Third Distinction. Second Part. On the Knowledge of Angels

Question One. Whether an Angle can Know Himself through his own Essence

255. Concerning the knowledge of angels I aska whether an angel can know himself through essence, such that his own essence is the reason for knowing himself without any representing thing that naturally precedes the act.

a.a [Interpolation] About the second principal point, namely the knowledge of angels, four questions are asked: first, whether an angel can know himself through the essence, as by the reason for knowing, without any representing thing that naturally precedes the act; second, whether an angel has distinct natural knowledge of the divine essence; third whether, in order for an angel to know distinctly created quiddities other than himself, he necessarily needs to have proper and distinct ideas for knowing them; fourth, whether angels can make progress by receiving knowledge from things.

256. That he cannot:

Because this could only be because his essence is intelligible and present to the intellect itself; but our soul is actually intelligible and actually present to itself, according to Augustine in many places [On the Trinity 8.6 n.9, 9.3 n.3, 9.4 nn.4 & 7, 9.5 n.8, 9.6 n.9, 9.12 n.18, 10.3 n.5, 10.4 n.6, 10.7 n.10, 10.8-10 nn.11-16, 10.12 n.19, 14.4 nn.6-7]; therefore our soul would be the reason for understanding itself with respect to itself. But this is contrary to the Philosopher On the Soul [3.4.429b26-29, 429a21-24, 429b5-10], who maintains that ‘the soul understands itself the way it understands other things,’ and that ‘[the intellect] is none of the things that are before it understands’, and that ‘it cannot understand itself when other things are not understood’.

257. Further, the essence of an angel is singular; a singular is not per se intelligible, nor is it the per se reason for understanding; therefore etc.

258. Further, every cognitive power must, as to itself, be bare of that which is the reason for knowing; but an angel, insofar as he is cognitive, is not bare of his essence; therefore his essence is not for him his reason for knowing himself.

259. Proof of the minor: first from the Philosopher On the Soul 2 [7.418b26-28,], that every eye must be without all color so that it can see every color; second from On the Soul 3 [4.429a18-20] where he maintains that the soul is unmixed and immaterial, so that it can understand everything.

260. Further, no thing the same is acted on by itself, because then the same thing would be in act and in potency; the essence of an angel is the same as himself; therefore the essence is not the object that immediately makes an impress on the intellect.a

a.a [Interpolation] Or as follows: the active and passive thing are distinct in subject (from Physics 3.1.200b29-31, 3.3.202a25-27, 7.1.241b24, 8.1.251b1-4, 8.4.255b12-17); but the essence of an angel either is not distinguished really from his intellect, if the power does not differ from the essence, or at any rate is not distinct in subject; therefore the intellect of an angel is not acted on by his essence. But the intellect is acted on by the intelligible object, from Metaphysics 12.7.1072a30; therefore etc.

261. Further, if an angel could understand himself through his essence, then the intellection would be the same either as the object or as his essence. The consequent is false, because this is proper to God alone, that his intellection is the same as his essence; therefore the antecedent too is false. The proof of the consequence is that the middle between extremes agrees more with both extremes than either extreme agrees with the other; but ‘to understand’ is intermediate between the power and the object; therefore if the power and the object are the same, much more will the act be the same as the object (the confirmation is that intellection only gets distinctness from the object or from the power).

262. On the contrary:

Some material form is the reason for acting according to the material thing’s essence (as heat is in fire, for the act of heating), or at any rate something in common is, else there will be an infinite regress in reasons for acting; therefore, since immaterial things are more active than material ones, an immaterial form will be, by its essence, the reason for performing the act that belongs to it; such is the idea of object to act of knowing.

I. To the Question

A. The Opinion of Others

263. Here the following is saida [Aquinas ST Ia q.56 a.1, SG II ch.98],ST: “In the case of an action that remains in the agent there is need for the object to be united to the agent in order for the action to proceed, just as there is need for the sensible to be united to the sense so that it may actually perceive. And the object united to the power is, for this sort of action [sc. intellection], disposed in the way that the form is that is the principle of action in the case of other agents; for just as heat is the formal principle of heating in fire, so the species of the seen thing is the formal principle of vision in the eye.” SG: “Hence a separated substance, although it is per se intelligible in act, is not however understood according to itself save by the intellect with which it is one. And thus does a separated substance understand itself through its essence.” ⁶⁷ that although the object is separate from the agent in the case of an action that passes over to something extrinsic, yet in the case of an action that is immanent the object must be united to the operator, and, as united, it is the formal idea of such immanent operation, as the species of vision is in the eye; and from this it is further said that, since the essence of an angel is of itself united to his intellect, it can be the principle of the intellection, which is an immanent operation.

a.a [Interpolation, from Appendix A] Here there is the opinion of Henry of Ghent, Quodlibet 5 q.14, that an angel does not know himself through his essence but through a scientific habit, in which his essence is presented to his intellect just as are also the essences of other things, “such that if an angel per se, in his bare substance, is posited, per impossibile, to be without any scientific habit, he would be moved to an act of understanding by nothing at all, neither by his own essence nor by any other.”

    Now the reason that is there relied on is the following: “The angelic intellect per se and first understands per se no particular essence, just as neither does ours,” because “essences are not represented to the intellect save as they are abstracted from all particular conditions, because science is only of things that are necessary and possess an unchangeability for their essence (according to Boethius On Arithmetic 1 ch.1), and of this sort are only essences as abstracted from singular conditions;” but the essence in itself, in actual existence, is not present to the intellect save as particular, while in the habit it is present and shines forth under the idea of a universal; therefore an angel first understands his essence as it shines forth in the habit, and the essence “as known universally by the angel is the means for knowing his own singular essence, just as any other species is also for him the reason of knowing any singular under it.”

    I argue against this opinion:

    It is unacceptable that a perfect created intellect, out of the whole order of natural causes, has no power for an act of understanding an intelligible object proportioned to it, because a more imperfect intellect - namely the human - has this power along with the order of natural causes, as with phantasms and the agent intellect; but this consequence follows if an angel can understand nothing save by the habit, because the habit is from God alone [Henry Quodlibet 5 q.14]; and thus all natural causes, active and passive, are unable to cause the habit.

    Further, if an angel cannot understand his essence save as it shines forth in the habit, this is either because the object is not intelligible unless it shines forth in the habit, or because it is not intelligible to this intellect save as thus shining forth, or because it is not proportionally present to the intellect in the idea of being intelligible save as it shines forth in the habit. Not in the first way, because then God could not know the angel’s essence save in the habit, because he cannot know anything unless the thing is intelligible. Nor in the second way, because the angel’s essence is supremely proportioned to his intellect, for everything intelligible in itself is a proportionate intelligible to some intellect, and this object is not more adequate and proportionate to any intellect than to its own. Nor in the third way, because presence through informing is not required for something intelligible to be present to an intellect, because then God would not know his own essence; hence it is sufficient that the essence be present under the idea by which an angel can return to it by a complete return; therefore it is proportionately present to his intellect otherwise than through a habit; therefore it is intelligible to him in some way other than by a habit.

    Further, according to him who thus thinks [Henry], the idea of immateriality is the same as the idea of intelligibility; but the essence of an angel is immaterial in itself, therefore it is intelligible in itself; but each thing has as much of intellectivity as it has of intelligibility; therefore an angel in himself, without such habit, is intellective.

    Further, if an angel cannot understand save through such a habit, the consequence is that he cannot know the existence of a thing. Proof: a knower that knows a thing through an idea indifferent to existence and non-existence cannot precisely know the existence of the thing; but such a habit, if it is posited, is disposed indifferently to representing the existence and the nonexistence of the thing, because it naturally represents whatever it represents; therefore either it represents that a will be and will not be, and then it represents nothing because these are contradictories; or it represents only that a is, and so the intellect would not know it when a is not, and the same conversely; therefore etc.

    There is a confirmation, because a thing cannot be representative secondarily of something unless the first object represented determines it to it; but the quiddity, which is first represented by the habit, is not determined to existence; therefore etc.

    Further, against the statement [above] that the angel does not per se understand the particular save through the universal: because singularity does not prevent a thing from being understood (otherwise God could not understand himself), nor either does limitation (because thus the angelic quiddity would not be per se intelligible to him), nor is there materiality there or any impeding condition; therefore etc.

    Further, the reasons that he makes against the species [Henry, ibid.] work equally against the habit, as is plain to anyone who looks at them.

    Therefore something else is said:

264. And if it be objected that such a form should be in that in which there is such an operation (it is not in this way in the essence itself of the angel, where however the reason for acting is), the response seems to be [Aquinas ST Ia q.56 a.1] that the form existing in something else and inhering in something else is the principle of operating; and if the form existed per se, it would no less be per se the reason for acting - just as heat, if it were separate, would, as far as concerns itself, be the principle of heating. Therefore so it is with the essence of an angel, that, although it subsists per se, yet it can be the reason for operating with the above immanent operation.a

a.a [Interpolation] The reason for the opinion is formed as follows: that which is for something the per se reason for acting can, if it is separate, be the principle of acting, as is plain of heat; but the object united to a thing active with an intrinsic or immanent action is the reason for acting; therefore, although it is separate, it will be the principle of that action; therefore although the essence of an angel is not united to the intellect of the angel by informing it, but by another reason for the uniting, it will be for the angel the reason for understanding himself.

265. And if it be again objected that the thing acted on should receive something from the agent (but here the intellect receives nothing from the essence itself, because no species preceding the act is posited), the response is [Aquinas ibid.] that some cognitive power is at times potentially knowing and at times actually knowing, but some other cognitive power is not so. Now, the fact that there is need for a cognitive power to receive something is not because it is a cognitive power, but only because it is sometimes in potency to act; in the issue at hand it is not so; therefore etc.

266. Against this:

This opinion posits, as it seems, that the intellect is in essential potency to operation and intellection (which it posits to be an immanent operation), and the whole reason for the operation is the object as it is united to the power, the way heat in wood is the whole reason for heating [nn.263-64].

From this I argue: nothing can have the principle of immanent action of any agent unless it is in act through that which is the principle of such action; but the intellect is not in act through its own essence in that which is per se subsistent, because the essence does not inform or impose any activity on the intellect itself; therefore the fact that such per se existing essence is present to an intellect itself cannot make the intellect have an operation where the essence (or its likeness) is, through the intellect, of a nature to be the reason for understanding.

267. His own example [about heat, n.264] confirms this against him; because although heat is what heats or is the reason for heating, yet it would not in the wood -from which it was separated - be the reason for heating, so that, if ‘to heat’ is called an immanent operation, it would be impossible for the wood to heat by the heat separated from the wood; therefore it is impossible for the wood to have this immanent operation, which is ‘to heat’. So it is in the issue at hand; therefore etc.a

a.a [Interpolation] Hence that which is the per se reason for operation, if it exists per se, is the principle of the operation - but it is not the principle of the operation for anything susceptive of the reason; thus, if heat were separate, it would not be the principle of heating for fire. So it is impossible for anything to act through that which is separate from it; hence the Philosopher, On the Soul 2.1.412a27-b6, 414a12-13, proves that the soul is ‘first act of the body, etc.’ because it is

    ‘that by which we live and sense etc.’ Therefore nothing acts by any reason for acting unless that reason informs it; but the essence of the angel is posited as subsistent; therefore it cannot be for the angelic intellect the reason for understanding.

