This commentary was written in 1272. In the Disputed Question on Truth, Thomas attributes this work to Aristotle, but now in his Prologue he off-handedly mentions a discovery that he was the first to make. The Book of Causes was not written by Aristotle. Rather it consists of excerpts from the Elements of Theology of Proclus, a Neoplatonist who flourished around AD 100, making him a contemporary of Dionysius. Thomas’s discovery explains the character of his commentary.
There is a constant referring of the propositions of the Book of Causes to the corresponding propositions in Proclus. Moreover, there is a regular appeal to Dionysius, not only a Catholic but, in Thomas’s estimation, an author of almost apostolic authority. But there is more than this trinity of authorities involved in Thomas’s effort to understand this dense and difficult book. Aristotle plays a key role in Thomas’s appraisal of the contents of the Book of Causes.
It is difficult to think of a book less congenial to Thomas’s customary mode of thinking. Were it not for the fact that Dionysius employed a Platonic framework and Thomas was doggedly docile in trying to understand him, he would have been ill-equipped to find his way through the thicket of these excerpts. His prologue, setting forth the order of learning the philosophical sciences, emphasizes the Aristotelian view that was Thomas’s own. The human mind is not capable of beginning with what is ontologically first. We must rise slowly and cautiously from the things of this world to defensible statements about immaterial things. Epistemologically and linguistically, metaphysics is dependent on our knowledge of material things and it is possible only after all the other philosophical sciences have been learned.
The Neoplatonist proceeds as if what is first in reality is what we first know. He sees human knowledge as following the declension of beings from the First Being. The physical world is for him remote and foreign, a far cry from the ineffable one.
The only way Thomas can find such a book as this philosophically acceptable is by regarding it as the via descensus which complements and is made possible by the arduous via ascensus which strives towards metaphysics as its goal. Thomas draws attention to the fact that sometimes in the commentary he clarifies positions that he would not accept. But this is not a disengaged reading. The frequent appeals to Aristotle indicate that truth for Thomas was not Aristotelian or Platonic. If Neoplatonism had truths to teach him, they must be compatible with those he had already learned from Aristotle.
Here is Thomas’s explanation of the first five propositions.
EXPOSITION OF THE BOOK OF CAUSES
Prologue
As the Philosopher says in Ethics 10.7, man’s ultimate happiness consists in man’s best activity which is of his highest faculty, namely intellect, with respect to the most intelligible thing. Because the effect is known by its cause, it is clear that the cause is in its nature more intelligible than the effect, although sometimes effects are more known to us than causes because we acquire knowledge of universal and intelligible causes from particulars that fall under the senses. Therefore, it is necessary that, simply speaking, the first causes of things should be in themselves the highest and most intelligible. This is so because they are maximal beings and maximal truths and thus the cause of essence and truth in others, as is evident from the Philosopher in Metaphysics 2.1, although such causes are less and later known for us.
Our intellect relates to them as the eye of a nightbird to the light of the sun which because of its exceeding brightness it cannot perfectly perceive. Therefore, it is necessary that the ultimate happiness of man which is attainable in this life consist in the consideration of the first causes, because the little that can be known of them is more desirable and noble than all that can be known of lesser things, as is clear from the Philosopher in On the Parts of Animals 1.5. But when this knowledge is perfected in us, after this life, man becomes perfectly happy, according to the Gospel (John 17.3): ‘This is life eternal that they might know thee the one true God.’
Hence the chief aim of philosophers was to consider all things in order to arrive at knowledge of first causes. That is why they placed knowledge of first causes last, in the final stage of life, and began first with logic which treats the mode of the sciences, went on second to mathematics, of which even children are capable, third, to natural philosophy which requires time for experience, fourth to moral philosophy of which the young are not suitable students, and finally they turned to divine science which considers the first causes of beings.
The intent of this book which is called ‘Of Causes’ is to determine the first causes of things. And because the word ‘cause’ implies a certain order and there is an order among causes themselves, he first formulates a proposition pertaining to the order of causes as a kind of principle of the whole work:
1
Every primary cause is more influential on its effect than the secondary universal cause.
In manifestation of this he introduces a corollary that casts light on it by way of a sign; adding: when the secondary universal cause removes its power from the thing, the first universal cause does not. He makes a third remark in proof of this, saying: this is because the first universal cause produces the effect of the secondary cause more than the second universal does. From this he concludes what was fittingly put second. It is necessary that what comes first be the last to withdraw; for we see that what is first in composition is the ultimate in resolution. Thus the meaning of this proposition involves three things: first, that the first cause influences the effect more than the secondary does; second, the impression of the first cause recedes from the effect later; third, that it first advenes to it.
Proclus states these three in two propositions, the first in Proposition 56 of his book, to wit: Whatever is produced by secondary causes is also and more eminently produced by prior causes, since these are the causes of the secondary causes. The other he expresses in the following proposition, to wit: Every cause both acts prior to the caused and afterwards sustains many things. Having stated these three he goes on to clarify them, first by an example, second by an argument.
The example seems to pertain to formal causes where a cause is first to the degree that it is more universal. Thus, if we take a man, his specific form is found in this that he is rational, the form of his genus in this that he is alive or an animal, and beyond those is what is common to all, namely, existence. Clearly in the generation of one particular man, he is first seen to be in a material subject, then he is seen to be alive, and afterwards to be a man, for he is animal before he is man, as is said in On the Generation of Animals 2.3. Again in the process of corruption, he first loses reason but remains alive and breathing; second, he loses life although some being remains, because he is not corrupted to nothingness. Thus the example can be understood in terms of the generation and corruption of some individual.
And that is his intention, as is clear from what he says: therefore when the individual is not man, that is, according to the proper act of man, he is animal because there yet remains in him animal activity of motion and sensing, and when he is not an animal, there is existence alone, which remains in a completely inanimate body. This example is verified in the order of things, for existent things are prior to living things and the living to men, and if man be taken away animal which contains him is not removed, although if there is no animal, there is no man. And the same goes for animal and being.
