as he is contained in the host. For the cult of worship [‘latria’] is due to him as he is in the Eucharist but, if the substance of bread remained there, such cult should not be shown, because it would be idolatry by being worship of a creature.

111. Second, the opinion is said to be unacceptable because it takes away the signification of this sacrament; for the sacrament should signify first the body of Christ as being the first signified thing; but if the substance of the bread remained, this substance would have the idea of first signified thing.

112. Third because it takes away the due use of the sacrament, for if the substance of the bread truly remained it would truly be bodily food; but the use of this sacrament is that it is spiritual food for the soul, not the body.

113. Now on the second point, namely that this position is impossible, Aquinas argues through the same middle term, both against the first opinion and against the second [n.98]. For nothing can begin to be where it was not before save through change of itself or change of something else into it. But the body of Christ does not change by the fact the Eucharist is carried out, for it remains in heaven as before. Therefore, if nothing is converted into it, it is not more really in the Eucharist than it was before - and this is impossible.

114. The third point, that it is heretical, is proved as follows: because it is against the word of Christ when he instituted the sacrament, Matthew 26.26, “This is my body.”

He does not say “Here is...” but “This is...” But if the substance of the bread remained, or was annihilated and not converted, it would be truer to say “Here is my body” than “This is my body.”

115. Against the second opinion [n.98] he argues specifically against its positing the reduction there of the bread into underlying matter. For either it would be made into bare matter (and this is impossible because then there would be matter without form, and thus there will and will not be an act of the matter). Or it would be made into matter under some other form, but this is unacceptable because then either that other new body (of which it is the matter) would exist together with the species and with the body of Christ, or it would be moved from its place; and both are unacceptable. The first because it is impossible for two bodies to exist together, and the second because the local motion of this new body could be perceived by perceiving the expelling of the other body that surrounds it.

d. Rejection of Aquinas’ Reasons

116. However it may be with the opinions, these reasons do not seem to be effective in rejecting them.

117. The first [n.110] is not valid, because he who now adores Christ in the Eucharist is not now an idolater, and yet it cannot be denied that there is some creature there, namely the species; but what should be adored is not the perceptible container but the contained Christ. And then one might say in the same way that Christ is contained under the quantum and quality of the bread, and so the bread is not adored but Christ who is contained in the bread as in a sign.

118. And if you object “at any rate the simple, who do not draw this distinction, would be idolaters,” I say that so can it be argued against you now, because the simple do not distinguish the accidents per se from the contained body of Christ. But in all such matters there is one response, that the simple give adoration within the faith of the Church, and this suffices for their salvation. But the more advanced adore distinctly what is contained and not the containing sign, and that whether the containing sign is an accident only or the substance of the bread with the accident.

119. As to the second argument [n.111] I say it proves the opposite, because if the substance of bread were there, the double signification [n107] would be true: namely the natural one whereby the accidents signify their substance, and also the one that is by divine institution, whereby a perceptible thing signifies the body of Christ - it would be true. But now the only signification that can be preserved as true is precisely the second one.

120. Nor can it be said that the natural signification would, because of the other signification that is by institution, come to an end; because then the accidents would no longer lead naturally (as concerns themselves) to an apprehending of the substance of the bread; instead their natural signification or representation, which yet was in them before, would totally cease. And then, after this cessation, the accidents would affect the intellect to make it apprehend the body of Christ in some way otherwise than before (supposing the substance of the bread is not there); this is a nothing.a

a.a [Text canceled by Scotus] and then the accidents would in some way affect the intellect differently before the consecration than afterwards; which is a nothing.

121. I reply therefore that the first thing by institution signified should be the body of Christ, and so it is, whether the substance of the bread remain or not. But the first thing signified by the accidents, namely what they signify naturally, is always the substance that they qualified before or were of a nature to qualify before, because the natural signification does not change.

122. As to the third argument [n.112] I say that it is not valid, because it is manifest even now that the species give nutriment, according to the Apostle I Corinthians 11.21, “One indeed is hungry, while another is drunk,” and this from receiving the sacramental species; and yet there is no denial here that it is food for the soul when that is given which is contained under the bodily food. Thus too, if the bread were posited as remaining there, it would be bodily food and yet what was contained under it would be food only for the soul.

123. As to Aquinas’ other point, about impossibility [n.113], a sufficient solution was given in d.10 q.1 nn.149-58, that the body of Christ does not begin to be here without any change, if one extends ‘change’ to include that body’s altogether simple presence.

124. To the point about ‘here’ and ‘this’ [n.114], it is nothing against the minor premise. For it is true that ‘here is my body’ and it is true that ‘this is my body’; however it is not true that ‘this accident is my body’ but that what is contained under the accident is so. In the same way, if the substance of the bread remained, that which is the substance of the bread would not be Christ’s body, but that is which is contained under the bread. But the Savior preferred to use the word ‘this’ rather than ‘here’ because it expresses the truth more, although both statements might be true.

125. To the argument against the second opinion [n.115] one could reply either by positing annihilation of the bread totally, or if reduction to the matter from which the bread comes to be is posited - the argument is not cogent. For it could be said that the reduction would be to bare matter and into matter under another form, and it could be said that the reduction is into matter remaining where it was before or moved from there in its location.

126. And when it is argued [n.115] against the first reply [sc. reduction to bare matter] that then the matter would be without form and so would be in act and not in act, there is equivocation over the term ‘act’. For in one way ‘act’ is that difference of being which is opposed to potency, insofar as all being, and anything that is, is divided, namely into act and potency. In another way ‘act’ states the relation that ‘form’ states to what can be formed, or to the whole of that of which it is the form.

127. And there is an equivocation over ‘potency’ in the same way. Because as potency is opposed to act in the first way [n.126], it states diminished being, namely something to which the ‘to be’ that is distinct from being in act is not repugnant, even when it is outside its cause; but being that is in act as act is opposite to potency is being that, whatever it may be, is complete in its ‘to be’ outside the soul and outside its cause. In another way potency states a principle receptive of act (in the second way of speaking of act [n.126]), the way matter is called potency and form is called act.

128. This distinction is made clearly plain by the Philosopher Metaphysics 9.1.1045b34-35, 6.1048a25-27.

129. The members of the distinction can also be proved from what the Philosopher says in many places when he speaks of act and potency now in this way and now in that, as in Metaphysics 7.16.1040b10-16. And in Metaphysics 8.6.1045b20-21 he says that from act and potency something per se one comes to be, where the understanding is not about act and potency as these are opposed, because as opposed they do not exist together. In another way, in Metaphysics 9.6.1048b1-6, he says, “Now there is an existing in act of a thing, but not as we say it exists in potency;” and then in explanation he manifests the fact in the case of many opposites, as being awake to sleeping, seeing to having one’s eye closed, work completed to work not completed. And to the one part of this difference, he says, determinate act belongs, and to the other part the possible.

130. As concerns the issue at hand, matter without form is in act and not in potency in the first way [n.129]. The proof is from Augustine Confessions 12.7.7; here are his words: “Matter itself has received this imperfect ‘to be’, which namely it has in potency;” and he has to posit this, because he concedes that matter is created by God.

131. But before it was created, it was in potency in the first way [n.127]. The proof is because otherwise that would be created which is incapable of being created. Therefore, after creation it is not in potency in that way, for then there would, after creation, be no entity of produced matter. Only after creation, then was it not in potency in that way but in the second way, because it was receptive of act in the second way of speaking of act. But now there is a mistaking of the question, or ‘ignoratio elenchi’, when it is said [by Aquinas, n.126] that ‘matter is in act in the first way and not in act in the second way, therefore it is in act and not in act’. In the same way there is equivocation about potency on this side and that.

132. Also, if the second sense were granted [nn.115, 126], namely that the matter would receive some form and would remain together with the body of Christ, one could not refute the claim that this would be possible for God, because it does not include a contradiction. For if the body of Christ, even as a quantum, can be together with a quantity of bread, and quantum is more repugnant to quantum (as far as concerns their being together) than the substance is to the substance and consequently more than substance is to any substance whatever (for thus does the Philosopher argue in Physics 4.8.216b10-11, that if two bodies can be together then any number of bodies at all can be together), then it follows that it is not impossible for any substance composed of the matter and a new form to remain together with the body of Christ. If, again, it be granted that this body would be expelled, and yet not in such a way that the expelling of the air would manifestly appear - neither can this be proved impossible for God, because it includes no contradiction.

e. Scotus’ own Response

133. As concerns this article, then, namely what is to be held [n.97], I reply that it is commonly held that neither does the bread remain (against the first opinion [n.98]), nor is it annihilated or reduced to first matter [sc. against the second opinion, n.98], but it is converted into the body of Christ.

134. And Ambrose seems expressly to say much to this effect, two authorities from whom were adduced above [n.94], and several are contained in Gratian Decretum and Master Lombard [nn.94-96].

135. But what principally seems to be the moving factor is that one should hold about the sacraments what the Holy Roman Church holds, as is contained in Gregory IX Decretals V tit.7 ch.9 [cf. Ord. IV d.5 n.12]. And now the Church holds that the bread is transubstantiated into the body and the wine into the blood, as is manifestly contained in Decretals I tit.1 ch.1 sect.3, where it is said, “Jesus Christ himself is priest and sacrifice, whose body and blood in the sacrament of the altar are truly contained under the species of bread and wine;” and immediately there follows, “the bread having been transubstantiated into the body and the wine into the blood by divine power.”

136. There is also an agreement with this because the Church prays, “Let the mixing and consecration of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ be eternal life for us who receive it” [canon of the Roman Missal].

137. And another agreement is that someone not fasting cannot fittingly celebrate, but after he has received the Eucharist a priest can still celebrate again, as is contained in Decretals III tit. 41 ch.3, “With the exception of the day of the Lord’s Nativity, and unless cause of necessity supervene, it suffices for a priest to celebrate mass once a day.” Hereby it is intimated that on the day of the Lord’s Nativity and when necessity impels, it is permitted to celebrate two masses in a day.

f. To the Reasons for the First and Second Opinion

138. To the arguments adduced for the first and second opinion.

As to the first [n.100], I concede that in matters of belief too more things should not, without necessity, be posited, nor more miracles than is necessary. But when you say in the minor [n.101] that the truth of the Eucharist could be saved while the bread remains, or without transubstantiation, I say that it would have been very possible for God to have instituted that his body would be truly present with the substance of the bread remaining, or with the accidents after annihilation of the bread, and then the truth of the Eucharist would truly have been there just as it would also with the annihilation of the bread, because there would be a true sign and a true thing signified. But this is not now the whole truth of the Eucharist, for God did not so institute it, as the adduced authorities say [nn.94-96]. And when it is said that for the truth of the Eucharist there is only required a true sign and a true thing signified, I say that this is true in the way the sign was instituted and in the way the thing signified should correspond to it; but now it is not precisely so, namely that the body of Christ is along with something else (namely along with the bread or with the accidents of the bread indistinctly), but it has now been instituted that, namely, the thing signified is only under the accidents as under a sign.

139. To the second [n.103] I say that no article [of the faith] should be pressed into something difficult to understand unless the understanding be true; and if it is true and is evidently proved to be true, the article should, when it is specifically inquired into, be held according to that understanding, because no other specific understanding is true. But such, from the authorities alleged [nn.94-96], is the supposition about the understanding of this article.

140. And then to the third argument [n.105], about where the force of the matter stands, one must say that the Church has declared that this understanding belongs to the truth of the faith, in the Creed issued under Innocent III in the Lateran Council, “We firmly believe etc.” (as was cited above [n.135]), where the truth of the articles to be believed is explicitly set down, more explicitly than is contained in the Apostles’ Creed or the Athanasian or Nicene Creed. And in brief, whatever it is said there must be believed is to be held to be of the substance of the faith - and this after the solemn declaration made by the Church.

141. And if you ask why the Church wanted to choose this difficult way of understanding the article, although the words of Scripture about it could be saved by an easy understanding and one that is truer to appearance about this article, I say that the Scriptures are to be expounded by the Spirit by whom they were established. And thus one must suppose that the Catholic Church, taught “by the Spirit of truth” [John 16.13], has expounded them in that way, just as the faith has handed them on to us. And for this reason has the Church chosen this understanding, because it is true. For it was not in the power of the Church to make it true or not true, but in that of God who is institutor. But the Church has expounded the understanding handed on from God, being directed in this, as is believed, by the Spirit of truth.

142. To the fourth argument [n.107] one could say that accidents do not always signify actually that the substance they qualify exists, but they are always apt to do so; or if they do now signify actually, there is no falsity in the sign as it is a sign, because as it is a sign instituted at pleasure so it has a thing signified for what is instituted.

B. The Conversion of the Bread into the Body of Christ can be made Clear

143. On the second main point [n.97] there are two things to be made clear: first how the bread is transubstantiated so that transubstantiation into the pre-existing body of Christ can be done; second what could be formal in the term ‘to which’ of this conversion. These two things were touched on in the arguments for the first part [nn.89-93].

I. How Transubstantiation into the Pre-existing Body of Christ can be Done

a. About the Possibility of Transubstantiation

144. About the first, one needs to know: either that for the transubstantiation of one thing into another no more is required save that each term is a substance and is fully under obedience to the agent as to total being and total non-being; or that, according to others (namely Godfrey of Fontaines Quodlibet V q.1), more is required, namely mutual convertibility in nature (because, that is, of identity in the principle of potential transmutability from the form of one thing to the form of another, although not by a single transmutation but by many, and this by a natural agent). One needs to know which of these is kept to in the question at issue, because both the bread and the body of Christ are totally in the power of God as to total being and total non-being.

145. They [the bread and Christ’s body] also have matter of the same idea, through which, on the part of each term, a transition can be made by nature from one to the other, and that through many intermediate stages, although considering Christ’s body insofar as it is now immortal and impassible, it could not be converted by nature into bread. But this is not because it lacks matter receptive of the form of bread, but because its matter is contained inseparably by its form, namely the impassible soul.

