Prima Pars
Lecture 60: God's Knowledge: Science, Immateriality, and Self-Understanding

Transcript
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article, right? Because we've considered already in questions, what, 3 through 11, right, the substance of God, and now we've considered this first act of God, understanding himself, right? And it's only until you know something about the substance of God and something about his understanding that you would ever even raise the question, are these really two things in God like they are in what? In us, yeah. Yeah. The first thing, also like, is it a consideration of the existence of this knowledge? Yeah. And then the fourth starts to be the nature? Yeah, what it is, you know, yeah. Yeah. So just like we asked, you know, whether God exists in the second question before we ask them, well, what is God then? So here we first ask whether there is knowledge in God, right? Whether he is understanding in God. And then secondly, what it is that he understands, right? And then how he understands it, right? Okay? That's kind of a natural way of proceeding, yeah? Yeah. You know, when I talk about what a philosopher is, well, he's a lover of wisdom, right? So what is it he loves? Well, he loves wisdom. Then we've got to talk about what wisdom is, right? But then I talk about how must he love wisdom, right? Well, he must love it for its own sake more than anything else that he loves for its own sake. And it's the very end or purpose of his life, right? So, obviously, you want to know whether God knows himself or not before you want to know whether he comprehends himself, right? So the order there is altogether clear, right? Now, the fifth article is whether God understands anything besides himself, right? And some people misunderstand Aristotle when he's talking about the divine knowledge at the end of the 12th book of wisdom, and where he speaks of God as knowing himself, right? As if God doesn't know anything else besides himself, which is not Aristotle's position. And some people think, though, that Aristotle is saying he knows only himself, right? What Aristotle is talking about is what God knows, what, chiefly or primarily. And it's only by knowing himself that he knows other things. He doesn't know anything else as his principal or chief object, right? But, I mean, Thomas had seen in Aristotle in at least two places, you know, he shows that the position of Pedocles about knowing, right, involves a consequence that we know something God doesn't know. For Aristotle, that's absurd, that we know something that God doesn't know. So, obviously, he's not talking about, you know, everything God knows, but what he knows primarily there in the 12th book, huh? It's probably come up in the, I wouldn't be surprised if it came up in the objections, huh? Okay? We'll get there far, that far today, but, okay? So there's some people who make a great mistake and think that God knows only himself and knows nothing else, huh? Okay? And that's the greatest mistake there about other things. But then there are those who admit that in a way he knows other things, but only in a very general way. He doesn't have an altogether, what, distinct and particular knowledge of them, right? He knows them as beings or something, right? So, in a way that to some extent is the question, of how he knows them, right, huh? He knows them not just in, what, some general way or some vague way because there would be some imperfection in God, right? Okay? Now, the next one, whether the knowledge of God is discursive. We've talked about discourse before there in the definition of reason, when Shakespeare defines reason as the ability for large discourse, looking before and after, right? And the discourse that defines reason is the act of coming to know what you don't know to what you do know, right? So there's a kind of motion, huh? Discourse comes from the Latin word to run hither, thither. So reason runs from one thing to another, right? It knows one thing and then through that it eventually comes to know something else. Well, someone might think, if God knows other things, the knowing himself, then isn't there a discourse in God, he knows himself and then he draws some conclusions from that sort of thing. Like, you know, we know the thing about the parallel lines and we draw some conclusions later on about the triangle that we didn't see at first when he learned these things about the triangle, about the parallel lines, right? Well, of course, he's going to deny that of God, right? There's not the shadow of any change in God as St. James says in the epistle. So you can see how six and seven, although in different ways, follow upon where he understands something besides himself, right? How well does he understand it? Does he understand it by going from himself to those things, by kind of movement of his mind? No, no. In seeing himself, he sees other things. And I suppose we add to that too, then, is whether the knowledge of God is a cause of what? Of things, right? Okay. So those three questions, six, seven, eight, are kind of general questions that arise once we know that God in some way knows things other than