When he says, ‘and the first cause…’ he proves the foregoing three by argument. That the first cause influences more than the second, he proves in this way:
Something belongs more eminently to the cause than to the effect.
But the activity whereby the secondary cause causes the effect is caused by the first cause, for the first cause aids the secondary cause, making it operate.
Therefore, the first cause is more the cause of the operation by which the effect is produced by the secondary cause than is the secondary cause itself.
Proclus proves it more explicitly in this way:
Since the secondary cause is an effect of the first cause, it has its substance from the first cause.
But a thing has the power or virtue of operation from that which causes its substance.
Therefore, a secondary cause has its power and virtue of operating from the first cause.
Since the secondary cause causes the effect through its power and virtue, it has the ability to be the cause of the effect from the primary cause. To be cause of the effect, therefore, is primarily in the first cause and secondarily in the secondary cause. But that which is prior in anything is ‘more’, because the more perfect is naturally prior. Therefore, the first cause is more the cause of the effect than the secondary cause.
Second, that the impression of the first cause recedes last from the effect, he proves where he says: ‘and when the second cause is removed…’ And he fashions this argument:
That which is more intensely in something, inheres it the more.
But the first cause more intensely imprints itself on the effect than does the secondary cause, as has been proved.
Therefore, its impression inheres more, and recedes later.
The third point, namely that it advenes first, he proves where he says: ‘and what is caused by the second cause…’ using this argument:
The secondary cause does not act on its effect save through the power of the first cause.
Therefore, the effect does not proceed from the secondary cause save through the power of the first cause; and thus the power of the first cause grants to the effect that it might be brought about by the power of the second cause.
Therefore, it is first brought about by the power of the first cause.
Proclus proves this by one middle term thus:
The first cause is more cause than the second cause and therefore has more perfect power.
But insofar as the power of a cause is more perfect, it extends to more things.
Therefore, the power of the first cause extends to more things than the power of the second cause.
But that which is in more, is the first to advene and the last to recede. Therefore, the impression of the first cause advenes first and recedes last.
We must ask of what causes this proposition holds true. In fact, when the question is referred to the kinds of cause, it is clear that it holds true of every kind in its own way.
The example given was in the genus of formal cause, but a similar argument can be made concerning material cause, for that which first undergirds as matter causes more proximate matter to ‘stand under’ materially, for example prime matter with respect to the elements, which are in a way the matter of mixed bodies.
He shows that both of these are true of efficient causes. For clearly, insofar as an efficient cause is prior, its power extends to more and its proper effect must be more common. But the proper effect of the secondary cause is found in fewer things, hence it is also more particular. The first cause itself produces or moves the cause that acts secondarily, which is why the latter comes to be a cause that can act. Indeed, the three things touched upon above are found primordially in efficient causes and are extended from them to formal causes. That is why he uses the word ‘influence’ and Proclus uses the word ‘production’ which express the causality of the efficient cause.
That it is extended from efficient to material causes is not yet manifest, due to the fact that the efficient causes we know do not produce matter and form; but if we should consider the universal causes from which the material principles of things proceed, it is necessary that this order be derived from efficient causes to material causes. It is because the efficacity or causality of the first and supreme cause extends to many that it is necessary that what first subsists in everything be from the first cause of all. Then the dispositions whereby matter is fitted to each thing are added by secondary causes. The same thing appears in a way in our activities, for in all artefacts nature provides the prime matter and then by prior arts the natural matter is disposed to accept the more particular effects of the artisan. But the first cause of all is related to nature as nature is to art. Hence what first subsists in the whole of nature is from the first cause of all and is fitted to singular things by the work of secondary causes.
In final causes too all the foregoing are manifestly verified, because all ends are desired for the sake of the ultimate end, which is universal, the desire for them coming after the desire for the ultimate cause and ceasing before it. This ordering too is reduced to the genus of efficient cause, for the end is a cause insofar as it moves the efficient cause to act, and this, insofar as it has the note of mover, belongs in a certain way to the genus of efficient cause.
If it is asked, however, of each genus of cause whether the foregoing are verified in all causes no matter how they are ordered, clearly this is not true. For causes are seen to be ordered in two ways. In one way, as such; in another, incidentally.
As such, when the intention of the first cause aims at the ultimate effect through all the intermediate causes, as the manual art moves the hand, and the hand the hammer which in turn strikes the iron, on which the intention of art bears.
Incidentally, when the intention of the cause extends only to the proximate effect, the fact that something else is then brought about by that effect is outside the intention of the first efficient cause. For example, when someone lights a candle, it is not part of his intention that the lighted candle should light another and that another. What is outside the intention we call incidental.
Therefore, this proposition is true of causes ordered as such, namely, those in which the first cause moves all the intermediate causes to the effect. But in causes incidentally ordered it is the reverse, for the effect which is as such produced by the proximate cause, is produced incidentally by the first cause and is outside his intention. That which is as such is more powerful than that which is incidental, and because of this he significantly says universal cause, which is a cause as such.
2
Having set down the first proposition as a principle of the whole subsequent treatise, here he begins to treat of the first causes of things. And this discussion is divided into two parts: first he treats the distinction of first causes; in the second their co-ordination or dependence of one on another – in Proposition 16 when he says, ‘all powers to which there is no end…’, he subdivides the first into two parts: first, he distinguishes the first causes; second he defines each of them – in Proposition 6, when he says, ‘the first cause is superior…’ The universal causes of things are of three kinds, namely the first cause that is God, then the intelligences and finally souls. On the first point he does three things: first, he distinguishes these three kinds, of which the first is undivided, because the first cause is one alone; second, he distinguishes the intelligences, in Proposition 4: ‘the first of created things…’; third, he distinguishes souls, in Proposition 5, when he says, ‘the higher intelligences…’ He does two things with regard to the first: first, he distinguishes the three kinds mentioned; second, he shows how they are united by a certain participation in the ultimate – in Proposition 3, when he says, ‘every noble soul…’
Concerning the first he sets down this proposition: ‘Every higher being is either superior to eternity and before it, or it is with eternity, or it is after eternity and above time.’ To understand this proposition we must first see what eternity is, and then if the foregoing proposition is true.