268. Further, second, against what he says, that ‘the power does not receive anything because it is not sometimes in potency and sometimes in act’ [n.265] - the object in respect of that which is in the intellect about it (namely in respect of intellection) is not only the cause in its coming to be (the way a builder is cause in respect of the house), but is cause both in its coming to be and in its being (otherwise, just as the house remains when the builder is corrupted, so when the object is at all absent or corrupted in idea of object that which is in the intellect about it as object would remain); but a cause of coming to be and of being is always equally causing, as is plain about the sun with respect to rays of sunlight [1 d.3 nn.602-603]; therefore the object that is posited as the principle of the operation of intellection [n.263] is always equally causing, and consequently the intellect is always equally receiving. The intellect then receives from the object not merely because it receives a new act which it is sometimes not receiving, but because the object is cause of being with respect to that which is always from it receiving.a

a.a [Interpolation] Further, according to him who thus thinks, ‘an angel is so much the higher the more he understands through a species that is more universal’ [Aquinas ST Ia q.55 a.3], which is not true by universality of commonness but by universality of virtue and perfection. And they [sc. those who think like Aquinas] do not first have to posit that species with respect to accidents, because accidents are known through the species of the substances in which they are virtually included; nor even do they first have to posit it with respect to subalternate species, because all the intermediate things can be known through the species of the most specific species. Therefore they have to posit this sort of intelligible species with respect to the most specific species, so that an angel is so much the higher the more he knows more things (as the inferior species) through the species of a superior species; therefore the highest angel knows inferior species through that by which he knows his own quiddity. So if he knows himself through his own essence, he would know all other created things through his own essence, which the author of this opinion himself denies [Aquinas ST Ia q.55 a.1].

B. Scotus’ own Opinion

269. To the question therefore I say that an angel can understand himself through his essence according to the sense expounded at the beginning of the question [sc. ‘an angel’s own essence is the reason for knowing himself without any representing thing that naturally precedes the act’, n.255].

270. In proof I say:

First, because an object has some partial causality with respect to intellection (and this the object insofar as it is actually intelligible), and the intellect has its own partial causality with respect to the same act, according to which it concurs with the object for perfectly producing such act - so that these two, when they are in themselves perfect and united, are one integral cause with respect to intellection [1 d.3 nn.486-494].

From this I argue as follows: every partial cause that is in the perfect act proper to itself as it is such a cause can cause the effect with the causality corresponding to itself; and, when it is united to the second partial cause in its act, it can, along with it, cause perfectly; but the essence of an angel is of itself in first act corresponding to the object, because it is of itself actually intelligible, and it is of itself united to the intellect with a conjunction of both partial causes; therefore it can, along with the other partial cause united to it, perfectly have a perfect act of intellection with respect to the essence.

271. Further, in the case of intelligible things possessed of intelligible species, the species, along with the intellect, cause an intellection by virtue of the objects; but the objects in the intelligible things have a diminished being; therefore, if they had in themselves an absolute such being and being simply (namely actually intelligible being), then they could more truly cause the same effect, because whatever can be caused by something diminishedly such in some being, can be simply caused by virtue of, and by, something simply such. But the essence of an angel as it is in itself is present to the angel’s intellect, and this essence indeed is simply such (namely, actually intelligible in itself, and intelligible in a certain respect in the intelligible species); therefore etc.a

a.a [Interpolation] Or let the argument be formed thus: if something having some sort of diminished being has power for some operation, then something that has a perfect such being has power for that operation; but the intelligible object, possessing diminished being in the species, is the reason for understanding it - for the object has being in the species in the intellect (as was said in 1 d.3 n.249); and it has there a diminished intelligible being because, where it is a being diminishedly, there it is diminishedly intelligible; therefore when the object has simply intelligible being in the intellect, it will be simply the reason for understanding it. But the essence of angel has such being with respect to its intellect; therefore etc.

Further, that thing can be the reason for understanding some object in which the object, ‘as actually intelligible’, is sufficiently present to the intellect, because it constitutes, along with the intellect, perfect memory, and this memory is sufficiently a generator; but the essence of an angel is actually intelligible, and is sufficiently present to the intellect in idea of object, because there is no requirement for it to be present in the intellect by informing it (for then God would not understand his essence); therefore an angel can understand himself in and through the essence.

Further, an angel can have intuitive cognition of his essence, for our soul can also do this if it did not have an ordering toward phantasms; but this knowledge can only be done through the essence of the thing (or it cannot be perfectly done by some other thing), because whatever other reason is posited, this other reason can remain when the intuitive cognition does not remain, and it would be indifferent to representing the thing whether the thing exists or not; therefore etc.

C. Instances against Scotus’ own Opinion

272. It is objected against this view [n.271] that then a sensible thing could cause intellection immediately, without an intelligible species (which was denied in 1 d.3 nn.334, 382); because a sensible thing present to the senses is of such sort simply as it is in a certain respect in the intelligible species; therefore if in the intelligible species (where it is in a certain respect) it can cause intellection, much more can it do so as it is in itself according to its being simply and absolutely.

273. Further, it seems one can argue against this position [n.269] as was argued against the opinion [of Aquinas, n.266], that nothing is for anything the reason for its operating with an immanent operation unless it informs it; but although the essence of an angel is actually intelligible and present to the intellect, yet it does not inform the intellect; therefore the essence is not for the intellect the reason for its operating with an immanent operation.

274. Further, if these two agents always concur for the same common effect [n.270], then they have an order between them, since they are not of the same idea; therefore one of the two is prior or superior, and the other posterior and inferior, and so one will be a moved mover and the other will, with respect to it, be an unmoved mover. But the object is not a moved mover with respect to the intellect but an unmoved mover; therefore the intellect is a moved mover with respect to the object [1 d.3 n.554].

275. Further, fourth: what is said about these partial causes concurring for one common effect [sc. that they are one integral cause of intellection, n.270] seems unacceptable, because two things distinct in genus cannot cause an effect of the same idea; but the spiritual and bodily, or the intelligible and sensible, differ in genus; therefore etc.

276. Proof of the major: because corresponding to these two ideas in the partial causes are two distinct somethings in the effect, and so the same effect would be bodily and spiritual, which is unacceptable. Second, because every agent is more excellent than its patient [1 d.3 n.507]; but the bodily or sensible is in no way more excellent than the spiritual; therefore it cannot be the agent in respect of the spiritual save in virtue of some more excellent agent, and so it will be a moved mover. Next third, because then one of the causes could be so intensified that the whole virtue of both could be in that one of the two, and then it alone could sufficiently cause the effect without the other [1 d.3 n.497], which is unacceptable in the case of two such agents.

277. Response to the first objection [n.272]. In 1 d.3 [nn.349-350, 382] an intelligible species different from the act was posited for this reason, that the object -whether as existing in itself or as existing in any species whatever outside the possible intellect - does not have the idea of an intelligible in act. And then I concede the fact that, wherever there is a thing existing as of some sort in a certain respect and something can make it simply of that sort, there it could, if it were simply such in act, do the same thing simply. But the sensible object is in a certain respect in the intelligible species and is not actually intelligible outside the species; and so, although in the species (where it is in a certain respect such) it could cause a diminished intellection, yet it can never cause intellection outside the species, whether a diminished or a perfect intellection, because outside the species it is not actually (but only potentially) such a sort of being as the actualizer of it is. Now the essence of an angel is such a sort of being diminishedly, that is, a being of such sort in the species (if it has a species); but it is in itself simply a being and such a being is actually intelligible; therefore etc.

278. To the second [n.273] I say that on the opinion that does not posit the intellect to have any activity, different from the activity it has formally from the object or through the species of the object (just as neither does the wood have an action in heating different from the action which is that of the heat [1 d.3 nn.456-459]) - that on this opinion it necessarily follows that the intellect (not having anything formally) does not do anything formally; and so was it argued against the first opinion [of Aquinas, nn.266-267], which seems to think this same thing about the intellect. But, as was said in 1 d.3 [nn.486-489, 494, 498, 500], the intellect does have its own proper activity along with an object present to it (present in itself or in its species), but an object concurring with it to cause an effect common to them both, so that the union and coming together of these formal parts suffice; and yet there is no requirement that one of the parts inform the other, because neither gives to the other an act pertaining to its own partial causality.

279. To the third [n.274] I say that ‘moved mover’ can be understood in two ways: either because it receives from the unmoved mover some form as first act (whereby it may move), or because the form, possessed as first act, receives from the unmoved mover some (further) form as second act, by which it may act.

280. Now the first way exists in certain ordered causes where a first gives virtue to a second; but this way is not in the issue at hand, because neither does the intellect, as acting by its own partial causality, give this act, whereby it operates for intellection, to the species of the object; and much less does the reverse happen, because the species of the object does not give to the intellect any activity pertaining to the causality of it.

281. The second way is seen in certain things moving locally, the way the hand moves the stick and the stick moves the ball; for the hand does not give to the stick the hardness by which it impels the body toward some place; rather it gives to the stick precisely a local motion whereby, namely, it is applied to this impelling because of the incompossibility that one hard body against another hard body not yield to it.Tr. A possible reference to an early form of golf? ⁶⁸ This is the way it seems to be in things acting for some effect produced by generation or alteration, because although the ordered causes there have some reason for causing and the inferior does not cause save in virtue of the superior, yet this virtue or assistance or influence -whatever name one gives it - is not the impression of some form or of something or other inhering in the inferior or superior cause, but is only an order and actual conjunction of such active causes, from which, as thus conjoined and with their proper activities presupposed to the conjoining, an effect follows common to both causes [1 d.3 nn.495-496].

282. Therefore to the issue at hand [nn.274, 279] I say that not only are the causes in question not mover and moved in the first way but they are not even properly so in the second way (the way that the sun and a father are disposed in generation); rather they are only two causes disposed as it were equally, in respect of the fact that neither per se totally moves and yet one of them has, in respect of the effect, a causality prior to the other.

283. For perhaps the inferior cause never acts in virtue of the superior cause (properly speaking), unless in its form, whereby it acts, it depends in some way on the superior cause, although it does not then - when it acts - receive that form from the superior cause but has it prior in duration or in nature. For neither does the object depend on the soul (at any rate as the soul is the possible intellect) with respect to the form by which it actually operates for the intellection, nor much less so the reverse dependence; and therefore the object is in no way an unmoved mover with respect to the soul as it operates for intellection.

284. However it can be a mover with respect to the soul insofar as the soul receives the intelligible species, but then it does not move the soul as to the causality that the soul has per se, but moves it per accidens to the form in respect of the partial cause, insofar as the soul operates on that form. And this is the way it was said in 1 d.3 [n.563] that ‘the agent intellect and the phantasm are one total cause of the [intelligible] species’, and further that ‘the intelligible species and something in the soul (whether the agent intellect or the possible intellect) are one total cause of intellection’ [nn.563-564]; so that in the first case there is an object (or a phantasm) moving the soul to intellection, and not to the first act that is the soul’s as it is soul but to the act that is from the rest of the partial cause previous it; but in the second case the object does not move the soul at all, neither to the first act of the soul nor as to any other concurrent cause, but it acts precisely for the common effect - and then the soul, by the act that it had [sc. through its first act], displays in its own order its perfect acting [or: displays.. .its acting through the effect], so that there is no motion of the soul there for acting naturally prior to the effect produced. However the soul is not moved to the effect insofar as it is active but insofar as it receptive of the effect, and so, although it is moved, yet it is not a moved mover, because it is not moved to actively moving but to receiving.

285. To the fourth [n.275] I say that the first proposition [sc. ‘two things distinct in genus cannot cause an effect of the same idea’] is false of partial causes ordered in some way or other to the same effect - that is, that there is an essential order to them and they are not altogether of the same idea. For such partial causes, which are of a different idea, are not only distinct in species (because causes of the same species do not go together in common as causes ordered to the same effect), nor are they only distinct in number (because then they are not of such idea [sc. ordered partial causes]) - therefore they are distinct in genus; and if you take it that they are not distinct ‘in this sort of genus’, a consequence drawn from the idea of distinction in genus cannot hold more of this genus than of that.

II. To the Principal Arguments

286. To the principal arguments [nn.256-261]:

To the first [n.256] I concede that the soul is of itself actually intelligible and present to itself, and from this follows that it could understand itself if it were not impeded; for nothing is lacking to first act, neither on the part of one cause or both, nor on the part of their union; and thus the whole of first act is perfect of itself, and on this first act should follow the second act that is intellection. For this reason, perhaps, Augustine frequently says that the soul ‘always knows itself’, because of this proximity to the act of knowing when there is no imperfection in first act.

