Love & Friendship #
A philosophical exploration of love and friendship through Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas. These lectures examine love as both passion and choice, analyze its causes and effects, and investigate friendship as central to human flourishing, integrating rigorous analysis with literary examples from Shakespeare and mystical theology.
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Lectures #
1. Love as Giving and Undergoing: The Paradox Reconciled #
This lecture explores the apparent paradox that love is simultaneously a giving (like the carpenter actively shaping wood) and an undergoing or passion (like the wood being acted upon). Through extensive analysis of Shakespeare’s love scenes and passages from Thomas Aquinas on the Holy Spirit as Gift, Berquist demonstrates that both perspectives contain truth and must be reconciled through careful philosophical analysis of how the heart relates to the beloved.
2. Love as Undergoing and the Paradox of Giving #
This lecture explores the fundamental paradox of love: it is described as both a giving (through expressions like ‘giving one’s heart’) and an undergoing or passion (being wounded, transformed, impressed by the beloved). Berquist resolves this paradox through Aristotelian metaphysics by distinguishing between truth (which is in the mind) and goodness (which is in things), arguing that love is fundamentally a transformation of the heart by its object, while the language of ‘giving’ reflects that the good exists in external things rather than in the lover’s mind.
3. Love as Undergoing and the Conformity of the Heart #
This lecture explores the paradox of love as both a receiving (undergoing) and a giving, resolving it through Aristotle’s distinction between knowledge (which is a taking) and goodness (which is in things). Berquist examines how the desirable object acts upon the heart, conforming it to itself, and how from this conformity follow the movements of desire and joy. The lecture also begins to distinguish between sense love (emotion) and chosen love (act of will), and between the love of wanting and the love of wishing well to another.
4. The Nature and Division of Love: Friendship and Wanting #
This lecture explores Thomas Aquinas’s analysis of love (amor) and how it divides into two fundamental kinds: the love of friendship (dilectio) and the love of wanting (amor concupiscentia). Berquist examines the philosophical foundations from Aristotle, the linguistic distinctions between different types of love, and how this division illuminates human relationships and the virtue of friendship. The lecture clarifies that love has two objects—the good wished and the one to whom good is wished—and that true friendship requires the love of friendship rather than mere love of wanting.
5. Love of Wanting versus Love of Wishing Well #
This lecture explores Thomas Aquinas’s fundamental distinction between two types of love: the love of wanting (amor concupiscentiae), where one loves something as a good for oneself, and the love of wishing well (amor amicitiae), where one genuinely desires good for the beloved. Berquist illustrates this distinction through concrete examples from human relationships, marriage, religious life, and Shakespeare’s works, demonstrating how this distinction clarifies what constitutes true friendship and authentic charity, both toward others and toward God.
6. The Good and Knowledge as Causes of Love #
This lecture explores Thomas Aquinas’s foundational analysis of love in Summa Theologiae II-II, Question 27, establishing that the good is the primary cause of love because it is the proper object of the desiring power. Berquist addresses key objections—including whether the bad can be loved, and whether beauty and knowledge constitute distinct causes—while using Shakespearean examples to illustrate how knowledge of the good moves the heart to love. The lecture demonstrates that bad things are never loved as bad, but only insofar as they appear good in some limited way, and that knowledge is a cause of love precisely because it presents the good to be desired.
7. Knowledge and Likeness as Causes of Love #
This lecture explores how knowledge and likeness function as causes of love in Thomistic philosophy, building on the principle that the good is the object of love. Berquist examines the objections to knowledge as a cause of love, explains why we can love something more than we know it, and then introduces likeness as a distinct cause of love. Through extensive Shakespeare examples and literary illustrations, the lecture demonstrates how both knowledge (as the good becomes known) and likeness (as similarity between beings) move the will to love.
