Fifth Part. On Theology insofar as it is a Practical Science

Question 1. Whether theology is a practical or a speculative science

217. The question is whether theology is a practical or a speculative science.

Proof that it is not practical:

Because in John 20.23 it is said: “These things are written that you might believe;” to believe is something speculative, because on it vision follows; therefore etc.

218. Besides, practical science is set down as being about the contingent, On the Soul 3.10.433a26-30 and Ethics 1.2.1094b7, 21-22; but the object of this science is not contingent, but necessary; therefore etc.

219. Again, Boethius On the Trinity ch. 2 assigns three parts to speculative science, one of which is theology according to him; and it seems he is speaking about theology in the present sense, because about its subject he there adds that its subject is the first substance, of which he says that “God’s substance lacks matter.”

220. Again, nobler than any practical science is some speculative science; but no science is nobler than this science [of theology]; therefore etc. The proof of the first proposition is both that speculative science is for its own sake while practical is for the sake of use, and that speculative science is more certain, from Metaphysics 1.2.982a14-16, 25-28.

221. Again, after all necessary sciences were in existence, this science was invented for escaping ignorance, as is clear because concern with necessities is an impediment to the investigation of this doctrine; therefore it is a speculative science. For in this way does the Philosopher argue in Metaphysics 1.2.982a19-25, that metaphysics is speculative.

222. On the contrary:

Romans 13.10: “The end of the law is love.”

Again, Matthew 22.40: “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

Again, Augustine On the Praise of Charity, Sermon 350 n.2: “He who keeps charity in morals possesses whatever is hidden and whatever is plain in the divine words.”

But these authorities prove that this science is not precisely for speculation, but speculative science seeks nothing beyond speculation, according to Avicenna Metaphysics 1.1 (70ra) (examine him there).

Question 2. Whether a science is called practical per se from order to action as to its end

223. Second, the question is whether a science is called practical per se from order to action [praxis] as to its end.

I argue that it is:

In On the Soul 3.10 433a14-15 the Philosopher says: “The intellect becomes practical by extension, and differs from the speculative in its end.”

224. Again in Metaphysics 1.2.982a14-16 he says: “The practical is less noble than the speculative, because it is for the sake of use.” This argument would not hold unless use was the end per se of that habit.

225. Again in Metaphysics 2.1.993b20-21 he says: “The end of the speculative is truth, but the end of the practical is work.”

226. On the contrary:

In Metaphysics 6.1.10225b18-28 the Philosopher distinguishes practical sciences from speculative by their objects, as is plain; for he there distinguishes practical science, both active and productive, from speculative by its object and not by its end.

Again, in Ethics 6.2.1139a3-15 he distinguishes the calculative from the scientific by the necessary and contingent object; therefore science is practical per se from its object; therefore not from action as from its end.

Again, in On the Soul 3.10.433a26-30 he assigns good as the object of the practical, not any good but doable and contingent good; therefore science is practical per se from its object; not therefore from action as from its end.

227. To solve these questions I take one general thing that is conceded by everyone, namely that the practical habit is in some way extended to action. One must consider therefore in particular: first, what the action is is to which practical knowledge is said to be extended; second, in what way practical knowledge is extended to that action; third, by what thing knowledge has such extension.

I. What Action [Praxis] is

228. I say first, then, that the action to which practical knowledge is extended is the act of some power other than the intellect, naturally posterior to the intellect, of a nature to be elicited in conformity with right intellect so as to be right.

The first condition is clear, because when one stops precisely at acts of the intellect there is no extension of the intellect, because it does not tend beyond itself unless its act has regard to the act of another power.

And if you say that one act of the intellect is extended to another, being directed by it, the second act is not for this reason action as we are now speaking of action, nor is the first knowledge practical, because then logic would be practical, because it directs in acts of discursive thought.

229. The second condition is plain, because acts not having an order to the intellect, of which sort are vegetative acts, and acts naturally preceding the intellect, as sense acts, are not called actions, nor is practical knowledge said to be extended to them in the way these are prior to understanding. Similarly, the act of the power of sense appetite, insofar as it precedes the act of the intellect, is not action; for it is in this way common to us and to the brutes. Nor is any knowledge practical in respect of these acts, unless it in some way moderates them and these acts follow the understanding moderating them qua being moderated by it.

230. From these two conditions follows a corollary, namely that the action to which the practical habit is extended is only an elicited or commanded act of the will, for no other act coming from understanding or beside understanding is essentially posterior to understanding, for any other given act, which is of the same nature as it is, could be prior to it, as is plain by running through the acts of all the powers.

231. This fact is plain, second, in this way, that action is an act that is in the power of the knower. The proof is from Ethics 6.5.1140b22, that the artisan needs a virtue for acting rightly; but he does not need a virtue with respect to what is not in his power; therefore the artisan has the act of making in his power; much more does the prudent man have action in his power, because he is virtuous in his very form. From this follows further: if all action is in the power of the knower, and if nothing is in the power of the will save either an elicited or commanded act, the proposition intended follows as before [n.230].

232. Against this condition is that the consequence seems to be that then any intellection will be action, because any intellection can be an act commanded by the will the way the act of other powers is commanded by the will. And in that case it follows further that therefore the first condition is false, namely that action is the operation of a power other than the intellect. - I reply: although speculation is a certain operation and so, in an extended sense, is an action, yet, in the way action is said to be only the operation to which the intellect can be extended, no understanding is action; and this is the way action is taken when practical knowledge is said to be extended to action. When, therefore, it is argued that ‘understanding is commanded by the will, therefore it is action’, the consequence does not hold, but what holds is ‘therefore it is action or practical’; for it has the nature to be denominated practical accidentally, as it were, because of the action to which it can be extended; but it cannot be the term of such extension. Yet, on the other hand, I do well concede that all action is an elicited or commanded act of the will. Hence, to infer from this second condition the opposite of the first condition is to commit the fallacy of the consequent, by asserting the consequent.That is, from ‘if an act is action, then it is an elicited or commanded act of the will’ one asserts ‘understanding is a commanded act of the will’ and then concludes ‘therefore understanding is action’, which is the fallacy of the consequent. ⁷³, Interpolation: “Note, intellection is either commanded by the will or is directive or not; if it is not, then it is purely speculative; if it is, either it is directive as a logical intention directs an act of discoursing or of denominating (which is an act of the intellect following an act of simple intelligence and an act of forming complexes, which is to combine and divide), and such is still speculative; or it is directive of an act of will, and then it is practical; but it is not praxis in the way it is being taken here, namely not for any operation whatever but for such an operation as the intellect is of a nature to be extended to by taking extension properly.” ⁷⁴

233. Proof of the third condition. First from the remark of the Philosopher in Ethics 6.2.1139a22-25, that right choice necessarily requires right reason. This remark is not only true of choice taken strictly but, by parity of reason, of any right volition, because it requires the right reason in conformity with which it is elicited; but all action either is volition or follows volition, from the preceding corollary [n.230]; therefore all action, for the purpose of being right, is naturally elicited in conformity with right reason. Second from the remark of Augustine On the Trinity XV ch.5 n.10, ch.7 n.13, that the intellect performs acts of understanding for itself and for the other powers. Therefore, just as it can pass judgment on its own act, so it can on the acts of the others; therefore on an act naturally posterior to its own act it can naturally pass judgment before that posterior act is elicited; and consequently, if the intellect judges rightly, that act, if it has to be right, must be elicited in conformity with that judgment.

From the two final conditions of action [nn.228, 229, 233] it follows that an act commanded by the will is not primarily but as it were per accidens action, because it is not primarily posterior to understanding nor is it primarily of a nature to be elicited in conformity with right reason. Some other act, then, must be primarily action; this act is nothing but volition, because through volition the commanded act has the said conditions; therefore the first idea of action is found in an elicited act of the will.

And then further: whenever something that is conjoined to another is primarily of a certain sort, it would still be of that sort if it could be separated from that other; therefore if the act of will can be separated from the act of the other power, it will be action when separated from that posterior act. But it is separate with respect to whatever can be the object of an act of will with respect to which there cannot be an act of another power, and of this sort are all immaterial things; therefore an act of will is about every such thing, and it alone is action.

235. Second, the same is proved from the intention of the Philosopher On the Soul 3.10.433a17-18, where, in his inquiry about the first mover, after he has concluded that there are two movers, namely will or appetite and reason, he subjoins: “The intellect does not move without appetite, for will is appetite.” And next he says that two appetites are sometimes contrary to each other; therefore he is positing as it were one species of mover, because common to the two appetites is the nature of the species that mediates between them, namely the nature of appetite. His meaning expressly, then, is that just as the sense appetite has the nature of a mover along with sense and imagination, so the will has the nature of a moving principle along with intellect and reason. Therefore, just as an act of sensitive appetite without any transition to what is extrinsic is truly action when it follows an act of intellect, so the act of will that is posited as equally a moving principle will truly be action, for it always follows an act of intellect; and it is action even if it is on its own without a commanded act, nay even if it is with an act in sense appetite opposed to the act which it commands, because, although it has that sometimes opposed appetite, it is itself a moving and operating principle, whose operation is action.

II. How Practical Knowledge is Extended to Action

236. From this article [nn.228-235] the second [n.227] is plain, for this extension consists in a double aptitudinal relation, namely of conformity and of natural priority; as to priority, it is plain from what has already been adduced from the Ethics [nn.231, 233]; about conformity there is what is contained in the same place, when he says: “truth in practical consideration is conformity to correct appetite.”