287. Now the soul does not in this way always know a stone, because although it always has the perfect act of knowing a stone with respect to its own proper partial causality, yet it does not always have the other partial cause in act and present to it in act; and therefore the soul can be said to be ‘sometimes in essential potency’ to understanding a stone, namely when it lacks the form that is of a nature to be the other partial cause in act and of a nature to be united to it in act. And in this way does Augustine posit a trinity [On the Trinity 14.6 n.9, 7 n.10] and yet posits that it pertains to the memory alone, because the whole thing exists under the idea of being intelligible only in the presence of the object (and this pertains to the memory [1 d.2 nn.221, 291, 310, d.3 n.580]), but in it is the virtual intellection of the object, which intellection pertains to the intelligence; and in this way, when the will is present as first act, the first act is in some way, in the sufficient cause as in the will and in the sine qua non condition as in the intellection, perfected for having a second act with respect to itself as effect. But because nothing of this whole save what pertains to the memory is in act, therefore this whole trinity (namely, that which is of a nature to be a trinity) is in the memory alone as to its real actuality.

288. But why does this total first act not proceed to second act [n.286], since it is per se a sufficient principle for eliciting the second act? I reply: because there is an impediment which this cause cannot overcome, in just the way that a natural cause, however much it be posited to be perfect, could yet never act because of some impediment overcoming it.

289. But what is this impediment? I reply: our intellect, for this present state, is not of a nature immediately to move or be moved unless it is first moved by something imaginable or sensible from outside.

290. And why is this? Perhaps because of sin, as Augustine seems to say On the Trinity 15.27 [cf. 1 d.13 n.78], “Infirmity does this to you, and what is cause of infirmity but sin?” (The same is said by the commentator on Ethics 6 and by Lincoln on the same place and on Posterior Analytics likewise.)Eustratius Nicomachean Ethics 6.4 f.106rb-va, as translated and annotated by Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, ibid., and on Posterior Analytics 1.14 f.14ra. ⁶⁹ Or perhaps this cause is natural, in that in this way was nature set up (as not absolutely natural), namely, if the order of powers (which was discussed largely in 1 d.3 nm.187, 392) necessarily required this, that a phantasm must, as regard whatever universal the intellect may understand, make actually appear a singular of the same universal; but this does not come from nature (nor is this cause absolutely natural), but from sin - and not only from sin but from the nature of the powers in this present state, whatever Augustine may be saying.

291. To the form, then, of the argument [n.256] I say that the cause that is on the part of the angel [sc. ‘because his essence is intelligible and present to the intellect itself’, n.256] is sufficient for the essence of the angel to be the sufficient reason for understanding itself; the essence is also such on the part of the soul, but in the soul it is impeded, and in the angel not impeded; for the intellect of an angel does not have the sort of order to imaginables that our intellect has in this present state.

292. And because of this impotency for immediately understanding intelligibles in act (which impotency does not come from an intrinsic but an extrinsic impossibility, which impossibility, and not just any impossibility, the Philosopher also experienced), the Philosopher himself said that ‘the intellect is not any of the intelligibles before it understands’ [n.256], that is, ‘it is not able to be understood by itself before the understanding of other things’; and this last proposition is multiple, according to composition and division (like the proposition in Topics 6.6.145b21-30, ‘this now is first immortal or incorruptible’), from the fact that the preposition ‘before’ along with its clause ‘the understanding of other things’ (which is equivalent to an adverbial determination) can be composed with the infinitive ‘to be understood’ signifying the term of the power (and the sense is that of composition) or with the composition itself signified by the indicative term of verb ‘is’ (and the sense is that of division); so that the first sense [sc. of composition] is this: ‘it is not possible for the intellect to be understood by itself before the understanding of other things’, and this sense is true according to the Philosopher; but the other sense [sc. of division] is that ‘before the understanding of other intelligibles it is not possible for the intellect to understand’, and it is false (just as the proposition ‘this is now first immortal’ is false about man in the state of innocence, Topics 6 above). And in this way does the Philosopher understand that ‘the soul understands itself as it does other things’ [n.256].In the Topics passage Aristotle discusses the sentence ‘this animal is incorruptible now’ and says it can be understood to mean ‘this animal is not corrupted now’ or ‘it is not possible for it to be corrupted now’, or ‘it is of the sort now as never to be corrupted’. He further remarks that when we say an animal is incorruptible now we do not mean that now the animal is such (sc. such as never to be corrupted) but that now it is as never corrupted (sc. though it can or will be corrupted sometime later, as was also true of man in the state of innocence before the fall, that he was immortal then but not such that, through sin, he could not die later). Hence the ‘now’ is either taken in divided sense where it is outside and governs ‘this animal is incorruptible’, so that the sense is that the animal is such as never to die, and this sense is false; or in composed sense where the ‘now’ is part of ‘this animal is incorruptible’, so that the sense is that the animal is at this time now incorruptible (though nothing is implied about whether it can or cannot be corrupted later), and this sense is true. So the sentence discussed here by Scotus, ‘the intellect is not able to be understood by itself before the understanding of other things’, can be taken either in divided sense where the ‘not possible before it understands other things’ is outside and governs ‘the intellect understands itself’, so that the sense is that the combination of ‘the intellect understands itself’ and ‘before it understands other things’ is impossible, or that the intellect is such as never to understand itself before understanding other things. This sense is false. Or the sentence can be taken in composed sense where the ‘not possible before it understands other things’ is part of ‘the intellect understands itself’, so that the combination of ‘the intellect understands itself’ and ‘before it understands other things’ is not impossible simply but only given the intellect’s current ability. This sense is true because it allows that the intellect might, in other conditions, be able to understand itself before it understands other things. So, finally, when the Philosopher says ‘the soul understands itself as it understands other things’, he should not be taken as meaning that it is impossible simply for the soul to understand itself in any other way, but that this way is how it does in fact understand itself - without implication about what it may or may not be able to do in other circumstances. ⁷⁰

293. And, according to this mode of exposition, the intellect is moved by imaginable objects and, when these are known, it can know from them ideas common to immaterial and to material things and thus, by reflection, know itself under an idea common to itself and to imaginable things. But it cannot understand itself immediately without understanding something else [n.256], for it cannot be moved immediately by itself because of its necessary ordering, in this present state, to imaginable things [1 d.3 nn.541-542].

294. As to the second principal argument [n.257], one doctor says [Aquinas ST Ia q.56 a.1 ad2] that a singular can be per se understood although not a material singular, because it is not the singularity but the materiality that gets in the way (otherwise God would not be intelligible since he is singular, which is false); and then the response is plain, that the assumed proposition about the non-understood singular [‘a singular is not per se intelligible’, n.257] is only true of a material singular. Another doctor says [Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 5 q.15] that the intellect is not able to understand either itself or other things under the idea of a singular (material or immaterial) but under the idea of a universal, which is per se the object of the intellect and also shines forth in the intelligible habit; and according to this opinion too the response to the argument is plain. However I believe neither is true save when speaking of the material intellect, which is not able perhaps, because of its imperfection, to understand every intelligible that an angelic intellect can understand.

295. To the third [n.258] I say that the reason for the major proposition [sc. ‘every cognitive power must, as to itself, be bare of that which is the reason for knowing’] is this - first in the case of the sensitive powers - ‘that every sensitive power requires a determinate organ’; hence from the possible determinate number of organs the Philosopher concludes, On the Soul 2.6.418a7-17, 3.1.424b22-27, 3.2.426b8-12, to a determinate number of actions or objects. But the organ has to be so disposed that it can receive the sensible thing without matter, and, in the case of bodily things, whatever is receptive of the form without the matter is not commonly receptive of every form (I said ‘commonly’ for this reason, that the discussion is not now of the organ of sense, about which there is a special difficulty [Reportatio ad loc.]). So the organ of sense must be not such, that is, it must lack the object in the object’s material and sensible being (not only actually but even potentially), because it is not receptive of the object in its material being (according to which being it is the object of sense). The point is very clear about color, where the thing that receives it in material being is the surface of a determinate body, but where the thing that receives it without matter is a transparent or indeterminate body [sc. the water or air etc. through which a colored object is seen]. And thus opposed dispositions are required in the organ of sense, because it must be receptive of the sensible without matter and in something which must receive the object in material being [sc. the eye, qua seeing, is transparent but qua determinate body has a colored surface]; so for this reason the organ, and consequently the sense that is in the organ, has to be bare of the form that it receives.

296. From this too follows what is put forward by the Philosopher in On the Soul 3.4.429a24-27, namely that the intellect is not the power of an organ and so is separated from the whole of matter, just as from any organ by which it operates. For if it required some organ, that organ would be of a determinate disposition (as is every bodily organ), and so from the fact it is receptive of things according to determinate material being (because of the determinate disposition of the body) it would not be receptive of all bodily forms according to immaterial being; and so the intellect could not receive the forms of all material things, as of its objects, if it were a material and organic power. However, when one has that it is a non-organic power, there is no need for it to be really not of the sort as that is of which it has to be intellectually receptive; for there is no need that there be an opposite disposition in what is receptive really and intellectually of something - on the supposition that the intellect is not an organic power, although this would be required if it were an organic power; for the same intellect can be itself really and be habitually in act really, and yet receptive intellectually both of itself and of its habit and of anything that really informs it; and the whole reason is that such things, when intellectually received, do not require in the receiver a determinate disposition opposite to intelligible real being [1 d.3 nn.383-390].

297. The proposition, then, which says that the knower must be not such, or bare of that which it knows or receives and of the reason for knowing [n.258], entails, if it is taken generally, that every intellect is nothing, because every intellect in itself belongs to the totality of beings, and so it will be none of the beings; and this understanding is false. But it is however not material or organic, so that it can be capable of all beings; because if it were material or organic it would be receptive only of some things without matter, things the reception of which would not be repugnant to its material entity; but to its intellectual entity the intellectual reception of anything whatever is not repugnant.

298. To the fourth principal argument [n.260] the reply has been made frequently [1 d.3 nn.430, 513-520] that the same thing can move itself (not only with bodily but also with spiritual motion), and universally any virtual univocal action can stand with a power for a second formal act; and, next, it has been frequently said [2 d.2 nn.472-473, 1 d.2 n.231, 1 d.7 n.72] how the same thing is not in power and in act as these are opposite differences of being, whether per se or denominatively, and yet the same thing is in potency (that is, is a passive principle) and in act (that is, is an active principle of the same).

299. As to the final argument [n.261], although some [Averroes, Metaphysics 12 com.51] concede the conclusion there drawn [sc. ‘the intellection would be the same either as the object or as his essence’] - which seems impossible, because then it would follow that the intellection would be actually infinite (for any intellect can be of infinite intelligibles, and if it then had an intellection the same as itself, the intellection of anything whatever would, by parity of reason, be the same as itself, and thus it would have an intellection the same as itself which was or could be of infinite intelligibles) -however I deny the consequence [sc. ‘if an angel could.. .then.. .the object or as his essence’].

300. And as to the proof of the consequence [n.261] I say that the intellection, according to truth, is an extreme both with respect to the power and with respect to the object, because it is the effect of both; for just as when knowledge is produced by diverse things (knower and known) there is an effect common to them both (Augustine On the

Trinity IX.12 n.18), so too when an effect is produced by something the same that has the nature of both the power and the object, it is the effect of that one thing (which thing really has the double causality) and is not in between the same thing and itself in natural reality, the way that a middle is in between contraries; and about such a middle, as far as concerns the nature of the thing, the proposition is true that ‘the middle agrees more with the extremes than the extremes agree with themselves’ [n.261].