146. This could also be made clear about the parts of each term. For God has in his power both the matter and the form, and can consequently convert matter into matter and form into form, and thus whole into whole, and totally. But a natural agent cannot do this, because matter is not in its power but is presupposed to its action, from Ord. IV d.1 nn.141-145.

147. This reasoning proceeds according to the way touched on in the immediately preceding question [n.61], but without supposing that conversion requires a receptive subject common to each term.

b. On the Manner of this Possibility

α. Opinion of Giles of Rome and its Rejection

148. [Exposition of the opinion] - But about the manner of the possibility of this conversion, the following is set down [by Giles of Rome]: matter as it is a ‘what’ is wholly indistinct, On Generation 1.1.315a1-2; therefore an agent, by presupposing it as a ‘what’, regards it as altogether indistinct; but God is of the sort that he does not act through motion, and this for the reason that he is not instrument but first cause; therefore he acts on matter as it is altogether indistinct. Therefore, just as he can bring back the numerically same destroyed form to its proper matter (and this because he does not act by a motion that prevents the return of the numerically same thing), so he can bring back the same form into any other matter. But on the numerically same form the numerically same matter follows; therefore God can bring it about that any matter whatever become any matter whatever, and thus he can bring it about that the form of the body of Christ is put into the matter of the bread; and thereby this matter becomes that matter, and form becomes form, and thereby the whole becomes the whole (as is made diffusively clear in [Giles’] first and second trifling proofs).

149. [Rejection of the opinion] - But against the first proposition that he accepts, namely ‘matter as it is a ‘what’ is wholly indistinct’ [n.148]: For either matter is understood as indistinct in number (namely because whatever matter is, as such, a ‘what’ is altogether the same as anything), or it is understood as indistinct in idea (that is, that as it is a ‘what’ it is of a single idea).

150. If in the first way, this understanding is altogether impossible, because it is against the Philosopher and against natural reason and against what Giles intends to make clear:

151. It is against the Philosopher because, when speaking intentionally in Metaphysics 12.5.1071a17-27 about per se principles, the Philosopher says that as things coming from principles are different so their per se principles are different, and different in genus, species, and number. And to the issue at hand he says, “Of things that are in the same species the principles are different, not in species, but because in the case of singulars your and my matter and moving cause and species are different, though in the same universal idea.” Therefore he means intentionally that my and your matter, as my and your per se principle, are different in number. But our matter is a per se principle as it is a ‘what’, because a part of a substance cannot be anything other than substance as substance is a ‘what’.

152. This is also plain from the way the Philosopher proceeds. For when investigating matter, in Physics 1.9.92a31-32 and On Generation and Corruption 1.4.320a2-3, 2.1.329a29-31, 330b12-13, 9.335b5-6, he says that it is the same subject for the whole of the change and for each term of the change. So it is, then, the same in the generated and corrupted thing in the way it is not the same in two simultaneously generated things, for then generation and corruption would not more include the matter than they would include the simultaneous existence of diverse things. Therefore, if matter as it is a ‘what’ is the same in the corrupted air and in the fire generated from it, then matter as it is a ‘what’ is not thus the same in simultaneously existing air and fire. And this reason can be confirmed because, if the matter could be simultaneously the same under the form of air and fire, then there would be no need for a change corrupting what precedes so that the matter would come to exist under a different form.

153. Also against this view of Giles is manifest reason, because matter is prior, in the order of nature, to the form received, for it is the foundation of the form and of everything else, according to Metaphysics 1.8.989b6-7 (in the old Arabic-Latin translation), “In the foundation of nature there is nothing distinct.” Now what is prior, as it is prior, does not essentially vary because of a variation in what is posterior. So if matter, as it is a ‘what’, is altogether the same in itself, in no way can it be different because it receives a different form; therefore it will, as altogether the same, receive contrary substantial forms (or at least incompossible ones), such as the forms of air and fire. And then the result would be that the generator could generate something without corrupting anything; and matter could also be simultaneously the same under the form of man and of ass, and thus no two substantial forms would be repugnant to each other in simultaneously perfecting the matter.

154. This understanding is also false to Giles’ proposed intention [n.149], because he concludes that God can put the form of Christ’s body into the matter of the bread. But if this matter is the same as the matter of the body of Christ, the form of the body cannot be put into it because the matter already has it. For what is numerically the same as it, namely as the matter of the body, already has that form; therefore this matter has it - and if it has it, the form cannot be impressed upon it, because then it would simultaneously have it and not have it.

155. But if Giles means that the matter is indistinct in that it is of the same idea [n.149], and if he thus concludes that God can impress numerically the same form on the matter that is in this [other] thing, the consequence does not hold unless he prove that numerically the same form can simultaneously inform two matters each of which is a sufficient and total receptive subject of it; for this unity of idea stands along with a numerical distinction of this matter from that. Also let it be that this consequent be granted, yet the result would not be that this matter would become that matter, because what is prior does not vary because of a newness of what is posterior. Therefore, the matter does not become different from what it was before by the fact that it receives a form different from what it had before.

156. This point is proved also in that, if the matter did become different, this form could not be impressed on it, for this form cannot be impressed on the matter because it already has it. The upshot is that one may argue thus: ‘if in the same instant the matter of the bread receives the form of Christ’s body and becomes now in that instant the matter of the body, then in that instant it cannot receive the form of the body’, for the matter of the body cannot then receive the form of the body, because it has it before.

157. Again, this impressing of the form of the body on the matter of the bread will not be transubstantiation but generation. For the matter was before in a state of privation of the form of the body, and now it has the form. Nor does one through this obtain how the form of the bread passes over into the form of the body.

158. And then too this proposition that ‘only God has regard to matter as it is a ‘what’’ [n.148] seems to be false. For an agent has regard to the passive subject under the idea under which it induces in it the term of the action; but a created agent can induce a substantial form into matter by generation, and that form is induced in the matter as the matter is a ‘what’, because thus is it per se receptive of the substantial form. Therefore, the natural agent reaches the matter of the passive subject as it is a ‘what’. From this it follows that if the other proposition were true, that ‘what has regard to matter as it is a ‘what’ can impress the same form on any matter whatever’ [n.148], then if a supernatural agent can transubstantiate, it also follows that a created agent could do this, which is manifestly false.

159. Again, the proposition whereby Giles proves that ‘God does not act through motion’ [n.148], because everything else is an instrument of God and God is the first cause, does not hold. Indeed, it can be drawn rather to the opposite, because an instrument, as it is an instrument, should act through motion only because it is a moved mover; therefore that with respect to which it is an instrument must move it, and consequently ‘that of which it is the instrument’ will be able to act on that instrument through motion.

160. However this doctor’s statement could be expounded [differently so as to be acceptable].

β. Scotus’ own Opinion

161. As concerns this point, then [nn.143-144], I say that the absolute possibility of the conversion of the bread into Christ’s body derives from the full obedience of each term with respect to the divine power.

c. A Doubt and its Solution

162. But there is a special doubt here because of the pre-existing term ‘to which’; for it does not seem that anything could be converted into something pre-existing and that remains in its pristine ‘to be’.

163. It can be said here that partial transubstantiation into something pre-existent is impossible, because partial transubstantiation is a change whereby something potential receives an act it lacked before, and consequently what is composed of the potential and the act is new, for it succeeds privation of the act. But the opposite is the case in total transubstantiation; for there is no change there (as was said before [n.45]), and so there is no need for the term of the transubstantiation to follow a privation or a negation opposite to the term’s ‘to be’.

164. But this answer does not suffice, because although the term of this transubstantiation need not be new because of the idea of change (as is well deduced [n.47]), yet it does seem it should be new because it is the term of a new action. Now nothing is the term of an action properly speaking, namely of an action in the genus of action, without its receiving being through that action, and this at least according to what is the formal term of the action. Hence the Son of God too, who is the term of the active generation of the Father, receives ‘being’ and ‘being a person’ and ‘being God’ through that active generation; otherwise, if he does not receive true ‘being’, it does not seem intelligible how there is anything there as term of a generation that is an action in the genus of action. I say this to this extent, to exclude operations that are called actions equivocally; their term, indeed, does not need to receive ‘being’ because they are not actions in the genus of action but terms, as was said in Ord. I d.3 n.601.

165. If you say that this is true of the term of a positive action but transubstantiation is only an action destructive of the term ‘from which’, and in this respect it is more a non-action - this does not seem probable, because transubstantiation is between two positive terms, so that it is not creation alone or destruction alone.

166. It can be said that transubstantiation, on the basis it is between positive terms that are substances, can be posited to have two ways of being understood. In one way that its term ‘to which’ is a substance as receiving ‘being’ through it; in another way that the term is a substance as receiving ‘being here’ through it. The first action can be called productive of its term ‘to which’; the second as adductive of its term, because the term is adduced through it so as to be ‘here’. Or in other words, transubstantiation can be to the entity of its term, or to the presence of it somewhere.

167. In the first way transubstantiation can well be to a substance that was before, but it does not seem that it can be posited as being to a substance remaining in its old or previous being. But in the second way transubstantiation can well be to preexistent being, because that being can come to be present newly here where the term ‘from which’ was.

168. And if you object that the second is not transubstantiation because its term is not substance as substance but is this presence, which is an accident of substance, for the presence alone is acquired by this action;

169. And besides, the term ‘to which’ will not, by any transubstantiation, be where it was not before (the opposite of which was proved in d.10 q.1 nn.30-41).

170. And further, there would be as many presences here, and consequently as many conversions, as there were things present here; but there are many things in Christ each of which is present here; therefore there are here many conversions.

171. In reply to the first [n.168] one can say that substance is the term of this transubstantiation in the second way of speaking, because substance succeeds to substance; however it does not have new substantial being but only new presence.

172. To the second [n.169] I say that transubstantiation in the first way of speaking does not make the term ‘to which’ to be where it was not before (and thus must the conclusion be understood that was proved in d.10 n.30). But transubstantiation in the second way of speaking includes in itself a certain change to simple presence concerning the term ‘to which’, and by reason of this the term ‘to which’ can very well through it be where it was not before.

173. To the third [n.170] one can say that there is there only a single thing that is first present, namely that which is the first thing signified by this sign; but the other presences are either parts of it or concomitants of it.

d. Conclusion

174. The conversion, therefore, is single, because it is of one substance of bread, present before to the species, into one body as present to the same species.

175. There seems, in favor of this way of understanding, to be this reason, that the way the prior term is converted into the later term is the way the later term succeeds to the prior term; but the later term does not succeed as to ‘being’ simply but as to ‘being present here’ to the preexisting bread; therefore the bread is only converted or passes over into the body of Christ as to ‘being here’.

176. If you say that the ‘being’ absolutely of the body succeeds to the ‘being’ of the bread, because the body remains as to its ‘being’ simply while the bread ceases to be - on the contrary: the ‘succeeding’ here is not that of term ‘to which’ to term ‘from which’, because thus could the sun be said to succeed to anything down here that is corrupted, since it remains in its ‘being’ while the corrupted thing ceases to be.

177. One can, according to this way, maintain how the terms of this passing over are incompossible in the way they are terms, because they are not together as terms, although by the absolute power of God they could be together (just as, though God could by his absolute power make air to be together with fire, and perhaps to be composed of the same matter, yet as air succeeds to fire they are incompossible as to existing together).

178. Against this seems to be that there is no change in what has been proposed, because the way that the body as it is here succeeds to the bread as it is here, the bread through this way only ceases to be as it is here, and thereby it does not cease to be simply; therefore one must grant some other change by which the bread ceases to be simply.

179. Look for the answer.a

a.^a. [Interpolation] It can be said, as the doctor [Scotus] says in the question ‘Whether the bread, in its conversion into Christ’s body, is annihilated’ before his solutions to the arguments (which is question four in order in this distinction [n.339]), that by this conversion the bread only ceases to be here, and thus it only has the change of losing its presence as here, and this by virtue of this conversion primarily. There follows on this conversion another change of losing, that of ceasing to be simply. And thus there are two changes but, by the unity of the conversion, only one change primarily.

2. What is Formal in the Term ‘To Which’ of Conversion

180. On the second doubt [n.143]: just as there are two things in the thing converted, namely matter and form, so are there in the term ‘to which’ of conversion; for it is posited here that composite is converted first into composite, and so in each term there must be something formal and something material.

What then is formal in the term ‘to which’?

a. First Opinion, which is from Giles of Rome and Thomas Aquinas

α. Fundamental Reasons for the Opinion

181. Here the statement is made that the human nature of Christ is only prime matter and intellective soul.

And for this there are four fundamental reasons.

182. The first is this: of one being there is one ‘to be’; one ‘to be’ is from one form; therefore of one being there is one form.

183. And there is a confirmation from the Philosopher in Metaphysics 7.12.1038a5-34, the chapter on the unity of definition [Aquinas Commentary on Metaphysics 7.7, 12 ad loc.]. Here the Philosopher maintains that “the genus is nothing beside what are the species of the genus;” and in the same place, “the final difference will be the substance of the thing and the definition;” and in the same place, “There is no order in substance; for how should one understand that this one is prior and that one posterior?” From all these one obtains the result that the unity of definition comes from the fact that the genus is nothing besides the things of which it is the genus, and that the difference that possesses the formal idea states the whole substance of a thing. So there are not different forms there; because if from a first form were taken the genus and from a second the difference, the genus would be something besides the species, at least as to its quidditative ‘to be’; and the ultimate difference would not be the whole substance of the defined thing; also, there would be an order in a thing’s substance according to the order of forms. The Philosopher also seems to say in the same place [Metaphysics 7.12.1038a15] that a later difference includes a prior difference, for the cleaving of the foot into toes is a certain sort of footedness. But a later difference would not include the prior difference if the differences were taken from different forms. (For this first reason is taken from ‘unity per se’ [Ord. IV d.1 nn.63-64].)