237. I said ‘aptitudinal’ because neither relation is required to be actual. For the fact that an action in conformity with consideration actually follows the consideration is altogether accidental to the consideration and is contingent;Interpolation: “On the contrary: of necessity an act of intellect is prior to an act of will actually, which you set down as the first action. - True, but it does not necessarily follow thereon about the act of will actually that is action.” ⁷⁵ for if it were called action from actual extension, no action would necessarily be practical, but the same action would sometimes be practical, sometimes theoretical, which nothing is; therefore a double aptitudinal extension or aptitude for extension is enough.Interpolation: “On the contrary: in that case any knowledge would be practical, because on any knowledge there is aptitudinally apt to follow in the will the right volition conform to them which you set down as first action. - One must say that it is not true of volition of a knowable, but of volition of knowledge, and this idea is action. - On the contrary: an aptitude that agrees with one nature and is repugnant to another is not seen save through something intrinsic to it; therefore it is necessary to explain why this conformity to action agrees with this habit and is repugnant to a second. - One must say that this is from its object” [n.252]. ⁷⁶

A clarification of this is that practical knowledge is commonly conceded to be extended to action as director to directed or as regulator to regulated. But knowledge’s being naturally prior to action and conformed to it is not its being conformed to action as to something prior but its making action to be conformed to it as something posterior, or its being what action is to be conformed to, which is what it is for knowledge to direct and rule in action. But as to whether directing and conforming action to itself like this is a certain efficacy in knowledge with respect to action, see 2 Suppl. 25 q. un.

238. From this second article it is plain that the practical and speculative are not essential differences of habit or science or knowledge in general, because ‘practical’ asserts a double aptitudinal respect of knowledge, which knowledge is as it were something absolute, being toward action as toward its term, and the speculative takes away this double respect; but neither the respect nor its privation are of the essence of what is absolute, but are as it were a division of the genus through the proper features of the species, as would be the case if number were divided into odd and even and line into curved and straight. For to one of the knowledges the practical per se belongs in the second mode of per se, from the predicate’s intrinsic cause in the subject, and to the other knowledge the speculative so belongs.Text cancelled by Scotus: “A confirmation of this reason is that some practical knowledge agrees more by essential agreement with some speculative knowledge than one speculative knowledge agrees with another. - On the contrary: the distinction of knowledges by their objects is essential. - I reply: the first distinction, which is according to essential differences, is essential and from the objects as from extrinsic causes, but there can from the same differences be some posterior non-essential distinction.” ⁷⁷

III. From what Source Knowledge gets its Extension to Action

239. [First opinion] - About the third article [n.227] there exist opinions one of which is of this sort, that the intellect is called practical from one thing, and the act or habit is called practical from another. It is as follows: truth that is doable and that is not doable are specific objects, formally diverse, and so they distinguish per se the things that have a per se respect to them, namely act and habit, which are called practical because they concern something doable; but the intellect is only called practical if it is operative, and only the intellect that apprehends an order toward doing is of this sort. But it does not apprehend this order unless it is moved by appetite for the end, so that the practical intellect includes in its act, not formally by the essence of the act but by connotation, an order that is necessarily toward desire, a desire explicitly of the end and implicitly of the things for the end; wherefore, since the ordering of an object of speculation toward doing is accidental to that object (although the object’s being capable of being so ordered is not accidental to it), the difference, which flows from this, between the speculative and the practical intellect will be accidental and in respect of something extrinsic to the intellect, although the difference of the habits and acts is formal in accord with the formal difference of doable and non-doable objects. Hence in On the Soul 3.10.433a14-15 it is said that the speculative and practical intellect differ in their end, and in Ethics 6.3.1139a29-31 that: “The good of the practical intellect is truth in conformity with correct appetite.”

240. An example: the speculative intellect apprehends health as a fitting good, the appetite desires it, and there follows in another way the consideration of the practical intellect that health is to be acquired. With the desire for the end in place, then, the practical intellect proceeds discursively from the principle ‘that by which health can be better acquired is to be procured’, and its discursive process ends at the final conclusion of deliberation; and the whole discursive process, just as it takes its principle from apprehension of the desired end, which is the first object of the practical intellect, so it does what has been discovered in view of the end, and hence it presupposes will for the end and is ordered to the choice that follows deliberation.

241. Against this opinion - which, to speak briefly, consists in this that it puts the distinction of the practical and speculative intellect in an end that is accidental to the object, but the speculative and practical habit differ and are distinguished by the formal difference of their special objects - the argument is that it is said of the habits in Metaphysics 2.1.993b20-21 that: “The end of speculative science is truth, but of the practical it is doing.”

242. Likewise, the practical habit will in that case be in the speculative intellect, and the intellect will not be called practical by that habit, which seems discordant, because every habit denominates its possessor according to the nature of the habit.

243. They reply to the first argument [n.241] that the end of practical science is work potentially and in aptitude, insofar as its object is per se doable; but the doable object is considered according to the habit in general, which consideration is not enough for it to be subject to operation in actuality and in particular; because in goods act is better than potency, and so such particular and actual consideration is required; now the consideration is by a habit different from practical science, and that habit alone is in the practical intellect.

To the second argument [n.242] the response is that the habit can be said to be by denomination practical, not simply, but by understanding the denomination to be made from the habit

244. To the contrary: therefore the practical habit and act can exist in the speculative intellect, because a habit and act that are of their nature practical can exist in the intellect without such reference to an act of will of the sort posited.

The consequent would be conceded, but another habit would be posited as capable of being possessed in the practical intellect, a habit generated not only by practical acts but also by acts of the practical intellect.

245. To the contrary: a practical habit generated from practical acts would be enough for the same things as the other habit would be enough for that is generated by acts of the practical intellect, because the will commanding consideration for the sake of such an end does not give any other reason for consideration in acts of directing, nor consequently for a habit generated by considerations.

246. Again, in that case many accidents of the same species will exist in the same thing. For one cannot, on account of order or non-order of the will, posit a specific distinction between this act and that, nor similarly between this habit and that.

247. Again, third, against the opinion in itself [nn.239-240] I argue thus: a subject is denominated more from a per se and essential condition of its accident than from an accidental condition of it; therefore, if the intellect can be called practical from an accidental condition of its habit, to wit from the order of the will ordering its act to something else, much more can it be called practical from the essential order of the act by which the act is said to be essentially practical. Therefore, the intellect seems to be called practical from the same thing as that from which the habit and act are called practical, although of the habit and act it is not said as accidentally as it is said of the intellect, where it has the respect of an accident per accidens.

248. [Second opinion] - Alternatively, it is said that the thing from which habit and act are said to be practical is the end and the extension of practical knowledge to action, which is extension to an end.

On behalf of this opinion are the authorities set down earlier [nn.223-225].

249. There is also argument by reason. First thus: that a habit is said to be practical either from the object or from the end. Not from the proper object because the intellect ‘is made practical by extension’,Interpolation: “with respect to the same object.” ⁷⁸ which is only true of the same speculative intellect that is also afterwards practical when extended to work; therefore there can be a speculative and a practical consideration of the same object.

250. Second thus: that medicine is divided into speculative and practical, and yet it is about some object that is the same, as about health or the body capable of health.

251. Again, an act is said to be practical because it is morally good or bad; goodness and badness in morals belongs to an act by its circumstances; but first and chief among the circumstances is the circumstance of the end; therefore etc.

252. Against this position I argue thus: I ask, are habit and act said to be practical because of actual extension to work or are they so only because of an aptitudinal or relational extension to work? Not because of actual extension (as is contained in the second article [nn.236-238] and as they concede), because in that case the workman who is not intending to work would not have practical knowledge; therefore because of aptitudinal extension. But an aptitude which is repugnant to one nature does not belong to another save because of something absolute in such nature; for because this nature is such, therefore such aptitude belongs to it; therefore in its very consideration it presupposes some intrinsic condition by which such aptitude belongs to it. This condition of consideration in itself is from another cause prior to it; but the prior causes of it are intellect and the object; therefore the condition belongs to it from the intellect or from some object.

253. If it be said that the end is the prior cause, or rather is the first among all causes, according to Avicenna Metaphysics 6 ch.5 (94va), and so from it can arise the consideration of such a nature so that such an aptitude befits it, on the contrary: the end is not a cause save insofar as, being loved and desired, it moves the efficient cause to cause its effect. But the said aptitude belongs to such a consideration whether the end is loved or not. For the said knowledge can exist in the intellect however the will is disposed, even were the will not conjoined with the intellect. And so it is not from the end as from the final cause that the aptitude belongs to the knowledge; for no cause makes a thing to be present that is present when the cause is not causing.

If you say that the end is apt to be loved before the aptitude is present in knowledge, on the contrary: this does not save the intended proposition, because an effect does not get anything causally from a thing on the ground that the thing has the nature to cause if the thing is not actually causing; therefore knowledge does not get an aptitude, or the nature that such aptitude is consequent upon, from an end that is apt to cause if it is not actually causing; nor does it actually cause as a final cause unless, being actually loved and desired, it moves the efficient cause to act; therefore etc

254. Besides, either the end as extrinsically elicited or possessed makes the habit to be practical, or it does so as considered and intended. Not as extrinsically elicited because in this way it is posterior to the habit and is in a way its effect; but an effect does not cause distinctions in a cause. If as considered, in this way it has the nature of the object; therefore the object causes the distinction. If as intended, this has already been refuted [n.253], because such knowledge exists before the end is naturally intended.Text cancelled by Scotus: “if science’s being practical is convertible with science’s being ordered to action as to its end, then moral science is not practical. The consequent is contrary to the Philosopher in Ethics 1.1.1095a5-6, 2.2.1103b26-30. The proof of the consequence is that the end of moral science is happiness, which, according to him in Ethics 10.7.1177a12-b1, 8.1178b7-32, 9.1179a22-32, consists in speculation, not action. - It if be said that happiness is its remote end but that its proximate end is action, namely to direct to acts of virtue for the sake of happiness, on the contrary: it is not necessarily ordered to giving direction except aptitudinally; but it is necessarily practical; therefore it will be this, according to the said response [nn.253-254], because it is aptitudinally ordered to giving direction. But to be practical and to be directive are the same, from the second article [n.237]; therefore from the said response [nn.253-254] it follows that it is practical because it is practical. Again, to direct is an act of intellect, because it is its habit that the act is elicited from; but no act of the intellect is practical, from the first article [nn.228, 232]. Therefore one would be saying in another way that the end of moral science, to which it is ordered, is the act of virtue, just as the end of prudence is as well, - and this act is action.” ⁷⁹

255. Besides, not every end of practical knowledge is action. For some practical understanding has regard to the action of a lower power, as for example the action of sensitive appetite or of the power of movement; but no act of a lower power is the end of an act of intellect, because nothing less noble is per se the end of something more noble; the act of understanding is nobler and more perfect than any act at all of any lower sensitive power at all.