himself, right? Okay. Now, the next group of questions, nine through what? Fifteen, maybe it's those sixteen there too, but certainly nine through fifteen are particular things, huh? That seem to involve some difficulty, right? Where the knowledge of God is of those things which are not. Does he know what doesn't exist? Does he know what I was doing yesterday? Does he know what I'm going to be doing tomorrow? Okay. There might be some problem about it, you know. So he might think, well, he can't know those things, right? Um, does he have a knowledge of bad things, huh? Some of you might think, well, it's not going to contaminate him a bit if he knows those bad things, right? Because you have a knowledge of singulars. Well, of course, in the case of our understanding, we know directly only the universal. The thing is singular when sensed, as Boethius says, universal when understood, right? When I see this over here, it's an individual matter with my senses. When I understand what that is, a man, I'm understanding something universal. So is the divine mind like that? It understands universal, but not the singular, because it doesn't have a body, it doesn't have senses, right? Right. Well, God, and for that matter, the angels know singulars in a, what, quite different way than we do. But our reason can't know the singular directly or indirectly by going back in a way to the senses. You can see how problems can arise about these things. Does God know an infinity of things? Well, how could anybody know an infinity of things, huh? Of course, the answer is going to be to all of these, yes. But there's a difficulty, a particular difficulty about each one of them, so Thomas takes them up. He does the same thing in the Summa Cognitiva. There's going to be a separate chapter in each one of these things. Whether he has a knowledge of future contingent things, right? Because you know I'm going to play baseball tomorrow or not, right? Or listen to Don Giovanni tomorrow or not, right? Or listen to Bach or something, right? Okay. Whether it's of annunciables, right? Well, in the second act of reason, Thomas Fowling Aristotle calls that compositio indivisio, right? Because in the second act, you put two things together in a, what, affirmative statement, or you divide them in a negative statement, huh? So there's a kind of composition there, subject and predicate and popular or noun and verb, right? Well, God, we've learned, is altogether simple, right? And as we learned earlier here, God's operation is his substance, so that's altogether simple too. Well, can he have statements then in his mind, right? Any statements in God, right? See? But that seems to involve some kind of, what, composition, right? Yeah, yeah. And whether the knowledge of God is variable, right? See? He put those together, it could be an M there in his mind, huh? Or he put things together, there's some kind of composition in them. It's not altogether, but simple. Whether the knowledge of God is variable, huh? And I couldn't think changes for example right I know you're sitting but you know you stand up in a few minutes then I'll know something else right my knowledge will change right and the last article whether the knowledge which God has of things is speculative or what practical right we'll find out when I get there so let's look at the first article here I mentioned before here the word scientia is the Latin word used to translate episteme in Greek and episteme names what we could perhaps call in English a reasoned out knowledge right then okay and so geometry would be example of scientia right okay now when I'm I haven't been the last few minutes you're thinking about geometry at the beginning of class I was right but geometry exists in me in a kind of what habitual form right now if you ask me to prove the theogran theorem I'll go to the board and I'll prove it to you if you want to say I'm pretty impressed with that way so with a few little theorems I do know um so but most of the time my geometry is in me just in the habitual form well does God have any habits uh say well he says science is a habit and it's only the science that we know right which does not belong to God why because a habit is in between what ability and act and Aristotle gives an example right he says um there's two kinds of ability here one is before I've learned geometry right now after I've learned geometry I'm in a way an act my mind right but if I'm not actually thinking about the things I still have a certain ability that can be actualized what further right now okay so my geometry is more an act when I was demonstrating those things at the board than it is right now when it's only what yeah I don't have to go back and learn these things again at least the ones that I remember you see so um a habit is in between ability and act right it's act with respect to the man who hasn't learned the science yet right but the kid will learn it right but it still has a kind of ability to be actually thinking about these things huh so it's in between ability and act but we've learned before that God is pure act right so there's no habits in God huh so if science is a habit there's no science in