184. The second reason is taken from the difference between accidental form and substantial form, because substantial form bestows ‘being simply’ and accidental form ‘being in a certain respect’. Thence there follows another difference, that accidental form comes to what is a being simply, and substantial form only to what is a being in potency. A third difference is that in the case of substance there is generation simply (because it is from potency simply to being simply), and in the case of accident generation in a certain respect. But if a substantial form could follow another substantial form in the same thing, these differences would not be preserved; for the second substantial form would not give being simply, since it would come to a being in act, and would be generation in a certain respect. And this last middle term, namely about generation, is given special weight because, according to the Philosopher Physics 5.1.225a10-32, generation is not motion, for two reason he touches on there. The first is that what is moved exists; what is generated does not exist. The second is that what is moved is in place and what is generated is not in place; and he is speaking in both cases taking ‘what is generated’ for the subject of generation. Therefore, the subject of generation simply is not, and has no form by which it can be in place; but if a prior form were posited, then through it at least it would be a subject simply and could be in place.

185. The third reason is taken from predication, because when predication is taken from diverse forms either it is per accidens predication, as when the forms are not per se in an order (as ‘man is white’), or if the forms are per se in an order, there is predication per se in the second mode of predication per se (as ‘the surface is white’). Therefore if the genus is taken from one form and the species from another (which one has to say if one posits in man several forms), it follows that predicating the genus of man will not be predication in the first mode of predication per se.

186. A fourth reason can be formed, and it is worth more than all the preceding ones: “plurality is not to be posited without necessity,” from Physics 1.4.188a17-18; but it is not necessary to posit many forms, because the more perfect contains in it virtually the more imperfect (as the quadrilateral contains the triangle), from On the Soul 2.3.414b29-32; therefore it is superfluous to posit the other form distinct from the more perfect form that contains it.

β Applications to the Issue at Hand and Rejection of them

187. Those who rely on these reasons, and hold to the conclusion of them, apply them to the issue at hand.

188. For it is said in one way [Thomas Aquinas] that the first term of this conversion is a composite of matter and intellective soul, not as the soul is intellective or as it constitutes the composite that is man, but as it gives bodily being and constitutes the composite that is body. For it is the same soul and constitutes body in being of man and in being of animal and in being of body and of substance, and this because (without distinction between form and form) it virtually contains the more perfect form. And in this way can something act first through the soul as it gives bodily being, although it does not do the same action through the soul as it gives intellective being, and thus can it be the term of action under the former sort of idea but not under the latter sort.

189. Against this:

If the host, when consecrated by Christ at the Last Supper, had been conserved in a pyx during the Triduum, it would have remained there as the first contained thing. But that into which conversion was first made was not prime matter nor the accidents nor the composite of matter and accident; therefore it was some composite of matter and substantial form; therefore that would always have remained during the Triduum. But it was then not composed of matter and intellective soul, because Christ was truly dead during the Triduum, for he truly died on the cross. And also because his intellective soul was truly separated; but it cannot be that it was both truly separated from and united to the body (from IV d.10 n.258).

190. Again, the term of this conversion ought to be something real, because the conversion is real. But the intellective soul as it gives bodily being, in distinction from intellective being, is (according to some [Henry of Ghent]) not any real being but only something abstracted by an act of the intellect, just as what is common, according to them, is something besides the singulars. Therefore, this conversion cannot be into the soul under the idea of its being the term of the conversion.

191. Someone else, holding to the same conclusion [n.181; Giles of Rome], says that the matter as possessing quantitative mode is the composite into which conversion of the bread is made. For quantity leaves behind in the matter a certain extended mode of the parts, which mode is not any accident in the matter, and yet the matter in that mode is something composite, so much so even that it could be called ‘body’, as he himself makes clear. And for this reason he denies that there is quantity in the per se term of the conversion, because there would be no transubstantiation if some accident were required in the per se term; and then also quantity would be there first, which they [Giles and Thomas Aquinas] deny, and others generally.

192. On the contrary: I ask whether the quantitative mode is the same as matter precisely taken or not. If it is, and conversion is made into the matter in this way, then conversion is made of all the bread into matter most precisely taken, and consequently there is no matter converted into matter and form into form,Sc. matter taken as precisely as matter does not differ into matter under this form or matter under that form, for as taken precisely it has no reference to this form or to that. So there can be no conversion of it taken precisely, for there is thus no different matter or form for it to be converted into. ²³ which he denies. If the quantitative mode is not matter precisely taken, then: either the quantitative mode is nothing and so conversion is made into nothing because the formal term of the conversion is pure nothing; or the conversion is made precisely into the matter, and then words are being multiplied fruitlessly.If the quantitative mode is other than matter precisely taken, then it is nothing, for by supposition there is nothing but matter there, since conversion, as Giles says, is not into anything with quantity. If the quantitative mode is precisely the matter, then nothing is added by talking about it. ²⁴

193. Or there is something else in the matter: either a substantial or an accidental form. If a substantial form and it is not the intellective soul, the proposed conclusion is gained that there is another substantial form in the body of Christ [n.186]. If it is an accidental form, the unacceptable result follows which he believes he is avoiding, namely that in the per se term of this conversion there is contained some accident [n.191].

194. Again, nothing caused by a posterior can be the same as what is naturally prior; this mode, for you, is caused and left behind by quantity [n.191], which is naturally posterior to the substance of the matter; therefore it cannot be the same substantially as the matter. The proof of the major is that if it is really the same as the prior, it does not depend really on it; but a posterior depends really on a prior, and a prior does not depend really on a posterior; therefore it follows that it does depend and does not depend. And the major of this reasoning is further plain because it is a contradiction for something to be and for something else not to be that is the same as it; but if this did not depend on anything, and that which is the same as it did depend, the former could be without the latter.

195. Again, that body, which you posit as the first term of the conversion, is either a mathematical body or a natural body (for the Philosopher did not distinguish body into more divisions [Physics 4.8.216a27-b8; Ord. II d.2 nn.216-218]). If it is a mathematical body then it includes quantity actually; therefore, you have what you are avoiding. If it is a natural body, then either through a natural substantial form or through quality; if in the first way, the proposed conclusion is gained, that the form is not the intellective soul; if in the second way and the natural quality presupposes quantity, the proposed conclusion is still gained, because the first term of the conversion would include matter with quantity and quality, and it will not only be a being per accidens but doubly a being per accidens.The proposed conclusion is gained because the matter without accidents will be what conversion is into (n.191), which returns to the former view that the body is a natural body through a natural substantia form. ²⁵

196. Again, the words of consecration are not more efficacious as regard the blood than as regard the body; but when ‘this is the cup’ or ‘this is the blood’ is said, the term of the conversion there cannot be imagined to be matter alone under a quantitative mode, because that is not blood; for blood states some substance that is generated from consumed nutriment and is next to be converted into flesh, and it would be neither generated nor converted unless it had a proper substantial form. In addition too, the body is not posited as something abstracted from the truth of flesh and bone and the like, but rather as it includes all the parts of what is first capable of being ensouled; but if ‘this is flesh’ or ‘this is bone’ were said, it would seem a fiction to posit that the term of conversion is only matter under a quantitative mode; therefore much more so in the issue at hand, when taking ‘body’ as it is something that includes all these, the way it is taken here.

γ. Insufficiency of Both Solutions

197. So these ways, then, which hold to this negative conclusion that in the body of Christ there is no other form than the intellective form - neither of them sufficiently saves the truth of the Eucharist. But neither sufficiently saves the truth of the thing contained in the Eucharist, namely the truth of the body of Christ, because as the body living and dead was the same in natural existence so also is it in the Eucharist.

198. This is proved by many authorities:

Of these one is from Ambrose On the Mysteries ch.9 n.53 (and it is in Gratian Decretum p.3 d.2 ch.74), who says, “The body indeed that was taken from the Virgin, that suffered and was buried, that rose from the dead and ascended into heaven.”

119. Pope Leo says the same in his sermon On the Lord’s Ascension tr.73 serm.1 ch.3, “We hold not with doubtful faith but with most firm knowledge that that nature will sit on the throne of the Father which had lain in the tomb.”

200. The same is obtained from Augustine in a sermon that begins “All things, most beloved.” [in fact Faustus de Riez, On the Lord’s Ascension sermo 1 n.1].

201. Against Augustine [in fact Fulgentius On the Faith to Peter ch.2 n.11], “The same man in the womb of his Mother both hung on the cross and lay in the tomb and resurrected.” But this identity cannot be understood save by reason of the part that is the body.

202. Damascene also maintains this Orthodox Faith ch.74, “He set aside none of the parts of nature.”

203. Again, Gregory on John 20.11, “Mary was standing...” (Homily 40 on John), “What he laid in the tomb in dying, that he lifted above the angels in rising.”

204. Also from Augustine [in fact Vigilius Tapsensis, To Felicianus ch.14], “He did not abandon the flesh in the tomb that he formed in the womb.”

205. This is also confirmed by Innocent III (Gregory IX Decretals III tit.41 ch.8), “From the side of the Savior flowed blood and water, in which have been instituted the two principal sacraments, baptism and the Eucharist.” Therefore the Eucharist, as here indicated, both signifies the blood that flowed from the side and is efficacious by virtue of that blood. But it only signifies the blood that is part of the body, and it is only efficacious in virtue of the blood that flowed from the body of Christ; therefore the body from which the blood flowed was the body of Christ. But this blood flowed from the dead body, because John 19 says that when Christ was already dead “one of the soldiers opened his side, since they saw that Jesus was already dead.” Therefore the already dead body was the same as the body of Christ alive.

206. Again, commenting on Jonah 2.7, “You will raise from corruption.” Jerome says, “The very same body and very same flesh rise that were buried in the earth.”

b. Second Opinion, which is from Henry of Ghent

α. Exposition of the Opinion

207. Others [Henry of Ghent], conceding this conclusion [n.197] for which the authorities have been adduced [nn.198-206], say that the four reasons adduced for the negative conclusion [sc. the negative conclusion that there are not several substantial forms in Christ, nn.181-186] are valid about anything that is produced by one and the same agent, but are not valid about man, because man is produced by two agents and two changes: for the body is produced by the propagator, but the soul by the creator (Aristotle Generation of Animals 2.4.736b27-28, says “Only the intellect is from outside”).

208. And proofs are given for these two conclusions, namely for the first conclusion that these reasons are valid there, and for the second conclusion that they are not valid here.

209. [Proof of the first conclusion] - The first conclusion is proved as follows: “Everything that is, for this reason is, that it is one in number,” according to Boethius [in fact Dominicus Gundissalinus, On Unity]; therefore, for any single natural thing there is one change in number; but a change is distinguished in genus, species, and number by the form that is its term, Physics 5.4.227b3-24; therefore, of one change by which one natural thing is produced there is one form in number that is its term.

210. If it be said that in the generation of one natural thing there are many particular generations, and that these changes are to diverse forms as to their proper terms, - on the contrary: these several forms are drawn out from one potency of matter or from diverse ones.

211. Not from one potency because, according to the Commentator Metaphysics 12 com.11, “the number of potencies in matter follows the number of species;” and so these two forms, by which it would be one potency, would be of the same species; but it is impossible for two such forms to be together in the same thing. And further, then these forms would perfect matter as to the same potency, and then there would be two acts of the same potency, which seems contrary to the Philosopher Physics 3.1.201a19-21, a35-b.2, where he maintains that potencies are distinguished as the acts are, because if ‘able to be healthy’ and ‘able to be ill’ were the same, ‘being ill’ and ‘being healthy’ would be the same.

212. Nor can it be said that these forms are drawn out of diverse potencies of matter, because since the potencies would be in the matter without order, it would follow that the forms that perfect the matter would be without order, which is impossible. Then too it would follow that matter, as it is the term ‘from which’ of a generation that includes many changes, would be a being per accidens as having many potencies; but from a being per accidens only a being per accidens is generated; therefore the thing generated would only be per accidens one.

213. Again, all these reasons validly proceed from the per se idea of substantial form; for substantial form per se constitutes a being in act simply.

214. And if a reply is made in terms of ‘complete and incomplete’ - this is refuted because there would be no way to distinguish substantial form from accidental form. For however much a form might be of this sort or of that, one could escape the fact by saying that the substantial one was accidental, and conversely, by way of the complete and incomplete. And from this the following reasoning can be formed: that position is irrational which removes the distinction between substance and accident; but this reasoning is of this sort, because one cannot use it to conclude that some form is accidental by the fact that it is added to a being in act, for according to you the being it was added to was in incomplete act; and so may I say that if an accidental form be added, what was pre-existent to it was in incomplete act.The argument seems to be that, if one supposes there could be many substantial forms on the ground that a prior substantial form would be incomplete and would be completed by a later and more complete substantial form, then one has abolished the distinction between substance and accident. For an accident is said to be an accident because it comes to or is added to what already exists as a substance. But if a previous incomplete substantial form is completed by another more complete substantial form that comes to or is added to it, then there is no difference between a substantial form that comes to or is added to an (incomplete) substance and an accidental form that comes to or is added to an (incomplete) substance. But to abolish the distinction between substantial and accidental forms is irrational. ²⁶

215. [Proof of the second conclusion] - The second conclusion, namely that the arguments [nn.182-186] are not valid in the case of man [nn.207-208], but that the opposite is true there, is proved as follows: Every per se agent has per se some act that is the proper term of its action, and consequently where there are diverse agents and diverse actions the same form cannot be the per se term (this is confirmed by the Philosopher in Physics 5.4.228a6-19, where he maintains that the same health, because of the diversity of actions, cannot go back to this and that heath). But the uncreated agent acts per se for the generation of man, because he infuses the intellective soul, and the created agent acts per se for the generation of man by altering, corrupting, and changing, otherwise an ox would no more be father of an ox than an ass would be, save because by the action of an ox from the seed of the ox an ox were generated; and so it is in man.