256. It is said that, although understanding is nobler in its natural being than the operation of a lower power, yet it is not so in the genus of morals, because to act bravely is morally better than to think of acting bravely.

257. Against this there is a twofold objection. First, that it supposes something false, for the act of a lower power is not morally good unless it is conformed to right reason as to its rule; therefore rightness of reason is the cause of such goodness in that act and not conversely; but the act of reason being in this way right is for it to be morally good, just as understanding can be morally good. - The reasoning is confirmed because prudence is simply better than moral virtue as moral virtue exists in the sensitive appetite; therefore the act of the former as it is the former’s act is better than the act of the latter as it is the latter’s act; therefore the former as practical, in the way that understanding can be practical, is better than the latter as practical or as good morally. Hence it is plain that the proof about thinking is not valid; for when one is looking for the excellence of one thing over another, one should not compare the best to the worst, but one should compare the best to the best or the simply so to the simply so. Therefore, just as the best is taken there, namely to act bravely in fact, so one should take the best in the intellect, namely ‘to command brave action in accordance with prudence’. This second is better even morally, because, as being the rule, it has formal goodness, which is rightness proper; the other is only good materially, because, when one removes from it its order to the rule and to the will as commanding, it is not of itself morally good.

258. Second, the first response [n.256] does not seem relevant to what is proposed: for one does not look for the source of understanding’s being practical by supposing it to be practical, especially since one is not presupposing its first condition, namely the condition of the end, but one is inquiring into that condition [n.248]; therefore, since one is looking for practical understanding and for the first circumstance that will make it practical, one only takes understanding as to what it is in its natural being; therefore to distinguish it according to moral and natural goodness like this is nothing other than to assume what is being sought for and to distinguish the thing as the thing is considered in its precision under one member of the distinction.

259. Therefore this opinion [n.248] is corrected by others and it is said that a habit is called practical from the end, which is practical consideration; for the proper end of any habit is its act. - But against this: If this consideration, which is the end of the habit, is practical, then it has a cause for being called practical; either then the cause it has is the end of that consideration, and this has already been refuted [nn.252-255]; or it is the object, and then it follows that the object is the cause, prior to the consideration itself, whereby the habit is said to be practical, and one has what is proposed, that it is from the object that both the habit, though mediately, and the act are said to be practical.

260. [Scotus’ own opinion] - I concede, then, that the habit is not called practical from the act proper, because the act too is practical from a prior cause. Nor is any habitual or actual knowledge practical per se because it is ordered to action as to an end; yet it can sometimes get its first extension, namely conformity to action [n.236], from the very end of the action, not however from it insofar as it is end but insofar as it is object.

261. The first point here [about first extension] is plain. For sometimes the first practical principles are taken from the end of action, and so the end, as first cause of action, includes virtually all the knowledge in the genus, and so the knowledge itself gets from it its quiddity and aptitude.

262. The second point [about the end as object] is plain. For practice gives the aptitude, or the sort of nature possessing an aptitude, for this reason, that as the first object includes the principles and, by means of them, the conclusions, so it includes the whole of practical knowledge; but not insofar as it is end, first because no nature or natural aptitude is got from the end, unless the end is loved and desired and so is moving the efficient cause [n.253]; but before it is naturally loved it includes the said principles and conclusions; for the truth of a necessary practical principle does not depend more on the will than does the truth of a speculative principle, and neither do the conclusions necessarily inferred from such a principle; - second because anything else that may virtually include such knowledge would give such conformity to the knowledge in the same way, to wit if the action itself, or that which the operation is about, were first in the genus to include such knowledge, as sometimes happens and as was touched on in the response to the third argument in the first question about the subject of theology [n.185]; for man is perhaps the subject of both moral and medical science - but not happiness or health - because the idea of the end of each is included in the idea of what the action is about.

263. If it be said that the first practical principles are always taken from the end, therefore the end always first includes the knowledge of them virtually, - if this conclusion were conceded, it would hold nevertheless that the end did so, not insofar as it was end, but insofar as it was object, and it could then be said that man is the end both of health and of natural happiness, as was touched on in the preceding response [n.262]; but man is not at any rate the proximate end of the action, because, if the conclusion were denied, the antecedent taken universally would have to be denied, for taken particularly it is true, namely when the idea of the end is not deduced from anything pertaining to practical knowledge [n.314].

264. Or the antecedent could be expounded in another way thus: ‘the first principles are always taken from the end’ is true in the case of those principles that, once an act good in its kind has been presupposed, are taken from the moral circumstances, because in this way the object is not a circumstance. In another way, when the act is taken bare, the object is also a circumstance; and by this the antecedent seems to be refuted; for that from which the first circumstance of the act considered bare is altogether taken seems to be prior to anything else, and so the object from which the act is first specified so as to be called good in kind of act, being qualifiable by the other circumstances so as to be fully moral, seems to be altogether first in practical knowledge. But it is not necessary now to pursue the question whether this conclusion holds or not, because its place is in the third book (3 Suppl. d.26 q. un. n.10; d.38 q. un. nn.4-5; also 2 d.7 q. un. nn.11-13, 24-28; d.40 q. un. n.3) [cf. n.362 below].

Briefly then to this article [nn.239, 227] I say that practical knowledge does not first get its appropriate extension from the end insofar as it is end, for the reasons adduced above [n.262].

IV. To the Second Question

265. From this the solution to the second question posed is plain [n.223]. I hold to the negative part of it [sc. science is not said to be practical from its order to the end], but the first relation, namely conformity [n.236], is had by practical science per se from the object, which is either rectitude of practice or something virtually including that rectitude, and therefore action is conformable to that knowledge so as to be right, because the knowledge is of such a known thing.

266. But as to the other relation, namely priority [n.236], it is doubtful whether it belongs to the knowledge. I say that necessarily some understanding naturally precedes action, as is plain from the first article [nn.229-233]; and in this respect posteriority belongs to action and priority to knowledge from the nature of the powers that are ordered naturally in acting, namely intellect and will. But that prior understanding is not always practical, but only when it is determinative of the rectitude or of the determinate rectitude of the action itself, and that either virtually or formally. But when there is in the preceding apprehension no virtual or formal determination of the rectitude of the action, although there is priority in it, yet conformity in it is lacking, because it is not the knowledge to which action should be conformed in order to be right, because it points out nothing determinate about the rectitude of the action.Interpolation: “Now when in a previous apprehension there is determination about the rectitude of an action, but when the power of which it is the action is not in any way determinable from elsewhere, then the knowledge, although it is determinate, does not make conform.” ⁸⁰

It can be said then that, although absolutely from the nature of the intellect and of the will knowledge is prior, yet the fact that conform knowledge, namely knowledge that makes conform, is prior comes from the object and at the same time from the order of the powers and of the power of the actor, for although the object determines the intellect to knowledge of rectitude naturally before the will wills, and although the will in some way receives its rule from something else, yet not apprehension alone but conform apprehension precedes action. But this happens whenever the determinate rectitude of action is a necessary knowable, either as a principle through the intellect or as a conclusion through science.

267. The things that have just been said, namely about the source from which the double relation, that is of conformity and of priority, belongs to practical knowledge, are to be understood in a general way, unless one should add something on behalf of the divine intellect, namely that the acting power, to whose action the conform knowledge is prior, is in some way determinable, or conformable to another as to a rule in its acting, from somewhere else; but whether this is required for knowledge or not will be touched on in response to the fourth objection that will be made against the principal solution to the question [nn.324-331].

268. But when determinate rectitude belongs contingently to action, then there is no object determining the intellect to knowledge of determinate rectitude before the will wills, and this when speaking of intellect and will in general, for the contingent thing is not determined to either part in advance of all acts of the will. But when making comparison specifically to this intellect and this will, the conform knowledge, which determinate knowledge of rectitude precedes, can precede the action, and the one which it does not precede cannot; but it can precede in all and only the intelligence whose will is not the first determinant of rectitude for the action.

269. An example of what has been said:

The rectitude of this act ‘to love God’ is necessary and is included virtually in the idea of God; this action is also not only naturally preceded in everyone by apprehension but also by conform apprehension, namely the apprehension to which the action must be conformed so as to be right; so it is from the object which of itself primarily determines the intellect to know the determinate rectitude of the action, and from the order of the intellect and the will in acting, that this knowledge is obtained which is prior to action and conform, and likewise in the case of any other action that determinate rectitude necessarily belongs to.

But the rectitude of this action ‘to worship God in the sacrifice of the altar’ is contingent; for sometimes the act is right, as it is now, and sometimes not, as it was in the Old Testament; and therefore there is not an object determinative of the intellect to knowledge of this rectitude in advance of every act of the will, and so the knowledge does not precede, as conform knowledge, every act of the will. Yet it does precede the act of some will, to wit of that will alone which does not first determine rectitude for this action, of which sort is the human will. For this rectitude is determined by the divine will, which accepts now this sort of cult or act and at other times some other one.

V. To the First Question

A. The Opinion of Others

270. Now that these points have been made visible, we must respond to the first question [n.217], where there are five ways of holding the negative side of the question [sc. that theology is not a practical science].

[First way] - One way speaks like this, declaring that there is a double act of the will, one perfecting the will, the other being perfected by it, as is maintained by Henry of Ghent in his Summa a.8 q.3 ad 3.Interpolation: “ ‘First act is with respect to the end and is the perfect operation which the will forms within itself and unites itself to the last end; second act is with respect to things that are for the end, hence a good action is that by which the will tends to something else outside itself, just as is any action directive to the end. In the first act the will does not need a directive act but mere showing of the end is sufficient; for there is speculation in it only so as to show perfectly to the will the object of its operation so that it may at once tend to it with a perfect operation. Now such act simply concerns speculative knowledge. In the second act the will needs a directive act, and this pertains to practical knowledge, because there is in it speculation so as to direct action, which is proper to practical knowledge. But the act that is perfected by the will is not the end of this knowledge (unless the end is under an end) but there is another act which perfects the will; and from this fact does this knowledge have its being most perfectly speculative, because the act principally intended in this knowledge is the act of the will about the end, in which it does not need a directive act but only a showing of the object. Therefore it is not practical knowledge, but only simply speculative knowledge, since in its own principal act it does not need a directive act.’ So Henry of Ghent. ‘For this way’ etc. [n.271].” ⁸¹

271. For this way there is the authority of Augustine in his sermon On Jacob and Esau (Sermon 88 ch.5 n.6): “All our works,” he says, “are for the purpose of purifying the eye whereby God is seen.”