The word ‘eternity’ implies a certain indeficiency or interminability, for the eternal is said to exist as it were outside limits; but, because, as the Philosopher says in Physics 7.3, in every motion there is some corruption and generation insofar as something begins to be and something ceases to be, it is necessary that in any motion there be some deficiency. Hence every motion is repugnant to eternity. True eternity therefore, since it implies indeficiency of being, also implies immobility. And, because the before and after in the duration of time come from motion, as is evident in Physics 4.11, therefore and thirdly, eternity must be without any before and after, wholly existing at the same time, as Boethius defines it at the end of the Consolation 5.6, saying, ‘Eternity is the complete, perfect and simultaneous possession of everlasting life.’
Any thing without deficiency of being has immobility and if it lacks temporal succession can be called eternal, and in this sense the Platonists and Peripatetics called separate immaterial substances eternal, adding to the notion of eternity that the thing always exists, something inconsonant with Christian faith. For eternity belongs to God alone. However, we call other things eternal insofar as when beginning to be they obtain from God perpetual and indeficient existence without motion and temporal succession. Dionysius too, in On the Divine Names 10, says that the things which are called eternal in Scripture are not absolutely coeternal with God, hence eternity so understood some called aevum, which they distinguish from eternity taken in the first sense. But rightly understand, aevum and eternity differ only as anthropos and man do. For in Greek aevon means eternity just as anthropos means man.
These things being understood, then, it should be noted that this proposition is found as Proposition 88 in Proclus, stated thus: every ‘be-er’ or ‘exist-er being’ is either before eternity, in eternity, or a participant in eternity.’ He says ‘be-er being’ to contrast it with movable being, as to be standing is opposed to being moved, which makes clear that what in this book is called superior existence is above motion and time. According to the books of both authors, existence of this kind is distinguished into three grades, but not quite the same reason is given by the two writers.
Proclus introduces this proposition on the basis of the presuppositions of the Platonists who, positing the abstraction of universals, maintain that something is prior in being to the degree that it is more abstract and universal. For it is manifest that the word ‘eternity’ is more abstract than ‘eternal’; for by ‘eternity’ the very essence of eternity is signified, and by ‘eternal’ that which participates in eternity. Again, to exist as such is more common than eternity, ‘for whatever is eternal is a being, but not every being is eternal’. Accordingly, separate existence itself is before eternity; that which is with eternity is sempiternal being; that which is a participant in eternity is, as it were, after eternity.
The author of this book agrees with the foregoing position on the first point. Hence he teaches that the being that is before eternity is the first cause since it is the cause of eternity. To prove this, he says that in it, that is, in eternity, there is an acquired, that is, participated, existence. And his proof is that those things which are less common participate in the things which are more common; but eternity is less common than being. So he adds: ‘And I say that every eternity is being but not every being is eternity; therefore, being is more common than eternity.’ In this way the author proves that eternity participates in being; but abstract being itself is the first cause whose substance is his existence; it follows that the first cause is the cause from which every always existing thing acquires sempiternal being.
But on the other two points the author of this book departs from the meaning of Proclus and rather advances views that are common to Platonists and Peripatetics. For he explains that the second level, which is being with eternity, is the level of the intelligence. Because eternity, as has been said, implies indeficiency with immobility, that which everyone agrees is indefective and immobile attains eternity totally. However, he points out that, according to the aforementioned philosophers, separate intelligence or intellect has indeficiency and immobility with respect to existence, power and operation. Hence Proposition 169 of Proclus is: ‘Every intellect in eternity has substance, power and operation.’ And on this basis he proves that intelligence is with eternity because it is in every respect wholly one, is not open to otherness either of power or of operation, nor can its substance be destroyed. Because of this he later says that it is ‘made equal’ with eternity, ‘since it is as extended as eternity and is not altered’, because eternity extends itself to every thing that is an intelligence.
He explains the third grade, that of soul, which enjoys a higher existence, above motion and time. A soul of this kind is closer to motion than intelligence is, however, because intelligence is not touched by motion either in substance or in its activity. The soul indeed exceeds time and motion according to substance, and touches eternity, but its activity touches on motion because, as philosophers proved, it is necessary that whatever is moved by another is reduced to something first which moves itself. According to Plato this is the soul that moves itself, according to Aristotle, however, it is an animate body whose principle of motion is the body. In both cases therefore, it is necessary that the first principle is soul and motion the activity of the soul itself. Because motion is in time, time touches the activity of the soul itself; that is what Proclus says in Proposition 91: ‘Every participable soul has an eternal substance but an operation according to time.’ Therefore, he says here that it is connected with eternity from below, connected to eternity in substance, but inferior because it participates in eternity in a lesser way than intelligence. He proves this through the fact that it is more susceptible to impression than intelligence, for the soul not only receives the impression of the first cause as does intelligence, but also receives the impression of intelligence. The more remote a thing is from the first, which is cause of eternity, the more weakly it participates in eternity. And, although the soul attains the lowest level of eternity, it is above time as the cause is above the effect, for it is the cause of time insofar as it is the cause of motion on which time follows.
