II. To the Principal Arguments

68. To the principal arguments [nn.29-35].

To the first [n.29] I say that there would be confusion if anything whatever were in another according to the opinion of Anaxagoras, because thus anything whatever would be in another thing as a part of it, the way the Philosopher seems to impute the opinion to him; but a person is not in a person as something of it; and so the conclusion does not follow.

69. When the reason is confirmed by the remark in the Physics 1.4.187b4-7 ‘about indivisibles’ [n.30], I reply that either it is false that ‘indivisibles of quantity are not distinct unless they differ by position’ (about which elsewhere, II d.2 p.2 q.5 nn.9-13), or, if it is true, it is not to the purpose, because the account that would hold in that case is not found in the divine persons, to whom position does not belong.

70. To the second [n.31] I say that deity is common to everything subsisting in the divine nature, and is a something of that which subsists in that nature, and therefore it could not really be distinct from another unless it were in some way compoundable with it, because that there be several things in some subsistent is not intelligible unless one of them is compoundable with the other; but the person is not a something of each thing that subsists in that nature, and therefore, although person is in person, yet there is no necessity that this person be that person or that it be compoundable with it in the way one has to say this about deity.

71. To the third [n.32] I say that when something abstract is said to be in something, either the virtue of the words denote that it is ‘in’ it the way a form is in the informed thing (as when it is said that ‘color is in the stone’), and they indicate that it is ‘in’ not as a part is in the whole but as a form is in the formed thing, and then the proposition ‘filiation is in the Father’ is to be denied, - and in that case the first consequence is not valid; or this denoting is not got from the virtue of the words but from use (as we say ‘heat is in light’ not in the way of being in a subject), and in that case one can concede this proposition ‘filiation is in the Father’ by taking the being ‘in’ for intimate in-being, as has already been said [n.54]. Nor does the further conclusion follow that ‘therefore the Father is the Son’ [n.32], but there is a fallacy of equivocation, by making an inference in the antecedent as if the ‘in’ there were taken after the manner of a form.

72. To the fourth [n.33] I say that that way of arguing holds when this sort of proposition is true (through which proposition the sort of arguing in question holds): ‘whatever has some relation to something has a like relation to that to which that something has such a relation’. This proposition is frequently true in the case of relatives where one of the things related is above in position and the other below,Tr. As in the case of the prior and the posterior, where the prior will be prior to whatever the posterior is prior to [n.33 above]. ⁵³ but it is not universally true. But I am not speaking of this now, because the argument here [sc. the fourth] proceeds of being ‘in’, which - as is assumed in the proposed case - indicates a common relation [n.45].

Therefore as far as the common relations are concerned I say that the proposition is universally false, to wit ‘whatever is like Socrates is like everything that is like Socrates’: for this proposition includes saying that something is like itself, because this falls under the universal quantifier ‘everything that is like’. But for the proposition to be true one must add this specification ‘everything other than himself that is like [Socrates]’; and then by virtue of this specifying proposition the sort of argument in question here holds in the direct sense forward but not in the converse sense backward, - I mean, the inference ‘Socrates is like Plato and Plato is like Socrates, therefore Socrates is like Socrates’ does not hold, for this proposition is false ‘whatever is like Socrates is like everything that is like Socrates’, unless one adds ‘everything other than himself that is like Socrates’, and then Socrates is not included under the universal quantifier ‘everything’, nor can the argument be made to go backward to SocratesTr. That is, one can argue in the direct sense forward ‘a is like b, b is like c, therefore a is like c’, but one cannot convert back and argue ‘therefore a is like a’, for the phrase ‘everything other than a that is like a’ blocks this backward move. ⁵⁴ but to go forward. Yet such an addition is still not enough for the truth of the proposition in question, nor for the efficacy of the argument in question, but one must add that the middle term - to which the extremes are compared - is limited as to the sort of idea of comparison in question, because it is not necessary that whatever is together with a be together with everything that a is together with (everything - I say - other than itself) if the a is unlimited, - because then someone existing at Paris would be together with someone existing at Rome, because they are both together with deity, which is immense and unlimited with respect to them. Nor even do all these additions suffice unless one add that the middle term not vary in its comparison with the extremes.

73. As to the proposed case, then, I say that the argument [n.33] is not valid because it argues by converting back and not by going directly forward; and the proposition confirming this sort of way of argument [sc. ‘whatever has some relation to something has a like relation to that to which that something has such a relation’] is false. The argument of the Philosopher, however, in the Physics [ibid.] holds because he only argues by directly going forward and by taking a middle term that is limited and not varied; but his argument is about relatives where one of the related things is above in position and the other below, hence it is not much to the purpose about the being ‘in’ of the proposed case as this case is talking of a common relation. In order, however, to make a brief remark about the relatives of disparity [sc. where one of the related things is above and the other below in position], I say that such a way of arguing generally fails to hold unless it is on the basis of prior and posterior, which is something pretty much common to all such relatives; for whatever is prior to the prior is prior to the posterior [n.33], - and, to speak more generally, ‘whatever has an order toward another has a like order to anything else that that other has a like order to’; this proposition is true in the case of essential order, when no special condition of order is understood (to wit, mediate, immediate, near, remote). Because, therefore, the being ‘in’ of air in fire states an essential order, and the being ‘in’ of fire in the heaven states a like order, so that consequence holds [n.33] by directly going forward, and that because it proceeds in accord with a general idea of order and does not specify a mediate or immediate order. Hence the inference ‘a is father of b, b is father of c, therefore a is father of c’ does not follow because ‘father’ denotes an immediate order to c as to a son; but the inference does well follow as it indicates paternity in general, to the extent that ‘father’ is extended to include grandfather and great-grandfather.

74. To the other argument [n.34] I concede that ‘God is in God’ and Hilary concedes it On the Trinity VII n.32. But when the inference is made ‘therefore God is distinct from God’ I deny the inference, because there is a fallacy of the consequent; for this preposition ‘in’ does not mark a power of confusedly embracing the whole of the term whose case it governs (nor does it have this power), and so the term whose case it governs can stand for some determinate supposit indeterminately; but ‘to be distinct’ distributes the term of this relation [sc. the relation of being distinct] confusedly and distributively, because of the negation it includes, and therefore the term of this relation [of being distinct] is not inferred from the term governed by the proposition ‘in’, - just as, for a like reason, the inference does not follow that ‘God generates God, therefore God is distinct from God’.

75. To the final argument [n.35] I say that the Son’s from the Father is the procession of the produced from the producer, but is not a diversity in nature; such a coming from in no way prevents that which comes-from remaining in that from which it comes, because it receives the same nature as what it proceeds from has.