272. Again, it can be argued thus: an act of direction is not required except where there can be error; practical science is directive, therefore the science of the blessed is not practical, because the blessed cannot err; therefore neither is our science practical, because it is the same as that of the blessed.

273. Again, it can be argued according to how the understanding of this science exists elsewhere: God does not have practical science; but he most of all or alone has this science; therefore etc.

274. I argue against it, and first I reduce the idea of these people’s position to the opposite in four ways. First thus: although the will cannot err about the end displayed in a universal way, yet it can err about the end displayed in a particular way; therefore, in order for it to act rightly about the end displayed in a particular way, there is need of direction. The end is displayed in theology not in a universal but a particular way, because displaying it in a universal way belongs to metaphysics.Text canceled by Scotus: “The blessed cannot err in any act concerning the theological object; therefore they naturally have directive knowledge in respect of any act concerning the theological object.” ⁸²

275. Further, a directive habit is not posited for the substance of an act but for its circumstance, as temperance is not posited for the substance of the act of eating, or of the other act of the sort, but for its circumstance; therefore, although the will is determined to the substance of an act that tends to the end in particular, direction would still be required as to the circumstances of the act, to which circumstances direction about the substance of the act does not extend. - From these two reasons the argument is taken that wherever it is possible to err or to act rightly in action, there practical knowledge is needed for giving direction; in the action that is love of the end, as it pertains to theology, error is possible in two ways, as the reasons show, both by reason of the object in particular and by reason of the circumstances of the act; therefore etc.

276. Further, third: where the love of something is what outside the genus of knowledge is principally intended, there the knowledge of that thing is what inside the genus of knowledge is principally intended; but love of the end, according to them, is what outside the genus of knowledge is principally intended, therefore knowledge of the end is what within the genus of knowledge is principally intended. But in any science what is principally intended is knowledge of the first subject, therefore the end is the principal subject of this science. From the end practical principles are taken; but practical principles entail practical conclusions; therefore this science [of theology], which first intends love of the end outside the genus of knowledge, is practical.

277. Further, principles and conclusions belong to the same genus, whether as regard action or as regard speculation; for practical conclusions are resolved to practical principles, not speculative ones; therefore when knowledge of the end is directive in the case of acts that concern what is for the end, and when knowledge of what is for the end is a sort of conclusion included in knowledge of the end as a sort of principle, then if knowledge of what is for the end is knowledge of practical conclusions, the knowledge of the end will be practical knowledge because of a practical principle.

Thus the response to this position’s first reason [n.270] is plain, because it assumes what is false, as if the will were determined from itself, the falsity of which is proved by the first two reasons [nn.274-275]. Likewise, if the will were determined, nevertheless the knowledge would still be practical, as the two final reasons prove [nn. 276-277].

278. To the authority they appeal to [n.271] (it seems to conclude that the vision of God is the end of this science, which they do not concede) I reply that the authority is speaking of those external actions that are fastings, vigils, and prayers; yet any external act is of a nature to be conformed to any interior act from which it gets its goodness, and also of a nature to be ordered to some interior act, and ultimately to an act of willing.

279. To the third [n.272] I reply: an agent intends per se to introduce a form and does not intend the removal of the opposite except per accidens. Thus a habit per se directs, but it per accidens excludes error; and if the habit is perfect it is not compatible with error, nay if it is compatible it is not perfect. Therefore although the blessed cannot err, it does not follow that they do not have also a directive habit, because, if that were per impossibile removed, they could err, but, once it is posited, because of its perfection, all error is excluded.

280. Discussion of the fourth [n.273] will be given below, after the solution of this first question, by solving the fourth objection against it [nn.324-331].

281. [Second way (n.270)] - The second way, although it might be rightly and not rightly coaxed out, nevertheless denies that love of the end is action because it is not about a contingent object. For the Commentator says on the Ethics [Eustratius

Explanations of Aristotle S Nicomachean Ethics 1 ch.1 3E] that action is operation according to choice; choice is only about the contingent, Ethics 3.4.1111b29-30, because it is deliberative appetite; deliberation is only about the contingent (Ethics 3.5.1112a21-22, 30-31). From this too is proved that the description of action posited in the first article of the solution [n.228] is insufficient, because it omits the precise object. As a result this way asserts that no knowledge is practical that is extended to a willing of the final end alone, because this end is not a true contingent.

282. Against this way is the fourth reason set down against the preceding way [n. 277].

Again, in truth action is that operation to which appetitive virtue inclines, because any such virtue is a habit of choice, from Ethics 2.6.1106b36-7a2, and choice is action, as will be shown against the third way directly [nn.287-289]; but not only is charity inclined to love of the end but also acquired love, which is appetitive virtue, because the acquired habit or appetite is in agreement with right reason.

The motive for this way will be solved in the solution to the second principal reason for the first question [nn.346-351].

283. [Third way (n.270)] - The third way posits that either volition is not properly action but only the act posterior to it is, or, if it is action, it is not so save in order to some act of a lower power that it commands, to wit of the appetitive power or of the motive power or the like.

284. An argument for this way is that all action follows choice. The proof is from the Philosopher in Ethics 6.2.1139a31-32: “The beginning of action is choice, not choice for the sake of which, but choice that is the source of motion,” that is, not the final cause but the efficient cause; the efficient cause naturally precedes the effect; therefore etc.

285. Further, a practical habit is generated from actions; but a practical habit is generated from acts that follow choice; therefore these are actions.

286. Again, the Commentator on the Ethics [Eustratius, id. 1 ch.1 3E] says: “Action is operation according to choice;” therefore action follows choice.

287. Against this is the proof that not only an act which follows choice is action, because in Ethics 6.2.1139a33-34 the Philosopher says that choice is not right without right reason and the habit of virtue; therefore virtue is per se required for right choice; but it would not be required if it were a habit generated from acts posterior to choice, because it would not then incline per se to any acts save those posterior to choice. For this reason the argument proceeds under another form, that a habit is generated by the same acts as those to which it inclines, from Ethics 2.1.1103b21-23; but moral virtue per se inclines to right choice, because, as is clear from its definition in Ethics 2.6.1106b36-7a2, virtue is “a habit of choice” etc.; therefore moral virtue is per se generated by choices, and as a result it is not only acts which follow choice that are actions.

288. Further, not only is it false to deny that choice is action, as argued by the reason just given, but also, as was proved in the first article [nn.230, 234], an elicited act of the will is action first, and a commanded act is so only because of it; therefore if a choice exists on its own, without order to a commanded act, to wit because of lack of matter of the external act, it alone will be truly action. This is made clear thus: someone without money, to whom however money is presented in imagination, before the choice of any action becomes a principle moving to or commanding some action, if he chooses to distribute the money liberally should he have it, then, as far as the act and habit of virtue is concerned, no further prosecution of the act or distribution is required, because when some object has been presented in imagination about which an act of liberality can be done, the choice from which liberality is generated, or which is elicited from liberality, is possessed in its completeness; nor is there required any further prosecution of the act, or anything external, or any order to what is external, if the matter of the external act is lacking.

289. Further, this order can only be of a cause to a causing ‘that’ of the effect;Sc. as opposed to a causing ‘why’. A cause ‘that’ merely makes the effect to exist; a cause ‘why’ gives the effect the nature it has as well. The argument of this paragraph seems to be that since the third way supposes that choice is only action because the effect it causes is action, then the cause is getting its nature from the effect, which is contrary to the relation of cause and effect. ⁸³ but that a cause in itself is not of itself such as to be prior to the effect, but is so only because it is actually ordered to bringing about the effect, seems discordant, since a cause gets nothing from the effect, nor from its order to the effect.

290. Then, as to the authority from the Ethics [n.284], I say that in the same place the Philosopher at once adds: “But of choice (supply: the principles are) appetite and reason for the sake of something” (that is, practical reason). Also, in order for choice to be right, virtue is required in the appetite; hence there follows: “Choice (namely right choice) is not without moral habit.” Therefore virtue has an elicited act more immediate to it than the act which choice is the principle of by commanding it; for the elicited act of the will, which is choice, is a good act before the external act, which is commanded by good choice, is good. The proof is given by the Philosopher; for he immediately adds

(after the remark ‘nor is choice without habit’): “For a good action is not without custom.” But if this is the major premise to prove what he said just before about choice, this minor premise will be assumed under it, ‘good choice is good action’. I concede, therefore, the authority that affirms choice to be the principle of action in the sense of the source of action, because an act commanded by choice is also a moral act; but from this it does not follow that only this latter is an act or action, nay rather choice is a prior action, on account of which that act too is a good action.

291. To the second [n.285], if the major is true, I say that a practical habit is generated from the choices, as was said above about the person who frequently chooses to give liberally [n.288]; even without the commanded act, should the means not be available, liberality can be generated in him. But because, when the commanded acts are impossible, the will does not in general make frequent right choice about the matter of these acts - for what someone does not believe to be possible for him he either does not will or wills weakly, according to Augustine - therefore in general the practical habit which is virtue is not generated without the commanded actions that are subsequent to the choices; it is not, however, generated from these subsequent actions but from the choices, where moral goodness exists formally; in the commanded actions it only exists materially.

292. To the third [n.286], in response to the Commentator, it is necessary that the ‘according to’ there not be an indication of the efficient cause, if the description must be convertible with the thing described, as was already proved by Aristotle in the Ethics [n. 290]; but the ‘according to’ must be understood effectively or formally, or let choice there be taken for liberality or for the controlling power, or let it be taken for the eliciting of an act of will which is not a choice or a volition. But all action is action in the genus of action in accord with that choice, as though in accord with its active principle, or let every action be choice or what follows choice, because action in the genus of action is reduced to the effective principle.

