Prima Secundae
Lecture 95: Causes of Pleasure: Liberality, Benefaction, Likeness, and Wonder

Transcript
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In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Thank you, God. Thank you, Guardian Angels. Thank you, Thomas Aquinas. God, our Enlightenment, Guardian Angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, or to illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. St. Thomas Aquinas, an angelic doctor. And help us to understand all that you have written. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. On some of these odd Latin words, you're going to have to help me, you know, okay? I'm too lazy to look like a kid in grade school. You don't want to look up the word in the dictionary, you know. To the sixth one goes forward thus, huh? It seems to do well to another is not a cause of, what? Pleasure, right? For pleasure is caused from the achievement of one's own good, as has been said above. But to benefit does not pertain to the achievement of one's own good, but more to the giving up of it, huh? The sending it off, huh? Therefore, it more seems to be a cause of sadness than of pleasure. Moreover, the philosopher, you know, that's Aristotle by Antonin Messia. Moreover, the philosopher says in the fourth book of the Ethics, that illiberality is more connatural to men than prodigality, huh? Now, these are the two vices opposed to liberality. And there are the virtues taken up, the virtues and vices there are taken up right after, what? In the beginning of book four, right? Right after he talks about, what? Courage and temperance in the third book, right? Well, courage and temperance, in some way, we vary our very body, right? What reserves our body or what destroys our body, right? What seems to be mixed to that is your money, right? What's your possessions, huh? That's kind of interesting, huh? You know, they regard the very substance of us, but we speak of the wealthy man as a man of what? Substance. Substance, right? And so you take away my money, you know, you take away my support, like the Jew there says in the play, right? That's what they sometimes joke to. If somebody was very large, they refer to this man as substance. Yeah, yeah. Now notice the word illiberalitas, now that's formed by the, what, negation of liberality. Now why is one of the vices formed by the negation of the name of the virtue, and the other one, prodigality, is not? Yeah, it's further away, right? Aristotle says virtue is between two extremes, but it's closer to one extreme than the other. So courage is closer to foolhardiness than to, what, cowardice, huh? And the same way like intemperance, right? If we speak of intemperance, it's a man who, what, goes to excess, which is more opposed to temperance than a man who's puritanical. So he gets his own name or something, right? The same way here. So liberality, huh? So the vice which is more opposed to liberality is more connatural to men than prodigality, because you need that money to support yourself, right? Keep yourself in existence, huh? But the prodigality pertains to benefit others, right? To illiberality, to desist from benefiting others, huh? Therefore, the connatural operation, since therefore a connatural operation is delightful or pleasant to each one, as is said in both the Seventh and Tenth Books of the Ethics, it seems that to benefit others is not a cause of what? Pleasure, huh? A good argument, huh? And contrary effects proceed from contrary causes. But some things that pertain to modafature, to do evil to someone, right, are naturally delightful to man. What a guy this Thomas is, right? I'm wondering what Richard III. Just as to what? Overcome, right? To win, right? To what? Redagur, how would you translate that? Redagur, yeah, to kind of like reprehend in some way, uh... Okay. Yeah. Criticize others? Drink or parry? Okay. And also to punish, right? It's pleasant, right? As regards those who are angry with somebody, right? It's a pleasure out of punishing them. As the philosopher says in the first book of the rhetoric. Therefore, since contrary effects are from contrary causes, benefatria must be more the cause of sadness than of, what? Pleasure, huh? But against this is what the philosopher himself says in the second book of the politics, huh? And that to, what? Pass around a lot of stuff, right? And to aid friends, or even those who are, what, extraneous, is most delightful, huh? That's beautiful. Yeah. It was coming out about Romney, right? That he's been a very generous man, huh? Kind of amazing, some of the stories you tell about. Some guy's telling about one of them last night, and he said, well, why is he not sad? He's a very modest man. He doesn't want to blow his own trumpet, you know? But, uh... Yeah, the charitable giving is low in Massachusetts because of so many liberals, right? Liberals in the other sense of the word. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Liberals opposed to servitude. Illiberal liberals. Now, Thomas, huh? What a mind this guy had. I answer it should be said that this very thing which is to benefit another, right? To do good to another. Being able to do well to another. Can be in three ways, right? A cause of what? Pleasure, huh? Now, how do you see that? That's amazing. In one way, in comparison to the effect, which is a good constituted in, what? Another. And according to this, insofar as the good of another, we regard as our own, what? Good. On account of the union of love, huh? We delight in the good that to us comes about to others, and especially to, what? Our friends, right? So on. As in one's own, what? Good, huh? Okay. Because you do it with parents and children, and the children do well. Yeah, but he's talking about how you're doing it good to the child, right? Or giving your wife a nice gift or something, you know? You've got pleasure doing this, right? Yeah. Okay. And again, an example last night was at Bain Capital, I guess. Somebody's daughter had disappeared in New York, and they didn't know where she was, you know? You know, all these horrible things. And he closed down Bain Capital, took the 30 people