He speaks here of the soul that the philosophers attribute to the celestial body and for this reason says that on the horizon of eternity it is below and above time. The horizon is a circle terminating vision and is the lower term of the upper hemisphere, but the principle of the lower. Similarly the soul is the ultimate term of eternity and the principle of time. Dionysius also agrees with this opinion in On the Divine Names 10, with this exception that he does not say that the heaven has a soul, since the Catholic faith does not teach this. He says that God is prior to the eternal and that, according to Scripture, some eternal things are also called temporal, but this ought to be understood according to the ways posited in Sacred Scripture. ‘Between existent and made or generable things there are some which are in one respect eternal and in another respect participate in time.’
3
Because whatever is in the higher is in the lower according to some participation, after he distinguishes three grades of superior beings, one higher than eternity, which is God, another with eternity, which is the intelligence, and a third that is after eternity, which is the soul, he now intends to show how the third participates in what belongs to the first and to the second, saying: ‘Every noble soul has three operations, for among its operations are the animal, intelligible and divine operations.’ That he calls the soul noble can be understood from the words of Proclus who offers this as Proposition 201: ‘All divine souls have three kinds of operation, some as of the soul; some, however, as receiving the divine intellect; some as conjoined to the gods without.’ From which it is clear that by the noble soul he means the divine soul.
In evidence of which it should be remembered that Plato held that the universal forms of things are separate and subsist in themselves. And because, according to him, universal forms of this kind have a kind of universal causality over the particular beings which participate in them, he calls all such subsistent forms gods, for the name ‘god’ implies a certain universal providence and causality. Among these forms he posited this ordering, because the more universal a form the more simple it is and the more a first cause, for it is participated in by later forms, as if we were to say that animal is participated in by man, and life by animal, and so on. The ultimate in which all participate and which itself participates in nothing, is the separate One and Good, which he calls the highest god and the first cause of all things.
Hence in Proclus we find Proposition 116: ‘Every god is participable,’ that is, participates, ‘except the One.’ And because forms of this kind, which they call gods, are intelligible in themselves, but the intellect comes actually to understand through the intelligible species, under the order of the gods, that is, of the foregoing forms, they posited the order of intellects, which participate in the foregoing forms in order that they might be intelligent. The ideal intellect is also among such forms. But the aforesaid intellects participate in the forms in an immobile way, insofar as they understand them.
Therefore, under the order of intellect he places the third level, that of souls, which through the mediating intellects participate in the foregoing forms according to motion, insofar as they are principles of bodily motions by which the superior forms are participated in by bodily matter. The fourth level of things is the order of bodies between the intellects. He calls the higher intellects divine, but the inferior, though intellects, are not divine, because the ideal intellect which is god as such, according to them, is participated in by the higher intellects in both respects, as intellect and as god, but by the inferior intellect only insofar as it is intellect, and therefore the inferior intellects are not divine. The higher intellects issue forth not only as intellects but also as divine.
Similarly, since souls are applied to the gods by mediating intellects as closer, the higher souls are divine on account of the divine intellects to which they are applied or in which they participate, whereas the lower souls, being applied to the non-divine intellects, are not divine. And because bodies have motion through soul, it also follows that the higher bodies are divine, according to them, and the lower bodies not divine.
Hence Proclus says in Proposition 129: ‘Every divine body is divine through a deified soul, every soul is divine because of the divine intellect, and every intellect is divine by participation in the divine unity.’ And because they called the first separated forms gods insofar as they are in themselves universal, consequently they called intellects and souls and bodies divine insofar as they had some universal influence and causality over subsequent things in their own genus and in lower genera.
Dionysius corrects this position insofar as they posited different ordered separated forms which they called gods, such that goodness itself differs from existence itself and life itself and so on with the others. For it must be said that all these are essentially the first cause of all things itself from which things participate in perfections of this kind, and thus we do not posit many gods but one. This is what he says in On the Divine Names 5. ‘It, namely Sacred Scripture, says that good is not different from existing or life or wisdom, nor do they produce many causes productive of other deities related as above and below, but all good processes are of one being.’ He shows how this can be, by noting that, since God is his existence and the very essence of goodness, whatever pertains to the perfection of goodness and existence, belongs totally and essentially to him, such that he is the very essence of life and of wisdom and of virtue and of the others. Hence a little later he adds: ‘God does not exist in a certain manner, but has existence in himself simply and as a boundless whole.’
The author of this book agrees with this. For he is not seen to introduce any multitude of gods, but establishes unity in God and distinction in the orders of intellect, soul and body. In this way it is called the noble soul, that is, the divine soul of the celestial body, according to the philosophers who held that the heaven is animate. For this soul, according to them, has a certain universal influence over things through motion, and thus is called divine in that manner of speaking whereby even men who have the universal care of public affairs are called divine.
Of this most nobly divine soul he says that it has a divine activity, and by way of explanation says that ‘its activity is divine’ in that ‘it prepares nature’, because it is the principle of the first motion to which the whole of nature is subject and it has this through a power participated in from the first cause which is the universal cause of all from which there passes to things a universal causality. Therefore, giving a reason for this divine activity proper to the soul, he says that it is the exemplar, that is, image, of the higher power, that is, the divine. The universality of the divine power is exemplified in this soul, such that, just as God is the universal cause of all beings, this soul is the universal cause of all the natural things that move.
As the second operation of the noble or divine soul he names intelligible activity which, as he himself explains, consists in this that it knows things insofar as it participates in the power of intelligence. Why it participates in the power of intelligence, he shows by saying that the soul is created by the first cause through the mediation of intelligence; hence the soul is from God as from first cause, and from intelligence as second cause. Since every effect participates in something of the power of its cause, it follows that the soul, which performs a divine activity insofar as it is from the first cause, performs intelligent activity insofar as it is from intelligence, participating in its power.
Some badly understand what is said here, namely that the first cause created the existence of the soul through the mediation of intelligence, thinking the author of this book holds that the Intelligences are creators of the substance of souls. But this is contrary to Platonic opinions. They posit the causalities of simple beings according to participation; it does not participate in that which participates, but in that which is through its essence primarily such. For example, if whiteness were separate, simple whiteness itself, not something participating in whiteness, would be the cause of all white things being white.