301. To the confirmation [n.261] I say that an intellection is distinguished from another intellection by the object, but it is distinguished from the object and the power by itself formally; but the fact it is distinguished from them causally it gets from the extrinsic causes (as from the power and the object), as the ray has causally from the sun that it is distinguished from it.

Question Two. Whether an Angel has a Distinct Natural Knowledge of the Divine Essence

302. Second I ask about an angel’s intellection with respect to things other than himself, and first whether an angel has a distinct natural knowledge of the divine essence.

303. That he does not:

Because this knowledge would come either through the divine essence or through a species of the essence. But not through the essence because then the angel would be naturally blessed, which is not something that can belong to a creature. Nor through a species because the divine essence is more intimate to the intellect than the species would be; therefore it would be superfluous to posit a species there, because the essence by itself would be able more efficaciously to do what the species is posited for than would the species itself.

304. Further, the Philosopher On the Soul 3.8.431b29-432a1 seems only to posit that a species is necessary because the object is not by itself in the soul, “For the stone is not in the soul but the species of the stone is;” therefore etc.

305. On the contrary:

The angel would then either have no knowledge of the divine essence, and then in vain would the precept be given to him, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God etc.’ (for in vain is a love prescribed of what is altogether unknown), or he would have a confused knowledge of that essence, and then his intellect seems to be potential like ours (which can proceed from the confused to the clear), and this seems unacceptable.

I. The Response of Others to the Question

306. There are some here [Aquinas ST Ia q.12 a.4, q.56 a.3, Henry Quodlibet 3 q.1] who agree in the negative proposition that ‘angels do not naturally have a distinct knowledge of the divine essence’.

A. First Opinion

307. If, when holding this negative proposition, you ask by what affirmative it is held, the response is that the angel does not know the divine essence naturally, throughTr. This proposition too is negative but it depends on the prior affirmative proposition that what is known by creatures naturally is known through a species. ⁷¹ any species.

308. The proof is:

Because every reason proper for understanding any object represents that object adequately; no created essence or species can represent adequately the divine or uncreated effigy, because anything of the former sort is finite but the object is infinite (there is no proportion of the finite to the infinite); therefore etc.

309. Again, the created species of one thing is more similar to another created thing than to God, because each of them is finite; therefore it more distinctly represents a creature than God. Therefore it is not a reason proper and distinct for understanding God.

310. Again, the formal reason according to which an object is apprehended is determinate (as is also the idea of the object), otherwise it would not represent this object more than that; God is most indeterminate and unlimited because he is infinite; therefore etc. Hence Augustine On the Trinity 8.3 n.4, “Take this good away and that good away, and look at the good itself, if you can, and you have indeed seen God, the good of every good, beyond every good;” therefore God cannot be known distinctly by such a species.

311. Again, if it is necessary to posit a species such that through it God is known distinctly, then as a result that species will be more an image of God than an angel or the soul in themselves are; but this is against Augustine (ibid., 14.8 n.11), who says that “the more something is an image of God, the more it is able to have a capacity for him and to participate in him;” but an angel is able more to participate in God than a species; therefore etc.a

a.a [Interpolated note] There are two arguments missing here, as is plain in the responses [nn.342, 345]. However, according to what can be elicited from the responses, the first can be formed enthymematically as follows: if an angel can have a distinct knowledge of the divine essence through some species distinctly representing it, then as a result he can naturally know the Trinity and the whole mystery of it. The second argument as follows: since a blessed angel can see the species in the intellect of another angel, as Michael for instance in the intellect of Gabriel, then as a result Michael, by virtue of the species seen in Gabriel’s intellect, will see everything supernatural.

B. Second Opinion

312. Another way [Aquinas] is to say that an angel knows God through his own proper essence, that is, through the angel’s essence, for the essence of an angel is an image and likeness of God; but each thing is known through its likeness and image; therefore an angel can know God through his nature and essence insofar as this is an image of God. And this image is called a ‘mirror’ image; therefore etc.a

a.a [Interpolation] Which is proved by Henry in the Quodlibet 5 q.9 [3 q.1, 4 q.7] and by Thomas in ST Ia q.56 a.3.

C. Rejection of the Opinions

313. Against the first [Henry], who posits the above reasons for the negative conclusion [nn.307-311], the argument is as follows:

Because it can be proved from the same reasons that an angel does not naturally know the divine essence through any created representation; and, according to Henry, an angel does not know naturally through the divine essence, because no creature can naturally see that essence. And from this it seems to follow that an angel can have no natural knowledge of the divine essence; for nothing about this essence is seen distinctly and in particular, because this seems to be possible only through the essence, or through something distinctly representing it, both of which Henry denies; and it is not seen indistinctly, or in some more common concept (a concept not proper to the divine essence), because Henry denies every concept common and univocal to this essence and to another.

314. Further, the divine essence, according to him, is of a nature only to form a single concept in the divine intellect, so that no other concept is had about it save by an intellect busying itself about it [cf. Scotus 1 d.8 nn.55, 174-175, 188]; therefore the divine essence is of a nature only to make of itself one real concept about any intelligible whatever. Proof of the consequence: every concept that is of a nature to be had and to be caused by virtue of this essence in any intellect is of a nature to be, by virtue of it, had in an intellect comprehending it; such is the divine intellect. And further it follows that no real concept save one can be had about this essence; the proof of this consequence is that every real concept that any intellect can have about this essence can be caused by this essence (otherwise it would not be perfect in idea of object), because that which is most perfect in idea of object can cause every real, causable concept about itself. And the further consequence is that either an angel’s intellect will have that one concept (however it is caused), or it will have altogether no concept; but it cannot have the former (namely ‘to know through the divine essence’ or ‘through a proper representing reason’, nn.306-311); therefore it will have no concept.

315. Against the second [Aquinas], who posits that an angel understands the essence through himself insofar as he is the image of God [n.312], I argue:

Although the image that is only a reason for knowing, and is not as a known species (as is true of the visible species in the eye and the intelligible species in the intellect), represents the object immediately, or non-discursively, yet the image through which the object it is the image of is not known, save as through a known species, is not the reason for knowing the object save only discursively (the way the knower reaches discursively the thing known); but the essence of an angel can only be posited as an image in the second way and not in the first way; the angel then does not know the divine essence through the image save discursively. But this is unacceptable, because according to those who hold this opinion the angelic intellect is not discursive [Aquinas ST Ia 1.58 a.3]; therefore etc.

316. Further, all discursive thought presupposes simple knowledge of that which it discursively reaches; therefore, if through the known essence [sc. of the angel] discursive knowledge is had of the divine essence, a simple concept of the divine essence must be had first, and then another, prior reason must be sought after for knowing it.

317. There is a confirmation too in that no object causes a distinct knowledge of some other object unless it includes that other object virtually in itself, because ‘each thing is disposed to being known as it is disposed to being’ [cf. Metaphysics 2.1.993b30-31]; an object then that does not include something virtually as to entity does not include it as to knowability. But the essence of an angel does not include virtually the divine essence under some distinct idea; therefore neither does the angel thus know the divine essence.

II. Scotus’ own Response to the Question

A. On Distinction of Intellections

318. I respond differently, then, to the question [n.302]. First I draw a distinction between two intellections: for some knowledge of an object can be according as it abstracts from all actual existence, and some can be according as the object is existent and is present in some actual existence.

319. This distinction is proved by reason [nn.319-322] and by a likeness [nn.323]:

The first member [abstract knowledge] is plain from the fact we can have science of certain quiddities; but science is of an object as it abstracts from actual existence, otherwise science could sometimes be and sometimes not be, and so would not be permanent but the science of a thing would perish on the perishing of the thing, which is false [Metaphysics 7.15.1039b31-1040a4].

320. The second member [knowledge of actual existence] is proved by the fact that what is a matter of perfection in a lower power seems to exist more eminently in a higher power of the same genus; but in the senses - which are cognitive powers - it is a matter of perfection that the senses are cognitive of a thing according as it is in itself existent and is present in its existence; therefore this is possible in the intellect, which is a supreme cognitive power. Therefore the intellect can have the sort of knowledge of a thing that is of it as present.

321. And, to speak briefly, I give to the first knowledge, which is of the quiddity as the quiddity abstracts from existence and non-existence, the name of abstractive. To the second, namely the one that is of the quiddity in its actual existence (or is of the thing as present in such existence), I give the name intuitive intellection; not as ‘intuitive’ is distinguished from ‘discursive’ (for some abstractive knowledge is in this way intuitive), but as simply intuitive, in the way we are said to intuit a thing as it is in itself.

322. The second member is also made clear by the fact that we are not waiting for a knowledge of God of the sort that can be had of him when - per impossibile - he is not existent or not present in his essence, but we are waiting for an intuitive knowledge that is called ‘face to face’ [I Corinthians 13.12], because just as sensitive knowledge is face to face with the thing as it is presently existent, so also is that knowledge we are waiting for.

323. This distinction [n.318] is made clear, second, by a likeness in the sensitive powers; for a particular sense knows an object in one way and imagination knows it in another way. For a particular sense is of the object as it is existent per se and in itself, while imagination knows the same object as it is present in a species, and this species could be of the object even if the object were not existent or present, so that imaginative knowledge is abstractive with respect to the particular sense, for things that are dispersed in inferior things are sometimes united in superior ones. Thus these two modes of sensing, which are dispersed in the sensitive powers because of the organ (because the organ that is well receptive of an object of a particular sense is not the same as the organ that is well receptive of the object of imagination), are united in the intellect, to which, as to a single power, both acts can belong.

B. Solution

324. Having premised this distinction, then, I reply to the question [n.302] that, although according to what is commonly said an angel cannot, on the basis of his natural powers, have an intuitive knowledge of God (on which see book 4 [not in the Ordinatio since d.49, where this matter would likely have been treated, is missing]), yet it does not seem one should deny he can naturally have an abstractive knowledge of him, understanding this as follows, that some species distinctly represents the divine essence although it does not represent the essence as it is presently existent; and then indeed an angel can have a distinct, though abstractive, intellection of God, for abstractive intellection is distinguished into confused and distinct, according to different reasons for knowing.

325. And to posit that an angel’s intellect has been endowed from the beginning with such a species, representing the divine essence, does not seem unacceptable, so that, although this species is not natural to his intellect (in the sense that his intellect could not acquire it on the basis of its natural powers, and could not even get it from the action of any naturally acting object, for it cannot get it by the presence of any object moving it save only of the divine essence, and this essence naturally causes nothing by natural causation other than itself), nevertheless, just as the perfections given to an angel in his first creation (even if they did not necessarily follow his nature) might be called ‘natural’ (by distinction from the ‘purely supernatural’ gifts of grace and glory), so too this perfection given to the angelic intellect - whereby the divine essence would be present to it distinctly, albeit abstractly - can be called ‘natural’ and be said to pertain to the natural knowledge of the angel; so that whatever an angel knows about God by virtue of this species, he would know in some way naturally and in some way not naturally: naturally insofar as this perfection is not the principle of a graced or a glorious act, supernaturally insofar as he could not attain to it on the basis of his natural powers nor of any natural action.

326. Now that such a species, representing the divine essence (albeit abstractly), should be posited is rendered persuasive as follows:

First because the natural blessedness of an angel exceeds the natural blessedness of man (even if both angel and man had been in the state of innocence for however long a time); therefore, since man in the state of fallen nature can have knowledge of the ultimate end in general, and since he could have had in the state of innocence a distinct knowledge of it in some way, and since volition of the supreme good follows knowledge of the ultimate end as such - it follows that an angel, in such knowing and willing the highest good distinctly, could have a greater blessedness than man.