working there, and he spread them out over New York in some kind of a pattern, and they found the girl. Wow. You know, but no, he just takes charge and gets something done. It's amazing, you know? Who did that? From me. From me. Yeah, Bain Capital, so he was making money. Yeah, that was... But he closed it down, and took the whole staff, and about 30 of them, I guess, and put them out in the, you know, in the search bar, you might say, or the... Oh, I don't know, back many years now, but you hear stories like this, you know? So liberal in politics is liberal with other people's money, they say. Okay. So you rejoice in doing, what, good to another, right? When another, you regard as another self. O philas estimelis autas. Friend is another self. In another way, in comparison to the end, just as when someone do this that he does good to another, hopes, huh? To achieve some good for himself, huh? Either from God or from some man, right? And we said before, like in the third article, that hope is the cause of, what, pleasure, right? Okay, now the third way, huh? In comparison to a, what, beginning. And thus, this which is to benefit another can be pleasant by comparison to a three-fold beginning, huh? Of which one is the faculty of, what? Doing well. Doing well. And according to this, or the capacity to do well, right? And according to this, to benefit another is delightful. Insofar as to this, there comes about a certain imagining, right? Of an abundant good in oneself that exists, right? From which one is able to communicate it to other. And therefore men delight in their sons and in their own. ...works, right? As to something that they have communicated their own what? Good, right? Another way, a beginning is a habit inclining us, according as to what? Benefit of another becomes a natural to somebody. So habit or virtue makes something be kind of what? It's second nature to you, right? And therefore, it's in accordance with your habit. It's not necessarily pleasant, right? When liberalists, those who have the virtue of liberality or generosity, delightfully give to others. It's in accordance with their habit, right? It just comes in. Like St. Paul says, they give cheerfully. Yeah, yeah. And the third beginning is the motive, as when someone is moved by someone whom they love, to benefiting another. For everything that we do or undergo an account of the friend are delightful, because love, especially, is the cause of what? Right. Of pleasure, right? Yeah. That's quite a distinction there, three, right? And he goes no more than three, right? No, we can handle it. Three is the first number about which he said all. To the first, therefore, it should be said that the omission, the sending out, the giving out, insofar as it is indicative of one's own good, is what? Pleasant, right? But insofar as it takes away one's own good, it can be saddening, right? Just as when it's immoderate, right? Gave too much money to him. Right. And now I have a need, right? Okay. Now the argument from prodigality, huh? Prodigality has an immoderate emission, right? And that's what? Repugnant nature, right? So he's not saying that liberality, generosity, is repugnant to nature, but prodigality is, right? And in that sense, illiberality is more connatural to man, so I don't give anything, or very little. I might not be generous, right? But at least I take care of myself, right? But if I'm prodigal and give too much, then I can't take care of myself and my own, right? Yeah. Now what about to overcome, huh? Venture, conquer, I guess? To prove, yeah. To prove, yeah. To punish. Is not delightful insofar as it is, what? Resulting in the evil of another, but insofar as it pertains to one's own good. Now how is that? Well, you love your own good more than you hate the, what? Evil of another, right, huh? Now this is good for the games, huh? To venture, to conquer, is naturally delightful, right? What a competitor this guy must have been, right? They tell the story, you know, of when he was being called the dumb ox by his fellow students there, that Elbert the Great arranged a, what, debate between himself and Thomas, or kind of his pitot seal, and of course Thomas won, right? And then Thomas is, or Elbert is supposed to have said, this guy you call the dumb ox, I tell you, his bellow will be heard around the world, and now it's heard up here, right? It's kind of marvelous, huh? Somebody said, talking about sports, I mentioned Vince Lombardi is a great coach, and Pat Moriali said, he put too much emphasis on winning, he thought winning was everything, and I said, winning is everything, and he said, what do you mean? I said, well, St. Paul says, run so as to win, what loss do you want? Not necessarily football, but winning is everything. Okay. So he says, to conquer is naturally delightful, right? Insofar as to this fact of conquering, a man estimates his own, what, excellence, right? I'm pretty good, right? I won the race, or I didn't, I won the game. And on account of this, all gains, you might say, right? Do die? In which there is concertazzo, so you get the word concert there, right? Concerto, right? You know, struggling, you know? In which there can be, what, victory, our most, what, delightful, right? If you win, right? Right. So the Patriots lost there, you know, it was 24-23, you know. You know, it was the last play of the game, and the enemy there was there, and they threw the long, long pass, and I was like, 60 yards, something like that. Like, I caught a random thing, and the game was over, and they kicked that thing, and that was it. Yeah. Used to have to go, my son was at West Point there. The Army-Navy game was, of course, the big game, huh? And it seemed like when I was there, one year, the Army would win, next year, the Navy would win, and, you know, go back and forth. But I saw at least two games, you know, with the one by a field goal at the last moment, and I remember one time, the Navy guy missed the field goal, so, you know, that's the last play, you know, if he'd made the field goal, they would have won, if they'd make it. How do you go back? