Question Two. Whether any Immanent Action that is in Christ Existing Naturally is the Same in Him as Existing in the Eucharist Sacramentally

268. Proceeding thus to the second question, argument is made that not just any immanent action that is in Christ existing naturally is in him existing sacramentally in the Eucharist; because hearing and vision are not, and so on about sensation universally.

269. The proof first is that the object is not present to him in the due proportion required for such act, meaning the object that is present to him as he is in heaven.

270. Second, because the sense organ does not have here the mode of extension under which, and not otherwise, it is able to receive sensation.

271. Again, third, because between the eye as it is here and the object as it is in heaven there is a barrier preventing the multiplying of color or light;     therefore etc     .

272. Again, fourth, because as he is here he does not sense the things that are present here; therefore much more not any sensible thing in heaven either. The proof of the antecedent is that the sense organ is not here in the mode required for sensation.

273. On the contrary:

Then he would be at the same time seeing and not seeing the same object (and in the same way with other acts of sensing); the consequent is false because contradictories would be present simply in the same thing. The evidence for this reason is plain from the preceding solution, in the second article [n.246-252].

274. Again, operation is the perfection of an operative power, and in it consists the blessedness of the power. On it too follows delight proportioned to the perfection of the operation; all this is plain from Ethics 10.4.1174b18-75a1. Therefore if the eye of Christ, as it is here, were to lack the vision that it has in heaven, it would lack its proper perfection here; and this perfection is its blessedness, in the way that vision can be said to be capable of beatification; it would lack also the perfect delight that is consequent to that perfect operation. And then it would follow that the eye, as it is here, would be wretched, with pain and sadness, because what takes delight away from it is painful and sad; and then it would be simply against its natural sense appetite to have being in the Eucharist.

I. To the Question

A. Three Conclusions

275. I reply that something is said to be in Christ first as he is here because it would be in him if it were in him nowhere else save here. But something is said to be concomitantly in him here because it is in him first as he is elsewhere, and so is in him as he is here because of identity of subject and form.

276. Accordingly, therefore, the first conclusion is this, namely that every operation that is in Christ first as he is in heaven, is in him concomitantly as he is here.

277. The second conclusion is that no act of sensation can be in Christ first as he is in the Eucharist.

278. The third conclusion is that spiritual operation (namely of intellect and will) can be in Christ first as he is in the Eucharist.

B. Proof of the Conclusions

1. Proof of the First Conclusion

a. Universally

279. Proof of the first conclusion.

First in general as follows, that nothing absolute ceases to be in another because of a new respect coming from outside; but operation is an absolute form, as was shown in Rep. IA d.3 nn.169-174; therefore, the operation does not cease to be in its subject because of a new presence, which is a new respect coming from outside. And evidence for this reason can be obtained from the end of the solution of the preceding question, where this reason was more fully dealt with [nn.246-252].

280. Some say [Henry of Ghent] to this that the major is true of absolute form simply; but operation is not thus absolute, because it requires the relation of power to object.

281. On the contrary: some qualities depend thus in their coming to be on the closeness of the agent to the passive subject, as is plain of heat and cold and other qualities that alteration is toward; and yet in their being simply they are absolute. And according to everyone, all such qualities, absolute ones as well, that were in the body of Christ on the cross, were also in the pyx.

282. Likewise too, in their coming to be they do not require such a relation, and that when they are present concomitantly and not first; for it is apparent that if Christ’s body on the cross grew cold, the cold was also in the body of Christ as it is in the pyx, but not first. And for the latter coming to be there was not required a closeness of the agent there to the passive subject; so, by similarity, since this quality is in itself absolute, although it requires in its coming to be the presence of the object to the power and this will only be where it is present first, so it can come to be concomitantly without any such respect.

283. They reply that operation includes a relation more than other forms about which there is argument do (as heat and the like), because the latter require only a relation of agent to passive subject, and this where they come to be first; but after their coming to be in their proper being, they do not require this sort of relation; but operation is in continuous coming to be, and therefore it requires the continuous closeness of power to the object. From this it seems that it is more repugnant for operation to come to be or to be present without such relation than it is for heat.

284. I say that although it continuously come to be, yet it does not follow that it cannot be concomitantly present and continuously come to be without the presence of the object. For just as heat can come to be in the body in the Eucharist without the closeness of the agent as there, so if the being of heat were to come to be, it could be always caused and always remain in the body and in the host, and yet without such closeness as to ‘where’. For a continuous relation to continuous coming to be does not seem to be required more than a relation then present is required for transient coming to be.

285. And if you object [Henry of Ghent] that “for operation there is required not only the object as cause, because it is a cause in becoming, but in addition its presence in the idea of term of the operation; so just as it impossible for there to be an operation and for it not to terminate at the object, so it is impossible that an operation be in something somewhere and not terminate there in an object present to it” - I say that the presence of the object in itself is needed not because there is a term to the act but only because there is a cause of it, so that when some sufficient cause of the act is posited the presence of the object is not needed to be the term of it (the point is plain about seeing a creature in the divine essence; if the divine essence were the cause of that seeing, the object, which is the term of the seeing, is not required to be present in its own proper presence).

b. Specifically

286. This first conclusion is, second, proved specifically because ‘every understanding that is in Christ here is also in him there’; for every such operation now abstracts from here and now; but if Christ’s soul were to understand precisely according to the mode of understanding of a soul that is a wayfarer, it would not have intuitive understanding of this or that object without concomitant sensation of the same; therefore since it would have that understanding the same here as there, it follows that it would also have the requisite sensation for it here and there.