327. This point is made persuasive, second, by the fact that someone in a state of rapture who has a transitory vision of the divine essence can, when the act of seeing ceases, have a memory of the object, and this under a distinct idea (under which idea the object of vision was), although not under an idea of its being actually present, because such presence does not, after the act, remain in its idea of being knowable; therefore, by some such idea perfecting the intellect, the object can in this way be objectively present, and thus it is not against the idea of the divine essence that a species of it, distinctly representing it, may be in some intellect. Therefore neither does it seem that such an object is to be denied to the most perfect created intellect; for it seems that to the highest created intellect nothing should be denied that is not repugnant to any created intellect in its natural powers, because it is not a perfection that is too excelling. The assumption here can be made clear by the rapture of Paul who, when the rapture passed, remembered the things he saw, according to what he himself writes, 2 Corinthians 12.2-4, “I know a man fourteen years ago, whether in the body or out of the body I know not, God knows etc., who heard secret words that it is not permitted for a man to speak.” Now it seems that after the rapture the species can remain distinctly, because this belongs to perfection in the intellect, that it can preserve the species of an object when the presence of the object ceases.

328. The proposed conclusion is made persuasive, third, by the fact that, according to Augustine Literal Commentary on Genesis 4.32 n.49, 26 n.43, ch.22 n.39, 18 n.32, the six days of creation were not days in succession of time but days in angelic knowledge of creatures possessed of a natural order, so that first the angel knew the creature in the Word and second in the proper genus and, not stopping there, he returned to praise the Word ‘because of his work’; and in the Word again he sees naturally the idea of the creature next following; so that, when God said ‘Let there be light’, the angel saw it in the eternal Word; and when was said ‘And there was light’ and evening came, he saw it in the proper genus; and when was said ‘And evening came and morning came one day’, he rose up from it to praise God, in whom he saw the second creature; so that his seeing was the end of the preceding day in that, from his knowledge of the first creature in the Word, he rose to knowledge of the Word - indeed, there was a ‘resting’ of all creatures in the first maker and craftsman (thus does Augustine distinguish the individual days up to the seventh day, which had a ‘morning’ of the final creature in the Word and no ‘evening’ followed) - and his seeing was the beginning of the following day, in that the angel saw another creature in the proper genus.

329. And although Augustine himself posited that the knowledge of things in the Word was a beatific knowledge - as is plain there in ch.24 n.4, “Since the holy angels always see the face of God the Father in the Word, for they enjoy his Only Begotten as he is equal to the Father, they knew first in the very Word of God the universal creation of which they themselves were made the first;” the enjoyment therefore pertains to blessedness. Likewise ibid., “Night then pertains to day, when the sublime and holy angels knew what the creature was in the creature, and they refer it to the love of him in whom they contemplate the eternal reasons by which the creature was created; and in that most concordant contemplation they are one day, with which the Church, when freed from this pilgrimage, will be joined, so that we too may exult and have joy in him etc.” -yet it can be proved from Augustine’s words that this knowledge (which is very commonly called ‘morning knowledge’) is natural and not precisely beatific, because -according to him - this order was in the angelic knowledge ‘of creature after creature’, and it naturally preceded the knowledge of creatures in the proper genus; but, when the creatures were made in the proper genus, at once the angel could have knowledge of them in the proper genus; therefore all those knowledges in the Word naturally preceded the knowledge of creatures in the proper genus; all of them then (according to Augustine) were produced at once. Therefore this ‘knowledge in the Word’ naturally preceded the production of creatures in the proper genus; but the angels were then in the state of innocence and not blessed, because there was some little delay - as will be said below [2 dd.4-5 qq.1-2 nn.5-7] - between creation and its fall; there was, then, in the angels some morning knowledge (namely of creatures in the Word) while the angels existed in their natural condition (or at least while they were not blessed), and so it does not seem one should give distinct knowledge to an angel while he is standing in his natural condition or in grace, because otherwise he could not know the creatures in the precisely known cause itself before he knew them in the proper genus, since a reason for knowing a cause confusedly is not a reason for knowing it and its ordered effects distinctly.

330. And if an objection be raised as to how in the Word not intuitively but abstractly known an angel could know other things, I reply that the whole of our knowledge of properties now is by abstraction through the intellect, so that an object not only intuitively but also abstractly known is that in which, as known, the property is known.

331. Briefly then to the question [n.302]:

Because we do not have a rule about the angelic intellect (for we are able neither to attribute to it whatever is a matter of perfection in an intellect simply, nor to attribute to it as much imperfection as we experience in our own intellect), and because it is rational to attribute to it all the perfection that belongs to a created intellect and no repugnance stands in the way of why a created intellect had such a knowledge distinctly representing the divine essence (provided however it not represent it intuitively), the concession seems rational [sc. the concession that an angel can know the divine essence abstractly through a species representing the divine essence], even if it be objected that God can cause intellection immediately without a species [nn.303, 347].a

a.a [Interpolation] I reply: “God administers things thus,” City of God 7.30; for he could cause this act immediately, but then this act would not be in the power of the angel (see the end of the fourth distinction [in fact d.3 n.347]).

III. To the Arguments for the First Opinion

332. To the arguments for the first opinion [nn.308-311], which reject this species. To the first [n.308] I say that, when speaking of God, the word ‘effigy’ does not seem to be a proper one; for perhaps nothing is properly said to be ‘effig-ied’ save what is figured.

333. But if, using proper words, the proposition ‘every reason proper for understanding any object represents that object adequately’ is taken, I say that here ‘adequately’ can be understood simply of entity to entity, or it can be understood according to the proportion of thing representing to thing represented (as matter is said to be adequate to form according to proportion, although not according to entity because the entities of them are unequal; yet matter is as perfectible as form is perfective, which is that the matter represents the form as much as the form is representable), or, in a third way, ‘adequately’ can be understood according to a proportion, not absolutely, but by comparison to such act (to wit, that it represents an object as perfect and as perfectly as the power, through the sort of act it represents, apprehends the object).

334. Universally in the first way, no per se representing thing (because it is the reason for representing and is not a something known) is adequate to what it represents but falls short, as is plain of whiteness and the species of a white thing. In the second way some reason does represent adequately, as the most perfect species of white represents the white thing, and it is a reason for quasi comprehensively seeing the white thing. In the third way any species of white (even in an eye going blind), even if does not represent the white thing as perfectly as the white thing was representable, yet does perfectly represent it by comparison to the ensuing act [sc. of sight], because it represents it as perfectly as is required for having such a species about the object.

335. As to the issue in hand, then, I say that no species can adequately represent the divine essence in the second way (nor even in the first way), because that essence -which is comprehensible to its own intellect - cannot be comprehended save through the essence as through the reason for comprehending; but in the third way, by comparison with a created intellect, a species can in some way adequately represent the divine essence, that is, as perfectly as such an act attains it.

336. When the minor proposition is proved through the term ‘infinity’ [sc. ‘no created essence or species can represent adequately the divine or uncreated effigy, because anything of the former sort is finite but the object is infinite’, n.308], I say that, just as a finite act can have an infinite object under the idea of infinite and yet the act more immediately attains the object than the species does, so a finite species can represent an infinite object under the idea of infinite; the species is not however adequate in being, nor even in knowing simply, because it is not a principle for comprehending [1 d.3 n.65].

337. To the next proof [n.309], when argument is made about the species of one creature in respect of another, I say that a natural likeness in being is not a per se reason for representing one thing in respect of another thing, because this white thing, however much it is more like another white thing than the species is, is not the reason for representing it; but the species of this white thing, which is much less in natural entity, is more like the white thing in the agreement and likeness of the proportion that is of representing thing to represented thing [n.333].

338. To the third [n.310] I say that ‘determination in an object’ can be understood in two ways: in one way as determination to singularity, in opposition to the indetermination of a universal; in another way as determination to a definite participated degree, in opposition to the unlimitedness of what is participated. In the first way ‘determination in an object’ does not impede intellection of the supreme good, which is God; rather that is the supreme good which is of itself a certain singularity; in the second way ‘determination in an object’ does impede this intellection, because the supreme good is good not in some determinate degree but good absolutely, able to be participated in by all degrees.

339. And although Augustine says about this good and that good (perhaps about singular goods that occur to the soul) ‘Take this good away and that good away, and look at the good itself, if you can etc.’, yet he has this understanding only because particular goods include limitation; but, when limitation is taken away, there is a stand at the unlimitedness of the good in general, and in this good is God understood in general, as was said in 1 d.3 n.192; or, further, there is a stand at the good most universal in perfection, and then, by taking away the limited degree of good, God is understood more in particular (and such good is neither this good nor that).

340. To the fourth [n.311] I say that ‘image’ is in one way taken for a likeness that depicts or represents precisely, which represents, not because it is known, but precisely because it is the reason for knowing; in another way ‘image’ is taken for a likeness that depicts what is something other than itself, and it represents because it is known; in the first way the species of white in the eye is an image; in the second way a statue of Hercules is an image of him.

341. In the first way the species of God in an angel is more an image than the angel is. In the second way is the angel an image, and to this image belongs a likeness in some way natural in existence, and it consists somehow in what Augustine proposed (in the fact that the soul in a way possesses a unity and trinity, just as the divine essence does), and this likeness is a concurring part in the idea of what is capable of blessedness. Although, therefore, the divine species represents the divine essence more distinctly than an angel does, yet an angel is more of an image to the extent an image is said to be something more alike in nature, possessing acts similar to the acts that are posited in the Trinity - and to this image, from the fact it has such acts, there belongs a capacity for that of which it is the image; and, through these means (namely natural likeness in acts) this capacity belongs to the image of God as Augustine is speaking of it, that ‘it is able to have a capacity for him and to participate in him’.

342. To the next argument [sc. the fifth, not posited above, n.311 interpolation a]This fifth argument reads as follows in Lectura 2 d.3 n.275: “Further, the species that would represent the divine essence can also represent the Trinity, because the Trinity exists in the divine essence; therefore if an angel could naturally know the divine essence distinctly through a species, he will be able naturally to know the Trinity distinctly, which is false.” Such an argument is also found in Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 4 q.7. ⁷² one could say that, although the species in the intellect of an angel is the reason for distinctly knowing the divine essence, yet it is not a reason for distinctly knowing the mode of that essence in the supposits [persons], just as also some created quiddity in us can be distinctly known although what supposits it is in and how it is in them is not known.

343. And if it be objected against this that when the supposits are, from natural necessity, intrinsic to the nature, then that which is the reason for distinctly knowing the nature will be a reason for distinctly knowing the supposits in the nature, and in that case it seems that an angel could naturally know the divine essence in the three supposits (because he could naturally know that in the first supposit there is an infinite memory productive of a supposit, and that in two there is an infinite will productive of another supposit) - one could say that the knowledge would not be purely natural, because an angel could not naturally reach it on the basis of his natural powers, nor on the basis of the necessary causes of something acting naturally; so that, although an angel possessing a species of the divine essence could naturally use the species, yet the species itself is from a cause that is supernatural and acting supernaturally.

344. But against this is objected that an angel naturally knows all things other than God, although he receives the other species from God imprinting them supernaturally. One could say that the angel could have the other species from the objects in themselves, with no agents being required other than those objects; but in no way could an angel have the distinct species with respect to the divine essence save from God imprinting it, and imprinting not naturally but supernaturally.

345. To the last argument [sc. the sixth, not posited above, n.311 interpolation a]This sixth argument reads as follows in Lectura 2 d.3 n.276: “Again, if some species distinctly represented the divine essence and the Trinity of persons in the essence, then since one angel could see that species naturally in the intellect of another angel, he can naturally know what it represents; and thus an angel can by natural knowledge know more about matters of belief than the faithful know by faith, which is false.” Such an argument is also found in Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 4 q.7. ⁷³ I say that if one holds that a blessed angel does not see supernatural things through that species, then neither will another angel, seeing the species in the first angel’s intellect, see supernatural things through it. But if it is posited that the species is, for the intellect, the reason ‘as that in which’ for seeing the Trinity, one can concede that it is the reason also for another intellect that sees, because the other intellect too has in it a like species of seeing; but then one has to say that the seeing is natural in one way and not in another way, as was expounded in the preceding response [nn.343-344].