293. These three ways [nn.270, 281, 283] lay down that theology is purely speculative, notwithstanding the fact that it is extended to love of the end - whether the will is as it were naturally determined to the end previously shown to it, or whether the will is freely and contingently related to it, although the object the will concerns is not contingent and doable [n.281], or, third, whether the will is related in any way at all to any object at all, not however by doing it, that is, not however in its order to the commanded act, but by stopping at the first elicited act [n.283].

294. But that such extension does not include the practical is proved because then any knowledge would be practical, because some delight or love accompanies any knowledge at all.

295. Likewise in Ethics 10.9.1179a22-24 it is said that “the happy man is most dear to God,” and yet the Philosopher sets down this happiness as speculative and not practical.

296. Against this conclusion, common to these ways, is that it seems to follow that there is some operation in the power of man such that it is truly a human act and yet is not properly speculation or action, namely love of the end; the consequent seems discordant.

297. Further, that directive knowledge in any volition is not practical seems, since ‘truth is agreement with right appetite’, to be discordant, because such truth is the proper work of the practical mind, from Ethics 6.3.1139a29-31.

298. What is added about delight [n.294] is nothing to the purpose, because since delight is a passion naturally consequent to perfect activity, whether it be of speculation or of the thing speculated about, no practical knowledge is, because of extension to delight, posited from this fact, because neither is it action properly speaking; this will be touched on at 3 Suppl. d.15 q. un. But to love and desire a known object, and one with such or such circumstances, is truly action, nor does it follow apprehension naturally but is free - being rightly or not rightly elicited.

299. What is added about the happy contemplative, that he is most dear to God [n. 295], is not the conclusion compelled by the authority, for it speaks passively, as though the happy man ‘is most loved by God’, not actively, as is clear in that place; for it adds: “if the gods have any care for human things, it is reasonable that they (that is, the gods) take joy in what is best and most like them; but this is the intellect,” and then: “to those therefore who love this (that is, the intellect) it will be reasonable for the gods to give reward, as to their friends,” etc.

300. But, setting that authority aside, is it the case that the happy contemplative is most dear according to Aristotle in the way that to love is distinguished from to be delighted, whether about the object speculated on or about the speculation? - I reply: in Metaphysics 12.7.1072b3 he wants the first mover to move as being loved; therefore a lower intelligence loves the first mover, and yet he would place its happiness in speculation, as is clear from Ethics 10.8.1178b7-32; therefore he himself includes under speculation not only delight but loving. Therefore neither will there be, according to him, practical knowledge because of extension to it, but speculative knowledge.

301. But why then is he not held to this result, since the idea of practical and of speculative science is adopted by him? - and so the first two ways, in rejecting that view [sc. that theology is practical], are, even according to the Philosopher, right to set down theology as speculative. - I reply: the ‘to love’ that he would posit in the intelligence he would posit to be in the will by natural necessity, so that it would not be a contingent matter there that it errs and acts rightly, so that, with respect to it, the knowledge is ostensive only, and not directive, whether as regards the object in particular or as regards any condition of it or any circumstance of the act of willing.

302. The theologians would not speak in this way about the loving of intelligible creatures with respect of God in the particular case and as regards the circumstances of the act, as was argued against the first way in the first two reasons [nn.274-275]. If therefore he [= the Philosopher] had agreed with us in positing that love of the end can freely and rightly and not rightly be elicited, and that it cannot be rightly elicited unless it is elicited in conformity with a right reason not only showing the object but also bidding it to be thus elicited, perhaps he would have posited a practical knowledge with respect to such love that was in agreement with right appetite. Therefore it is better for the theologian, who must disagree with him in the minor premise, to say that he disagrees as a result in the conclusion than to agree in a conclusion he himself [= the Philosopher] would not posit if, with the theologian, he did not hold the minor.

When, therefore, you say that we get from him the idea of practical and speculative, it is true, and we agree in the major premise that it [= theology] is speculative, which although it is, as pointing out the object, extended to love, yet in no way is it directive in act of an object as subject to circumstances and as of this object in particular; but the minor which he himself assumes under the major we have to deny in the proposed case.Text cancelled by Scotus: “And given that such necessity is posited in the intellect from the nature of the will that loves God, would he posit necessity thus in the will of the wise man whom he himself posited as naturally happy? If not, then the wise man can be directed in such an act. - I reply: he only denied the practical to such a man because he said his happiness was speculative.” ⁸⁴

303. [Fourth way] - And therefore there is a fourth way, which says that theology is affective. Which can be understood in a good way if affective is set down as something practical; but if it is set down as a third member, distinct from the practical and speculative, it is in this way contrary to what was said in the first article, where it was shown that love is truly action [nn.228-235], and also against many authorities that believe precisely that science is divided into the practical and the speculative, and there is no third member.

304. [Fifth way] - The fifth way says that theology is contemplative. For this way Augustine is adduced in On the Trinity 12 ch.14 n.22, where his meaning is that wisdom is in respect of contemplation, science in respect of action; since, therefore, theology is properly wisdom and not science, it will not be practical but contemplative.

I reply that Augustine in On the Trinity 12 ch.4 n.4 says that the two parts of the soul, the superior and the inferior, are only distinguished according to their functions; and in both there is a trinity (but in the superior the image of the Trinity), and yet only the superior is contemplative, because it has regard to things eternal. Therefore the contemplation of which he speaks is not distinguished from speculation within the genus of science; for the contemplative contains memory, intelligence, and will, and so in the contemplative there can be extension outside the genus of science, just as there can be in the active, that is, in the inferior part, which regards temporal things, and it too contains a trinity. If then it is contemplative as Augustine speaks there, it is not for this reason prevented from being practical if it is extended to practice in the superior part.

305. [Another opinion] There is another opinion, discordant from the preceding ones in its conclusion that science is speculative and practical. The proof for it is twofold. One way is as follows: just as a teaching in which there are some things written about law and other things about philosophy would be speculative and practical, whether they were written in separate books or intertwined and mixed, so too in this teaching [of theology] speculative and practical things are treated of together, not in separate books and chapters but intertwined and mixed; therefore it is speculative and practical.

306. Again it is proved in this way, that no speculative knowledge treats more distinctly of doable things than is needed for speculation by the knowledge of them, nor does any practical science treat more distinctly of things to speculate than is required by the knowledge of them for the action it is extended to; this science treats more distinctly of doable things than is needed for speculation by the knowledge of them, and more distinctly of things to speculate than is required for practical knowledge by the knowledge of them; therefore it is speculative and practical. - The major is plain, because things to speculate are considered in a practical science only on account of practical consideration, and doable things are considered in speculative science only on account of speculative consideration. The minor is plain, because this science treats of doable things as distinctly as if it were precisely about them, and of things to speculate as distinctly as if it were precisely about them.

307. Against this it is argued thus: a habit that does not have evidence from its object is not distinguished according to distinction of objects (for then it would be necessary to posit two infused faiths); this habit [of theology] does not have evidence from its object, therefore it is not distinguished according to distinction of objects; therefore it is not two habits on account of the distinction between things to do and things to speculate.

308. Further, although the said opinion about two habits could have some probability about theology as it is handed down in Scripture, yet about theology in itself, whose subject is the divine essence as this essence (in the way said about the subject of theology [n.167]), it does not seem probable; for as to that object, since it is most truly a single knowable, some knowledge truly one is of a nature to be first had about it; if there were some other knowledge which was not about it but about some other first thing, that other knowledge will not be theology in itself. Therefore theology is a habit simply one, although perhaps there could along with it exist in Scripture some knowledge that was about some other subject.

309. Again, it is plain that the order of sciences with respect to eminence is in relation to one thing alone, because there cannot be two sciences simply first; that single and sole eminence I say is theology, which alone is first about the first subject of theology.

310. Further, I reduce the reason for it [n.306] to the opposite conclusion: that knowledge is practical in which the determination of things to speculate on is no greater than pertains, on the part of knowledge of them, to practice or practical knowledge; this knowledge [of theology] does not treat of things to speculate on more distinctly than knowledge of them requires for directing practical knowledge and practice; therefore etc. - Proof of the minor: any knowledge at all of the conditions of the desirability of the end, and of the conditions of what is for the end insofar as it is for the end, and third of the conditions of anything of the sort or of other things, about which conditions the operative power can err unless it is directed, is necessary for practical knowledge; no knowledge here treats of the end or of what is for the end without being of this sort; therefore etc. Or at any rate it is possible for an ignorant will to err about them, as will be said in the solution of the third objection [n.322] against the principal solution of the question.Text cancelled by Scotus: “For although the Trinity of persons does not show the end to be more desirable than if they were not three (because the Trinity is the end insofar as they are one God, not insofar as they are three), yet a will ignorant of the Trinity can err in loving or desiring the end by desiring to enjoy one person only. Likewise, a will ignorant that God made the world can err by not repaying the sort of love that gratitude would require for so great a communication of his goodness made for our utility. Thus, by being ignorant of the articles pertaining to reparation it is possible to be ungrateful, by not repaying the love due for so great a benefit. So too of other theological articles.” ⁸⁵

311. The assumption is plain, because any conditions handed down about the end are of a nature to show more the desirability of the end, and the conditions of the things that are for the end are of a nature to show more the things ordered to the end.

312. To the argument [n.306], it is plain that the minor is false. In proof I say that the end and the things for the end could not be treated so distinctly without the whole knowledge being practical for a created intellect, because the whole knowledge is of a nature to show the end under the idea of desirability and to show the things that are for the end under the idea of their order to the end, or in respect of whatever an undirected will could err about.