God that's okay okay moreover science is a knowledge of conclusions it's a knowledge caused by another right so I sometimes translate that word ecustamia is a reasoned out knowledge right what you reason out is a conclusion from the premises you reason out that the interior angles of the triangle could be right angles so it's a knowledge of conclusions and that's caused by the premises and so um the premises of the sojism are in a sense a cause of conclusion but there's nothing caused in God he's the first clause therefore there's no science in God right these arguments are good at least they're showing that that there's no science in God like the science we have yeah moreover every science is either universal or what particular but in God there is nothing universal and what particular as is clear from the things before therefore in God there is no what science on now against all this is what the apostle says now who's the apostle yeah what's the figure of speech there uh peter and uh paul are called what apostles by antono messiah um it's a little bit like when when john paul is second with son and jeffredic peter and paul is the princes of the apostles right okay and i guess you'll find this somebody in scripture you know in the canonical epistles and so on that peter and paul identify themselves as an apostle more so than the other ones do but that's by what antono messiah this is aristotle's called the philosopher by antono messiah or homer homer the poet but against this is what the apostle says in the epistle to the romans chapter 11 oh the altitude the highness on the height of the riches of the wisdom and the science of god okay so as thomas said the argument for authority is the strongest in theology the weakest in philosophy but the strongest in theology okay okay so now he's going to reply to this i answer it should be said that in god most perfectly is there what science or knowledge now he's going to show that well to the evidence of this huh it should be considered and that knowing things right those who know are distinguished from those that don't know in this or by this because those not knowing anything they have nothing but their own what form so a rock has only the form or the nature of a stone right or rock and the tree the poor tree out there is only the nature of a tree right but the one knowing is naturally apt to have the form even of another thing right so we can say in my eyes i look around this room it has the shape of the blessed virgin statue over there it's got the shape of the clock it's got the shape of your head it's got the shape of the glass got the shape of the book it's got all these different shapes right if you take a piece of wood and give the same piece of wood the shape of the blessed virgin statue the shape of the clock the shape of the cup the shape of the chair you know no piece of wood it's just a non-knower and all it has is its own shape right why my eye which is one of my sense powers uh is able to receive all these other shapes huh okay there's a difference between a knowing and a non-knower so sometimes they speak of knowing as receiving the form of another as other right while retaining your own so when i look at the statue over there does my eye take on the shape of the statue but it retains its own shape right but it receives the shape of the statue okay look at the book the shape of the book is in my eye right does my eye take on the shape of a book you see that some of the greeks got in the eve you know and they would uh and reminded them later you know you see you look in somebody's eye and you see what yourself right yeah so like you know your shape is in the thing yeah but that's not really knowing the way the form is in there but i guess when they look closely up in the shape they see what again uh juan diego and and the bishop i guess too huh isn't that the thing but the knower is naturally apt to have the form even of another thing right for the species or the form of the known is in the what knower right once it is manifest that the nature of a thing that doesn't know is more contracted right more what limited right why the nature of things that know have a greater what amplitude and extension right and a kind of which the philosopher says in the third book about the soul and this is after he's considered what this all the sense powers right and considered the understanding right so he's considered all the what knowing powers right and then he stops and reflects upon what can be said about the soul on the basis of what we see in it right and in kind of which the philosopher and that's again it then tona messiah that same figure of speech and the third book about the soul that the soul is in some way all things because all sensible forms are received in the senses and the natures of things are received in the what Understanding, yeah. When you have the definition of a thing, that's the way that you have very explicitly the nature of another thing. Okay. Now, the coarctatio, the confining, so to speak, the narrowing of the form is through what? Matter. Whence we have said above that forms, according as they are more immaterial, according to this, they