In this way the Platonists held that that which is existence itself is the cause that other things exist, and that which is life itself is the cause that other things live, and what is intelligence itself is the cause of all understanding. Hence Proclus says in Proposition 18 of his book: ‘Everything giving existence to others is itself primarily that which it passes on to the recipients.’ Aristotle agrees with this view when he says in Metaphysics 2.1 that what is first and maximally being is the cause of subsequent beings. It should be understood, therefore, that the very essence of soul, according to the foregoing, is created by the first cause which is its own existence, but it has consequent participation from later principles, such that for it to live it has from the first life and to understand from the first intelligence. Hence in Proposition 18 of this book it is said: ‘All things have essence through first being and things are alive through the first life, and intelligible things have knowledge because of the first intelligence.’
This, then, is how he understands that the first cause created the existence of the soul by the mediation of intelligence. The first cause alone created the essence of the soul, but the soul might be intelligible because of the activity of intelligence. This meaning is clearly shown by the words which follow. ‘Afterwards then,’ he says, ‘the first cause created the existence of the soul, placing it under intelligence,’ that is, putting it under the activity of intelligence, so that intelligence acts in ‘its own activity’ to make it intelligible. He concludes that on account of this the intelligible soul engages in intelligible activity.
This is in accord with what was said in Proposition 1 that the effect of the first cause pre-exists the effect of the secondary cause and is more universally diffused. For existence, which is most common, is diffused into everything by the first cause, but understanding is not communicated to everything by intelligence, but only to some, presupposing the existence they have from the first.
This position too, if not wisely understood, is repugnant both to truth and to the view of Aristotle, who argues in Metaphysics 3.6 against the Platonists teaching this kind of order of separated causes that follows on what is predicated of individuals. Because it would follow that Socrates is many animals, namely Socrates himself and the separated man and also the separated animal: for the separated man participates in animal and thus is animal, and Socrates participates in both, and thus he is man and he is animal. Socrates would not be truly one if he were animal because of one thing and man because of another. Hence, since being intelligible pertains to the nature of soul as its essential difference, if it had existence from one thing and its intellective nature from another, it would follow that it is not simply speaking one thing. So it must be said that just as it has essence from the first cause, so too does it have intellectuality.
This agrees with the view of Dionysius mentioned above, namely that good itself, being itself, life itself, wisdom itself are not different but one and the same being who is God, who brings it about that things are and live and understand, as he himself shows. Hence Aristotle, in Metaphysics 12.7, significantly attributes to God both understanding and life, saying that he is life and intelligence, in order to exclude the aforementioned Platonic positions. This can be true in another way, if it is referred not to the intellectual nature, but to the intelligible forms that the intellective soul receives thanks to the activity of intelligences. Hence Dionysius says in On the Divine Names 4 that thanks to the angels souls become participants in illuminations emanating from God.
The third operation of the noble or divine soul is animal activity. And he explains that ‘animal activity’ consists in this that it ‘moves body as such’ and consequently ‘all natural bodies’, for it is the cause of motion in things. He gives the reason for this later. Because soul is lower than intelligence since it receives the impression of intelligence, it follows that it operates on things below it in a way inferior to the way in which intelligence acts on things subject to it, because the primary cause has more influence than the secondary, as is clear from Proposition 1. But the intelligence acts on souls without motion, namely insofar as it causes the soul to know, which is without motion. But the soul acts on bodies by motion, and that below it, namely body, does not receive the impression of soul except as moved by it. Consequently he assigns the cause why it should be said that the motions of natural bodies are from soul. For we see all natural bodies directly arrive at their fitting ends by their own activities and motions, which could only be insofar as they are directed by someone understanding. From this it seems that the motion of bodies is from the soul which impresses its power on bodies by moving them.
That the motion of the heaven is from soul is not supported by the faith. Augustine leaves this in doubt in the Literal Commentary on Genesis 2.18, but that it is from God directing the whole of nature and that the bodily is moved by God by the mediation of intelligences or angels, Augustine asserts in On the Trinity 3.4, and Gregory in the Dialogues 4.6.
Finally he concludes what he proposed, namely that the noble soul has the three operations mentioned. What he said of divine intellect and the divine soul agrees with the opinion of Dionysius in On the Divine Names 4 where he calls the higher angels divine minds, that is, intellects, by which deiformed souls also participate in the gift according to their power. But it receives divinity by union with God, not according to his universal influence on created things. That is more divine, because in God himself too that which he himself is is greater than what he causes in others.
4
After the author of this book distinguishes three levels of superior being, and shows how the whole is found participatively in the least of them, he now intends to show a distinction in the second level, namely of that being which is with eternity; for he sets aside the first level, which is of the first cause existing prior to eternity, because as has been said it is undivided.
In this he proceeds differently than he has with the others, for in all the others he set down a proposition and, after an explanation of it, proved it, but here, in the manner of dividing, he first sets out what is common. Second, he divides it, when he says ‘And to be created, though it is one…’ Third, he gives the difference between the parts of the division, when he says ‘And everything that follows on it…’
That which is common to all the different intelligences is to be created first, concerning which he sets forth this proposition: ‘The first of created things is existence and before it nothing else is created.’ In his book, Proclus states this as Proposition 138, in these words: ‘The supreme being is the first of all participants in the divine property and deiformed things.’ The reason for this, according to Platonic opinion, is that, as has been said above, the more common a thing the more they held it to be separate and as participated in first by later things, and thus to be their cause.