IV. To the Argument for the Second Opinion

346. To the argument for the second opinion [n.312], that an angel is an image, I say that the term ‘image’ is equivocal, because an angel is not an image of the sort that is precisely a reason for the knowing of something as known thing; but it is an image having in some way a natural likeness in existing [nn.337, 340-341], and in being a reason for knowing as itself something known; and, in addition to every such reason for knowing as is a reason insofar as it is known, one must posit - as presupposed to discursive knowing - a reason different from it [nn.315-316].

V. To the Principal Arguments

347. As to the principal arguments [nn.303-304], it is plain how an angel can know the divine essence distinctly through a species [nn.324-325, 332-345]. And when it is objected [as by Henry of Ghent, Quodlibet 3 q.1] that the divine essence ‘is more intimate to the angel’s intellect than the species is’ [n.303], I say that although that intimacy could immediately cause the act that the species causes, yet the act would not be in the power of the angel, just as neither is the cause that causes it; and if the cause should sometimes cease from acting, the angel could not have the act again unless the essence is causing the act, and this would not be in the power of the angel himself. In order, then, that this act, an act not necessarily perpetual, may be in the power of the angel doing it, one must posit in the angel a species of the sort that he can perpetually through it know God distinctly.

348. Hereby is plain the answer to the second argument [n.304], namely that a species is necessary, not only so that the object be present to the soul, but also so that the act be in the power of the doer of the act.

Question Three. Whether an Angel is Required to have Distinct Reasons for Knowing Created Quiddities in Order to Know them Distinctly

349. I ask third about the knowledge of an angel (and it is the second question with respect to things known other than himself [n.255, 302]), whether an angel is required to have distinct reasons for knowing created quiddities in order to know them distinctly.

350. That he is not:

Metaphysics 8.3.1043b33-34, “Forms are disposed like numbers;” therefore the more perfect virtually includes the more imperfect, and consequently the more perfect will be a sufficient reason for knowing the more imperfect, just as a greater number is a reason for knowing a lesser number.

351. There is a confirmation from the Philosopher On the Soul 2.3.414b29-32, where he maintains that the sensitive power is in the intellective power as a triangle is in a quadrilateral, and such seems to be the order of ordered forms in the universe; but a quadrilateral can be a sufficient reason for knowing a triangle; therefore etc.

352. Again, a material thing is more perfect than its species, because the species has to the material thing the relation of measured to measure, but the measured is naturally posterior and more imperfect than its measure; but nothing more imperfect than a material thing seems to be a perfection of an immaterial thing; therefore no species of a material thing will be the proper reason of knowing for the intellect of an angel. But that which is for it the reason of understanding any intelligible is for it a natural perfection insofar as it is intelligible; therefore etc.

353. Again, an angel understands himself through his own essence (from the first question [nn.269-271]), therefore he understands other things through it as well. The consequence is plain, because his quiddity is intelligible in the same way as other created quiddities are intelligible; therefore if for any intellect its own essence is the immediate reason for knowing itself, by parity of reasoning the quiddity of another thing will be a reason for its knowing itself, and so there will not be proper reasons with respect to proper quiddities different from those quiddities.a

a.a [Interpolation] Again, in the first proposition of On Causes, “Every first cause has a greater influence on the thing caused than a second cause does;” if therefore an angel is a cause of an inferior thing, he will contain it perfectly.Further words are added at the end of this interpolation that the Vatican editors have transposed to n.364 as its last sentence (‘There is a confirmation of this...more things through one reason.’), where they think the words properly belong. ⁷⁴

354. To the contrary:

The divine intellect (according to most people) understands many things distinctly through many distinct reasons (and on this account do some posit [Bonaventure, Aquinas, Henry of Ghent] a necessity for ideas in the divine intellect), and our intellect understands many things precisely through many reasons; therefore the fact of having many reasons with respect to many intelligibles comes neither from an imperfection of intellect (because it belongs to the supreme intellect) nor from a perfection of intellect (because it belongs to the lowest intellect); therefore it comes from an absolute perfection of intellect in itself.

I. The Opinion of Others

A. First Opinion, which is that of Henry of Ghent

355. Here Henry of Ghent says, Quodlibet 5 q.14, that an angel understands all quiddities through a single scientific habit. Now his way of positing it is this, that although the habit is in the intellect as a form in a subject (or by impression), yet the object that shines forth in the habit does so only objectively.

356. And if it be asked how an object could be present as shining forth through a habit, the answer is that “although scientific habits are qualities in the first species of quality, yet there is founded on this quality a respect essential for it (which cannot be removed from it) to the knowable object as to that on which it depends in its essence and its existence.. .so that the intellect cannot take hold of this quality without taking hold of the knowable object with resect to which it exists,” because of “the natural connection of correlation” that it has to it; and even if the quality is “divinely bestowed, it no less has the essential respect to the knowable object,” so that “the knowable object, from the nature of the scientific habit, always shines back on the intellect with that of which it is the object...and it as much more naturally shines forth than could happen through a species as the science depends more essentially on the knowable object than the species on the thing, from which thing the species does not get its being caused.”

357. And if it be asked how it is that through one habit many objects can be present, the response is that “a single habit of science contains virtually the many intelligibles that the science concerns, and contains them the more actually the more simple it is; so that, if there were infinite species of creatures, that one habit would suffice for understanding all of them one after another, even by an infinite process, and this by understanding each of them the more simply and clearly the more indeterminate the habit is and the less determinate in its nature and essence, according as the higher angels are reckoned to understand by more universal and simpler habits than the lower ones do.”

358. And if it is asked how this habit reduces the angel’s intellect from potentially understanding to actually understanding, the answer stated is that “an angel’s intellect is naturally inclined by the habit co-created with it to understanding the quiddities of simple things, in the way an unimpeded heavy object is at once made to tend downwards by its heaviness; and an angel’s intellect is inclined so much the more naturally by the habit to understanding this thing rather than that thing the more essentially the habit is ordered to one thing rather than another (as to an intellection of itself or of a more abstract and more perfect creature that has more intelligibility). And then, when the intellect has been put into first act for first understanding, it runs discursively by a free choice of will to understanding particular things both propositional and simple (I mean by ‘discursively’ to know this thing after that thing, not to know this thing on the basis of that thing).. and according as it tends determinately to something by command of will, so the habit inclines determinately to that same thing;” for the habit “moves determinately to something according as it is impelled toward it by command of will.”

359. Now, in support of this opinion, five reasons can be elicited from the statements of the author of it. The first of these is that the Philosopher Ethics 2.4.1105b19-21 says there are only three things in the soul: power, habit, and passion. But the reason of understanding in an angel cannot be only his power (because thus something natural would be a sufficient principle for representing all knowables), and it is certainly not his passion; therefore it is his habit.

360. The second is as follows: in an intellect that has no habit a habit can be generated by frequent elicited acts; therefore if a scientific habit for knowing were not cocreated in an angel, he could generate in himself such a habit, and thus he would be in essential potency, not only to second, but also to first act (the way our intellect is), which is unacceptable.

361. The third is that Dionysius Divine Names ch.7 says that ‘the connection of the universe consists in the fact that the highest of the lower is conjoined with the lowest of the higher’; but the highest in human knowledge is that he should be ready for knowing through a scientific habit; therefore this sort of knowledge must be posited in an angel.

362. The fourth is that if there were no other reason save that a species without a habit does not suffice for perfect knowledge while a perfect habit without a species does suffice, in vain is a species posited for an act of understanding.

363. The fifth is that several elements are not posited in the will as principles for willing diverse objects; therefore neither are diverse principles of understanding posited in the intellect, but a single habit in a perfect intellect will suffice for representing whatever is naturally knowable to it.

B. Second Opinion, which is that of Thomas Aquinas

364. Another opinion says [Aquinas ST Ia 1.55 a.3, De Veritate q.8 aa.10-11] that there is no need to posit proper reasons in an angel with respect to individual created quiddities, because although a lower angel knows many quiddities through many reasons for knowing, yet a higher angel can know them through some one reason, as is proved by Dionysius Celestial Hierarchy ch.12, “The superior angels have a more universal science than the inferior ones;” it is also proved by reason, because just as prior things are nearer to the first thing in entity so are they too in intellectuality. Since therefore the first intellect understands everything through one reason, a higher intellect will understand through fewer reasons what a lower intellect understands through more. There is a confirmation of this, that a sharper human intellect understands more things in one reason for knowing than another less sharp one does; therefore it thus seems that the angelic intellect, because of the greater perfection of its intellectuality, can distinctly understand more things through one reason.See footnote to interpolation after n.253 above. ⁷⁵

365. There is another argument to the same effect, that the more some reason for knowing is in something more immaterial or in something more actual, the more universal is the reason for representing; this major premise is plain of the species in the senses and of the phantasm in the intellect; and the reason is that ‘a received thing is in the receiver in the mode of the receiver’ [n.412]; therefore the reason that is in a higher, more actual angel will be a reason in a superior for knowing more things than in an inferior.

C. Rejection of Both Opinions in General

366. Now this opinion seems to coincide with the preceding one in this respect, that as the first posits that infinitely many quiddities could be known by the one habit (as far as concerns it of itself [n.357]), so this second one has to posit that in some one angel there was some one reason that would not be a reason for representing a definite number of quiddities without being a reason for representing more. For, by proceeding according to the number of quiddities in the universe and the number of intelligible species in angels, ‘of which there is always a smaller number in a higher angel’ [nn.364-365], one will eventually reach some single species in some single angel that could be the reason for knowing all inferior intelligibles - or at any rate one will reach some few species, and so all the inferior quiddities whatever that could come to be could be known by those few species; and thus, by attributing to one species some one definite multitude of knowable quiddities, one would not be able to find, on its part, why it was the reason for knowing so many and not more. And granted that the second opinion could in some way escape this conclusion, nevertheless, even were it not the first reason I pose against it, there will be another three against it, as also against the first opinion [nn.369, 371, 376].

367. I prove first, then, that a single created reason cannot be a principle for knowing an infinity of quiddities, or cannot be a principle for knowing a definite number of them without being a principle for knowing more, because where a numerical plurality requires a greater perfection, there an infinite plurality or a numerical infinity requires an infinite perfection (an example: if being able to carry more weights at once entails a greater power, then being able to carry an infinity of weights at once, or not being able to carry a definite number at once without being able to carry more, entails a power intensively infinite); but for something to be a reason for distinctly knowing several quiddities entails a greater perfection in it than does being a reason for knowing one quiddity alone; if therefore something could be a reason for knowing an infinity of things (or not a reason for knowing a definite number without being a reason for knowing more), it will be infinite - which is impossible.

368. The assumption [sc. the minor, ‘for something to be.. .knowing one quiddity alone’, n.367] I provea by the fact that if the proper reason representative of this quiddity is taken, then, insofar as it is the representative reason of this quiddity, it includes some perfection, and likewise the proper reason representative of another quiddity includes some perfection; and these perfections in their proper representative reasons are of different idea; the one reason, then, that distinctly represents both of them as objects includes virtually in itself several perfections of different idea, and so it is more perfect in itself than is either of them alone. This is also confirmed by what is said in 1 d.2 nn.125-127, where it is proved that God is infinite from the infinity of the things represented through his essence.

a.a [Interpolation] Hereby not only is the minor proved but also the major.

369. Second I prove that no created reason can be a reason for knowing distinctly several quiddities:

First, because each one reason for knowing has one adequate object, and in this object are perfectly included all the things knowable through that reason, if several things are knowable through it.a The point is plain from a likeness about the divine essence as reason and as object; for the divine essence as reason is distinctly representative in regard to infinite objects because it is of one first object, which object perfectly includes all those infinite objects insofar as they are knowable. But the one reason here that is being posited does not have any first object virtually including, according to its total knowability, all other quiddities; for this reason is posited precisely as having for object all created things, and no creature thus includes all quiddities.

a.a [Interpolation] Or alternatively let the major be this: whatever is the reason for knowing distinctly several things has one object in which those several things are perfectly contained.

