b. Second: About Christ’s Body Quantum without Quantitative Mode

α. First Opinion and its Rejection

56. On the second point it is said [Richard of Middleton, Henry of Ghent, Giles of Rome et al.] that the quantity of Christ’s body is not under the species of bread save concomitantly, because the first term of the conversion is the substance of the body of Christ, and a thing is there in the way in which it is the term of the conversion. Therefore the quantity is not there by way of being the first term. But the first term, which is the substance, does not of itself have a quantitative or commensurate mode; therefore the quantity existing there under the idea or the mode of it, that is of the substance, will be there in non-quantitative mode.

57. On the contrary: each thing, whether it is the first term of the transubstantiation or the second, provided however it is there, has the properties that necessarily or naturally belong to it.

There is proof also of this through an example, because if God were to create a substance quantum or if nature were to generate a substance and quantity were a concomitant, the first term of each production will be the substance and the quantity will be concomitant; and yet both in the generated and the created thing the quantity has its real mode, just as it would also have if it were the first term of a change.

58. This is also proved by reason:

Because a different relation to the agent does not vary the nature of the thing, whether the relation is first or second, mediate or immediate, provided however that the thing is produced; because neither does a relation to a different agent vary the nature of the thing done, according to Augustine On the Trinity 3.9 n.16. Therefore neither will quantity lack its natural mode merely for the reason that it is not the first term of transubstantiation, provided it is really there (whether primarily or secondarily) through the change.

Secondly as follows: if, through the conversion, the term ‘to which’ is where the term ‘from which’ was before, the mode of being of the latter and the former will be similar, at least the mode of being that can be common to both. But the converted bread was here quantitatively in its own way, because it was under quantity having part next to part. Therefore the substance of Christ’s body as well, existing here by force of the conversion, will be here quantitatively in its own way, namely having part of substance under part of quantity; and then quantity will be here in its proper dimensions.

β. Second Opinion and its Rejection

59. Alternatively it is said [Godfrey of Fontaines, Albert the Great] that the parts of Christ’s body are next to each other in the sacramental host.

The proof is as follows, that just as it is possible for divine virtue that a body be simultaneously together with a body such that one part of the body exist simultaneously together with another part, so can divine virtue make part interpenetrate part, and so on and so on, making the part that has interpenetrated another again interpenetrate another, and in this way they will interpenetrate each other mutually up to the smallest natural quantity. Thus the true reality of each part is preserved and yet there is no extension of part next to part (just as the true reality of one body is preserved notwithstanding that it exists by interpenetration with another).

60. On the contrary: for this view takes from the body of Christ its position in the whole, as well as all shape that is perhaps necessary for an animated body. For if the head is not distant from the foot and the whole interpenetrates the whole up to the smallest natural part, there will no longer be the ordering of parts in the whole, nor the shape, that is necessary for an animated body.

γ. Scotus’ own Opinion

61. I say otherwise, then, that the position that is a difference of quantity is necessarily present in a permanent continuous quantum; and one must preserve it in the matter at hand, namely that it states the order of parts in the whole. For that something is a quantum with dimensions, and yet that this does not signify an order in the whole of this part to another part according to intervening quantity, is not very intelligible.

62. But the sense of position that is set down by some as a category, adds something else. For, on the presupposition that there is an order of parts in the whole, position states further an order of parts to place or to the parts of place or of what locates it in place; that is to say, that the parts are coextended with the parts of the place (as a ‘whole’ is said to be primarily commensurate with the whole place in which it has its ‘where’), so that position as a category presupposes position as difference of quantity, and it specifies the ‘where’.

Now by quantitative or dimensioned mode (however it is named) I understand only position said in the second way [sc. ‘where’].

63. But this relation can be separated by God from a quantum (while position in the first sense remains), and not merely by negation of limit, just as he could make a body outside the universe. And then it would not have position in the second sense [sc. ‘where’], because it would not have anything containing it with whose parts the parts of the contained thing were commensurated. But even when a limit has been posited, namely a limit with whose presence there could be commensuration or coextension with another body, God could preserve a quantum and its coexistence with another quantum and yet without a coextension of the parts of one quantum with the parts of the other, which coextension is what is meant by position in the sense we are speaking of [sc. ‘where’].

64. I prove this in a first way as follows: any nature that has a contingent relation to some form of some genus is simply related contingently to the whole genus (by ‘simply’ I mean ‘not necessarily from an intrinsic cause’). This seems sufficiently evident in that, if there were some nature and if it were from some intrinsic cause that necessarily determined a genus for it, it would necessarily determine some species of that genus for it. For one nature does not intrinsically have a necessity for disjunct opposites without having a necessity for one of those opposites.