216. And the argument is confirmed because, if the same thing be the per se term of each agent, either the same composite or the same form. If the first, the composite, be granted then a man is created, because he is the per se term of creation; if the form, then the form is per se from the propagator because it is the per se term of the action; and both are unacceptable [sc. because the composite that is man is not created but propagated, and because the form or the intellective soul of man is not propagated but created].

217. [Four things added to the proofs of the first conclusion] - And Henry adds, in conformity with his first reason [nn.209-214], that for two forms drawn out of the potency of matter there are distinct powers; but for two forms one of which is drawn out from the potency of matter and the other created there are not two abilities or powers; and so there is more a single generation for two forms in the second way than in the first.

218. He also adds that the form that can give being to matter really, in separation from a second form, is of a nature to constitute a supposit, and so every form that comes to it in addition is an accident; but a form that is not of a nature to give per se being without another form is not of a nature to constitute a supposit save miraculously. And, as to the issue at hand, the form of the mixture is not a form of a nature to perfect the whole save while the intellective soul is perfecting it, and so it is of a nature to be separated from the matter when the soul ceases to form it. And therefore it is a miracle that the form of the mixture remains in the matter without the intellective soul; nor is the intellective soul that comes to the mixture an accident, because the first is not of a nature to constitute a supposit save miraculously.

219. He adds too that the same matter is what can properly be perfected by the mixture and the intellective soul, but the prior form, that of the mixture, does not constitute what is properly receptive of the soul, for then the intellective soul would come to a being in act and would then not be a substantial form

220. He adds, fourth, that the intellective soul contains in itself the vegetative and sensitive soul; and the form of the mixture contains virtually all the other forms that can exist separately in other forms of body. And therefore the intellective soul does not contain the form of the mixture, because it is unmixed and without extension and without ability to be extended, and therefore it contains the forms that are able to have being in such a way. But the form of the mixture contains all the forms that are extended and able to be extended. And therefore these two [intellective soul and form of the mixture] are sufficient in man’s case.

β. Rejection of the Opinion

221. Argument against the conclusion [n.207] is drawn from the fourth and last addition [n.220] as follows: The vegetative soul in a plant contains in itself the form of corporeity, and the sensitive soul in an ox contains the vegetative soul and corporeity, otherwise one would have to posit several forms in them, which Henry denies [nn.209-214]. I then take this proposition, ‘whatever perfectly and formally contains some form that formally contains another form, also contains that other form’; but the intellective soul perfectly and formally contains the vegetative and sensitive soul, according to you [n.220], and this not under an idea that destroys the idea of the vegetative and sensitive soul but under a more perfect idea than those forms would have without the intellective soul; therefore the intellective soul perfectly contains the form [sc. corporeity] that the vegetative and sensitive soul contain.

222. So it seems without reason to say that the sensitive soul in a brute and the vegetative soul in a plan contain the form of corporeity and yet that the vegetative and sensitive soul, as contained in the intellective soul, and in a more perfect way, do not contain the same form.

223. If you say that they are contained in the intellective soul in a non-extended way and do not contain the form of corporeity, which is capable of extension - on the contrary: either the way not capable of extension or the way capable of extension or neither is repugnant to the sensitive and vegetative soul. If in the first way then they are not in the intellective soul. If in the second way then they do not contain the form of corporeity. But if the third member is granted, namely neither this way nor that, then the sensitive and vegetative soul will be able to contain the form of corporeity indifferently as they are in themselves or as they are contained in the intellective soul. For then they contain corporeity because of the order of perfection of form to form, and not because they have such and such a mode of existence; but the order of perfection is always the same.

224. Again, it seems more manifest (setting the faith aside) one can conclude that the form of the mixture differs from the soul in other living things than from the intellective soul in man.

225. The proof is that the same effect cannot regularly come from agents of just any sort and however diverse; but by whatever and in whatever way a living body is corrupted, provided however it be not immediately reduced to its elements, the same corpse and a corpse of the same idea is always produced (as is plain to the senses). But the same thing cannot be the proper term of this action and of that agent; so no new thing is produced by the corrupting action of the animated thing, but it is something left behind.

226. This is plain in a particular case: if an ox is destroyed by a knife or by drowning or killing or in other ways, always the same cadaver of the same idea is left behind; but these and those corrupting agents are not of a nature to introduce the same but rather different forms, and this at once without any previous alteration. Rather, if the same form had to be produced and by the same agent, a uniform alteration would yet seem to be a necessary prerequisite; but here, however different in form the alteration that precedes and however much from different agents, the same term always follows.

227. Against the second addition, namely about a form that naturally perfects seperately from another form [n.218], the argument is as follows: every agent that has sufficient power for its own action without the action of something else, and sufficient power for the term of the action, is able to form the passive subject into that form without the action of something else; but a natural agent has power for its action and for the term of its action, which is the form of the mixture, using its ordinary influence without special divine action. For the fact that God then creates the soul in the same instant is not something naturally prior to the propagator’s introducing of the form of the mixture; rather it is naturally posterior, just as the form for which it is the disposition follows the disposition. Nor does God create the soul simply necessarily, but he does so merely contingently; therefore that agent [sc. the propagator] can form the passive subject in the form of the mixture without divine action; and consequently there is no repugnance nor contradiction (with respect even to a created agent) in the form of the mixture doing the forming without the intellective soul. Therefore there is no miracle [n.218].

228. Against the third addition, about what in the intellective soul is properly capable of perfection, there are two arguments [n.219]:

First as follows: what is properly perfectible can be made perfect with its proper perfection by a sufficient agent when any other agent and any other perfection are removed (especially an agent that does not depend in its acting on the action of that other agent). Therefore, if prime matter is what is first and properly perfected by the intellective soul, then by the agency of God (who does not depend in his acting on anything created) the matter can be formed with the intellective soul without the action of a created agent and without the term of that action; and so the intellective soul can immediately, without any form of mixture, perfect prime matter. This seems unacceptable, because such a composite does not seem to be a man, since it would not have what belongs to the being of man; nor would it not be a man, because it would have that by which a man is formally a man.

229. Second as follows: from two acts, one of which is not in potency with respect to the other, nothing per se one can come to be (this seems to be taken from Metaphysics 7.13.1039a3-8, 8.6.1054a14-25), because each of the acts there remains simply act with respect to the other, and nothing per se one comes to be from two acts that, in and between themselves, are act. But for you the form of the mixture and the intellective soul are two acts, and neither is potential with respect to the other, because neither is the idea of receiving the other; therefore nothing per se one comes to be from them.

230. If you say, that it is rather because the same thing (namely the matter) receives both, this is nothing against the minor of the argument [n.229 ‘for you the form of the mixture and the intellective soul are two acts’], because the per se unity of any being is from its act, not from its potency (from the above cited references [n.229]).

γ. To the Reasons for the Opinion

231. [To the reasons for the first conclusion] - Against the reasons for this opinion [nn.209-214] to the extent it agrees with the preceding opinion.

232. Against the way by division ‘either by one change or by many’ [n.209], I argue as follows: either two changes ordered to ordered forms are sufficient for the unity of a generated composite or only one change is required. If the latter is not sufficient, then there are several changes, though ordered ones, by certain agents, yet the generated thing will not be one, and then man - according to this opinion - will not be one. But if the former is sufficient then, although the several changes are from one agent, the thing produced will be no less able to be one than if the changes were from diverse agents. Indeed, other things being equal, it seems rather that one agent suffices than several.

233. The response is made to this that two changes, for which there is one potency of matter, suffice for the product’s being one, but not where there are diverse potencies of matter; but, according to the first addition [n.217], there are diverse powers for forms drawn out of the potency of matter, but for a form drawn out and another not drawn out there is the same power; and two agents have regard to this potency and to that, and therefore two changes from two such subordinate agents suffice for producing the composite, but the two other changes do not suffice.

234. On the contrary: either the potencies are numbered with the numbering of the form, and then it follows that there are two potencies on both sides just as there are two forms, whether they are drawn out by the same or by diverse agents. Or the potency is not numbered with respect to the form but with respect to the agent, and it follows that there is more a numbering of potency when the agents are diverse than when there is one agent only.

235. You will say: they are numbered according to the number absolutely of the forms received in the composite and that are drawn out from its potency, and such are those that are the term of the actions of a natural agent. But the form that is the term of the action of the creator is not such, and so they are not numbered according to this form.

236. On the contrary: it is an accident to matter that the form perfecting it is drawn out or not drawn out from its potency; for if it were possible for some form to exist in matter and yet not to be drawn from its potency, it would perfect the matter just as if it were drawn out from its potency; therefor the matter is disposed in the same way in idea of being perfectible to what is drawn out and to what is not drawn out, and consequently the potencies of matter will be numbered or will not be numbered in the same way in respect of this form and of that.

237. In accord with this one can make reply to the first reason for the second opinion [n.209]: for either member can be granted. And first indeed that there is one change by which one natural being is produced - and this when speaking of the final change. And then I concede that the conclusion is true that there is only one form that is the per se term of the change. However, there are several partial changes that have had several preceding forms as term: either in order of duration if one posits that one form is introduced earlier in time than another, or in order of nature if one posits that they are all introduced at the same time, unless (as was said in [Scotus’] Metaphysics IX q.14 nn.40-43) there was not properly a change for the final form.

238. An example of this is if organic parts differing in substantial form are posited; for then the generation of one part precedes the generation of another part not only in nature but also in time, and so also does the generation that is simply generation of the whole, namely by which the total form is produced with the forms of all the parts having been already presupposed.

239. But by thus positing one or many forms you would say: is there one potency or several in the matter with respect to these several ordered forms?

240. One could grant either this alternative or that:

And if one potency is granted, I respond to the two refutations of it [n.211]. To the first: ‘a potency one in species is related to a form one in species’ is true, when they are of the same order. And to the two authorities from the Philosopher Physics 3 [n.211] I reply that they are understood not of receptive potency and received act, but of potency and act as these are opposite differences of being, as is plain of ‘able to be healed’ and ‘being sick’ which he gives as examples. But this is not true of the potency of a subject, because the same body and the same receptive potency can be posited in a body with respect to two contraries, though the acts are not the same. But this distinction between act and potency in this way and that are plain from this question, in the first part [nn.126-132].

241. If it also be granted that there are two potencies with respect to this and that form, then a reply can easily be made to the two refutations of this member:

For when it is said first that ‘the two potencies are present in the matter without order’ [n.212], this can be denied; indeed there is in the matter an order to one of the forms more essentially and more immediately than to the other, just as a potency in a subject can, with respect to diverse properties, be prior with respect to one of them and posterior with respect to the other. But if it were conceded that the powers are equally balanced, it does not follow that the acts are; for there can be an order in the potencies as regard the terms although not an order in them as regard the foundation (as is plain in many other cases, where two respects without order are in one foundation and the terms of those respect have an order between themselves and in relation to the foundation).

242. The other proof about being per accidens [n.212] is not evident; for although air could be generated from fire, yet not for this reason does it follow that fire under the idea of ‘term from which’ is a being per accidens, because this potentiality and that do not per se constitute a ‘term from which’. So too on the part of the subject: it does not follow, if it have different potencies, that ‘if the powers are accidental to each other then what has them is a being per accidens’.

243. The second principal reason for this opinion [n.213], which proceeds from the idea of substantial form and from the unity of the thing, does not hold, since I distinguish ‘to give being simply’; for, in accordance with the Philosopher Generation and Corruption 1.3.317b1-3 (where he argues that nothing can come to be from a ‘nonbeing simply’), I reply to the argument by drawing a distinction within ‘non-being simply’:

Either as the ‘simply’ is taken universally, and then a ‘non-being simply’ is a pure nothing, and it is in this way that from a ‘non-being simply’ nothing can come to be; and the being opposite to this non-being is any being whatever, however minimal be the entitative reality that it have.

In another way ‘being simply’ is taken as it is distinguished from ‘being in a certain respect’; and then ‘being simply’ is substance and ‘being in a certain respect’ is accident; and it is plain what is the ‘non-being simply’ opposite to this.

244. So I say to the issue at hand that substantial form gives ‘being simply’; not indeed ‘first being’ (namely what immediately follows ‘non-being simply’), but the ‘being simply’ that is distinguished from ‘being in a certain respect’.

The first point is plain, because if an accident were to come first to matter, although it would give matter ‘first formal being’, yet it would give it not simply but in a certain respect, because it is not act simply but act in a certain respect. Also, there is no material substantial form that does not presuppose matter, and a matter that has ‘being simply’, that is ‘being’ departing from non-being (as was proved in this solution, the first part [nn.130-131]), because, according to the adversaries [Henry of Ghent], matter has ‘being simply’ in this way even without any form. Therefore, it is not just substantial form that gives ‘being simply’ nor does it give it first, that is universally, but it gives it when ‘being simply’ is taken in the second way[n.243], as it is opposed to ‘being in a certain respect’. I say therefore that, as being is divided into prior and posterior, or first and second, and the first contains substance under it and the posterior contains accident under it, so ‘simply’ in this way of understanding is equivalent to what is ‘naturally first’, and ‘in a certain respect’ is equivalent to what is ‘naturally posterior’ (and in this way every accident gives ‘being in a certain respect’).

245. I say, therefore, that substantial form, whether it comes to something either already possessing being or not, always gives ‘being simply’ in this second way but not in the first way - just as accidental form, whatever it comes to, gives being not ‘simply’ but ‘in a certain respect’.