313. [Another opinion] - Another opinion holds the same conclusion, but posits along with this that theology is one habit simply.Interpolation: “and this because of its one subject, which is God, in which come together all the things that are considered in this science. For all of them fall under the consideration of this science insofar as they participate in something divine, and therefore whether it consider them by comparison to work or not, as in the case of purely speculative science, but because of the formal unity of the subject this science is single. - Against this opinion thus: whenever something common is divided first through certain opposite differences, it is impossible for both differences to be found under some one thing contained under that common thing; but science in common is divided first into practical and speculative; therefore it is impossible for these differences to be found together in some one science. The major is manifest, because if differences that jointly divide some common thing could be compatible with each other in something contained in common, then the same body could be corporeal and incorporeal, and the same animal sensible and non-sensible, and the same man rational and irrational, which is absurd. The minor is plain from Avicenna at the beginning of his Metaphysics 1 ch.1 (70ra), and from the Commentator in his first comment on Ethics 1 [Eustratius, I preface (1A)]. Again, a contradiction about one and the same thing would follow, namely that it is extended and not extended, and many other disagreeable results follow. - An addition.” ⁸⁶

B. Scotus’ own Opinion

314. [On the theology of necessary things] - To the question [n.217], therefore, I reply that since an elicited act of will is most truly action, even if no commanded act accompanies it (as is plain from the first article [nn.230, 232, 234-235]), and since extension of practical knowledge consists in conformity to action and in aptitudinal priority (this is plain from the second article [nn.236-237]), it follows that that knowledge is practical which is aptitudinally conform to right volition and is naturally prior to it; but the whole of theology necessary for a created intellect is thus conform to the act of the created will and prior to it; therefore etc. - The proof of the minor is that the first object of theology is virtually conform to right volition, because from the idea of it are taken the principles of rectitude in the will; it also determines the created intellect to knowledge of the determinate rectitude of action itself, with respect to all the necessary elements of theology, naturally before any created will wills them, otherwise they would not be necessary; therefore from the first object there follow both the conformity and the priority of theology to volition, and thus extension to action, from which extension knowledge itself must be called practical. A confirmation of this reason is that the first object of theology is the ultimate end, and the principles in the created intellect taken from the ultimate end are practical principles, therefore the principles of theology are practical; therefore the conclusions too are practical.

315. If an objection be made against this from what was said in the preceding question, where it is said that God is not the first subject here as he is the end but as he is this essence [nn.167, 195]; but the principles taken from the end as it is end are practical; therefore etc.

316. Again, knowledge of the ultimate end is not immediately conform to, nor is it of a nature to be conform to, the eliciting of action; therefore it is not proximately practical.

317. Again, the first object virtually includes conformity to right action, but it does not include only the knowledge that is thus conform; otherwise there could not be speculative science about it, which seems discordant. For how is this truth practical ‘God is triune’ or ‘the Father generates the Son’? Therefore the first object includes some speculative knowledge. Therefore from the virtual conformity of the first object to action it does not follow that theology is practical, since the truths that are most theological insofar as theology is distinguished from metaphysics are speculative.

318. Again, the science of God, which is about the same first subject, would in that case be practical, and it seems that the reason for the solution to the question [n.314] could be applied to the divine intellect just as to the created intellect.

319. To the first [n.315] I say that the respect of the end is not what the principles are taken from in any science, but the absolute subject is on which the respect is founded; that subject is ‘this essence’.

320. To the second [n.316] I say that what virtually contains conform knowledge is virtually conform, and thus is practical knowledge, because practical conclusions have practical principles; but the knowledge proximate to the one which is about the end is knowledge of enjoyment of the end, and it is of the nature to be formally conform to the action of enjoyment.

321. To the third [n.317] I say that the first object includes only knowledge that is conform to right volition, because by virtue of it nothing is known about the will that is not either rectitude of some will or virtually includes knowledge of such rectitude. And I concede what is inferred as a discordance in the consequent, that there can be about it no speculative science; for necessarily knowledge of it and of anything intrinsic known through it is aptitudinally conform to action and prior, if what is known is necessary.

322. When an instance is drawn from the truths, which seem to be most truly theological and not metaphysical, ‘God is triune’, ‘the Father generates the Son’ [n.317], I say that those truths are practical. The first indeed virtually includes knowledge of the rectitude of love tending toward the three persons, such that if the act were elicited about one of them alone by excluding another (as an unbeliever would elicit it), the act would not be right; the second includes knowledge of the rectitude of the act which is about two persons one of whom is thus from the other.

323. And if it be objected against this that only what is essential is the reason for terminating the act of love; but theology is more properly about the personals than about the essentials, because several essentials can be known by the metaphysician; therefore theology, as it is distinguished from metaphysics, is not practical as to what is most proper to it. The proof of the first proposition is that otherwise there would be some reason of lovability in one person that was not in another, which is false, because then no person would be blessed in itself.

I reply: an essential is absolutely a reason for terminating the act of love as the ‘that because of which’, but the persons terminate the act of loving as what are loved. For it is not sufficient for rectitude of the act that it have the formal reason that is fitting to the object, but there is also required that it have the fitting object in which such formal reason exists. So, over and above the knowledge of rectitude which the essential includes in the act of loving God, the personals include the further proper knowledge of the required rectitude.

324. To the fourth [n.318], one could concede that the theology of God about necessary things is practical, because in his intellect the first theological object is of a nature to generate, as it were, the knowledge conform to right volition that is naturally prior to the volition itself. That it is conform is plain. That it is also prior is proved because the intellect naturally understands the first object before the will wills it; therefore it can naturally have, prior to the will, all the knowledge sufficient for it virtually included in the understanding of the first object; of such sort is any necessary knowledge whatever of the first object. The assumed consequence is plain, both because, if all will were per impossibile excluded, the intellect could have all sufficient knowledge virtually included in the understanding of the first object, since that understanding precedes volition; - also because the divine intellect is not discursive; therefore it does not naturally understand the first object before it understands anything as to knowledge that is virtually included in the object; therefore, if it understands the first object before the will wills anything, it understands anything as to knowledge that is included in the first object before the will wills (this second proof of the consequence is less strong).

325. If it be objected that the divine will will not be the first rule of itself in its act if its act is preceded by the knowledge it should be conformed to so as to act rightly; the consequent seems discordant, because the supreme freedom of the divine will is taken away if this will is determined by another and not first by itself to its first act. But if all its acts are preceded by practical knowledge, it will be determined to its first act by the intellect, because it cannot dissent from it; for then it could commit sin.

326. Again, it was said above that the Philosopher consequently speaks well if intelligence naturally loves God when seen; therefore a knowledge that shows God is not practical. Let there be a like consequence about God naturally loving himself.

327. Again, something that directs is a cause in respect of something directed, so there is a real distinction between them; but there is no such distinction of God’s intellection to his willing. A confirmation of the reason is that, if one understands an act of will to have already been elicited, the intellect is not directing, for its direction only concerns something to be elicited as being prior to it; but in God his willing does not follow the being of the will, so his willing there is never something to be elicited, as it were, but is always as it were elicited; therefore etc.

328. It seems here that, in consequence of what has been said [nn.274-277, 310-312, 314, 319-320, 322-323], one must say that, when one takes the rule for what gives right guidance in action, the first rule is the ultimate end, which virtually includes the knowledge of the rectitude necessary to any action, just as the first object of speculative science first includes knowledge of truths of speculation. But this first rule, which is the end, gives right guidance to the intellect and the will according to the order that those powers naturally have in acting, such that it generates knowledge conform to right action as it were before right action or before it makes action right; and in this way there will be another power that is right prior to the power that acts, so that it seems that the consequent deduced in the first reason [n.325] must be conceded. Although it is criticized [n.325], one could say that, just as freedom is universally consistent with previous apprehension, so supreme freedom is consistent with the most perfect previous apprehension; but the most perfect apprehension of action includes the knowledge of conformity when it necessarily agrees with action.

329. When it is further argued that it would then be determined by something else [n.325], one must deny this by speaking of the determination that is done by a sufficient agent. For although it could not disagree with knowledge that is right and prior to action, yet it is not as if the intellect is by its knowledge a sufficient cause actively determining the will to act, but this is from the perfection of the will, which is of a nature only to act in conformity with the prior power in acting, when that prior power acts perfectly about its object, that is, when it knows in advance as much as it can know. But I say this about contingent things, of which the divine intellect does not have all the knowledge possible to it before any act of the will; therefore, as to those contingent things, I say that it is not necessary for it to act in conformity with the prior power, because it does not itself have in advance conform knowledge of such object. But it is otherwise as regards knowables that are of themselves necessary, because these contain the most perfect account of themselves without any act of will.Interpolation: “To the second [n.326] it can be said that it is not similar, because there is there simple being pleased, but here there circumstanced efficacious willing. Likewise, the divine will is not merely ostensive, but it is at least equivalently directive, because it is an objectual, though not potential, regulation and determination, which the Philosopher did not posit. - To the third [n.327] I say that, if it was conclusive, it would follow that there was neither any intellection nor any volition in God, since the divine essence is the moving object for both, and thus, along with the concurring part, it is a vital power as joint cause; I say therefore that there is only an order of quasi-effects of the same quasi-cause in the proposed case, which order however is not distinct from the quasi-effects, because these effects are neither properly caused nor produced, nor do they have a principle, nor are they elicited, but they simply flow out; the causality therefore is metaphorical, as commonly happens in divine reality. Or in another way, when upholding that the intellect in some way or other directs, the assumption is denied when speaking properly of cause. To the confirmation [n.327] I say that the order of nature suffices, which order stands along with simultaneity in duration of the knowledge for action and of the will for willing, and thus the answer is plain to the arguments, when one upholds the first way.” ⁸⁷

330. Now although this response seems to avoid the argument [n.325], and although the subsequent arguments might be avoided [n.326-327], yet one must respond otherwise and say that necessary theology in the divine intellect is not practical, because there is no natural priority of confirmative or directive intellection to the will to make it conform or to direct anything; because once any knowledge whatever of the rectitude of action has been posited, although it could of itself conform a conformable or directable power from without, yet it could not conform the divine will with respect to its own first object, because the will is rectified by itself alone with respect to that object, for either it naturally tends toward it or, if it tends freely, it is not of itself in any way as it were indifferent to rectitude or in any way from without as it were possessed of that rectitude, and so determinate knowledge of rectitude is not necessarily prior to volition as though the will required it in order to be rightly elicited; but all that is required in advance is the showing of the object; and the knowledge that is of itself directive it does not require in advance as directive but only as ostensive, and so if the mere showing of the object could precede the will and if knowledge of the rectitude necessary for action could follow (in the way that will be said of action about contingent things [n.333]), volition would be rightly elicited equally in this case as in that. Therefore intellection is not now prior and conformative or regulative.