65. And hereby is solved an objection that could be made: number is necessarily equal or unequal, but it is not necessarily one rather than the other. For the objection is about some common respect of a property that has distinctions, but any specific instance is necessarily related to one of the two as also to the genus.The objection seems to be that if number is necessarily equal or unequal, then it is necessarily equal or necessarily unequal. But the necessity refers to the disjunction (which is common to both), namely ‘number is necessarily one or the other’, and not to the disjuncts (which are distinct for each), namely ‘number is necessarily this one’, or ‘number is necessarily that one’. Of course, any particular number, as opposed to number as a class, will necessarily be the equal it is or necessarily the unequal it is. ⁵ Nor is there even an objection to the matter at hand, because there is no subject here that is contingently disposed to some form of the whole genus.The subject is a quantum that coexists with another quantum, but which God withholds from having coextension with it, and so place [n.63]. Such a quantum, then, has no ‘where’ and is not disposed, even contingently, to having this ‘where’ or that ‘where’ or some other ‘where’. ⁶

66. And if you object that a surface is necessarily colored and yet it is contingently related to any particular color - this is not an objection, because here there is no necessity intrinsically; for one could not find an intrinsic idea whereby there would be a contradiction on the part of a surface that it was without color, as there is contingency in respect of any particular color.The objection seems to be that just as a surface is necessarily colored but not necessarily this color rather than that color, so a quantum is necessarily in a place but not necessarily in this place rather than that place. The response is to deny the analogy by denying that a surface qua surface is necessarily colored (there is no necessity intrinsically, or no necessity in surface as such). For color is not surface but the limit of the transparent at a surface, and a surface would have no such limit in the dark (when there is no transparency for it to be a limit to), nor would it if the surface were transparent (like glass) and so were not a limit to whatever transparent medium there was. So similarly a quantum has no necessity in itself to be in a place. The objection fails, therefore, because it does not hold of a quantum simply, as it does not hold of surface simply, but only of a quantum together with the additional relation of place and only of surface with the additional property of being the limit of the transparent. ⁷

Taking this major, then [n.64], I add the minor, namely that a body is related contingently to any position (this is plain, because I can move my body from any position to another). Therefore a body, even when it has the position of parts in the whole, is not simply related necessarily to the position that is a category [sc. ‘where’], nor is the coexistence of a quantum with a quantum simply a necessary reason for position in that sense; for it is possible to understand coexistence of something with the whole without understanding the coexistence or coextension of parts with parts. For this latter coexistence is different from the former, even when they go together, nor does the former include the latter in its formal idea. Therefore, a body quantum absolutely, possessing the first sense of position [n.61], could be without all extrinsic position or idea, that is, it could be understood to be a quantum and to have coexistence with another quantum without this sort of position [sc. ‘where’].

67. And if you ask what this means, namely ‘preserving quantity without extrinsic position’ [sc. ‘where’] - I say that it means nothing other than conserving an absolute without the respect that comes to it from outside. In this way too, preserving the coexistence without that [extrinsic] position is nothing other than to conserve one relation without a different extrinsic relation - as the relation that is position ‘where’ is the relation of the whole circumscribed thing to the whole circumscribing thing. But position in the sense stated, which is a different genus [the genus of position in the sense of relation of parts with each other without extrinsic relation to a circumscribing body], adds the respect of parts to parts. And that the first necessarily has the second is only because its respect is such that it includes the diversity of the parts and the presence of them to the parts of what locates them. But the coexistence of some whole with the whole or with any part abstracts from position in this sense, the sense in which ‘where’ necessarily has position. Therefore it is simply possible for this coexistence to be without position [sc. without ‘where’].

68. And this can be well explained briefly as follows, that the second sense of position presupposes ‘where’ strictly speaking; therefore if God can conserve a quantum without a ‘where’ properly speaking, he can also conserve it without position.

69. And if you say “it can well be without a ‘where’ but not when it has presence or coexistence with another body” - this is false, for although coexistence is of a quantum with a body, it is however not formally a ‘where’.

70. And if it be objected that quantity cannot be posited without the respect that quantitative mode states, because there cannot be a quantum and another quantum unless the one be commensurated with the other - I say that equality and inequality, which state a respect coming from within, do indeed follow on quantity when quantity is posited. But an extrinsic respect does not necessarily follow, and of such sort is commensuration, or more properly coextension, as we are here speaking of it [sc. ‘where’]. For if you speak of commensuration as to equality and inequality, namely that this is bigger or smaller than that, I concede that, in the matter at hand, Christ’s body is bigger than the sacramental host. But this commensuration is not what is properly called ‘coextension’, for this properly states the being together of part with part [sc. ‘where’].