246. And if you ask “how can it be proved that this from gives ‘being simply’ and that does not, if giving being as it departs immediately from non-being is of the idea of neither?” - I reply: are you asking about the thing in itself or in relation to our cognition? If in itself, there is no cause that this gives ‘being simply’ and that ‘being in a certain respect’ save that this is substantial form and that accidental form; for just as there is no cause that a hot thing heats, because the cause is immediate (and between an immediate cause and its effect there is no intermediate cause), so in the genus of formal cause this proposition is immediate ‘heat constitutes a hot thing and soul constitutes man’; and it is the immediacy of form to formal act.

247. And if you are asking about the thing in relation to our knowledge, which the argument [n.246] seems to be proceeding about, as if this opinion would destroy all distinction for us between substantial form and accidental form - I reply:

Philosophers have distinguished between substantial form and accidental form a posteriori through these middle terms: ‘to have a contrary and not to have a contrary’, ‘to receive more and less and not to receive them’, and ‘there can be motion in accord with it or there cannot be’. But to the issue itself I say briefly that there is one middle term through which, as concerns our knowledge, the distinction is more manifestly drawn between what form coming to a being in act is a substantial form and what form coming to a being in act is an accidental form. For as long as the process is made through substantial forms, a posterior is always more perfect than those that are prior; but when it comes to accidental forms a later form is more imperfect than the last preexisting one. But as to what form is more perfect than another, this cannot be made known to us save a posteriori. And this is reasonable both in itself and in us; in itself indeed because in a subject the same in genus no form comes to a form save as making it more perfect in that genus; but whatever comes to it in another genus, namely as an accident, is more imperfect (whatever is presupposed) than a substantial form.

The response then to the form of the argument is plain, that this opinion does not destroy the distinction between accidental form and substantial form, neither in itself (for this distinction is immediate, because this is this and that is that), nor as to our knowledge through those middle terms through which we are able to recognize this distinction. And no wonder if, when distinguishing this form from that, one must, according to our understanding, use things posterior to this form and to that, because neither do we in any other way recognize substantial forms in anything, as it were, save a posteriori.

248. [To the reason for the second conclusion] - The reason that he gives for the other member [n.215], namely that the four reasons are not valid about man, make for our position.

Yet insofar as he denies this conclusion about other living things, one can reply that in respect of any living thing one can posit that it has two agents, or as it were two. For any form of life is more excellent simply than any form of mixture, and so whatever introduces the form of life must be more perfect in itself, or in another, as it precisely introduces the form of the mixture. Therefore, although it is by the same agent that the mixed body and the soul are introduced in a plant or a brute, yet the ‘same’ there is as it were two agents, because the agent has in itself the idea of a more perfect and of a more imperfect agent.

c. To the Fundamental Reasons for the First Opinion

249. To the reasons for the first opinion [n.181].

α. To the First Reason

250. As to the first [n.182] I concede the first proposition, that “of one being there is one ‘to be’;” but the second, namely that “one ‘to be’ requires only one form” needs to be denied when taking ‘to be’ uniformly in the major and minor. For just as being and one are divided into simple and composite, so ‘to be’ and ‘to be one’ are distinguished into ‘to be’ of this sort and of that sort; therefore ‘to be’ per se one does not determine for itself a ‘to be’ simply, just as neither does any member of a division determine for itself precisely the other of the dividers.

251. In this way, there is one ‘to be’ of the whole composite and yet it includes many partial ‘to be’s’, just as a whole is one being and yet has and includes many partial entities. For I have no knowledge of this fiction that ‘to be’ is something that supervenes to the essence, and is not composite the way the essence is composite. The ‘to be’ of the whole composite includes in this way the ‘to be’ of all the parts, and includes many partial ‘to be’s’ of many parts or forms, just as a whole being that is made of many forms includes all the partial entities.

252. If, however, the force be altogether in the words, I concede that the total ‘to be’ of a whole composite is principally through one form, and that this form is the one whereby the whole composite is ‘this being’; but this form is the ultimate one, that comes additionally to all the preceding ones. And in this way is the whole composite divided into two essential parts: into act proper, namely the ultimate form by which it is what it is, and into the proper potency of that act, which incudes first matter along with all the preceding forms.

253. And I concede in this way that the total ‘to be’ is made complete by one form, which gives to the whole what it is. But it does not follow from this that in the whole there is included precisely one form, or that there are not included in the whole several forms, not as specifically constituting the composite but as certain elements included in the potential of the composite.

254. There is an example of this in a thing composed of integral parts: for the more perfect a living thing is, the more it requires several organs (and probably organs made distinct in species through substantial forms); and yet it is more truly one - by more truly, I mean, more perfectly, though it is not more truly one in the sense of more indivisible. For a truer unity and being are found with a greater composition in composite things than in the parts.

255. To the confirmation adduced from the Metaphysics [n.183], that chapter does not seem to be expounded well by Aquinas, as is plain in the Exposition I produced on that chapter;Scotus’ Exposition of Aristotle’s Metaphysics 7 sect.2 ch.13 n.103: “One must note that those who deny the plurality of forms want to take their argument from this, that the unity of a definition comes from the fact that the genus is nothing besides the species of the genus, at least as to quidditative ‘to be’^” ²⁷ and the authorities verbally quoted are truncated and irrelevant to the minor premise [n.182, “one ‘to be’ is from one form”]. The first authority, indeed, is truncated, because the sequence is: “the genus is nothing beside what are the species of the genus, or if is indeed it is so as matter;” and the second part of this disjunction is true. Hence in favor of this second member he adds an example “voice indeed, as it is a genus.” It is the intention of the Philosopher, then, that what the genus imports is only that which is potential with respect to the species.

256. And in the same way, after “the final difference will be the substance of the thing and the definition” [n.183] there follows “in no way can one understand that the whole quidditative idea is the ultimate difference (for then the genus would be altogether superfluous in the definition, because the ultimate difference alone would express the whole essence of the thing); but one must understand it thus, that it is the whole substance of the thing as completive of it, in the way that the whole essence of what has the form is from the form that completes it.” For Aristotle himself assigns here the unity of definition in the same way as he said he put it first in Posterior Analytics 2.3-10; and the way that in Metaphysics 8.6.1045a7-33 he assigns the unity of a thing, that just as there he says the composite is constituted of two parts (because “this is act and that is potency”), so here he says [7.12.1038a25-30] that one quidditative or defining concept is composed of two concepts, because this concept is potential and that actual. And just as act is more principal there than potency, and consequently is the more principal idea of unity as of being, so here too the concept of the ultimate difference, which is the more actual concept, is the more principal idea of the unity of definition.

257. As to what is added there [n.183] that ‘there is no order in substances’, [I wrote in my commentary Exposition on Metaphysics 7 sect.2 ch.13 n.108] that “it is nothing to the purpose; for immediately prior Aristotle has maintained [Metaphysics 7.12.1038a30-34“It will be plain if one transpose such definitions, as the definition of ‘man’ which says ‘a two-footed animal having feet’; for it is superfluous to say ‘having feet’ when ‘two-footed’ has been said. But there is no order in the substance, for how should one understand that the latter is posterior and the former prior?” ²⁸] that if there is trivial repetition when a prior difference is added to a later one, there will by parity of reasoning be triviality in the opposite direction; for there is no such order in the substances, that is, in what belongs to the substantial or defining idea of something, because different orders make and remove the triviality.”

258. As to what is added there [n.183], that ‘a lower difference includes a higher difference’, this is manifestly false:

Because then it would be impossible to define a thing through the proximate genus and the proximate difference, for the same thing would be said twice, namely the higher difference that is per se included both in the idea of the lower difference and in the idea of the proximate genus. Hence if one puts the idea of the genus and the difference in place of the names, the triviality manifestly appears. And this is the Philosopher’s intention in that place [Metaphysics 7.12.1038a18-35], how the triviality should be recognized in the definition, namely by putting the ideas for the names.

259. Nor even could a definition be given through the remote genus and several differences, because the same and proximate difference that divides the remote genus would be said several times in the many differences added to the genus. This result is plainly against the Philosopher in that same place [Metaphysics 7.12.1037b29-38a2], when he says, “Nothing else is in a definition besides the first stated genus and the differences. But there are different genera: the first genus and with this the exhaustive differences;” and he at once gives an example there: “as first ‘animal’, next ‘biped animal’, and again ‘non-winged biped animal’; and it is similar too if several differences are stated; there is absolutely no difference whether it is said through more or through fewer differences.” He means to say that a definition is nothing other than the first genus with many differences, and nothing other than the proximate genus and one difference, because the proximate genus is nothing other than the remote genus with many differences included in it; and both ways of defining would include triviality if a lower difference per se included a higher one.

260. As to what is added there [n.183] that Aristotle himself meant to say this -the authority “the cleaving of the foot into toes is a certain sort of footedness” is not to the purpose; for Aristotle’s understanding there is not about predication in the first mode per se [sc. when the predicate falls into the definition of the subject], of the sort which is understood through those abstract terms [sc. ‘cleaving’, ‘footedeness’], but that the lower difference should per se divide the higher insofar as it is such, and this per se division is made known through these abstract terms.

261. And that Aristotle does understand things thus is plain from what precedes, at the beginning of the paragraph, where he says that “one should divide the difference of the difference.” And he adds how he understands this: “not by saying ‘of what has feet, one sort is winged and another not-winged’, but that ‘one has cloven feet, and the other non-cloven feet’; for these are differences of feet.” And the passage cited follows: “the cleaving of the foot into toes is a certain sort of footedness,” that is to say, ‘cleaving of feet per se particularizes footedness’, and so it per se divides ‘having feet’, but ‘winged’ does not.

262. From the whole of this chapter [of Aristotle’s Metaphysics], then, if it is consistently expounded throughout, as it has been expounded elsewhere [Scotus, Exposition on Metaphysics 7 sect.2 ch.13], one does not get that the genus is nothing else per se in the definition besides the idea of the difference, nor does one get that the ultimate difference is the whole definition, or that it indicates the whole substance of the thing, or that there is no order per se in what is imported per se by ordered differences, nor that an inferior difference per se includes a higher. Nor does one get anything for the unity of form; rather the whole of that chapter is saved by positing a quidditative idea composed of an actual and a potential concept, and that the actual one is the more principal cause of the unity (just as one should say about a composite being as to its real unity, as he himself says in the Metaphysics [nn.255-262]).

β. To the Second Reason

263. As to the second reason [n.184] the response has been given [nn.243-244] that there is equivocation over ‘simply’ [sc. ‘being simply’ as opposed to ‘non-being simply’, and ‘being simply’ as opposed to ‘being in a certain respect’]. And indeed, as for ‘to give being first’, it neither belongs to every substantial form nor to substantial form alone to give ‘being simply’ such that quantity, if it were to come to matter first, could not give it formal being (though not first being) that departs from formal non-being; and a substantial form can come additionally to a second and third substantial form. But if one distinguishes ‘being simply’ from ‘being in a certain respect’ (as what is naturally first from what is naturally second), then every substantial form gives ‘being simply’ and every accidental form gives being not ‘simply’ but ‘in a certain respect’. You should not ask, therefore, if this form comes to that form first or second but, whenever it comes, what real act is it of a nature to bestow? The same sort surely as the sort that the form is.

264. But the two proofs brought forward from Physics 5 [n.184], about generation and motion, seem to contain a special difficulty.

To the first I say that ‘non-being’, when taken for the subject of generation, is taken there as privation, and the sense is: ‘what is generated is not’ (that is, what is the subject of generation lacks ‘being simply’); but ‘what is moved is’ (that is, as subject to motion it does not lack some ‘being simply’).

265. And if you argue that therefore what gives being simply has no substantial form - this does not follow, but is a fallacy of the consequent; for it is possible to have ‘being simply’ in this way through one substantial form and yet to lack the ‘being simply’ that another substantial form is of a nature to give.

266. The other argument, about being in place [n.184], brings in, as it seems, another difficulty. However, a response about change of place and change of alteration can easily be given through the same fact, that everything changeable in alteration, or by transference through some form presupposed to the change, is located in place; because quantity necessarily precedes each of these changes. But what is generated, that is, what is subject to generation, is not per se located in place, either by what is subject to generation or by another form that it has through generation. For although the subject of generation in act would possess substantial form and even some quantity (which is the reason of being in place), yet it does not have quantity as quantity is the subject of generation; because quantity is not the idea of receiving the term of this change. And so I say universally that the subject of generation, as it is per se the subject of generation, does not include anything that is per se the idea of being in place, because it is nothing but substance alone - even though quantity accompany it, yet the quantity is not anything of it per se insofar as it is subject to generation.

267. And if you ask how that which is changed with the change of increase is in place - although this doubt is not necessary for the present purpose, yet I reply thatquantity or quantum, according to some, is presupposed in the change of increase and decrease; and this or that sort of term of quantity is the term of this or that change.

268. But against this: in the case of increase and decrease no quantity remains through the whole change or under either term of it, and the subject does remain the same; therefore, a quantum is not the subject of this change. And besides, of what genus is the term the per se species? If of the genus of quantity, the term is quantity; if not, the change will not be per se to quantity.

269. I say, therefore, that just as in the case of a subject of alteration, although it is under quantity during the whole alteration, yet one should not say that a quality is the subject of alteration (because the quality is accidental to what is the subject of alteration), so too in the case of a subject of increase, although it is always a quantum while it is being increased yet, from the fact that it varies in quantity (as a subject of alteration varies in quality), the quantity is not the idea nor the per se condition of the subject of increase.

270. So why?

Just as the subject per se of alteration is a being in act as to prior forms of quality yet is not a being in act as to quality, so the per se subject of increase is some being in act as to some prior form of quantity, yet it is not per se a being in act as to quantity; and the prior form is nothing but a substantial one. Therefore, the per se subject of increase and decrease is nothing but substance alone.