more exceed to a certain what? Infinity, right? That's why what Kierkegaard says, you know, not being married gives you a kind of infinity, right? But getting married is like being contracted, you know? So I says to one of my philosophical friends who knows his teaching, you know, what is it like to get married? He says, well, it's like a form to be contracted to matter. To be very limited. And down to the here and now, you see? I remember one of my colleagues there, you know, who was very much into political philosophy, right? And he studied with the Straussians and so on. And he thought of himself as a what? Political philosopher, right? So he was. He was interested in those universal questions of political things. Why he said, my wife thinks of me as a professor at Assumption College, huh? See, you know, very contracted to, you know, here and now, this place, right? So, once we said above that forms, according as they are more immaterial, according to this, they exceed more to a certain what? Infinity. Once it is clear that immateriality is something, is the reason that it is what? Knowing. And according to the way of being immaterial is the way of what? Knowing, huh? Once in the second book about the soul, Aristotle says, huh? It is said that plants do not know on account of their, what? Materiality, right? Just compare the bark of the tree, you know, with your, what? Flesh, right? Which is still kind of a material thing, huh? But I know with your flesh there, your skin, you know, you press a certain shape into it, and then it comes back into his own shape, right? Keeps it shaped, huh? And that's part of the reason, too, why even in the most material kind of knowing, in a sense, by touch, you get, say, into the shower or something like that, right? You feel the warmth of the water more when you first get in than after you've been in there for a while, and you might turn the heat up a little bit if you're in there that long, right? And when I, you know, go into the ocean or something like that, it takes a little while to get adjusted to it. I think I'm going to have a hard time if I don't, I can't, you know, rush out there into the water, you know? But then your body gradually adjusts to it, right? But as you receive the coolness of the water as the temperature of your own body, you don't sense it as much, right? As you receive it in a more material way, in other words, huh? In the way matter receives, huh? Matter receives the coolness of something as its own temperature, right? So it's very important in the sense that man has, to some extent, a stable temperature, right, by nature, because that makes him able to know the temperature of things better, right? But as they say, you don't sense the coolness of the water or the ocean after you've been in the water for a while as much as you did when you first went in. Once in the second book about the soul, Aristotle says, it is said, that plants do not know and encounter their materiality. But the sense in those, because it's receptive of the forms of things without their, what, matter, right? And so you receive, let's say, the shape and the colors of your friends, right? And so you recognize them, you see them, right? But if you cut open your head, you find a little piece of bone chiseled out and the shape of everybody you know. A little piece of flesh, right? See? You've got the shapes of your friends and other things you recognize in the room, recognize in the book, and so on. Not in a material way, right? As if there's a piece of flesh or bone or something that has been chiseled out in the shape of these things. I've got rows of statues up here for everybody that I know and recall. And the understanding is even more knowing, huh? In the senses. Because it is more separated from matter and it's not mixed with it. As Aristotle shows in the third book about the soul. We've talked about that before. Whence, since God is in the summit of immateriality, right? It follows that he is in the summit of what? Knowledge. Knowing. Okay? That's the way Thomas shows it here. Now, the first objection to there being the shien tse and God is that the shien tse we have is a habit, right? And the habit is in between act and ability and how can it be in God who's a pure act? Saw it back in the question of simplicity of God. To the first, therefore, it should be said, because the perfections that proceed from God into creatures are in a higher way in God, as has been said above, right? It is necessary that whenever some name is taken from some perfection of the creature, right? It should be attributed to God. That one takes away from it, from its meaning, all that which pertains to the imperfect way which belongs in the creature. Whence the knowledge that... Whence knowledge is not a quality in God, right? An accident, in other words, or a habit, but his very substance and its, what? Pure act. Okay? Now, sometimes, you know, what we do, and you find Thomas often saying this, when you transfer these names to God, you drop the genus and keep the, what? Difference, right? Because the genus is taken from what's material in the thing, right? And the difference of what is formal, and