370. There is also proof of the major [n.369] by reason, because the unity of the naturally posterior depends on the unity of the prior, for on a distinction in the naturally prior follows a distinction in the posterior; but every reason for knowing that exists in a created intellect (that is, which is not participated as the divine essence is) is disposed to the known thing as measured to measure, and so is as naturally posterior to prior; therefore its unity necessarily depends on the unity of the object measuring.a

a.a [Interpolation] Therefore it is necessary that some one object is the measure of the reason for knowing. But the object that is the measure of it is adequate to it; therefore it is not a reason for knowing other things save in that these other things are virtually contained in the first object, which is the measure of the reason for knowing. - Second, the major is proved as follows: nothing is a reason for perfectly knowing another thing unless it either is the proper reason for it or contains the proper reason for knowing it; but not in the first way, since it is a reason for knowing distinctly several other things; therefore it must contain virtually the reasons for knowing many things, if it is a distinct reason for knowing them. The minor is evident, because the quiddity of the object will be a created one - and it cannot contain other quiddities distinctly in knowability, because there is some entity in an inferior that is not contained in a superior; therefore likewise there is in knowability some reason in an inferior that is not contained in a superior knowability; therefore etc.

371. Again second: each one reason for knowing can have some act of knowing adequate to it; but this reason, which is posited to be the reason with respect to knowing distinctly several quiddities, cannot have some one act of understanding adequate to it, because - according to them - this intellect cannot know distinctly and at once the several quiddities of which it is the reason; therefore etc.

372. The proof of the major is that every perfect memory can have an intelligence adequate to itself as to the fact that, according to its first and total act, it can produce an effect adequate to itself; this is clear because even the infinite memory of the Father can be the principle for producing an actual infinite knowledge.a

a.a [Interpolation] Proof of the minor: for it cannot have one act adequate to it intensively, because then the act would contain virtually acts of understanding all other quiddities, which it cannot do; nor can it have one such act extensively, because then it could at once actually and distinctly understand all those quiddities, and this is not true and not conceded by them either.

373. Against these two arguments [nn.369, 371] it is objected that a form productive of several things does not have to have one first object in which are contained virtually all other objects (as is clear about the form of the sun with respect to generable and corruptible forms); nor even does it have to be able to have one act adequate to itself, but several. So it is in the issue at hand.

374. I reply:

A productive power in some way unlimited in its effects is an equivocal power, and therefore simply superior and nobler than any effect; because of this its unity does not depend on the unity of the effect but the effect depends on this cause; and the effects can be many while this cause exists as single, because there can be a plurality in posterior things along with a unity in the naturally prior thing. But in operations that are not productions the object in that case does not have the idea of a naturally prior with respect to that which is the proximate reason for operating (speaking of the case of creatures), and the unity of what is naturally posterior depends on the unity of the prior.

375. Likewise too, such a productive form does not naturally have to have a passive thing adequate to it (adequate both in intensity and in extension) so that it can act with an adequate action; but the memory insofar as it is an operative power has itself a natural intelligence (in the same nature) as the passive or quasi-passive thing adequate to it, namely because it can receive an action or a second act adequate in every way (namely both intensively and extensively) to the first act of memory itself; otherwise there would be in the memory some reason for knowing that would altogether exceed the power of generating of the memory as it is parent, and so ‘the parts of the image would not mutually take hold of themselves’, which is contrary to Augustine On the Trinity 10.11 n.18 (for that is why these parts are equal in comparison with the objects, because every object, in the way it can be in the memory, can be in the intelligence actually and in the will lovably or hatefully according to its act) - and the Master [Lombard] adduces in Sentences 1 d.3 ch.2 n.41 authorities from Augustine for the fact that ‘whatever I know I remember’.

376. I argue third as follows: the intellect that can without contradiction habitually know this and not know that does not know several things habitually in the same way formally (the proof is that it is a contradiction for the intellect to have and not have the same thing formally, and to have something by which it is and is not formally such; therefore if it can be non-knowing a habitually and knowing b habitually, it does not know a and b habitually in the same way); but every created intellect can know one object and not another; therefore no such intellect knows several objects in the same way habitually.

377. The proof of the minor is that if a created intellect could not, without contradiction, habitually know a in the absence of knowing b, this would be either on the part of such an intellect - which is false, because it can now habitually know one thing and not another thing (otherwise it would be knowing several things at once); or on the part of a necessary binding together of objects - which is false, because one object can be known by our intellect while another is not known. If then this is not because of a necessary connection of objects, nor of a necessary connection of object to power, then not in any way.

D. Rejection of the First Opinion in Particular

378. Further, I argue specifically in four ways against the first opinion about habit: First against what it posits about essential respect [n.356]: it seems to contradict Augustine, On the Trinity 7.1 n.2, who maintains that “everything that is said relatively is a something after the relative is removed;” and in 2 d.1 nn.260, 272, 243-252, 260-261, 266, 278, 284 (the question on the relation of the creature to God) it was proved that no relation is formally or essentially the same as its foundation, although it is sometimes by identity the same thing. If then the habit in question is a certain quality and an absolute entity, it does not have a respect in such a way that it cannot be understood without it.

379. Further, if the respect is posited to be the same as something absolute, it is so only as to what is naturally prior, as is plain from the question about the relation of a creature to God [ibid. nn.261, 263, 265]; but the respect of a habit in the angelic intellect to a stone is not to what is naturally prior, because a stone is not disposed in any genus of cause with respect to such a habit.a

a.a [Interpolation] Or in this way: a respect is not posited as being the same as something save in regard to that on which it essentially depends; but nothing can essentially depend on several things of the same order, because in that case, when one of the things terminates the dependence of it, another would not terminate it - and thus would it be even if that other on which it essentially depends did not exist, which is unacceptable. But if such a habit is posited, it will represent all quiddities under the same order, such that it will represent none of them by means of another but all of them immediately; therefore etc.

380. Second against the fact that an object is posited through the habit to be present under the idea of the intelligible [n.355]:

First by Henry’s own reason: for he proves that an intelligible species cannot be the reason for the presence of the object because it perfects the intellect as a certain being, the way form perfects matter, and consequently it will not perfect the intellect as it is intellect [sc. as it is an intellective power], nor will the intelligible be present insofar as it is intelligible. Much more can this be proved of the habit, because the habit, as habit, is a perfection of a power.

381. Further second: the consequence would much more hold in our habit, which is caused by the object, that our scientific habit would be something by which the intelligible object would be present, and so, when the scientific habit has been acquired, no turning toward phantasms would be required for actual intellection, which he denies.

382. The response is that our intellection depends on sensibles, not so the intellection of an angel. - On the contrary: if a necessary joining together (or an essential respect in the habit) is the reason because of which the object is sufficiently present through the habit [n.356], and if that respect is more essentially in our habit than in an angel’s habit (because ours but not the angel’s is caused by the object), then our habit, because of this essential respect, will be more the reason for such presence than the angelic habit will be.

383. Third, against what he says that every created intelligible object is present through this habit [n.355]: this seems unacceptable, because if an angel were created in its purely natural powers without any such habit (and this involves no contradiction, because this habit differs, as a quality does, from the angel’s essence), then the angel would not be able to know, and the nature of angel would thus of itself be more imperfect in intellectuality than the nature of a man; because the nature of a man, however bare it is made to be, has the means to acquire intellectual knowledge of certain objects, but an angel could not acquire this habit nor be able, without it, to understand anything.

384. Further, the habit, according to him, does for this reason not represent the singular ‘the way a species would represent it’, because it is not of a nature to be generated immediately by the thing itself but only by an act of intellect comparing simples; but he himself argues against the species because, when something ‘generated by its natural cause’ is of a nature thus to represent a singular under the idea under which it is generated by it, it will, by whatever the singular is impressed on it, always thus represent it; therefore, since the habit that was thus generated by its natural cause would naturally follow the apprehension of simples (by whatever the apprehension too is impressed on it), the consequence would be that it would presuppose that apprehension of simples; therefore it cannot be the proper reason for apprehending simples.

385. Further fourth: as to his saying that this habit is the principle for knowing any distinct objects whatever [n.357] - the first argument against the first opinion [n.367] seems to be against it, namely because it would be naturally infinite.

386. As to his also saying that the habit determinately inclines to what the will by commanding determines it [n.358] - this seems irrational, because this habit, ‘as it is a natural form’, has a determinate natural inclination, and if there are many inclinations to diverse things they are ordered inclinations, such that at least one of them is first; and consequently to use it for that to which it is not first inclined seems to be against its first natural inclination, and so it will not be inclined to it merely naturally. Nor does it seem rational to posit that one natural form - as concerns its natural inclination - is subject to a created will; for if a heavy thing, while remaining actually heavy, were moved upwards by God, although the heavy thing be perfectly in obediential potency to the divine power, yet it does not seem, on its own part [2 d.2 nn.466-467], to be passively moved naturally; and however it may be in this case, it does not seem that any natural form - in its natural inclination - is altogether subject in its act to a created will, such that it be inclined naturally to that to which the created will wants it to be inclined

387. Further, in whatever way he may be able to say that the habit, by command of the will, determinately represents different things, much more could it be posited that what has many intelligible species can use now this species and now that; and a naturality will exist in any species that represents and inclines to its own object, and a liberty in the user of this species or that.

II. Scotus’ own Opinion

388. As to the question then [n.349], I concede the conclusions of the first four arguments [nn.367, 369, 371, 376], which prove that an angel has distinct reasons of knowing for knowing distinct quiddities.

389. And if it be asked what these reasons of knowing are, I say that an angel has reasons of knowing, different from the known essences themselves, that represent those essences, which reasons are both properly and truly called intelligible species; and if they are called habits by some people [e.g. Henry], they are thereby actually expressed as being accidents of species, for the idea of habit is an accident of a species, insofar as a species in the intellect, from which it is not easily deleted, has the idea of habit (because it has the idea of permanent form), but ‘species’ is not stated of the whatness of this quality or habit, just as ‘habit’ is not stated of the whatness of a species (for the same absolute essence in the genus of quality can be a habit and a disposition).

390. Likewise, ‘habit’ is universally used for a fixed such intelligible species, because although every such firm species is a habit, yet not conversely - rather, neither is every intelligible habit of the same object of which there is an intelligible species the same as the species.

The fact is plain, first because the species of the first object which is not naturally present through the essence naturally precedes the act of knowing it; but the habit with respect to that object naturally follows what it is generated from [n.384]; but the essentially same thing does not naturally follow and naturally precede, because there is no circle in essentially ordered things, neither in the case of causes nor in the case of caused things. Second because a habit can be more intense than something of which the species is less intense (and conversely), for he who has an imperfect intellect, in which an imperfect intelligible species is received, has a less intense intelligible species than someone else who has a sharper intellect (as is plain, because the natural causes in the former and the latter are unequal, namely the agent intellect and the phantasm, and natural causes act according to the ultimate of their power); therefore the intelligible species in the more imperfect intellect is less intense than in the more perfect intellect, and yet the slower intellect can more frequently consider the intelligible thing (of which it has the species), and thereby have a more intense habit with respect to this object, which habit is a quality facilitating the consideration of the object.

391. Thus this reason therefore (namely the species) is called per accidens and in general an ‘intelligible habit’, but per se and essentially such a reason is called an ‘intelligible species’, because in this way it is more properly expressed, more properly even than in the idea of a likeness.

392. But the proof that an angel, with respect to quiddities other than himself, has such a reason of knowing, different from his essence, is that he knows through something through which he would know those quiddities even if the quiddities were not in themselves existent; for this is a feature of perfection in our intellect, that we may have actual knowledge about a thing when it does not exist, so much more does this feature belong to the angelic intellect; but such knowledge of a thing, which can be had of it when it does not exist in itself, could only be had through a species representing it; therefore etc.