271. How then is the subject that there changes in place?

I reply: as a universal fact, the subject of any change is in place either through a form previously acquired in the changeable thing changed by such change, or through a form according to which the changeable thing is in flux or changes; and the first alternative is true of alteration and transfer, and the second is true of increase and decrease.

272. But that which is the subject of generation is not in place in either way; for neither is anything that is the idea of being in place presupposed to change in the subject, nor is that according to which the subject is in flux the idea of being in place.

γ. To the Third Reason

273. To the third reason, about predication [n.185], I reply that, prima facie, it does seem that the predicate taken from a posterior form is not said per se of that which is taken from a prior form, just as this statement is not per se ‘man is white’ or ‘a surface is colored’. And from this one cannot get more than that this statement is not per se ‘animal is man’.

274. And if you object that the same holds conversely, for this statement is not per se ‘a colored thing is a thing with a surface’, I reply that ‘what is taken precisely from a prior form’ and ‘what is taken precisely from a posterior form’ are so disposed that neither is per se included in the other; so the prediction is not per se, just as not conversely either. Now when one posits that the genus is taken from the prior form and the difference from the posterior form, one must conclude that the genus is not predicated per se of the difference nor conversely - which I concede. But it does not follow that the genus is not predicated per se of the species, because the species, although it imports the ultimate difference as concerns what is principal in its idea, yet does not import it precisely, but imports along with it the idea of the genus as belonging to its per se concept.

275. And if finally you object that neither is this statement per se, ‘a colored thing with a surface has a surface’, where however the understanding of the prior and of the posterior are not taken precisely as they are distinguished from each other, but the understanding of the posterior is taken as it includes the prior, comparing it with the understanding of the prior taken in itself - I reply that if this is true it is so for this reason, that the subject ‘a colored thing with a surface’ does not have a concept that is per se one, and what is not per se in itself does not seem to be per se one for anything. But it is not so in the other case, because the concept of the prior and of the posterior do make a concept that is per se one.

276. And if you ask ‘why here more than there’? - I reply:

Just as there is no question as to why a one is made from act and potency, from Metaphysics 8.6.1045a23-25, b17-21, for there is no reason other than that this is per se act and that is per se potency, so there is no cause as to why from this act and this potency a per se one comes to be (whether in things or in concepts) other than that this is potential with respect to that and that actual with respect to this, and that of this fact further there is no reason other than that this is this and that is that.

277. And in the same way about what is one per accidens: because this is this and that is that for the reason that this is act per accidens and that is potency per accidens, and, further, that for this reason does a one per accidens come to be from this and that; for it is more immediate that heat constitutes a hot thing and humanity a man (and consequently heat constitutes a being per accidens and humanity a being per se) than that a hot thing heats; yet this second one is immediate, and to seek a middle term for it is a sign of lack of education, from Metaphysics 4.4.1006a5-8, 6.1011a8-13.

δ. To the Fourth Reason

278. To the fourth reason [n.186] I say that it gives good evidence against the second rejected opinion [nn.207-230]. For in vain would corporeity be posited as different from the intellective soul if the intellective soul include the vegetative and sensitive soul, and the sensitive and vegetative soul include corporeity.

279. But as to this other way [sc. the first, of Aquinas and Giles], there is an easy response. For here there is a necessity to posit more things. And the necessity is? - That which is the reason universally for distinguishing this from that, namely contradiction, which is the immediate reason for distinguishing many things under being, to wit if this and that have a contradiction in being, because then, if this is and that is not, they are not the same in being.

280. So it is in the issue at hand: when the form of the soul does not remain, the body does remain. And so it is universally necessary to posit in any animate thing that the form by which the body is body is different from the form by which it is animate. I am not speaking of the form by which a body is a body, that is, an individual body as body is a genus, for any individual is, by its form of this sort, a body as body is a genus, and is possessed of corporeity. Rather I am speaking of body as it is the other part of the composite, for by this it is not an individual or a species in the genus of body, or indeed in the genus of substance either (which is a superior genus); but it is so only by reduction. Hence since the body, which is the other part of the composite, remains indeed in its own being without the soul, it consequently has a from by which it is a body in this way and does not have a soul; and so this form is necessarily other than the soul. But it is not an individual in the genus of body, save only by reduction, as a part; just as neither is the separate soul per se under the genus of substance but only by reduction.

281. Against this: a necessary disposition does not remain without that for which it is necessarily disposed; but the form of the mixture [sc. of the body] is a necessary disposition for the soul;     therefore etc     . And there is a special confirmation in the issue at hand, because the intellective soul even in death, since it is immortal, is not necessarily separated from matter save because another substantial form (which it requires as a necessary disposition) is separated; for the soul does not in itself have anything in matter that is repugnant to it; but the necessarily required form can only be the form of the mixture; therefore the intellective soul cannot exist without it.

282. I reply: some qualities follow the form of the mixture and are in some degree necessary so that the form of the mixture remain in the subject; and they are necessary in the subject in the same degree, so that the intellective soul remain, because whatever is necessary for the disposition is necessary for the form for which the disposition disposes; but those qualities can well be necessary simply for the intellective soul as it forms the body, and required for it in a more perfect degree than they are required for the form of the mixture. For it is possible that a more perfect form requires what a more imperfect form requires, and not only in equal degree but in a more perfect degree. Therefore when those dispositions are destroyed in the degree to which they are necessarily required for the intellective soul, the intellective soul does not remain, and yet the other disposing form can remain, because the dispositions are not corrupted in the degree necessary for that other form; but this other also does not remain in perfect and undisturbed being, because the qualities consequent to it are corrupted in the degree to which, in perfect and undisturbed being, they follow it. And therefore no mixed body able to be ensouled has being simply perfect and undisturbed when the soul departs; rather it is at once in a continual tendency toward its dissolution into the elements.

283. To the form of the argument therefore [n.281] I say that the form of the mixture is not a necessary disposition for the intellective soul; and although the intellective soul immediately follow it in generation, this is not because of a necessity between them, but because the superior agent has as passive subject a proportioned composite, namely one made of matter and the form of the mixture; and when it has a proportioned passive subject it at once introduces into it the form of which the subject is capable.

284. As to what is also added in confirmation [n.281], that the intellective soul does not have in matter any repugnance to itself, I say that there is no substantial form that in-forms matter without the consequent qualities following it, or without it requiring them, and in a certain degree - a degree in which the form, if they do not remain, will not in-form the matter. Although therefore the intellective soul not have a repugnance properly to any natural form, yet when it in-forms matter it requires some qualities, and requires them in some perfect degree, in which it will, if they do not remain, not in-form the matter. Now these are the qualities consequent to the prior form, but not necessarily required for the being of that prior form in as a great a degree as they are required for the being of the intellective soul in matter. This is plain from an example, because for animation by the intellective soul there is required a heart and a liver of a determinate hotness, a brain of a determinate coldness, and so on about the individual organic parts; but when such a disposition ceases, there can still remain some species or quality which stands along with the form of the mixture, although not the one that is required for the being and operation in matter of the intellective soul.

d. Scotus’ own Opinion

285. As to the second doubt [nn.97, 143, 180] of this second part, I say that the body of Christ per se includes matter, and at least one form of mixture prior to the intellective soul; and by this form is it in partial act and in proximate receptivity to the intellective soul, although it is not thereby in the genus of body as body is a genus, save by reduction. And into this composite, which however is per se a part of man, the per se conversion of the bread is made, that is, conversion of whole to whole and of parts to parts; and consequently this form is the formal term of the conversion, or the form of the term of conversion.

286. Now this form remains the same whether the soul be united to it or not united to it, because it is, at least by its in-forming, naturally prior to the soul; and it remained during the Triduum while the soul did not remain there. And so, during the Triduum the thing of this sacrament would have been the same, if the sacrament had then remained, because during the Triduum the form of corporeity was not separated from its matter in Christ, and consequently not separated from its matter as it is in the Eucharist. For just as the numerically same thing was the thing in itself in its natural existence, so also the numerically same composite, which is the first term of the conversion, would have remained always in the Eucharist.

287. It is of no avail, then, when saving this identity, to flee to the identity of matter or hypostasis, because contraries can exist in the same identity of matter when they succeed to each other in turn; even if the Word had assumed a stone, the stone would have been the same as the human nature by identity of hypostasis [Ord. III d.1 n.133, 152; cf. also William of Ware Sent. III q.9 a.1, Henry of Ghent Quod. III q.5].

II. To the Initial Arguments

288. To the first initial argument [n.89] I say that just as bread is said to be gathered from grains, so the species that remain are said to be gathered, because they are something of what is gathered. And such is the exposition of Augustine.

289. To the second [n.90], Damascene does not mean that we feed on the bread remaining there as we are accustomed to make use of bread, but that, as concerns use, it has the same act as bread has; and the species nourish in the same way as that of which they are the species. His simile then must be understood to the extent we so use the bread and wine as we use things disposed in the same way for our use, or that we are fed in the Eucharist as we use water in baptism. But not to the extent that, as the water remains there, so the substance of the bread remains here, for he expressly holds the opposite immediately afterwards in the same chapter: “The bread itself and the wine pass over,” he says, “into the body and blood of God. But if you ask about how, it suffices for you to hear, since it is done by the Holy Spirit.” And a little later: “Bread and wine and water are by the invocation and special arrival of the Holy Spirit supernaturally transubstantiated into the body and blood of Christ.”

290. To the third [n.91] I say that the species of bread and wine represents the true and mystical body of Christ the way bread does, and so the species displays in itself many grains to the extent that grains have the idea of being perceptible, namely by reason of the accidents.

291. To the next [n.92] the answer is plain from the second part of the solution to the question [n.175], for the transubstantiation here is not that whereby the term [of the conversion] receives ‘being simply’ but whereby it receives ‘being here’.

292. To the last one [n.93] I say that the first term of this conversion is neither matter alone, nor matter under quantity (because then there would not be transubstantiation but trans-accidentation), nor matter under some mode, nor the composite of matter and intellective soul. Rather it is the composite of matter and a certain form prior to the intellective soul, which form remained really the same in the living Christ and in his dead body, and which has always remained as the formal part of the thing contained under the Eucharist from the time when the Eucharist was instituted. Therefore the argument is to no avail.

Question Two. Whether the Bread is Annihilated in its Conversion into the Body of Christ

293. Proceeding thus to the second question [n.88], argument is made that the bread is annihilated in its conversion into the body of Christ.

Because that which existed before, and of which nothing remains, is annihilated; the bread existed before and nothing of it remains, for neither the matter nor form remains; for the whole has been wholly transitioned, namely the matter into matter and the form into form;     therefore etc     .

294. Secondly as follows: what is nothing in itself or in another and was something before is annihilated; the bread after the conversion is nothing in itself, and nothing too in the body of Christ, because then the body of Christ would be increased by the conversion of the bread into it; for that becomes greater in which there is one quantum after another that remains.

295. Third as follows: in partial transition the form is annihilated, because nothing of it remains - at least corruption of the bread is only distinguished from annihilation because the prior form remains in the potency of the matter; but in the issue at hand the form of the bread does not remain in the potency of what is receptive of it. One can also prove that the form there from which transition was made is annihilated because it does not remain in act, as is plain; nor does it remain in the potency of the subject, the proof of which is that nature can reduce a natural potency to act, and consequently, if the destroyed form were to remain numerically the same in the potency of the matter, it could be reduced to act by a natural agent - which is against the Philosopher, Physics 5.4.228a9-19, On Generation and Corruption 2.11.338b14-19.

If you say that it does not remain in the potency of the subject the same in number but the same in species - this does not prevent annihilation, because even if it were annihilated, a form different in number could be drawn out of the potency of the matter.

296. Again, annihilation and creation are opposites just as are generation and corruption, because as is said in Physics 5.1.225a12-20 “the term ‘from which’ of generation and the term ‘to which’ of corruption are the same, and conversely.” So the term ‘to which’ of annihilation and the term ‘from which’ of creation are the same, and conversely. But when the whole of the substance is the term ‘to which’ of generation and is so wholly, the production of it is creation;     therefore when the whole of it is the term ‘from which’ and is so wholly, the destruction of it is annihilation. But in the issue at hand the whole of it is the term ‘from which’ of the conversion and is so wholly; therefore etc     .

297. To the opposite:

Many authorities, adduced in the first part in the preceding question [nn.134-137], say that the bread is converted into the body of Christ; therefore it is not annihilated.

298. And there is argument by reason, because creation and annihilation are opposites; but if the body were converted into the bread, the bringing back again of the bread would not be creation, because it would not be from nothing as from the term ‘from which’; therefore, by parity of reasoning the conversion of the bread into the body is not annihilation.

299. Again, the cause of this annihilation could only be God, to whom alone it belongs to create. But God cannot be the cause of not being a thing, as Augustine proves 83 Questions qq.21-22.

I. To the Question

A. Opinion of Henry of Ghent

1. Exposition of the Opinion

300. One statement here [from Henry of Ghent] is that the bread is not annihilated, and from this is inferred that, after the conversion, the bread is not nothing and consequently is something. But it is not what was before, because what was before has been converted. Nor is it anything other than the term into which it is converted. Therefore, after the conversion it is something, since that which, as being thus what was bread before, is converted is the body of Christ. Or if this be denied, one must grant that a something-ness of Christ’s body belongs to what was bread, and likewise the being of the body of Christ belongs to it, otherwise the bread after the conversion could in no way be said to be something; rather one would have to say that it had been altogether annihilated.

2. Rejection of the Opinion

301. This opinion, then, states two things: both that the bread is not annihilated and that after the conversion it is not nothing but in some way something. And the second of these it deduces from the first.

302. Against the second I argue in four ways.

First as follows: a term of change, insofar as it is a term, includes the non-being of the other term. The proof is that, insofar as it is a term, it has some incompossibility with the other term; therefore, as it is a term, it does not include a something-ness of the other term, nor does it include the other term’s being in any way something, because it is a contradiction that, as it includes that other term’s non-being, it include a something-ness of that same term.