They held that the one and good are the most common in the order of those things that are predicated, even more common than being, because good and one are found to be predicated of that of which they say being is not predicated, namely, of prime matter which Plato linked with non-being, not distinguishing matter and privation, as is said in Physics 1.9. Yet he attributed unity and goodness to matter insofar as it is ordered to form; for good is not only said of the end but of that which is for the end. That is why the Platonists said that the highest and first principle is the separated one itself and good itself, but after one and good there is nothing more common than being; and, therefore, the separated good itself they held indeed to be created, as participating goodness and unity, but they made it the first among all created things.
Dionysius, however, removes an order among separated things, as has been said above, positing the same order as even the Platonists among the perfections which other things participate in from the one principle, God. Hence in On the Divine Names 4 he puts good first among all the divine names and shows that its participation extends even to non-being, understanding prime matter by non-being. For he says: ‘And, if it be fitting to say it, that good is above all existent things and even the non-existent desires it.’ But he puts existence first ‘among the perfections of God in which things participate, and that which is exists itself is older than that which is to be life itself, and that which is to be wisdom itself, and that which is to be of itself a divine likeness’. The author of this book seems to think in the same way. For he says that this is so because ‘existence is above sense and above soul and above intelligence’. And how it is above these he explains by saying, ‘And there is nothing wider’, that is, more common, ‘after the first cause’, and consequently no effect prior to it; but the first cause is wider because it extends even to non-beings, according to what has been said. From what has been said he concludes that ‘to be itself is made superior to all created things’, because it is more common than the other effects of God and it is also ‘more intensely united’, that is, more simple, for the things which are less common seem to relate to the more common by way of some addition.
But it seems that it is not his intention to speak of any separated existence, as the Platonists do, nor of the existence commonly participated in by all existing things, as Dionysius does, but of the existence participated in by the first level of created being, which is a higher existence. And although higher being is in both intelligence and soul, yet in intelligence itself the notion of existence itself is considered to be prior to the notion of intelligence, and similarly in soul; on account of this he premisses that it is above soul and intelligence.
He gives as the reason why this existence participated in by intelligence is especially unified, its closeness to the first cause which is ‘pure subsistent existence’ and is a truly one and non-participated in which there is no plurality of essential differences. What is closer to the one as such is more unified as more participant in unity; hence intelligence which is closest to the first cause has an especially unified existence.
Then when he says: ‘And it is not made many…’ he gives the reason for the distinction that can be found essentially in intelligences. On this matter consider that if some form or nature were wholly separate and simple, manyness could not occur in it, just as, if there were some separated whiteness, it could only be one: now, however, there are many whitenesses which participate in whiteness.
Therefore, if the first created existence were abstract existence, as the Platonists held, such existence could not be multiplied but would be one alone. But because to be created first is to be participated in by the nature of intelligence, it is multipliable according to the diversity of participants. This is what he says: ‘And it indeed,’ – namely the first created existence – ‘is not made many,’ that is, distinct in many intelligences, ‘except because, although it itself is simple and there is not in created things anything more simple than it, yet it is composed of the finite and infinite.’
Proclus too mentions this kind of composition, saying in Proposition 86: ‘Every be-er being is from the end and infinite.’ Which he explains thus: ‘Every immobile being is infinite according to the power of being; for if that which can endure longer has greater power of being, that which can endure infinitely is in this respect of infinite power.’ Hence he said earlier in Proposition 86: ‘Every be-er being is infinite, not in multitude or size but only according to potency,’ namely, of existing, as he explains. But if something had the infinite power of existing and did not participate in existence from another it would be infinite alone, and such is God, as is said below in Proposition 16. But, if there should be something that had an infinite power for being with respect to existence participated in from another, the existence it participates in is finite, since what is participated in is not received in the one participating in its full infinity but particularly. Therefore intelligence is composed in its existence of the finite and infinite insofar as the nature of intelligence is called infinite according to its power of being, but the existence itself it receives is finite. It follows from this that the existence of intelligence can be multiplied insofar as it is participated existence: this is what composition of finite and infinite means.
Then when he says: ‘And whatever follows on it…’ he shows the difference between the members of the division, that is, between the many intelligences, and this in three ways: first with respect to their diverse perfections; second, with respect to the influence of some on others, there ‘and the first intelligences…’; third, with respect to the effects of intelligences on souls and this in the following proposition which in some books is found conjoined with this comment, and begins: ‘Higher intelligences…’
With respect to the first he does two things: first he shows the difference, second he removes a certain doubt: ‘and because they are differentiated…’ On the first point it should be considered that he assigns a twofold difference to intelligences, one having to do with their nature, the other with the intelligible species through which they understand. With respect to their natures it is necessary that they be placed in a given order. Their difference is formal not material; for they are not composed of matter and form but of nature, which is form, and participated existence, as has been said. In things which differ materially there is nothing to prevent there being many equal individuals, for in substances the individuals of the same species participate equally in the notion of the species; and in accidents too it is possible for different subjects to participate equally in whiteness. But in things which differ formally there is always an order. For if one considers carefully, he will find in all species of the same genus that one is more perfect than the others, as in colours whiteness and in animals man. And this because what differ formally differ according to some contrariety. For contrariety is the difference following form, as the Philosopher says in Metaphysics 10.9. In contraries one is always more noble and the other more vile, as is said in Physics 1.5, and this because the first contrariety is privation and habit, as is said in Metaphysics 10.4. That is why in Metaphysics 8.3 the Philosopher says that the species of things are like numbers whose species are diversified by adding one to the preceding. Manifestly a thing is more perfect insofar as it is closer to the most perfect one. Hence he gives this difference with respect to the nature of the intelligences, that that intellectual existence, which follows immediately on the first cause, is ‘intelligence whose ultimate completion’ with respect to created existence ‘in power of being and in the other goods’ following on it, is the intellectual existence which is lower in the order of intelligences and retains the nature and notion of intelligence but is beneath the higher intelligence in the perfection of nature and power of being and operating and all the goods and perfections.