8. Likeness as a Cause of Love: Thomistic Analysis #
This lecture examines whether likeness (similitudo) is a cause of love, addressing the apparent paradox that similar people often compete and hate one another while maintaining that Thomistic philosophy reconciles this through careful distinctions. Berquist explores two types of likeness—actual (act to act) and potential (ability to act)—and explains how likeness per se causes love while competition per accidens may cause hate. The discussion integrates literary examples, philosophical objections, and the theological implications of loving God versus neighbor.
9. The Causes of Love: Good, Knowledge, Likeness, and Hope #
This lecture explores Thomas Aquinas’s analysis of the four causes of love: the good, knowledge, likeness, and other emotions/acts of the will (particularly hope). Berquist examines how these causes relate to one another, addresses objections to each cause, and emphasizes Augustine and Thomas’s teaching that being loved—especially with unselfish love—is the supreme motivator of love in return. The lecture connects these philosophical causes to theological virtue and pastoral practice.
10. Union as the First Effect of Love #
This lecture examines union (unio) as the primary and formal effect of love, distinguishing between union by affection (emotional attachment) and union in things (physical presence). Berquist explores how love creates attachment even in absence, analyzes Thomas Aquinas’s response to objections about how union can be an effect of love, and uses Shakespeare’s romantic scenes to illustrate the paradox of two becoming one through love.
11. Love’s Effects: Union, Indwelling, and Ecstasy #
This lecture examines three primary effects of love according to Thomas Aquinas: union between lover and beloved, mutual indwelling (adhesio), and ecstasy (standing outside oneself). Berquist explores how love operates through both the knowing power (keeping the beloved in mind and seeking knowledge of them) and the desiring power (affection and tendency toward the beloved), demonstrating the superiority of love over knowledge in achieving real union. He distinguishes between the love of wanting and the love of friendship, showing how each produces different kinds of union and ecstasy, and illustrates these philosophical principles through extensive examples from Shakespeare and other literature.
12. Jealousy and Zeal: The Fourth Effect of Love #
This lecture explores the fourth effect of love in Thomas Aquinas’s treatise—jealousy and zeal—as natural movements against impediments to what one loves. Berquist distinguishes between jealousy (arising from the love of wanting, moving against obstacles to one’s possession or enjoyment) and zeal (arising from the love of wishing well, moving against threats to the beloved’s good). Through literary examples from Shakespeare, novels, and Scripture, the lecture examines how this effect demonstrates love’s intensity and how it differs fundamentally from hatred, while addressing the apparent paradox that jealousy can cause strife yet remain rooted in love rather than malice.
13. Love as Perfecting or Corrupting the Lover #
This lecture examines whether love is a passion that harms or perfects the lover, drawing on Thomas Aquinas’s analysis of love’s effects. Berquist explores the distinction between love of good objects (which perfect the lover) and love of bad objects (which corrupt), contrasting this with knowledge (which is always formally good). Through extensive Shakespeare quotations and literary examples, he demonstrates how love shapes one’s character and actions, and addresses the relationship between love and reason, love and weakness, and the bodily vs. formal aspects of the passion of love.
14. Love as the First Cause of All Human Action #
This lecture examines Thomas Aquinas’s thesis that love is the fundamental cause underlying all human actions and passions. Berquist explores how love relates to the good and the end, how other passions (desire, fear, anger, hate) arise from and presuppose love as their first cause, and addresses the classical objection that humans act from other sources like choice, ignorance, and contrary passions. The lecture draws heavily on literary examples from Shakespeare and Dickens to illustrate how love motivates human behavior.
15. Aristotle’s Six Reasons for Studying Friendship #
This lecture presents Aristotle’s foundational arguments for why friendship (φιλία) deserves serious study in ethics and political philosophy. Berquist develops each of Aristotle’s six reasons, examining friendship’s necessity in human life across all conditions, its natural foundation in familial bonds and human solidarity, its superiority to justice in holding cities together, and its intrinsic nobility as a good worthy of pursuit for its own sake. The lecture also introduces the classical debate over whether friendship arises from similarity or opposition, settling this question by distinguishing natural philosophy from the ethical study of human customs and passions.