331. To the argument, therefore, that proves the priority of knowledge of rectitude to right action [n.324], one can reply that although there is some priority of intellection to volition, yet it is not prior such that it requires right cognition to be prior to action, because such priority is priority of the rule to the thing ruled, which is not the sort there can be when the will is in every way its own rule in acting.

The sum of this controversy about the science God has with respect to himself, whether it is practical or not, consists in this: whether the knowledge which of itself would be directive in action, if it were granted that the power in the knower which is right or is active were directable in its acting, is practical from the fact alone that it is directive, or is not practical from the fact that the power in the knower which is active is not directable. He who holds one side or the other will answer accordingly.

332. [About the theology of contingent things] - From this is introduced the second article of the question, namely about the theology of contingent things, whether it is practical or not [nn.314, 324, 330; 1 d.38 q. un. nn.1-4]. I say that the theology of contingent things can be practical only in that intellect which can have determinate knowledge of the rectitude of action prior to all volition of the one who has the intellect, or prior to the elicited action itself, because only there is this theology of contingent things able to be or is conform to action and prior to it. Of such sort is every created intellect, because in the case of no created intelligence does the will first determine the contingent rectitude that is fitting to its action.

333. But in the divine intellect contingent theology cannot be practical if one holds onto these two points, namely that practical knowledge and the action to which it is extended ought necessarily to belong to the same supposit,Interpolation: “and if of another supposit, then it would be practical, because it would be of the directible or determinable power of the other supposit, namely of the power of some created supposit or other.” ⁸⁸ and that of God as an actor there is no action save volition (if one does not posit in him a third power other than intellect and will), for no knowledge conform to action or to a right contingent will precedes in the divine intellect its right action or God’s volition itself, because such rectitude is first determined by the will for that action.

334. The first point is true, for if any knowledge at all about someone else’s action is practical, then my knowledge of the fact that God creates the world or that an intelligence moves the heavens, will be practical. This at least seems to be conclusive, because the practical knowledge cannot belong to a lower intelligence or understanding when something else is acting according to the action in question, nor, by parity of reasoning, to a higher or equal intelligence if it is contributing nothing to the action of the doer; but if it does contribute something, the higher intelligence does now have its own action with respect to which its knowledge would be practical.

335. Again, if practical knowledge has any causality with respect to the action to which it is extended, and if it only naturally has such causality in the first respect of action in the one who understands, the thing proposed [n.333] seems to follow.

336. To the contrary: therefore about the same thing one intellect would have practical knowledge and another speculative, if action were possible to one intellect and not to the other.

One can say that perfect rectitude of action includes the circumstance of the doer just as it does the other circumstances as well, so that without it there is no rectitude. For if one takes ‘God is to be loved’ and does not add by what, namely by the will, it is not a practical truth completely, because God is not to be loved by a brute; therefore this perfect truth ‘God is to be loved by God’ is practical in any intellect whatever; thus too this truth ‘man should sometimes fast’ is practical not only to the man who knows it but also to an angel and to God; so also this truth is practical to man and to God ‘the heaven is to be moved by an angel’, - and I concede as something discordant what the first proof infers [n.334].

337. And if it be objected that the priority of practical knowledge to action is not preserved - for love with respect to himself is right before a man or an angel could understand ‘God is to be loved by God’ - I reply: this priority ought to be from the object and the intellect, that is, that it naturally determine the intellect to knowledge of determinate rectitude of action, namely as far as it is of itself in advance of action; in this way this object is of a nature to determine any intellect whatever to the knowledge ‘God is to be loved by God’ as far as it is of itself in advance of action, although some intellect, because of its own imperfection, is not determined before the acting power, because of its own perfection, acts.

338. To the other objection [n.336] I say that just as the will can be a superior cause with respect to the action of the moving power, not however any will at all with respect to any power at all, for example, not my will with respect to the moving power of an angel, but when it is in the same subject, so that if it is a practical cause with respect to action, this is in the same knower and the same doer; nor is it necessary that in someone else it be non-practical, unless one takes practical strictly for what is immediately applicable to a work to the extent it depends on the identity of subject in knower and doer, which immediacy is denoted [in Latin] by the infinitive that signifies the action when it is construed with the verb ‘to know’ - for in this way it is conceded that only God knows that he loves himself [Latin infinitive: ‘to love himself’]infinitely although an angel might know that he is to be infinitely loved by himself.

339. Someone who thus responds must from the beginning concede that every truth about the action of created agents is known by some acting intellect, because all these truths are of a nature to be conform to action, or to determine the rectitude of action (whether from the object if they are necessary, or from something else if they are contingent), before the action is elicited. But all truths about divine volition are practical if necessary but not practical if contingent, because these, in advance of the action’s being elicited to which they are extended, do not have conformity, for they do not have any determination of rectitude; for example, God knows practically that man should repent and that the angel should move, but not that God should wish a holy man to repent and an angel to move.

340. If you ask of what sort theology of contingents is in itself when not compared with this intellect or with that, one can say that it is in itself the sort it is from its object; but from its object it is not conform to action in advance of every action, because no determinate knowledge of contingent rectitude is of a nature to be had from the object; therefore from its object it is not practical, therefore it is speculative, if knowledge is sufficiently divided between these [n.303]. Congruent with this is that in the divine intellect it is denied to be practical [n.333]; for a thing seems to be such in itself as it is in a perfect instance in that genus and not as it is in an imperfect one.

341. If it be objected that then knowledge in itself speculative is for someone practical, to wit for a created intellect, therefore the practical is not repugnant to the speculative, I reply: to be speculative from the object is to be speculative per se; so, to be practical from an object that sufficiently determines the intellect to knowledge of rectitude - and if sufficiently then prior to volition - is to be practical per se. It is in this way that these two are opposed, as are also these ‘not-extendable to action’ and ‘extendable to action’. But to be practical from something other than the object, to wit from an extrinsic cause, as from the will determining the intellect to knowledge of action, is to be accidentally practical; thus I concede that the theology of contingent things is practical for us, though in itself it is speculative.

342. Against this: that to which one opposite per se belongs the other opposite belongs neither per se nor per accidens; therefore knowledge in itself speculative is not practical either per se or per accidens.

I reply: although the antecedent might be expounded of per se in the first or in the second way, not however in the third way, the way in which it signifies the same as the solitary [Posterior Analytics 1.4.73a-34-b10], yet I concede that in no way of inhering does the opposite of this predicate inhere which is ‘per se practical’ or of this predicate ‘per se speculative’, because contingent theology per se in the second way is per se practical or speculative, so that the inherence is both per se and the predicate is determined by the ‘per se’. But to be per accidens practical is per accidens not opposed to that inherence, just as to be black simply and to be white in some respect are not opposed; for ‘in some respect’ and ‘simply’ determine predicates as they are denominative. If it is argued ‘it is per se to be per se speculative, therefore it is per se speculative’, I concede the point, but to this predicate the predicate ‘per accidens practical’ is not opposed.

343. But if the one of these two [n.333] that is held by that response is not held, then it can be conceded that contingent theology, although it is not in itself practical because not so from its object, yet in every intellect created and uncreated it would be practical per accidens, because in the divine intellect it can be conform to action before the action is elicited by a created will; for the intellect of God knew that the adult sinner in the New Law should be punished before the sinner is punished. And by not holding to the first of the two above mentioned, the knowledge of God about the action of some other actor is practical; also by not holding to the second of them, to wit by positing the action of God extrinsically to be an action of his formally different from the will of God, although the divine intellect does not know by any ‘it must be created’ before his will wills it, yet he knows before he creates, and so conform knowledge precedes the extrinsic action, although it is not conform from the object but from something else.

344. This at any rate I hold to, that the theology of contingents is not practical per se or from its object; yet for a created intellect it can be practical per accidens, and that in the intelligence to whom it belongs to act according to the action for which rectitude is determined by the divine will. But as to whether it is practical to the divine will, by holding those two positions [n.333] or the opposites [n.343] it is plain what should be said as a consequence. These three things, however, seem to be probable: first, that the practical is regulative in the action of the contingent, and second that it is regulative of the power of the doer who is set right by something other than himself, and third that in God the only power that acts is will. From the first and third it follows that if divine knowledge is practical, it is rectificatory or regulative in divine volition; but this is false from the second of those things that were said [n.333], because the will of itself first rightly elicits willing with respect to the first object, but with respect to the second objects, which it is contingently related to, it is determined by itself alone, not by any preceding knowledge of rectitude.

VI. To the Principal Arguments of the First Question.

345. To the principal arguments of the first question. To the first [n.217] I say that faith is not a speculative habit and that to believe is not a speculative act, nor is the vision that follows believing speculative, but practical; for the vision is of a nature to be conform to enjoyment and it is first naturally had in the intellect so that right fruition may be elicited in conformity with it.

346. To the second [n.218] one must say that the contingent thing that practical science is about is the end or what is for the end; but in doable things action is the ultimate end according to the Philosopher in Ethics 6.2.1139b3-4; therefore the contingency of action suffices for the object of practical science.

347. Against this is argued, first, that science is of necessary things; therefore there is no science about contingent things. The antecedent is plain from the definition of ‘to know’ in Posterior Analytics 1.2.71b15-16.

348. Likewise from Ethics 6.2.1139a3-15, the scientific is distinguished from the calculative by reference to the necessary and the contingent [n.226], therefore all the habits of the scientific part are about the necessary; but science is a habit of that part; therefore etc.

349. Further, if theology is about the contingent doable, therefore it is a habit of action along with true reason; but, as is said in Ethics 6.5.1140b20-21, this is the definition of prudence; therefore theology is prudence, not science.