287. It is proved third as follows, because the passion of sense appetite, such as pain, would be the same here as there; therefore the sensation would be the same. The proof of the antecedent is that death would thus have followed here as there; but it followed there on extreme pain; therefore here too. The proof of the first consequence is that there is no same effect without the same cause, and this when not positing a miracle and when meaning a natural cause precisely; but pain is an effect of sensation or of an object that is sensed; therefore there cannot be the same pain without, in the absence of a miracle, the same sensation.

288. Some reply [Richard of Middleton] that an act of imagination in Christ would be sufficient for this, namely for the pain.

289. Against this in two ways:

First: the response destroys itself, for it is not possible for an act of imagination to be in something in which an act of sense cannot be, because imagination is a movement caused by sense, On the Soul 3.3.428b11-12.

Second, because imagination is not the cause of the same specific pain as is the pain caused by external sense; otherwise someone dreaming would be pained with a pain of the same species as the pain of someone awake.

2. Proof of the Second Conclusion

290. The proof of the second main conclusion is as follows, that the organ of sense is not in Christ’s body in the Eucharist in the way required for being affected by the object, because if it is to be affected by a body-object it must have a quantitative mode and be located in a place; likewise, Christ’s body as it is in the Eucharist does not have the object near it. For it is present here to a body as agent as if it were not present, because it is here as if, as far as concerns the idea of being affected by a body, it were nowhere; for every body requires a passive subject locally next to it. But Christ’s body is not here by location, but only the sacramental species is here in that way; nor is Christ’s body more present here to any body with the idea of being a passive subject than if an angel were here; therefore no sensation can be first in Christ’s body as it exists in the Eucharist.

3. Proof of the Third Conclusion

291. The third conclusion, that the operation of intellect and will can be first in Christ in the Eucharist, is proved as follows: the now beatified soul of Christ understands as an angel does insofar as it does not depend on the senses nor on sensible things in its understanding; therefore just as an angel existing somewhere could intuitively understand an object proportionally present to him, so the soul of Christ existing in the same place can intuit that same object; therefore the soul of Christ, as it is here, can now intuitively understand the intelligible objects that are present here to him, just as an angel could see (intuitively that is) an angel that was present here and the soul of a priest.

292. But this intuition is in the soul of Christ first as it is here, because it is not in that soul first as it is in heaven (if one supposes that an extreme distance impedes created intuitive understanding), just as neither would an angel existing in heaven see intuitively whatever, as present here, he might see intuitively here.

293. From this follows a corollary, that Christ, because of his being in the Eucharist, is not only not deprived of any operation he has in heaven, but as he is in the Eucharist he has some operation first which as a consequence he has concomitantly in heaven, namely the intellection and volition of any object that an angel here present would have intellection and volition of. And as a result, his presence in the Eucharist does not tend to his imperfection but to his greater perfection.

II. To the Initial Arguments

294. To the first argument [n.268] I say that all sensation of the same object that is in Christ’s senses as he is in heaven, is in the same senses in the Eucharist, as was proved in the first conclusion through the three ways [nn.279, 286-287].

To the proof for the opposite [n.269] I say that an object present in due proportion is only required for an act of sensing when the object is in some way cause of sensation, and cause of it as it first comes to be.

295. To the second [n.270] I say that the organ is truly a quantum here just as in heaven, and consequently it can receive sensation notwithstanding the fact that sensation is only received in a quantum; but it does not have here a quantitative mode, that is, coextension with the quantum to which it is present, nor does it fill place. And therefore sensation cannot be in it first as it is here. For this quantitative mode is required in the eye for sensation to be in it first. But it is not required for sensation to be in it, or come to be in it, concomitantly, because this sort of quantitative mode is not necessary for receiving sensation, but it is only a required condition by reference to the first transmuting agent.

296. To the third proof [n.271] I say (and it is plain from the same point that has already been made [nn.294-295]) that the obstacle is only an obstacle to sensation coming to be or being present first.

297. As to the fourth argument [n.272] I deny the consequence, for the antecedent is true from the second conclusion of the solution [n.277], but the consequent is false from the first conclusion [n.276]. The reason the consequence fails is plain from what has been said, that in order to sense the things here sensation would have to be in the eye first as it is here; for the sensation cannot be in the eye first as it is in heaven, because the sensible object is not present to the eye as it is in heave. But for sensation of some object to be concomitantly in the eye as it is here, it is sufficient that the same thing be proportionally present to the eye as it is somewhere, and that it be able to be first present to it as it is there. And such is how it is with objects that Christ’s senses perceive as he is in heaven.