1. The Opinion of Others

20. It is said, then, that taking action in this way, the Eucharistic conversion can be done, and is done, by divine action.

21. The proof is as follows: to convert something into what preexists seems to require no less virtue and action than to change something into what does not preexist; but if bread is converted by God into what does not preexist, there would be there a divine action simply whereby what does not preexist would be produced, because it could not be produced save by some action; so there is also action now.

22. Again, creation is true action; but the term of the action of conversion can no less receive being than the term of creation, namely if this conversion were to be into something not preexisting, for it would totally begin to be through this conversion;     therefore etc     . - The major, though it seems plain, may nevertheless by proved by taking action strictly, as was said [n.19], because if creation were relation, then ‘to create’ would only be ‘to be related’; but since ‘to create’ is ‘God wills the thing to be’, then the divine will would be only relation, which seems unacceptable.

23. Again, God has an action properly speaking that is intrinsic; therefore he can equally, or more, have an action properly speaking that is extrinsic; and so it is in the issue at hand. - Proof of the antecedent: because if generation, as distinguished from relation, were not an action properly speaking, the consequence would be that generation was only a relation, and so ‘to generate’ and ‘to speak’ would only be ‘to be related’, which is unacceptable.

24. Again, on the same matter of an action properly speaking that is intrinsic, there is an argument as follows: a relative is not the cause of its correlative, for the two naturally exist together at once; but a producer is cause or principle of the thing produced, and clearly is so by production formally; therefore the production is not just a relation to the thing produced, for then it would be wholly together with it at once and not prior to it nor be the idea of cause.

25. There is a final argument, and the reasoning is common to action extrinsically (which the first two arguments were about, nn.21-22) and action intrinsically (which the other two were about, nn.23-24). The argument is as follows: in Metaphysics 5.15.1020b28-30, 21a14-19, the chapter on relation, relations of the second kind are founded on action and passion; but a relation is not founded on a relation; therefore action is not just relation.

26. If argument is made against this opinion that, according to Boethius On the Trinity chs.4, 6 (and it seems to be accepted by Augustine On the Trinity 5.6 n.7 [cf. Scotus Ord. 1 d.8 n.130] and by the doctors generally), there are only two categories in divine reality, namely substance and relation, and so not the category of action as distinct from relation - the response would be that action properly speaking is included under relation, for action states a certain respect but does not properly state a relation [cf. Scotus Quodlibet q.4 nn.30-32]. And this seems it can properly be confirmed from Augustine On the Trinity 2.3 n.3, where Augustine excludes from God the individual categories and seems to allow that God is properly a maker as to the category of action, but that he is so without change.