303. Second, because the body of Christ after the consecration is not disposed in any different way than before, therefore, neither does anything have being in it in any different way. But the non-converted bread does not in any way have its something-ness in the body of Christ, nor does it have any something-ness of the body of Christ; therefore it does not have it after the consecration either. Proof of the first consequence: to be in a certain way in something is because of the being simply of that something; for because something is in itself such, therefore does it thus or thus have something in itself. So there is no difference in the way something is in something save because of the difference in itself of that other something.

304. Again, that of which there is a something-ness is formally something by that something-ness. If therefore a something-ness of the body [of Christ] belong now to that which was the substance of bread, then that which was the substance of bread is now formally something by that something-ness. I ask what that something is. Not bread because the bread is not, and it seems a contradiction that by the something-ness of the body it be formally something that it is, namely bread. Nor is that which was the substance of the bread the body by that something-ness, because that which was the substance of bread has simply ceased to be, and the body remains simply in the same being. Nor can it be said that by this something-ness there is something else besides the bread or body.

305. Next, ‘something’ and ‘thing’ are convertible terms, according to Avicenna in his Metaphysics 1.5. That then of which there is a something-ness is formally a thing; and so it would follow that that which was bread would now be a thing. And ‘thing’, according to this doctor, is taken in two ways: in one way for a thing that is opinable, as ‘thing’ is said to come from ‘I think’, ‘you think’; or, in another way, from ‘ratified thing’, insofar as this is said to come from ratification [cf. Ord. I d.3 n.310].Latin ‘res’ ‘thing’ from Latin ‘reor, reris’ ‘I/you think’, or ‘res rata’, with ‘rata’ also coming from the same verb ‘reor’. The etymology is dubious but adopted by Henry and many others. There is no such etymological connection in English between ‘thing’ and ‘think’, or of course ‘ratify’. The English translation nevertheless tries, if fancifully, to capture something of the Latin word play. ²⁹ By this something-ness, therefore, ‘that which was bread’ will be a thing in the first way; and then it follows that it is not more a thing than a chimaera is, for a chimaera is a thing in this way, according to him; and then the annihilation of the bread stands very well with such something-ness (just as if anything were converted into a chimaera it would truly be annihilated). If thing is taken in the second way, then (as before) either the thing is quidditatively bread, and then the bread quidditatively is not converted, or the thing is quidditatively what the body is, and this is impossible because of the quidditative distinction between that which was of the bread and that which was of the body.

B. Opinion of Giles of Rome and its Rejection

306. It is said in another way [Giles of Rome] that the bread is not annihilated because, after its conversion into the body, it remains in the body in potency; for the body of Christ and the bread have a common subject (as the matter), and therefore the substance of the bread can return through conversion of the body into it, and this conversion would not be creation. Therefore, not even this conversion is annihilation, and this because of the common subject in whose potency are both terms.

307. On the contrary: the bread could not, on the basis of this statement, be annihilated while any other body remains; because if any other body remains (at least a corruptible one), matter of the same idea would remain, in whose potency the bread consequently remains, just as now it is said [by Giles] to remain in the matter of Christ’s body. Therefore, the bread could not be annihilated unless the whole of bodily substance were annihilated.The point of this argument seems to be that Giles has given a sense to the idea of annihilation such that nothing can ever be annihilated unless everything, or everything bodily, is annihilated. But this view is absurd, for something can surely be annihilated without everything else being annihilated as well. So, annihilation cannot be what Giles says it is, and consequently he has not given an adequate reason for saying that the bread is not annihilated in its conversion into Christ’s body. The same should be said, mutatis mutandis, about the point of the next two arguments [nn.308-309]. ³⁰

308. Again, if the bread were annihilated and the body of Christ were present here, the bread would remain in altogether the same way in the potency of the matter of Christ’s body according as it now is; therefore, it should not, because of what it now is in the potency of the matter of Christ’s body, be said to be not annihilated.

309. Again, something that is common to both terms is not necessary save for transmutation properly speaking; because, if one excludes the subject and takes precisely the terms of a transmutation, opposition rather is required in them than something the same that is common. Indeed, something the same that is common to certain things prevents these things from being the per se terms of a transmutation. Therefore, since in this transition there is not properly a change, nor a subject that remains, but only the two terms of the transition, nothing common will per se give or take away from this transition any of its idea; therefore, if this transition (with everything common removed) were annihilation, it will also be annihilation now [sc. on Giles’ theory].

C. Scotus’ own Opinion

310. To the question one can say that, in the issue at hand, nothing of the bread remains after the conversion; and second that the bread is not annihilated or (which is easier) that the bread is not by this conversion annihilated.

1. Nothing of the Bread Remains after the Conversion

311. The first point may be supposed to have been proved by the reasons given against the first opinion [nn.302-305].

2. The Bread is not Annihilated by this Conversion

a. Proof

312. The second point is proved as follows: the term ‘to which’ of this transition of the bread is not pure nothing; therefore, the bread is not annihilated.

The proof of the consequence is that the term ‘to which’ of annihilation is pure nothing. And the proof of this is by a likeness: just as the term ‘from which’ of creation is pure nothing, so the term ‘to which’ of annihilation should be pure nothing.

The proof of the antecedent is that the term of this transition is the body of Christ, because, although negation of the bread be concomitant with the term ‘to which’, yet this term is not altogether nothing but is in something positive.

b. Objection

313. Against this is that, although the positing of Christ’s body here is concomitant with the ceasing to be of the bread, yet the ceasing to be of the bread in its proper and primary idea, as it is distinguished from the positing of Christ’s body, seems to be annihilation; and it is not distinguished from annihilation because its term ‘to which’ is the nothingness of the bread.

314. There is confirmation through a likeness, that corruption now is not annihilation - not because of the mere fact that generation is concomitant with it, for if it were because of this not annihilation, that is, because of the term precisely of generation, then the corruption would, on account of the positive term of the change, be a positive change - which is false. But as it is, corruption in its proper idea, as it is distinguished essentially from the concomitant generation, is not annihilation, because something of the corrupted thing remains (that is, the matter). And from this follows that the negation (to which term the corruption is) is negation in a naturally suited subject; therefore, it is privation. Therefore, from the opposite in the issue at hand, since nothing of the term ‘from which’ remains, and the negation of the being of the bread is not privation (because it is not in a naturally suited subject) but pure non-being, it follows that this destruction of the bread is, in its proper idea, annihilation.

315. And this is confirmed lastly because the per se idea of a thing does not vary with something per accidens concurrent with it; but it is per accidens that with the destruction of the bread the positing of the body here of Christ is concurrent (the proof: for the first could be separated from the second); therefore, the idea of this destruction [of the bread] does not vary because of this positing of the body here of Christ, but the destruction, if it occurred alone without the positing [of the body here], would be annihilation of the bread; therefore it is annihilation now as well.

c. Refutation by Others of the Objection

316. One might in one way say here [Henry of Ghent] that transubstantiation is a change precisely between positive terms, such that two privative terms and two changes will not, as in the case of generation and corruption, be givens there; but just as, according to the Philosopher Physics 5.1.225a8, some change is ‘from subject to subject’, namely a change that has something positive for both per se terms, so does this transubstantiation have precisely two terms, and both are positive. And so one is not to suppose here that the destruction is a sort of per se change formally, and that it would be distinguished in genus from the beginning of the body here of Christ, but that there is only a single transition of this positive term into that positive term.

317. Against this way: it is manifest that ‘the non-being of the bread’ is not formally ‘the being of the body here of Christ’, nor conversely; for it would be possible for the bread not to be and for the body here not to be posited, and conversely; similarly, the ‘non-being of the body here of Christ’ and ‘the being of the bread’ are not formally here the same. So we have the per se terms ‘the being of bread’ and ‘the non-being of bread’, and ‘the being of the body here of Christ’ and ‘the non-being of the body here of Christ’. Likewise, ‘the non-being of the body here of Christ’ and ‘the being of the body here of Christ’ are not the same but opposite terms; so we can have two transitions quidditatively distinct, each of which has two terms of its own. And then the whole of the difficulty remains that was touched on in the case of generation as distinct from corruption [n.316], and in the case of the per se formal distinction of the destruction [of the bread] as it is distinct from the positing of the body here of Christ.

d. Scotus’ Rejection of the Objection

α. Reasons Proving that the Bread is not Simply Annihilated

318. [First reason] - A reply can be made while holding to this conclusion, namely that the bread is not simply annihilated. For the term of annihilation is a pure nothing, that is, because nothing of the term ‘from which’ remains in the term ‘to which’. And negation in a naturally suited subject (which is called ‘privation’ [n.314]) is not the term of annihilation, and conditions opposite to the above conditions [sc. for annihilation] exist in corruption as corruption is negation. And, third, because negation in a disparateBoethius On Hypothetical Syllogism I, “I call those things ‘disparate’ which are only diverse from each other, with no conflicting contrariety, as ‘earth’, ‘clothing’, ‘fire’ etc. ³¹ positive subject is not the term of annihilation but negation simply outside the genus is -that is, outside everything positive or every subject that might be called a privation according to this negation, or according to a disparate subject that might include this negation.

319. And this last point can be made evident, for not only does the matter of corrupted air remain and have the privation of its prior form, but the negation of the form of air is preserved in the form of fire that is newly introduced. And the negation, as it is in the form of fire, is not there as in a subject suited to it (but it is only so in common matter); rather it is there as in something disparate. And even if one removed the negation as it is in the common matter that is now the term of corruption (and because of which corruption is not now annihilation), yet if this negation as in something disparate were the term of some ceasing to be, the air would still not be annihilated.

320. To the issue at hand: although there are here two reasons which make it clear that, because of them, corruption is not annihilation, namely because something of what was corrupted remains and because the negation that is the term of it remains in a naturally suitable subject [nn.319, 314], there is nevertheless a third reason here, namely that the negation that is the term is in something positive, not in a subject but in something disparate.

321. Hereby, then, to the reason [n.313]: one can say that this ceasing to be of the bread in itself, and also as it is toward the non-being of bread, is not negation outside the genus; but as it is in the body it is not annihilation.

322. And the answer now to the example of corruption [n.314] is plain: for it is true that corruption is not denied to be annihilation precisely because of the concomitant generation, but because of those two causes (one of which includes the other), namely that there is a common subject and therefore the negation that is its term is privation. But if the third cause could stand alone without either of these two, namely that negation would be the term as it is in some positive disparate thing, still this transition would not be annihilation; and such is what this conversion is posited as being.

323. But the third argument [n.315, 320] is more compelling, namely about per se and per accidens. For there is found here one per se transition from the being of bread to its non-being, and another from the non-presence here of the body of Christ to the presence of it here. And then, as was argued [n.312], if the second [the presence of the body of Christ] were not concomitant with the first, the first would be a case of annihilation [sc. of the bread]; therefore now too it is formally annihilation, since its idea does not vary because of that which is per accidens concomitant.This argument seems to assert what has just been denied [n.322], that the conversion of the bread into the body of Christ is not annihilation. But the meaning rather is that though the first part of the transition (from the being of the bread to the non-being of the bread) could be, or indeed is, annihilation, yet the whole conversion is not, as n.337 makes clear (cf. also nn.312, 322). ³²

324. [Second reason] - Again, if the bread were annihilated and the body of Christ were posited as being present here, both the bread and body would, as regard every condition both of being and of non-being, be disposed in the same way as they are disposed now. But what is disposed the same as it would be if it were annihilated is itself annihilated;     therefore etc     . The first proposition is manifest, because if the bread were annihilated, neither its matter nor its form would remain; and they do in the same way not remain now. If too the body were then present under the accidents, it would be present in this way now as well.This argument seems to be a reductio: if annihilation is regarded as the non-being of bread and the presence of the body here of Christ, then the conversion of the bread into the body would be annihilation however that conversion is understood. But this conversion can be understood as not annihilation; therefore annihilation must be more than the non-being of bread and the presence of the body here of Christ (as per Scotus’ explanation in n.318). ³³

325. [Third reason] - Again (and this is directly against the last response given to the point about corruption [n.317]): because the term, as being the term of a new action, is itself new, therefore the negation of the being of the bread, as it is the term of the ceasing to be of the bread, is new. But as it is in the body of Christ, it is not new, for the way that the disparate thing [sc. Christ’s body] includes the negation of the disparate thing [sc. the bread], the body of Christ was non-bread before the ceasing to be of the bread.

326. If you say “it is true that ‘non-bread’, as it is in the body [of Christ], is not a new negation, just as neither is the separation of the body from the bread new,” - on the contrary: from this follows that the non-being of the bread is the term, because, as this negation is in the body of Christ, it is so, according to this response, by reason of the separation; if therefore non-being is the term as new, it is the term not as it is in the body by reason of the separation.

327. [Fourth reason] - Again, when changes of diverse genera concur together, negation is not the per se term of either of them as it is included in the term of the other. An example: if generation and change of place are together, the negation that is term of the corruption accompanying the generation is not the term of it per se as it is preserved in its ‘where’ (and this is proved by reason, that where the negation of the term ‘from which’ of one change is per se preserved in the term ‘to which’ of the other change, these changes must be of the same genus, because the term ‘to which’ and the term ‘from which’ are opposites). But in the issue at hand, the body of Christ here absolutely does not include the non-being of the bread, as is plain, because the separation of the body from the bread existed while both extremes remained; therefore, it only includes the negation of the being of the bread as it is here. But this term ‘as it is here’ does not pertain to the genus of substance; therefore, this negation is not the per se term of the destruction [sc. of the bread] the way it is preserved in the body as the body is here.