therefore perfect, right? So you keep the idea of the difference and drop the, what? The genus, huh? Okay? But you drop whatever pertains to imperfection. So in Aristotle, for example, defines demonstration, who's the syllogism that produces science. All these are demonstrations here that produce the science of geometry in my mind, you know? He says a demonstration is a syllogism making us know the cause, and that of which it is the cause, and it cannot be otherwise. We drop all the idea of syllogizing and making someone to know something they didn't know already, right? And keep just what's of perfection, knowing the cause, and that of which it is the cause, and it cannot be otherwise. And that belongs much more perfectly to God than to us, right? But it doesn't have to syllogize, it doesn't have to reason from one thing to another to know the cause, and that of which it is the cause, and that it cannot be otherwise. You see? So you drop out part of the, what? Meaning, right? And keep the, what? What's of our perfection, and what's of our form in there. Okay? So that's one way in which a name becomes, what? Equivocal by reason, no? It's kind of beautiful in the, in the Summa Contra Gentiles, you know, when Thomas is talking about how the names of emotions are carried over to the, to the acts of the will. And when you do so, you keep the formal aspect of the emotion, but you drop the idea of what? Of the body and the bodily change, right? And then these names that are carried over to the acts of the will, some of them can be carried all the way over to God, if they don't imply any imperfection, even as far as the will is concerned. So you can carry over love, and joy to God, but not desire, because desire is for a good you don't have. But love can be for a good that you have, and even more so for a good that you have than when you don't have. And joy is when you possess the good, right? So properly speaking in God, there can be joy and love, but not desire or wanting. And there can't be hope, because that again, probably don't have the good that you're hoping to get, huh? And there can't be sadness in God, because then there's something bad that happened to him, right? And so on. So it's kind of interesting there to see the way those names are carried over, but originally from the emotions to the acts of the will, by dropping out, are they meaning, right? And eventually, some of them that don't... Pertain, don't have any imperfection in their meaning, can be carried all the way over to God, right? Once you've talked about that material aspect. Now the second one, science senses of conclusions is a knowledge caused by another. So Aristotle speaks of the premises of syllogism as being the efficient cause of the conclusion. So in the definition there of syllogism, we say it's what, speech in which some statements laid down. Another follows necessarily because of those laid down, right? So this idea of cause and effect, the premises are causes of the effect, the conclusion. Well, this won't be found in God. To the second it should be said that those things which are divided and multiplied in creatures, in God are simply, and what? Yeah. And also they put simple and united together there, right? Even though in the treatise there, they're what? First and the last of the five attributes, huh? Inclusion. I was thinking about the Trinity doing this, Subha Kandijantila, as you know, and he says, well, the God's understanding is simple and one and perfect. They put simple and one right together there, see? And then his act of the will is simple and one. Therefore, there can't be two words in God or two loves in God and so on, see? So those things which are divided and multiplied, multiple in creatures, in God are simply in a united way, as has been said above. Man, however, according to the data, diverse things he knows has diverse knowledges. For according as he knows the beginnings, he said to have, what, understanding, or I sometimes call it natural understanding. Science, according as he knows conclusions, right? Wisdom, according as he knows the, what, highest or the first cause. Counsel or prudence, foresight, according as he knows things doable, right? And these are most of the virtues of reason that Aristotle talks about. But all of these things God by una and specie, one and a simple knowledge knows, as will be clear below, right? Whence the simple knowledge of God is able to be named by all these names, right? But such that from each of them, according as it is going to be said of God, it comes into the divine predication. Predication means, what, being said of. One secludes or takes away, right? Whatever is of imperfection and retains whatever is of, what, perfection, right? And according to this, it is said in the book of Job, chapter 12, before him is wisdom and fortitude, right? He has counsel and, what, understanding, right? Okay. He knows what to do. He doesn't have to, you know, investigate. Yeah. Even if, in perfection, I guess, take it away. Decisions, decisions. Now, the last one is about the universal in particular. To the third, it should be said that science is according to the way of the knower. For the