16. Envy and Flattery as Vices Opposed to Friendship #
This lecture explores envy and flattery as vices that either oppose or complicate friendship. Berquist examines envy—defined as sadness over another’s good fortune—as fundamentally incompatible with the mutual goodwill required for friendship, drawing on observations from three major English novelists and extensive examples from Shakespeare and Homer. The lecture also addresses flattery as a less directly opposed but still complex phenomenon in friendship, distinguishing between the honest eye of a true friend and the eye of a flatterer.
17. Friendship, Self-Love, and the Three Kinds of Friendship #
This lecture explores the nature of friendship through literary examples, particularly Shakespeare’s plays, examining how friendship relates to self-love, virtue, and the three kinds of friendship (utility, pleasure, and virtue). Berquist analyzes the paradox that true friendship requires proper self-love and asks whether Polonius’s advice to be true to oneself necessarily prevents falsehood to others, using Proteus’s betrayal in The Two Gentlemen of Verona as a counterexample to explore the distinction between reason/will and passion as the true self.
18. Self-Love, Friendship, and the Nature of True Affection #
This lecture explores the relationship between self-love and friendship, distinguishing between excessive self-love (pride) that prevents affection and proper self-love that enables it. Through Shakespeare’s portrayals of characters like Beatrice and literary examples of friendship, Berquist examines how friendship requires time, choice, mutual knowledge of goodwill, and how likeness of character draws friends together while explaining apparent contradictions to this principle.
19. Friendship: Definition, Types, and the Perfect Friendship #
This lecture explores Aristotle’s analysis of friendship (φιλία) through careful examination of its essential components: mutual goodwill, knowledge, and a lovable object. Berquist distinguishes three forms of friendship among equals—based on utility, pleasure, and virtue—arguing that only friendship grounded in virtue constitutes perfect friendship. The lecture emphasizes how friendship requires not merely emotion but choice rooted in habit, and how the virtuous are simultaneously useful and pleasant to one another in ways that make their friendship stable and enduring.
20. The Habit and Act of Friendship; Trust and Living Together #
This lecture examines the distinction between friendship as a habit (stable disposition) and friendship as an act (living together and mutual enjoyment), drawing on Aristotle’s analysis of how friendship develops through habituation rather than emotion. Berquist explores the necessity of trust grounded in demonstrated virtue, the importance of living together for friendship’s continuation, and how the three kinds of friendship differ in their stability and trustworthiness. The lecture also clarifies the relationship between choice, habit, and friendship, arguing that genuine friendship proceeds from deliberate choice rooted in habituation, not mere passion.
21. Friendship Among Equals and the Problem of Inequality #
This lecture explores Aristotle’s account of perfect friendship and its practical realization among human beings. Berquist examines why perfect friendship is rare and difficult to sustain, analyzing the three kinds of friendship (based on virtue, pleasure, and utility), the role of habit and choice in forming friendships, and the fundamental problem of inequality that makes perfect friendship impossible or extremely difficult when great disparity exists between parties. The lecture culminates in a theological reflection on how the Incarnation addresses the seemingly insurmountable distance between God and humanity.
22. Unequal Friendships and the Nature of Loving #
This lecture examines Aristotle’s analysis of friendships between unequals—such as parent-child, husband-wife, ruler-ruled, and God-man relationships—showing how genuine friendship can exist despite different virtues, works, and reasons for loving. Berquist explores the principle of proportional equality in unequal friendships, addresses the problem of infinite inequality, and culminates in an analysis of whether friendship consists more in loving or being loved, with references to Homer, Scripture, and Christian theology.
23. Friendship Consists More in Loving Than Being Loved #
Berquist examines Aristotle’s claim that friendship consists more essentially in the act of loving than in being loved. Through logical and virtue-ethical analysis, he demonstrates that loving is an intrinsic act of perfection in the lover, while being loved is merely an extrinsic denomination dependent on another’s act. The lecture uses maternal love as the paradigmatic example of this principle and addresses why humans naturally seek to be loved more than to love, attributing this to a defect in our actual friendships rather than to the nature of friendship itself.