β. On the Possibility of Evading these Reasons

328. Some of these reasons [nn.318-327] can be evaded:

329. [About the second reason] - The second [n.324] as follows: when denying this proposition, namely “what is disposed to being and non-being in every way it would be if it were annihilated is itself annihilated,” one would have to add in the subject the words “and altogether the same thing succeeds to it.” And that this addition is necessary is sufficiently plain, because before a thing is created it is as much nothing as if had been created before and afterwards annihilated, and yet before it is created it is not annihilated. And why? Because in this case its nothingness does not succeed to its being. So I say that, if the bread were annihilated, neither matter nor form would remain, just as they do not remain now. But yet now something succeeds to the total being of the bread which then would not succeed; because now negation in genus, namely in some positive disparate thing, succeeds, but in then negation simply outside the genus would succeed.

330. [About the third reason] - To the third reason [n.325] one could say that negation, as it is included in its disparate subject, is not incompatible with the affirmation of it in the common idea of being; otherwise disparate things could not both be beings together. But the negation in the case of a contradiction is repugnant to the affirmation, even in the whole range of being. If therefore the disparate negation of the bread [sc. negation in something disparate] were in Christ’s body beforehand, nevertheless the contradictory negation of its being is not. But now, after the conversion, the contradictory negation is in the body of Christ; and thus it is new, because it follows the affirmation that contradicts it.

331. Against this: it does not in any way seem that the contradictory negation is in the body more than it was before; and so, as it is new and is the term of the ceasing to be of the bread, it is not the term as the term is in the body. Also, the contradictory negation is pure nothing, and so a pure nothing is said of something positive, as if it were said of a chimaera; therefore, if the negation is the term of this ceasing to be, it follows that this ceasing to be will be a pure nothing.

332. If it be said to the first point here [n.331] that the non-being of the bread, as it contradicts the being of the bread, is in the body of Christ otherwise than it was before, because the contradictory non-being is included in the body of Christ as that body is here, while in the body of Christ absolutely only the disparate negation is included - this is refuted by the fourth reason [n.327], because the later term is not the idea of a new incompossibility with anything that is naturally prior. Therefore ‘it as here’ is not the idea of a new incompossibility of the body with the being of the bread. So one must say that the negation is not new and then it is not the term of the ceasing to be; or if it is new and not in the body as the body is here (because the presence is not the idea according to which such incompossiblity exists in it), in no way will the negation as it is in the body be the term of the ceasing to be of the bread.

e. Conclusion

333. The third reason [n.323] therefore can be maintained, namely the second member of the distinction posited above [ibid.], that destruction is annihilation of the bread absolutely. The reasoning about ‘per accidens’ is proof, that because the ‘non-being simply’ of the bread must be said to succeed to the ‘being simply’ of the bread, and because this succeeding of opposite to opposite is per accidens conjoined simply to the succeeding of ‘the presence of Christ’s body here’ to its ‘non-presence here’, therefore the latter will have two per se terms different from the per se terms of the former. Therefore the per se term of the latter will not be the per se term, or not precisely, as it is conjoined per accidens to the per se term of the former change.

334. I also say that the bread is not annihilated in this conversion of the bread into the body. This is made clear as follows, that (as was said in the preceding question [n.166]) one kind of transubstantiation is that whereby the term receives ‘being simply’, and another kind is that whereby it receives ‘being here’. As to the former kind, whereby one term receives ‘being simply’ and the other term ‘non-being simply’, perhaps the fact that the destruction of the term ‘from which’ is not simply annihilation could be saved, because there the per se term ‘to which’ of its beginning would be opposite to the term ‘from which’ of its ceasing (as is the case with the term ‘from which’ and ‘to which’ of generation and corruption), and the negation there of the term ‘from which’ as it is in the term ‘to which’ could be the term of the ceasing. But in the issue at hand, where the conversion is only a transition that introduces the term ‘to which’ of the per se positive change, it is not opposed to the term ‘from which’ of the privative change; and so it cannot be a reason for including the negation of it.

335. One could say, therefore, that this conversion is as of substance to substance, not insofar as it is to the being simply of the substance but as it is to the ‘being here’ of it, so that, just as the body as here succeeds to the bread as here, so the bread as here is converted into the body as here. And these changes, though they are between substances, yet they are changes as between substances, not as between terms; for the terms are only present-ness and non-present-ness, which can be reduced to the genus ‘where’, as was said in d.10 q.1 nn.35, 55.

336. Therefore, just as the body in the positive change does not acquire ‘being simply’ but ‘being here’, so in the corresponding depriving change (which this conversion includes, insofar as this conversion is a transitioning but not a productive transubstantiation) - this change, I say, does not take away the ‘being simply’ of the bread but its ‘being here’. And the beauty of the correspondence is sufficiently plain, because just as the body has a new presence without losing its old presence and states an acquisitive change without a depriving change (as was said in d.10 q.1 nn.48-49), so conversely the bread has a depriving change without an acquisitive change, because it ceases to be here and does not acquire another presence elsewhere.

337. Because, therefore, nothing is acquired or lost through this conversion, as it is a transitioning conversion, save only ‘being here’ and ‘non-being here’, the result is that, by this conversion as it is here, substantial being is not lost and so not annihilated; indeed neither is the bread destroyed by this conversion. However, because the bread does not remain in its substantial being and is, by this conversion, not destroyed (as was said), it must be that it cease to be by the ceasing to be that is from the ‘being of it simply’ to the ‘non-being of it simply’. Now the ‘non-being of it’, although it is quasiconcomitant with the presence of the body of Christ as that body is here, yet not as it is a term of the same genus; and so, if this destruction, considered in itself, be annihilation, yet in no way is the conversion annihilation.

338. An example of this: if the bread were destroyed and an angel were newly created and became present to the species of the bread, the conversion of the bread into the angel would be ‘of the bread as it is here’ into ‘the angel as it is present here’, and by this conversion the angel would only acquire that presence. However the new ‘being’ that is the term of the angel’s own creation would be concomitant with this new presence.

339. This way of speaking makes apparent which transubstantiation can be into something preexistent and which cannot, and which can be when the term ‘from which’ remains and which cannot. For the transubstantiation that is from term to term as to the ‘being’ and ‘non-being’ simply of the terms cannot be of something that is converted and yet remains, nor can it be conversion into a preexisting term. However, the transubstantiation that is a transition of substance to substance as to ‘being here’ can also be of a term ‘from which’ that remains (so that if it cease to be here, yet not cease simply to be and something else as it is here succeed to it). This transition can also be into a preexisting term, if the term begin to be here without beginning to be. Possible too is that the term ‘from which’ is destroyed, but not destroyed by this conversion; and possible that the term ‘to which’ begin to be, and not begin to be by this conversion, as was illustrated by the example of the created angel [n.338].

II. To the Initial Arguments of the First Part

340. To the initial arguments.

As to the first argument [n.293], if the first member of the disjunctive set down at the beginning of the solution [n.310] is held to, the major of the argument is to be denied [n.293: ‘that which existed before, and of which nothing remains, is annihilated’]; for one must add that ‘nothing of it remains and nothing simply succeeds to it as a per se term’.

341. As to the second [n.294] the same point holds: although it is nothing in itself or in another, yet its being is not succeeded by altogether nothing.

342. As to the third [n.295], one must deny that the form is annihilated in corruption.

343. And as to the proof that ‘it only remains in the potency of the matter’, I say that ‘its remaining in the potency of matter’ is ‘the other part of the composite remaining per se’; and so does the form too remain per accidens; but that of which something either per se or per accidens remains is not annihilated.

344. And when you argue that the numerically same thing could return through a natural agent, I say that this does not follow, because the potency in which the form remains must be understood as a potential principle, and not as a respect. For when the form is corrupted, the respect of the potency to the form does not remain, because the respect of the potency is not to what is altogether past, just as neither is it to what is altogether impossible. But the potential principle remains per se, and the form (which was something of the whole) remains per accidens according to some part of itself. Or one could say briefly that although nothing of the form of what is corrupted remains, yet the negation that succeeds to it is a negation in a fitting subject, and so is a privation. And a privation is not of a nature to be the term of annihilation.

345. And when this is applied to the issue at hand, then although [the bread] is required to remain so as to be said not to be annihilated, and although the form of the bread does not thus remain because its matter transitions into matter, I say that for many reasons, as stated before [n.314], corruption is not said to be annihilation; and although these two points suffice, namely that the subject remains and the negation that is the term is a privation [ibid.], yet if the negation that is the term were some negation in a genus, as in some disparate positive thing, still the transition to it would not be annihilation.

346. To the fourth argument [n.296] it can be said that not every production of the whole substance is creation, but the production that is from a term ‘from which’ as from what is purely nothing; and so the answer here is by assertion of the opposite, if the second member of the disjunctive posited in the solution to the question is held to [nn.310, 340]. But from this the conclusion does not follow that the bread is annihilated by this conversion, but only that its annihilation is concomitant with this conversion.

III. To the Arguments for the Opposite

347. As to the reason for the opposite [nn.297, 238]: Ambrose is speaking of the conversion of terms not according to ‘being simply’ but according to ‘being in a certain respect’.

348. As to the next, about creation [n.298], the answer is plain from the solution to the last argument of the first part [n.346].

349. As to Augustine [n.299] I reply that God does not annihilate things by any positive action; but just as he conserves things by acting positively, so annihilating creatures is to stop conserving them, and God can do this.

Question Three. By which Propositions the Conversion of the Bread into the Body of Christ can Truly be Expressed

350. Lastly the question is asked, without arguments, about which propositions this conversion can be truly expressed with.

I. About the Ways it cannot be Signified

351. I reply that it cannot be truly signified by the word ‘being’ or ‘becoming’, nor by the word ‘can’ or ‘possible’, and that according to no difference of time. For the bread neither becomes nor was the body of Christ, nor is it nor will it be the body; nor conversely was the body the bread, nor is it nor will it be the bread.

352. And the reason for all these statements is:

Because ‘to be’ marks the union (essential or accidental) of the extreme terms for the time that it signifies. But for no difference of time do these extremes have an essential or accidental union. Rather they have for every instant either disparate-ness (that is, when both terms are positive beings), or a repugnance that is greater, namely the repugnance of being to non-being for the instant when one is and the other is not.

353. A second assertion is that the bread neither becomes, nor did become, nor will become, the body of Christ, nor conversely. And for these statements the reason is that, when ‘to become’ is predicated as the added second element of the statement,The difference between second and third element added is the difference between using ‘is’ or ‘comes to be’ etc. as predicate or as copula. ‘Socrates is’ asserts being simply of Socrates, and ‘Socrates is just’ asserts the property of justice of him, and in this second proposition the ‘is’ comes in as third element (for it joins ‘Socrates’ and ‘just’), while in the first proposition it comes in as second element (for it asserts existence of Socrates as ‘is just’ asserts justice of him): Aristotle On Interpretation 10.19b19-25; also Boethius’ commentary thereon (Commentary IV): “In the statement ‘man is just’, ‘man’ is subject and ‘just’ and ‘is’ are both predicated; so there are here two predicates and one subjects In ‘man is just’ the ‘is’ is the third element added, but the predicate ‘just’ is not the third but the second element added. So the third is said to be added and the second to be predicated...” ³⁴ it predicates ‘to become’ simply of that of which it is said, and it does not thus combine anything in apposition to the subject. In this way the bread became (came to be) when it was baked, and thus did the body come to be when it was formed in the Virgin’s womb; but this is not relevant to the minor premise [n.351]. But when ‘to become’ is predicated as the third added element of the statement, then it denotes that the subject comes to be according to the form of the predicate. But the bread does not come to be, for any difference of time, according to the form of the predicate. And this is plain in a likeness by way of opposite; for ‘man becomes white’ is true for this reason, that man comes to be under the form of whiteness and, by way of opposite, this statement is impossible ‘man becomes an ass’, and this when one is speaking strictly of the force of the sentence. So does it seem to be in the issue at hand.

354. A third assertion is that the bread cannot be, and could not be, and will not be able to be, the body of Christ, nor conversely. And the reason for all these is that a proposition about possibility, of which a statement about actual presence is impossible, is false; for any proposition about possibility can be asserted, although perhaps falsely, about something that can be present. But any proposition about presence corresponding to any of the above about possibility, is impossible (from the first conclusion just proved); for this proposition about presence is impossible ‘the bread is the body of Christ’, and the proposition ‘this bread will be or was the body’; and the same with the verb ‘to become’.

II. About the Ways it can be Signified

355. How then should one speak?

I reply that, when taking each term directly as nominatives, neither should be predicated of the other in any of these ways.

356. So if the predication is to be true, one of the terms must be taken in an oblique case, denoting the order of one extreme to the other.

357. And this can be done in two ways:

First with the preposition ‘from’ or ‘of’, by adding the term ‘from which’, as the Philosopher says Metaphysics 2.2.994ab2-3, that from morning midday comes to be, and not conversely. And in this way one can concede that from the bread the body of Christ comes to be.

Secondly by adding to the term ‘to which’ the preposition ‘into’, which denotes that it is the term ‘to which’. In this way does the bread pass into the body of Christ.

358. And all these locutions about the force of the statement reduce to one of these two ways. But the second is more proper, because it does not denote that anything common remains, as the preposition ‘from’ in some way does, according to the way that ‘from’ is properly taken. For an opposite only comes to be ‘from’ the opposite because it is from a subject common to both opposites, according to the Philosopher Physics 1.7189b32-190a21, On Generation 1.4.319b18-320a5, Metaphysics 2.2.994a22-b6.

359. But no proposition taken along with change or movement (even when taking one term in an oblique case and the other in the nominative case) is true, as ‘the bread is changed into the body of Christ’; for there is no change here, as was said in question 1 of this distinction [n.45].

360. But ‘transition’ or ‘(con)vert’ abstract from the idea of change, because they posit the relation of term to term without implying that a common subject remains.