known is in the one knowing according to the way of the knower. It comes down to the general principle, that what is in something is in it according to the way of the receiver, which I like to recall when I was teaching, you know, a whole class of people, you know, three people, you know. And what is received, you know, and what is received according to the mood of the receiver, right? So, so, and one person, you know, if you see it very perfectly, you know, they don't seem to understand what you say. And some people, it's hardly in there, right? It's like falling on the stone. But, and therefore, since the way of the divine substance or essence is higher than the way of the creature, in which the creatures are, the divine science does not have the way of the creative science, that it be universal or particular, right? Or in habit or in potency, right? Or disposed according to any such, what, mode, huh? Okay. Going back to the body of the article, you know, the fundamental thing to see there is that immateriality is the root of knowledge, huh? And then God is in the summit of immateriality, and therefore he must be in the summit of knowing, right? But then you remove all the imperfection of what? The creature is what? Knowledge from God, huh? Why don't we take a little break here? What? We'll break this time. We'll break this time. We'll break this time. We'll break this time. We'll break this time. We'll break this time. We'll break this time. We'll break this time. Look at the second article here, right? Which is about what God chiefly knows, huh? It's asked. The second one proceeds thus. It seems that God does not understand himself, right? For it is said in the book de Causis, huh? Now that, you know, it's got a long history, the book de Causis. They first thought it was by Aristotle, and then it's actually by, what? But an Arab who had taken it from Proclus, I guess, and kind of contracted it. So Thomas has a commentary on the book de Causis. It's like the last books of wisdom, philosophic wisdom. For it is said in the book de Causis that everyone, knowing, who knows his own, what? Essence or nature or substance is returning to his own essence by a complete return. But God doesn't go outside his essence. Nor in any way is he moved. And therefore it does not belong to him to return to his own essence. Therefore he doesn't, what? Know his own essence, huh? Of course, even we in some imperfect way return to our own essence, huh? But what we first know is things around us, right? And then we come to know our knowing them, and then the kind of mind we have, and the kind of animal we are, and turn back, coming back to ourselves, huh? So if your reason thinks out the definition of reason, like Shakespeare does there that we had, then that's like the word of God, right? And if you love what you understand, then you're like the Holy Spirit, huh? That's the image of the Trinity in us. But in a sense, when reason knows what reason is, it's coming back in a sense to itself, right? Coming back to itself. Well, God doesn't come back to himself, and he'll release himself. Moreover, to understand is a certain, what? Suffering, a certain undergoing, as Aristotle says, and to be moved, as is said in the third book about the soul. For science is an assimilation, huh? To the thing known. And the thing known is a perfection of the knower. But nothing is moved, or undergoes, or is perfected by itself, nor is a likeness to itself, is what he says. Therefore, God doesn't know himself. Moreover, especially to God, we are alike according to our understanding. Because according to our mind, and that maybe includes the will, too, we are to the image of God, as Augustine says. But our understanding doesn't understand itself, except insofar as it understands other things, as is said in the third book about the soul. Therefore, neither does God understand himself, except perhaps in understanding other things. But against this is what is said in the first epistle of the Corinthians, chapter 2. The things which are of God, or pertain to God, no one knows except the Spirit of God. So God knows himself. That's the end, you know, that comes up a lot, that's kind of a strange way the Scripture has it speaking. You know, where it says in the Gospels, no one knows the Father except the Son, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Well, doesn't the Son know the Son, and the Holy Spirit know that, you know? And that way Scripture is insinuating, right, that those things that pertain to the nature of God, right, are common to all, even though they're said to only, what, be known by this one person. And here he says, no one knows this except the Spirit of God, right? That's the Holy Spirit. But the Father also knows it, and the Son also knows it. So you can see how the heretics can, you know, have a problem with those texts, or misuse them, I should say. I answer it should be said that God understands himself, through himself, right, to the knowledge of which it should be known, that although in the operations, which go outside to an outside effect, the object of the operation, which is signified as its term or limit, is something outside