1. Argumentation from the First Middle Term, namely from the Object, and the Weighing of it

211. One middle term is from the object.

On behalf of the understanding, as follows: the true is nearer to being than the good is.

212. On behalf of the will, as follows: the idea of good is nobler because it is good by its essence, the true is good by participation; likewise, the universal good is nobler than a particular good, the true is a particular good because the good is an object of the intellect.

213. This middle term seems efficacious for neither opinion, because the major in both cases seems false, for the true and good are not really distinct, and consequently neither is one really nobler than the other.

214. But if one of them is said to be nobler than the other in idea (understanding ‘idea’ for something caused by the intellect), this is a relation of reason arising from the intellect comparing these things to others - this nobility does not make for the proposed conclusion, because a relation of reason is not the formal idea of the first object of intellect or will.

215. Likewise, to what will the comparison be made? If to the divine persons (to the Son, namely, to whom true corresponds in being, and to the Holy Spirit, to whom good corresponds), the divine persons are not different in nobility. But if they [the true and good] be compared to things posterior to them, namely to the acts of which they are the objects, there is now a circle in the reasoning.

216. And if they are posited to differ in real idea, as was said of the attributes in Ord. I d.8 nn.192-193, then some nobility in one of them (according to the proper idea of it) with respect to the other can well be preserved, and this before an act of intellect; because just as there is a distinction between things of a different idea, so is there inequality between them, especially if the distinction is quidditative, not hypostatic, and between absolutes. But perhaps neither true nor good assert absolute ideas beyond being.

217. The minor, too, of each reason is dubious as to the part that says ‘the good is the object of the will’ and false as to the part that says ‘the true is the object of the intellect’, as was said in Ord. I d.3 nn.171-174.

218. Both the major, then, and the minor require a lengthier discussion than may concern the present question.

219. Giving weight, then, to this middle term [sc. ‘from the object’] in favor of neither side, I respond to the reasons taken from this middle term:

As to the first [n.211] the inference is to the opposite effect, because just as being is potential with respect to any particular idea so what is more potential will be closer to it.

220. But against this: the idea of being precisely taken is nobler than any idea superadded to it precisely taken, just as the idea of the subject is nobler than the idea of the accident; therefore, what is closer to it as it is most perfect will be more perfect. Hence it is false that being is disposed to other things as matter is to form, but rather it is as it were an active potency (as subject to property).

221. In another way it is said that something can be closer in one order to what is most perfect and another thing closer in another order; just as quantity is more immediate to substance than quality in one order, and yet quality is a more perfect thing and consequently closer [to substance] in another order. But that is simply more perfect which is in a nobler order, or according to a nobler condition, closer to what is most perfect, as good is closer to being in the order of communicating perfections or being the term and completing the perfection of another (because of which good is said, in one way, to be communicative, according to Augustine Christian Doctrine 1 ch.31-32, in another way to be the end, Physics 2.3. 24-25, Metaphysics 5.2.1013b25-27, Ethics 1.4.1097a33-34) -though true be nearer to being in its order to powers operative about the whole of being.

222. As to the reason to the contrary [n.212], a first objection is that one could argue similarly about the true. For the true is true by essence, but the good is true by participation; therefore, the true is truer, therefore also greater, because thus does Augustine negatively argue On the Trinity 8.1 n.2, “if not truer, not greater,” where the context is only about things convertible.

223.     Therefore I reply that all these transcendentals [sc. good, true] denominate each other mutually, and for this reason ‘being essentially true’ is of equal perfection as ‘being essentially good’, unless it be proved that the idea of true is nobler than the idea of good, and conversely.

224. Another response is realer, because the ‘more’ [sc. in ‘nobler’, ‘closer’ etc     .] can be referred to the inherence or to the predicate; inherence follows the identity of the extremes. Therefore, what is essentially present is more present to the extent it determines inherence or identity, but not to the extent it determines the inhering extreme (an example: a white animal is not a more white thing than a man who is white).The term ‘white’ in the phrase ‘a white animal’ inheres in the term ‘animal’ more than ‘white’ in the phrase ‘a man who is white’ inheres in the term ‘man’ (for in the first the noun is directly qualified and in the second only by apposition); but the white animal is not thereby said to be a whiter thing than the man. ⁴⁹