350. To the first [nn.347-348] I reply: there are many necessary truths about contingent things, because it is a necessary conclusion that an act that is contingently elicited should be such as to be right; about it, then, there is science as far as concerns the conclusion necessarily deduced, although it is in itself contingent as far as it is elicited by its proper power.

The response is then plain to the authority of the Philosopher in the Posterior Analytics [n.347]: science is of something necessary that is said about the contingent, and so necessary truths are included in the understanding of the contingent, or they are deduced about something that is contingent by reason of some prior necessary thing [Posterior Analytics 1.8.75b24-25, 33-36; n.212].

The same point provides the response to the authority of the Philosopher in the Ethics [n.348], that the habit of the calculative part is about the act insofar as it is contingently elicited; but the scientific habit or science is about the same thing insofar as something about it is necessarily deduced. If it be objected that there is not the same object for a scientific habit as for a calculative one, we will speak about this next [n.351], how there can be the same object for several habits, although not the same habit for several objects.

351. To the second [n.349] I say that it would prove that moral science is prudence, for moral science is a habit of action along with true reason. Therefore I say that the definition of prudence must be understood of the proximate habit of action, such as is the habit acquired from acts. Hence, just as art is related, in respect of things to be made, to the habit of the man of experience, so is moral science related, in respect of things to be done, to the habit of prudence, because the habits of art and of moral science are as it were remote givers of direction, since they are universal; but the habits of prudence and of the man of experience, because they are generated from acts, are particular and proximate givers of direction. This exposition is necessary, otherwise there would be no practical science, because any practical science is a habit of doing or of making; but the conclusion is discordant and contrary to the Philosopher in Metaphysics 6.1.1025b25, as it seems, and against Avicenna in Metaphysics 1 ch.1 (70ra), and against other authors.

352. To the third reason [n.219] that Boethius understands by theology metaphysics. And as to what he says about the substance of God, I say that God is considered in that science insofar as it is possible in acquired sciences to consider him.

353. To the next [n.220] I say that it is a mark of nobility in an inferior that it reaches what is superior, according to the Philosopher in Politics 7.14.1333a21-22. Hence the sensitive power in man is nobler than the sensitive power of a brute, because in man it is ordered to the intellective power. It is therefore a mark of nobility in science that it is ordered to the act of a nobler power. But the Philosopher does not posit any science to be conform to the action of the will about the end, because he did not posit the will to have action about the end but as it were a certain simple natural motion, and therefore he did not posit that there could be any nobler science through conformity to the end; if however he had posited some action about the end, he would not have denied, as it seems, that practical science in respect to that action was nobler than speculative science about the same thing, for example, if there were some speculative science about what moral science is about, he would not say that the speculative science was nobler than the moral science. But we do posit that there is true action about the end, to which knowledge is of a nature to be conform, and therefore that practical knowledge about the end is nobler than any speculative knowledge. Therefore the first proposition of the argument [n.220], which it seems could be taken from the Metaphysics, although the Philosopher does not expressly say it, is to be denied.

354. To the first proof of it [n.220] I say that what is for its own sake is nobler than what is for the sake of some act inferior to it; but whatever he posits as practical is for the sake of something lower than speculative consideration, because it is at any rate about some object inferior to what he posits as the object of speculative consideration; and therefore whatever he posits as practical is less noble than something speculative. Now what is for the sake of some other act, nobler than its own act, is not, because of such order, less noble; for then our sensitive power would be less noble than the sensitive power of the brute.

To the second proof of the denied proposition, when the discussion is about certitude [n.220], I say that any scientific knowledge with respect to its object is equally certain proportionally, because any science makes resolution to its immediate principles; but it is not equally certain in quantity, because these knowables are more certain than those. Thus everything that the Philosopher posits practical science about is a less certain and perfect knowable in itself than what he posits some speculative science about; therefore some speculative science according to him is set down as more certain in quantity than any practical science. But we posit the doable knowable, that is, what is attainable by doing, which is truly action, to be in itself most knowable, and therefore the science of it is not exceeded by any other science either in quantity or in proportion of certitude.

355. To the other reason about necessary existents [n.221] I say that this science was not invented for the sake of extrinsic necessities but for intrinsic ones (as namely for the order and moderation of passions and actions), just as moral science, if it were invented after all extrinsic necessities had been possessed, would no less be practical. Now this science was not invented ‘for escaping ignorance’, because many more knowables could be handed down in so great a quantity of doctrine than have here been handed down; but here the same things are frequently repeated, so that the listener may more efficaciously be induced to the doing of the things that are here proved.

VII. To the Principal Arguments of the Second Question.

356. To the arguments of the second question. To the authority of the Philosopher in On the Soul [n.223] I say that he is speaking there of the end as known; for the intellect that is calculating for the sake of something is calculating for the sake of the end as known and as principle of demonstration.

357. To the second authority from the Metaphysics [n.224] I say the practical is not for the sake of use as for its per se end; yet it does have some relation to use, such that use is its per se object, or something that virtually includes use, of which sort the only being the Philosopher posited was being for an end; and every such object is less noble than the object of speculation; and therefore such order to action proves the ignobility of the practical in respect of the speculative.

358. To the third authority from the Metaphysics [n.225] I say that the speculative and practical have diverse ends speaking of ends per se within the genus of knowledge, but those ends do not first distinguish them, but there is a prior distinction from the objects, as was said before [nn.252-255, 259, 265-266].

359. To the reasons for the opposite position when argument is given against making distinction by objects:

To the first [n.249] I say that a speculative habit and a practical habit cannot be about the same object. - But when the opposite is proved through the remark of the Philosopher in On the Soul that “the intellect is made practical by extension,” I say that the Philosopher does not say the following, namely that the speculative intellect is made practical by extension; but Aristotle, when he posits three grades of intellect, of which the first considers speculables only, the second considers doables, not by commanding to pursue or flee, he says that “by extending itself further it intends to pursue or flee,” so that this extension is of intellect imperfectly practical to consideration perfectly practical, for example from apprehension of things terrible to a complete command about them, prescribing flight or pursuit. A concession, however, that the speculative intellect is made practical is not to the purpose, because ‘speculative’ and ‘practical’ are accidental differences of the intellect, although they are essential differences of habits and acts, and therefore habits and acts are not extended.

360. To the other about medicine [n.250], some say that the universal habit is speculative but when from it the particular habit is acquired it becomes practical. - On the contrary: then from speculative principles a practical conclusion would follow, which is discordant.

361. Therefore one must speak otherwise and say that when there are extreme opposites, the more something departs from one of the opposites, so much the more does it approach the other; the consideration that most has the idea of the practical is the one that is of a nature to be immediately conform formally to the action to be elicited; therefore the more something departs from that, so much the more does it approach the speculative; therefore the universal habit, which is not of a nature to be immediately conform to action, can be said to be in a way speculative with respect to a habit that is immediately of a nature to be conform to the action to be elicited. In this way art could be set down as a speculative habit with respect to the habit of the man of experience, because art, as being a more universal habit, is not thus immediately directive, as appears from Metaphysics 1.1.981a14-24, “the one with the art will err, the one with experience will not err.” In this way medicine can be distinguished into the speculative, namely the one that is about universal causes and cures, which is a knowledge more remote from the action to be elicited, and into the practical, which is about particulars and things closer to action and more immediately conform to the action to be elicited. However, in truth that more universal knowledge, which is called speculative comparatively, is simply and most truly practical, because it virtually includes the particular knowledge that is formally conform to action.

362. To the next one about moral goodness and badness [n.251] I say that not every good act is good first from the circumstance of the end as end, nay some act is good from the circumstance of the object, to wit when the end is the object, and there the circumstance of the end as object first gives rectitude to the act [nn.263-264]; for the act is from the object alone simply good, as the act ‘to love God’ is simply good without any other circumstances. So it is false that the first goodness of the moral act is taken from the end as the end is contradistinguished from the object, nay it is false in a second way, because, although an act about what is for the end has the end for its first circumstance, yet there is from the object a prior goodness, the goodness by which an act is said to be good in its kind; the third response, directly to the purpose, is that although the circumstance formally circumstances the action so as to make it good, yet it does not formally circumstance practical understanding; for the intellect does not command an act moderately or in a middling way, such that it is circumstanced by this circumstance to command moderately, but the intellect commands the act according to the utmost of its power; but the ‘commanding’ is right from the principle, and the principle is taken from the first object.

363. Against this is that the distinction is not through the objects. The proof is that everything formally of a certain sort is of that sort by something intrinsic to it, therefore, if a habit is formally practical, this is by something intrinsic to it; but this is not the object; therefore etc. Example: the sun is not formally hot although it is virtually hot.

364. Further, the object only distinguishes the habit as an efficient cause; efficient causes do not distinguish the effect into species, because an effect the same in species can come from causes diverse in species, as a hot thing the same in species is generated equivocally and univocally by fire and by the sun.

365. To the first [n.363] I say that being practical means intrinsic to knowledge just as aptitudinal respect means intrinsic to the foundation, and that some knowledge is naturally apt to be referred [sc. to something else], that is by a nature intrinsic to the knowledge, which nature it has from the object as from its extrinsic cause. I say then that a habit is practical by what is intrinsic as by the formal cause, but by the object, which is extrinsic, as by the efficient cause.

366. To the second [n.364] I say that although from essentially ordered causes, one of which is univocal and the other equivocal, there can result, when each is causing, an effect one and the same in nature, as in the example of heat, however, when proximate causes of the same order to the effect cause something insofar as these causes are distinct, especially if each is univocal with the effect (whether the univocity is complete or diminished), there cannot result from such distinct causes an effect of the same nature. I say univocity is complete when there is likeness in form and in the mode of being of the form; I say univocity is diminished when there is likeness in form although the likeness has another mode of being, in the way that the real house outside comes from the house in the mind of the builder (hence the Philosopher calls this generation ‘in some way’ univocal, Metaphysics 79.1034a21-25). Because therefore the object is the proximate cause with respect to knowledge and is univocal, although in a diminished way, it follows that the formal distinction of objects, since these cause knowledges insofar as they are distinct, necessarily includes a formal distinction of knowledges.