With respect to the second difference which is taken from intelligible species, he supposes that the intelligences understand through intelligible species and that such intelligible species have greater breadth and universality than in lower intelligences, and he leaves this for now undiscussed, for it will be shown below in Proposition 10 which is concerned solely with this.
Then when he says: ‘And because intelligence is differentiated…’ he removes a certain doubt. Because it might seem false that intelligible species are different in higher and lower intelligences, because the thing understood is the same, he shows how such intelligible species are differentiated. And first he introduces an example; second he shows the difference: when he says: ‘but though they are indeed diversified…’
On the first point it should be noted that, as was said above, the Platonist posited separated forms of things through participation in which intellects come actually to understand, just as through participation in them corporeal matter is constituted in this or that species. The same follows even if we do not posit many separate forms, but, in place of them all, put one first form from which they all derive, as was said above according to the opinion of Dionysius, which the author of this book seems to follow, placing no distinction in divine existence.
Therefore since intelligences are essentially different, as was said above, it is necessary that participated intelligible forms are diverse and different in different intelligences, just as participated forms in this sensible world are differentiated by the diversity of the individuals participating in the forms. Then when he says: ‘Although they are indeed diversified…’ he shows the diversity in the foregoing example. For the sensible forms participated in different individuals are individuated forms and are disjoined from one another by that disjunction whereby one individual is disjoined from another, such that two forms do not pertain to the existence of one thing but of diverse things. Intelligible forms are not disjoined because they are in diverse intelligences or intellects, because they are not thus made individual forms but retain the power of their universality insofar as each of them causes universal knowledge of the thing understood in the intellect in which it is.
The reason for this is apparent from what has been said. For since the forms of things, whether they stand as such and divided or whether they are united in one first, have the most universal and divine existence, it is manifest that the more they approach this most universal existence of forms the more universal they are. It was on this basis that he said that participated forms in higher intellects are more universal.
That which is least in things is corporeal matter, hence it receives such forms as particular without any universality. This is what he means when he says that although intelligible forms are diversified in diverse intelligences, they are not distinguished from one another as individuals in sensible things differ, because they have at one time one and manyness: one, on the side of universality, manyness, according to the diverse mode of participation in diverse intellects.
This totally excludes the notion of Averroes who wished to prove the unity of intellect by the unity of intelligible form; for he thought that if intelligible forms are diverse in diverse intellects, they are individuated and intelligible potentially not actually. The silliness of this is clear from the foregoing. When he says: ‘And the first intelligences…’ he states a second difference which follows on the first. For we find in every order of things that that which is actual acts on that which is potential; but the more perfect always relates to the less perfect as act to potency; therefore the more perfect of any kind are fashioned to act on the imperfect. Therefore, since the higher intelligences are more perfect in power and in other goods than lesser intelligences, it follows that, just as the first cause flows into the higher intelligences, so the higher intelligences flow into the lower and thus on to the least.
5
After he has shown in the previous proposition the differences among intelligences, the author here treats of the distinction of souls, the source of which he assigns to the differences of the intelligences which in a certain way cause them, according to his position. Therefore, what is here said about the differences of souls can be referred to the distinction of intelligences insofar as the differences among causes are manifested in the differences of effects. Hence in some copies this proposition is not stated as such, but is added to the comment on the previous proposition, which is also apparent from the epilogue he gives here, which is common to both propositions. This is the proposition: ‘The first higher intelligences act on secondary subsistent forms, which are not destroyed so it is necessary to go back to them by way of others; second intelligences impress on separable forms, such as the soul is.’ Proclus states two propositions corresponding with this one, namely 182: ‘Every divine intellect is participated in by divine souls,’ and 183: ‘Every participated intellect is intellectual alone, and is participated in by souls neither divine nor made in the altering of understanding and ignorance.’ In evidence of this proposition, three things are to be considered: first, concerning the impression of the soul; second, the distinction of souls; third, the difference between distinct souls.
Concerning the impression of the soul: first must be considered how it belongs to the soul to be impressed; second, that by which it is impressed. That it belongs to the soul to be impressed, appears manifestly when one considers the meaning of impression, for which two things are required: first that what is impressed should be existent in something; second, that it be in it not superficially according to extrinsic contact alone, but that it be intimate, as penetrating it in depth.
These two belong to the soul according to its proper notion. For it was said above in Proposition 3 that the proper activity of the soul is to move the body, because the activity of soul itself is below the proper activity of intelligence, which knows things without motion; but the principle of motion must be applied to the mobile because, as was proved in Physics 7.2, the mover and the moved exist simultaneously; hence to be in a movable body belongs to soul according to its proper notion. But the motion whereby the soul moves the body is the motion of a living body, which is not from an extrinsic agent, like violent motion or the motion of light and heavy bodies from the one generating, but is an intrinsic movement. Hence living things are said to move themselves. Therefore, the soul that moves the body must be in the body, united to it intrinsically, and on account of this it is said to be impressed.
If it be asked by what it is impressed, according to the opinion of the author of this book it is impressed by intelligence. For he says, ‘Nor is it,’ – namely the inferior soul – ‘from the impression of second intelligence,’ that is, of the second order of intelligences, ‘which,’ – that is, the second intelligence – ‘follows lower created existence,’ that is, in the lower part of the first created existence which is the existence of intelligences. Or, what he says, ‘which follow the existence…’ could be referred to soul, which is below the eternity of intelligence, as was said in Proposition 2. But this opinion has not up until now been ratified.
For we can speak of the impression of the soul in two ways: in one way, on the part of the soul impressed; in another, on the part of the matter on which it is impressed. And this distinction is found in any soul standing by itself, such as any intelligent soul, as will become clear below, because the existence of its substance does not consist totally in its union with corporeal matter, such as the existence of non-subsistent souls, like those of brutes and plants, so that in these the foregoing distinction is not necessary, because the existence of such animals is considered simultaneous on the side of the matter receiving and on the side of the soul itself.