393. And herefrom follows further that an angel has a reason of knowing even about his own quiddity, because no knowledge imperfect in its kind belongs to a higher angel without an inferior angel having about the same thing a knowledge more imperfect in kind; but a superior angel can have knowledge about an inferior angel through a species (from what was already proved [n.392]), and knowledge through a species is more imperfect in its kind than knowledge through the essence; therefore an angel can have knowledge of himself through a species.

394. And if it is objected that this contradicts what was said in the first question [nn.269, 353], because it is said there that an angel knows himself through his own essence, I say that an angel can know any quiddity at all (other than himself and even his own) through a species of it and through the essence of it; he can know it through the essence indeed when he knows it with intuitive knowledge (namely under the idea under which it is present in actual existence); he can also know it through a species when he knows it with abstractive knowledge, about which a little will be touched on in d.9 qq.1-2 nn.19, 30 [cf. supra nn.318-323], in the question about the speaking of angels.

III. To the Principal Arguments

395. To the principal arguments [350-353].

To the first [n.350] I say that the Philosopher’s intention in Metaphysics 8 concerns subaltern species; this is clear from the first property of a number, where

Aristotle maintains that just as a number stops at indivisible units so the resolution of definitions stops at indivisibles; therefore the quiddities are ordered in the universe the way numbers are ordered, as resolvable to unities. He is speaking therefore of subaltern species, and so it is not to the purpose when speaking of the most specific species in the universe.

Yet if this point is taken, not from authority but as something true in itself, to be about most specific species, I say that a higher angel has a more perfect entity than a lower one; however the higher angel does not include the whole entity of the lower, such that the lower only differs from him by negation, for species in the universe are not distinguished by negations but by their proper ideas. Nevertheless the divine essence, which is infinite, does include eminently all perfections, and for this reason no higher angel is a sufficient reason for knowing a lower but the divine essence alone is.

396. As for the quote from On the Soul 2 [n.351], I say that the Philosopher is speaking there specifically of the sensitive, vegetative, and intellective soul. Nor is there a likeness between the species of numbers (or figures) and the most specific species in the universe, because greater numbers (and figures) include lesser ones as parts and according to the whole entity of numbers, and therefore they are sufficient reasons for knowing the lesser ones; but the higher species in the universe do not thus include the lower species.

397. To the second argument [n.352] I reply by conceding that the species of a material thing is a perfection of an angel in intelligible being, but an accidental perfection (not a substantial or essential one), and such a perfection does not always simply exceed what it perfects; rather, every accident is simply less a being than substance is (from Metaphysics 7.1.1028a13-20).

398. And if you ask how the species of a material thing can be an accidental perfection of a nature already perfect if that species is thus lower than the lowest nature (namely than corporeal substance), because that which is the reason for understanding whiteness in a perfect intellect (as in an angelic intellect) seems to be more perfect than whiteness - I say that the species is not altogether lower than the lowest nature, because it is not the effect of it as of the total cause but is the effect of it and of the intellect of the angel as of integral parts of one total cause. But the effect of some partial cause can exceed its partial cause, because it can have something of perfection from the other partial cause on account of which it can exceed the former partial cause; hence the species of whiteness in the intellect of the angel is a perfection of his intellect; indeed it is not a more imperfect entity than the entity that whiteness is but rather a more perfect one. And this does not belong to it insofar as it generated from whiteness but because it is generated as well from the intellect of the angel, as being a living perfection and in some way more perfect than whiteness itself (and yet it does in some way fail of entity simply, because it is an entity generated from whiteness); but this excess of perfection is only ‘in a certain respect’.

399. As to the final argument [n.353], it is plain that an angel’s understanding himself through a species stands together with his understanding himself through his essence, just as does his thus understanding anything other than himself [n.394] - and that naturally, the divine essence alone excepted [nn.324-325].

IV. To the Arguments for the First Opinion

400. To the arguments for the first opinion [nn.359-363].

To the first argument from Ethics 2 [n.359] I concede that, by proceeding through the division of things in the soul, species can truly be called habits, and habit can truly be predicated of the species as a universal and per accidens predicate; and if this has to be rightly expressed per se and in particular, such a thing is called an intelligible species. But the Philosopher does not mean that nothing is in the soul save what is a per accidens habit; on the contrary, that to which the idea of habit belongs is a sort of universal predicate.

401. To the second [n.360] I say that an angel cannot generate in himself any habit from his acts (I mean a habit that is a thing other than a species), because a habit is not generated in things inclined or determined naturally to one thing (as the reason for falling in a heavy thing is not generated by its falling however many times); nor in things moved violently is an inclination generated in conformity to the mover or to the operation of a habit (as is plain if a heavy thing is projected upwards however many times),a - but a habit is generated in powers that are in themselves indeterminate to an act frequently elicited. Now it is not a feature of imperfection that some created intellect is supremely habituated to intellection; but if there is any such intellect it will be the angelic, and so in it (as in what is supremely habituated to act) an aptitude that may be called a habit in the above way [sc. as a habit is ‘a thing other than the species’] will not be able to be generated from any action; or if it lacks such a habit (a habit that was an aptitude for considering this intelligible thing) and the intellect is capable of it, then I say it is not unacceptable for it to be able to generate such a habit in itself.

a.a [Interpolation] [nor in things moved violently] is there generated, by their being so moved however many times, any idea or habit facilitating and habituating them to such violent motion, as is plain of a stone moved upwards.

402. And when you say ‘therefore it is potential, as our intellect is, not only to second act but also to first’ [n.360], I deny the consequence; because the first act in an intellect is that which is presupposed to second act (which second act is intellection), but this habit (which is an aptitude for understanding and is distinguished from a species) does not naturally precede the act but follows it; therefore it is posterior to second act (and so it is not first act), and thereby the potency for it is not an essential potency (rather it is quasi posterior to accidental potency), because an essential potency is properly for a first act preceding second act; hence the science, for which the intellect, according to Aristotle, is said to be in essential potency, is not a scientific habit (which is generated from acts), but an intelligible species.

403. Hereby is plain the answer to the third argument, from Dionysius [n.361]. I say that ‘the highest in an inferior is lowest in a superior’ when what is placed as highest in an inferior is not repugnant to the superior. Here however it is repugnant, because in us the habit of science is a perfection supplying the imperfection of our intellect, inasmuch as our intellect is not of itself supremely habituated; even when a man has an active reason whereby the object is sufficiently present, such a supreme inclination as is required for the most perfect act is still lacking.

404. Although this perfection in us supplies an imperfection, yet it is repugnant to an angel, because there cannot be an imperfection in an angel that may be supplied by this perfection; so could it be said in many other cases, because if what is supreme in an element is to generate something like itself, there is no need that it be lowest in any mixed body proximate to it, for some mixed bodies do not generate something like themselves, because such a perfection supplying imperfection in an inferior is repugnant to them (so too can what is lowest in a superior be repugnant to an inferior, and then the converse is not valid, namely that the lowest of the superior are the highest of the inferior). Hence this argument [sc. taken from Dionysius, n.361] would entail many falsehoods; for it would follow that the sensitive soul (which is the supreme form in brutes) would be formally in the intellective soul.

405. To the fourth [n.362] I say that if there were no other reason save that the species, when it is perfect, suffices for perfect intellection without a habit (and in an angel the species perhaps necessarily suffices without a habit, if a habit as it is distinguished from a species is impossible in it; or if a habit is possible there, it does not suffice without a species) - this alone suffices for denying in an angel a habit other than the species as a necessary principle for the act of understanding.

406. To the fifth and last argument [n.363] I say that if the appetible object were present to the appetite by some proper presence different from that by which it is present to the cognitive power of the appetite, then proper reasons would be required in the appetite whereby diverse objects might be present to it; but this supposition is false, because an object present to some cognitive power is present by the same fact to the appetitive power that corresponds to the cognitive power.

407. And then if you argue that ‘the will does not require diverse reasons, so neither does the intellect’ [n.363], I say that the antecedent is false if it is understood of the reasons by which an object is present to the intellect (for the reasons by which objects are present to the intellect are reasons that are diverse); but if you mean that the reasons by which the objects may be present would not be required in the will, I say that this is not valid, because the appetitive power is not of a nature to have an object in itself in the way that an object is present to the cognitive power. Nor is it valid to raise an objection against this from ordered cognitive powers, for the order between themselves of things that are of the same genus is not like the order of the intellective and appetitive powers, which are of different genera; and therefore ordered cognitive powers that are diverse have diverse reasons (by which their objects may be present), just as the cognitive power has diverse reasons in relation to its appetitive powers.

V. To the Arguments for the Second Opinion

408. To the arguments for the second opinion [nn.364-365].

The answer to Dionysius [n.364] is plain from a different translation that is adduced (‘total’ etc.) - look at Lincoln [Grosseteste, translation and commentary on Celestial Hierarchy ch.12]; for, as Lincoln himself expounds, by ‘universality of species’ is understood ‘totality of species’. But this totality is totality of perfection (as of clearness or intensity), and not that a single reason is for something a reason of knowing more things than it is for another, because equal for every finite intellect is that all of them require, as regard knowing several things, proper reasons.

409. When, second, the argument is made that ‘the first are nearer the first’ [n.364], I concede the fact; but they do not have to be nearer in this sense, that they know through fewer principles, but because they can know more clearly; for the per se nearness of perfection lies in the latter and not, were it possible, in the former. For that intellect is simply more perfect which knows more clearly; but nothing is lost to it if it knows through different principles, provided however it knows more clearly; for if it were to know through one and the same principle and were not to know more clearly, it would not know more perfectly - which is false [sc. for, ex hypothesi, it does know more perfectly]. For per se nearness exists in this clearness, and not in the fewness of reasons for knowing, because - absolutely - it is not in the nature of any created reason that it be one for several.

410. And hereby is plain the answer to the argument that is made about the cleverer intellect, that it knows through fewer things etc. [n.364]; the argument is false, but the cleverer intellect has as many species of knowables as the slower intellect has; yet it thereby knows objects more clearly and uses them more quickly, combining this object with that and running discursively from one known thing to another. But from its greater clearness and speed one cannot deduce that it understands through fewer reasons; so it is in the issue at hand.a

a.a [Interpolation] As to what was said there [interpolation to n.353], about the authority of the author of On Causes, there is no need to worry about it; hence one should say that the authority has to be understood about a cause simply first, not about any intermediate cause, because although a first cause can do more than a second cause (because it includes it), yet because it does not include it eminently in its whole entity (because only God includes everything in this way), so neither does it include it in its whole active virtue, because it does not include it in the representative power by which it can represent the intelligible object that a body cannot represent.

411. To the final argument for this opinion [n.365] I say that there is not a single species in sense, imagination, and intellect, but different ones; nor does a species represent more universally merely on the ground that it is in a more immaterial subject, because if - per impossibile - the species that is in the sense were in the imagination (or if the one that is in the imagination were in the intellect), it would not represent more perfectly (neither as to quiddity nor as to intensity) because, namely, it was the proper reason for more things. So from the sole immateriality or greater actuality of the receiver cannot be deduced a greater actuality in representing of the species received, but this will be only from the nature of the species in itself.

412. However these conditions of received species are proportionate to the receptive things (according to the saying of Boethius [Consolation of Philosophy 5 prose 5] that ‘the received is in the receiver in the mode of the receiver etc.’) - but absolutely, just as no receiving essence is universal with respect to all essences (nor even does it perfectly contain every essence other than itself), so neither can anything received in it be the universal reason for perfectly representing everything else; but such universal representation can precisely belong (infinitely and eminently) to the divine essence, and to no other.The Vatican Editors point out that the interpolated fourth question here (see interpolation to n.255), about whether angels can progress in receiving knowledge from things (interpolated by another manuscript after d.12 q.1), is conflated from Rep. II B d.11 q.2 and Additiones Magnae 2 d.11 q.1 or d.10 q.1. ⁷⁶