the one operating. Nevertheless, in those operations, which are in the one operating, the object, which is signified as the limit of the operation, is in the one operating himself. And according as it is in him, thus there is operation act. Whence it is said in the book about the soul, Baristado, that the sensible in act is a sense in act, and the understandable in act is the understanding in act. For from this, we sense something in act, or we understand, because our understanding or sense is informed in act by the form of the sensible or the, what, understandable, right? So your color and your shape have to act upon my eye before I see you. And in a sense, my seeing you is a result of, what, your color and shape being, what, impressed upon my eye. So in a way my eye in act, it's actually seeing, is, what, your color and shape being the same thing as my eye in a way. And according to this, only is sense or understanding other from the sensible or the understandable, because both are in, what, only an ability, which, of course, is not true about God, eh? Okay? So my, what, eye is an ability as far as knowing your color and shape at first, right? And your color and shape is able to be known, but it's not actually known by me, right? Okay? But later on, they become one when you act upon my eye, right? But since, therefore, God has nothing of potentiality, but God is pure act, eh? See how important that ninth book of wisdom is, eh? The whole ninth book of wisdom is about, what, act and ability, right? And after Aristotle distinguishes the various kinds of ability and act, then in the third and culminating part of the ninth book, he talks about the order of act and ability. And one of the orders that he talks about is that although the thing that goes from ability to act is an ability before it's an act, it goes from ability to act because of something already in act. So simply speaking, in the universe, act is before ability. And therefore, the first thing, the first cause, must be pure act. And so he's bringing that out again here, right? Since, therefore, God has nothing of potentiality, but is pure act, it is necessary that in him the understanding and the understood are altogether the same thing, right? In all ways. Thus, so that he neither, what, lacks the understandable form as our understanding does when it understands in ability, right? Nor is the understandable form other from the very substance of the divine understanding, as happens in our understanding, when it is act, enact understanding. But the understandable form of the divine mind is the divine understanding, what? Itself, right? And thus, he understands himself through himself, right? And this, incidentally, is true about the angels, right? They understand themselves through themselves. They don't understand everything through understanding themselves like God does, right? But we don't understand ourselves through ourselves, we understand other things, and then we come back and think about our understanding and say, oh yeah, I'm an intellectual creature, and then we start to know ourselves a bit, right? We know ourselves through knowing other things, huh? I know what a triangle is and it's the universe, and that's something universal. Yeah. Universal must be separated from matter. You might understand it must be material, right? I start to know myself, right? But I have to know the triangle first before I can know how I know, that my knowing is in material. So, it's not the way God knows. Yeah? See, if God understood by... some form other than himself, then he'd be in what? Ability for this other form. And then he wouldn't be pure act, he wouldn't be simple, right? So if he understands by the form which is himself, what does he understand primarily? Yeah, he'd understand that of which he had the form. So he has to understand primarily himself and owning himself, right? But in seeing himself, as we'll learn later on, he sees other things. Because he's the cause of them and they all have a certain likeness to him and so on. Okay, the first objection was taken from the Book of Causes there. To the first, therefore, it should be said that to return to one's own essence is nothing other than a thing to subsist in itself. For a form, insofar as it perfects matter by giving it being, is in a way poured out upon the matter. But insofar as in itself it has being, it comes back to what? Itself, right? So if our soul had being only in the body, right? It'd be kind of poured out in the body, right? And its existence would be limited to the body. But our soul has existence not only in the body. How do we know that? Well, you have to exist before you can do anything. And when we study understanding the universal, we come to realize that understanding the universal is not in the body. If it was in the body, it would be in the, what? Continuous. And what's in the continuous is here or there, and therefore singular. So if things are received in the understanding universally and not as singular, then the universal, the understanding rather, must be what? Immaterial. When you study, you know, the source of individuation in material things, it's always what