Therefore, if we speak of a soul subsisting of itself, that is, any intellectual, whether celestial if the celestial bodies are said to be animate, as the author of this book supposes, or of the human soul on the side of the soul itself, then according to the roots of the Platonic positions which the author of this book often follows, such a soul is from the impression of intelligence because, as was said above in Proposition 3, Platonists hold that that which is common in a thing is caused by one principle and that which is proper to it by another lower principle. Therefore on this basis the soul subsisting in itself has its existence from the first cause, but that it should be intellectual and a soul it has from the secondary causes, which are intelligences. Hence, since it belongs to the notion of soul that it be impressed in a body, it will follow that this soul has it from intelligence that it should be impressed on such a body.
But because, as we showed above, this position has no truth and is contrary to the opinion of Aristotle, it must be said that such a soul is intellectual and a soul from the first cause from which it receives its existence, and consequently that it be impressed on a body. Therefore, on this basis, the soul is not from the impression of intelligence but from the impression of the first cause. If indeed we should speak of such a soul from the side of the susceptible on which it is impressed, then with respect to the soul of celestial body, if the heaven has a soul, there would be the same argument. For the nature of celestial bodies is in no way caused by intelligences but by the first cause from which it has existence.
But if we should speak of the human soul from the side of what is susceptible to it, then in a way it is from the impression of intelligence, insofar namely as the human body itself is disposed to be receptive of such a soul through the power of the heavenly body acting in the seed, by reason of which it is said that man and the sun generate a man. But celestial bodies, according to the doctors of the Christian faith as well, namely Augustine and Gregory, are said to be moved by spiritual creatures which are called angels or intelligences or separate intellects. It follows from this that intelligences contribute something towards the fact that the human soul is impressed on body from the side of what is susceptible to it. And in this way it can be said that the other souls which are not of themselves subsistent are due to the impression of intelligences and the celestial bodies.
The second remains to be considered, namely, the distinction of souls. And he gives the same reason for the distinction and multiplication of souls as he gave in the case of intelligences: for just as the existence of intelligence is composed of infinite and finite, insofar as its existence is not subsistent but participated in by some nature, by reason of which it can be distinguished as many, so too is it with the existence of soul. That is why he says: ‘And souls are not multiplied except in the way in which intelligences are multiplied, which is that the existence of soul has a limit and for that reason is below the infinite.’ He calls this nature that participates in existence ‘lower’, but also calls it ‘infinite’ because of its power to endure infinitely in existence. He calls participated existence itself finite because it does not participate in it according to the full infinity of its universality but according to the mode of the nature of the participant. But it should be noted that because the nature of intelligence is completely free of body, the distinction of intelligences is based on the level of the proper nature without reference to any body. It is of the essence of soul that it be impressed on body, and therefore the distinction of souls is based on a reference to animated bodies.
Hence, if animate bodies are of different species, the souls impressed on them will be specifically different, just as we would have to say if the celestial bodies were animate. But if animated bodies are of the same species, the souls impressed would be of one species and multiplied numerically alone, as is evident in human souls.
Then the third point is to be considered, namely the differences between distinct souls. He gives three differences, the first of which is taken from the diverse perfections of souls. For he says that souls, that is, the higher ones such as those of celestial bodies, which follow on intelligence, because they are ranked immediately after them, are complete, namely in the perfection of animal nature.
And he gives a sign of perfection, adding: ‘of little falling away and separation’. For it was said above in Proposition 2 that the soul, insofar as it falls away from the perfection of intelligence, draws near to motion. Therefore, to the degree that souls are higher and closer to intelligences, the less they have of motion. For lower souls have motion not only insofar as they move body but also insofar as they are always conjoined to their bodies and are always intelligent and have motion because they move celestial bodies. Therefore he says that they are ‘of little falling away’ because they decline but little from the immobility of intelligence, and ‘of little separation’ because they are but little separated into diverse ones, such that they are found sometimes in this, sometimes in that – that is, with respect to the local motion alone of the celestial bodies. Lower souls are less than the higher souls because of less perfection and because of that slight falling away or separation.
The second difference is taken from the influence of souls on one another. For just as he said above that the first intelligences dispense to the second goodnesses that they receive from the first cause, so now he says that the higher souls pass on the goodnesses they receive from the intelligence above the lower souls. And the reason is the same in both cases: because that which is less perfect is perfected by the more complete, as potency by act.
The third difference is drawn from the side of effects. For just as he said of intelligences that the higher impress the more noble souls, so now he says of souls that the higher soul receiving power immediately from intelligence has a stronger impression because the higher cause always acts more forcibly, as was said in Proposition I; therefore that which is impressed in the body by the higher soul is fixed and stands, that is, is firm and immobile, and its motion is equal, that is, uniform, and continuous, as is evident in the celestial body. The lower soul to which the power of intelligence pertains through the mediation of the higher soul makes a weaker impression on its body since it is a lower cause, and therefore that which it impresses on body, like life and the like, ‘is weak’, because of the passibility of the body with respect to the exterior agent, ‘evanescent and destructible’, as transmuted by an internal principle, because finally what the soul effects in body completely ceases to be.
Yet the body in a certain fashion participates in eternity, namely according to species, by way of generation. By attributing the corruptibility of human bodies to the weakness of the impression of their souls, the author of this book shows a better understanding than the Platonists who held that even the human soul has some incorruptible body forever joined to it.
It is clear, according to the opinion of our author, that when the human soul was perfected through its conjunction with the first cause, it can impress perpetual life on its body. Because of this the Catholic faith professes a future eternal life not only for souls but also for bodies after the resurrection. He concluded by summarizing what was said in the two propositions. What we ourselves have said of the souls of the heavens we said not as asserting its truth but as giving the opinions of others.