3. About the Third Proposition, that ‘The Specific Form of Man will not Perpetually Remain Outside its Whole’

125. About the third proposition it is said [Aquinas] that it can be proved from the fact that a part outside its whole is imperfect; but a form so noble will not remain imperfect perpetually; therefore not separate from the whole either.

126. Again, “nothing violent is perpetual” according to Aristotle On the Heavens 1.2.269a19-28. But the separation of the body from the soul is violent, because against the natural inclination of the soul, according to the Philosopher; for the soul is naturally inclined to perfecting the body.

127. Now as to this proposition [n.125], it seems that if the Philosopher had posited the soul to be immortal he would rather have posited it to remain perpetually without the body than in the body, because ‘everything composed of opposites is corruptible’.

128. Nor do the above reasons prove it:

Not the first [n.125] because the major premise, ‘a part outside its whole is imperfect’, is only true of a part that receives some perfection within the whole; now the soul does not receive perfection but communicates it. And thus an argument to the opposite can be formed, because it is not repugnant for something to remain equally perfect in itself though it not communicate its perfection to another. This is clear about the efficient cause, whose remaining however much without its effect is not repugnant to it. But the soul remains equally perfect in its proper being whether it is joined or separated, being different however in this, that when separated it does not communicate its being to another.

129. Hereby also to the next argument [n.126], because natural inclination is double: one is to first act and is the inclination of the imperfect to the perfect, and accompanies essential potency; and the other inclination is to second act, and is of the perfect to the communicating of perfection, and accompanies accidental potency.

About the first inclination it is true that its opposite is the violent and is not perpetual, because it posits perpetual imperfection, which the Philosopher considers unacceptable [On the Heavens 2.14.296a32-34], for he placed causes in the universe that at some time take away any imperfection. But the second inclination, even if it be perpetually suspended, is not properly called anything violent, because neither is it an imperfection; but as it is now the inclination of the soul for the body is only in the second way.

130. Or one can say, according to Avicenna [On the Soul 1.1, 3], that the appetite of the soul is satisfied by the fact that it once perfected a body, because its conjunction with the body is so that by means of the body the soul acquire its perfections through the senses, which it could not acquire without the senses, and so not without the body either. But when the soul has been once conjoined, it has acquired as much as it desires simply to acquire in that way.