matter, right? So if we know the natures of things in separation from matter, that's a sign that our mind itself is something immaterial. It's not because of the things we know, because they're material. Okay. Knowing powers which are not subsistent, but are the acts of some bodily organs, do not know themselves, just as is clear in the senses themselves. So it's not only the hand does know what a hand is, but does the eye know what an eye is? Does the ear know what an ear is? It's only reason that knows what reason is. You know, the famous invitation of the seven wise men of Greece that include Thales, the first philosopher, and Solon, the lawgiver, by circus and so on. But they said, what? Gnothi Sautan, know thyself, right? And you've heard me talk about that before, but to whom is that addressed, know thyself? To us, right? You know, it's addressed to someone who is able to know himself, but doesn't know himself, or know himself well, right? And so, it's not addressed to the animals, and a fortiori, not to the plants and the stones, because they can't really know themselves. And it's not addressed to the angels of God, because they know themselves primarily. So, it's addressed to man, right? But you could say also that it's more addressed to our soul than to our body, right? Because our soul can know what a soul is as well as what a body is. But the body can't know what a soul is. But it's addressed most of all to our reason, right? Because that's the only part of our soul that can know itself. So, they said, know thyself. They're saying, you know, read Shakespeare's Exhitation there to use reason. So, it's your reason might know itself, right? I didn't know I was the ability for a large discourse, looking before and after. That's what I am. And Thomas compares that, and he's talking about the image of the Trinity in us, that when our reason forms a definition of itself, right? When it proceeds from our reason a thought about itself, right? It's a little bit like God the Son proceeding from the Father. It's the word of the Father, right? Like in the other Ote de Vote, Neil, Hope, Verbo, Veritatis, Verius. Nothing more true than this word of truth itself, right? And then once reason knows what reason is, then you see how lovable reason is. And then you have something like the preceding of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son, the Spirit of God. There's a several text, you know, where the Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of what? Of God, huh? It's kind of neglected that name of him, right? But, you know, just as we call the second person, you know, the Son of God, right? So we could call the third person the, what, Spirit or Breath of God. Though we usually call the third person the Holy Spirit, huh? But you could call him the Spirit of God, huh? Occasionally he's called the Spirit of the Lord, too, but more commonly the Spirit of God, the Breath of God. But knowing powers which are per se subsistent know themselves. In account of this it is said in the Book of Causes that the one knowing its own, what, nature returns to its own, what, nature. But to subsist per se most of all belongs to God, huh? Once, according to this way of speaking, he is most of all returning to his essence, huh? And knowing himself, huh? Okay. Yeah. Although as I say that way of speaking insofar as implies motion is not properly God, huh? But you have something like that, you know, in the creation where on the seventh day God, what, rested from everything he had made and kind of like returned to himself, right, huh? But it's a kind of way of speaking that is more appropriate maybe to the creature who has to return to itself by a, what, operation that is something other than his very substance, huh? The second objection was Aristotle says in the third book about the soul when he's talking about our understanding that it's a kind of undergoing and being moved, right? It's interesting our word understand, right? Stand under as if you've been acted upon. But nothing is moved or undergoes or is perfected by itself. Okay. To the second it should be said that to be moved and to undergo are taken equivocally, right? According as to understand is said to be a certain, what, undergoing or suffering, right? This is clear in the third book about the soul. Of course, Aristotle will point that out in the third book about the soul. If you talk about sensing as undergoing even that's equivocally. Now, as I mentioned before, I think we talk about those words. I have a problem here in translating and in English, but you see, in Greek, the Greek word Aristotle uses, pascain and so on, in the Latin word pascio, has first of all the meaning of what? Suffering, right? Now, suffering is something bad. And when you suffer, you are what? Active upon a way that is, what, destructive of you, right? Now, in English, the word suffering seems to have stopped in that meaning. But the Latin word pascio, in the Greek word pascain, let's say, finit in there, is moved from that first meaning, right? And it seems to be moved by dropping part of its, what, meaning, right? So, the Latin word is, what, the Latin word the Latin word the Latin word