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But one time, the West Point guy, he was down at the last play, and he was going to kick the field goal, and he kicked it and made it, you know, under all that pressure, right? And then they announced there was some kind of a penalty, and so they moved the ball back 10 yards, and now he's got to kick it again, after having done it once, right? And all the pressure on it, right? Yeah. And he'd done it once already, and now you're 10 yards further out, and so, let's see, and he kicks it again, makes it, you know, wow, you know what I'm saying? I remember being out at the parking lot, though, after one of the times the Navy had won, you know, and, of course, they'd see our little Army stickers, you know, and the guy, and he'd have a funny gun in the foot of my car, you know? Okay. Story says, if they can't win a football game, how can they win a war, you know? I don't like it playing. And university, all concertaciones, how would you translate that, Father? Just struggles, or whatever? Yeah, generally all struggles, yeah. He must be doing that in a concerto, I guess, that's what got his name, some of the one group of instruments, you know? Yeah, too common, so, yeah, it's kind of against it, it's a binary kind of thing to struggle with, I suppose, it's kind of... Yeah, yeah. According as they have the hope of, what, victory, right? Now, to reprove and criticize and so on can be, yeah, can be in two ways a cause of pleasure, right? In one way, insofar as it makes a man to have the imagination of his own wisdom and excellence, huh? And to criticize and to correct belongs to those who are wiser and greater, huh? Of course, that's why the sophist wants to make you appear to contradict yourself and so on. In another way, according as one by, what, criticizing and reprehending someone benefits them, right? Correcting them, right? Correcting them, right? Which is what? Delightful, okay? Brotherly, what do you call it? Fraternal correction. Fraternal correction. Fraternal correction. I think of them. Do you rejoice in fraternal correction, you guys? We try. If a just man strikes or reproves me, it's kind of. But to the angry man is delightful to punish, right? Insofar, he seems to remove the apparent, what, lessening of himself, right? Which seems to result from the preceding, what, injury, right? For when someone is injured by another, he seems to be, what, made less to this, front of him, or by him. And therefore, he desires from this, what, being made less to be liberated, huh? Through the pain back of the injury, right? Mm-hmm. Okay? So, boys, you see that, huh? So, you know, snowball fights, you know, we're going to get those guys, you know? And then, notice, this thing, he makes it the end here. And thus, it is clear that to benefit another, per se, huh, is able to be, what? Delightful. But to harm another is not, what, pleasant, except insofar as it pertains to one's own good. It is not per se, right? Kind of pratchettant, so. So, now we come to Article 7 there. Whether likeness is the cause of what? Pleasure. Pleasure. To the seventh one proceeds thus, one goes forward thus. It seems that likeness is not the cause of what? Pleasure. For to what? To rule over. Yeah, to rule over and to stand before, right? To be for implies a certain what? It's similar to it, right? But to rule over and to stand over is actually what? Delightful, as I said in the first book of the rhetoric. Therefore, dissimilitude is more the cause of pleasure than what? Dissimilitude, huh? So I heard the guy on the radio there saying, you know, you can't really be on the radio unless you like being on the radio. And so, start with the politicians down and say, you know, they should mention they really want the power, right? They like to have the power, right? Just one minute, you know, I mean, instead, you know, I mean, sure you might want to do some good people, you know, but part of this is you want the power, right? Yeah, so it's not just you want to help people, but you're on the radio, you must enjoy getting up there and talking and laughing and so on and sit in your mouth out. More or nothing is more dissimilar to what? Pleasure than sadness, huh? But those who what? Suffer what? Sadnesses, most of all what? Seek pleasure, says it said in the seventh book of the Ethics. Therefore, dissimilitude is more the cause of what? Pleasure than similitude, right? Moreover, those who are filled with some things pleasant do not delight in them, but they more grow tired of them, right? Or bored with them, huh? Just as is clear in the filling up of food, right? Like Thanksgiving time, right? Oh, it's so uncomfortable. I can't get a walk. I don't have to sit around until another hour or so. Yeah, it's all for the Thanksgiving time. Therefore, likeness is not the cause of what? Pleasure, right? But against all this nonsense is that likeness is the cause of love. As has been said above. But love is a cause of what? Pleasure. Pleasure. Therefore, likeness is a cause of pleasure, right? It's a cause of a cause. Thomas replies. I answer it should be said that likeness is a certain unity. Whence that which is like, insofar as it is one, is what? Delightful, just as the, what? Lovable, as has been said above. And therefore, that which is like, and therefore, if that which is like, does not corrupt one's own good, right? But grows it, increases it. It's simplicitary without, delightful. As man to man, and youth to what? Youth, huh? But if it is corruptive of one's own good, then per accidents it is made, what? Wurisome or saddened, huh? Not insofar as it is like and one, but insofar as it corrupts that which is more of what? More of one, huh? It's a kind of subtle thing, you see? But now, how does this take place? However, something similar corrupts one's own good can happen in two ways, huh? In one way, because it corrupts the measure of one's own good through a certain excess. For the good, especially, that is bodily, as health, consists in a certain commensuration. An account of this, excessive food or bodily pleasures, what? Nausky. Yeah. I said what that one was pretty good. Nausky. She might get pretty tired of turkey, you know, if there's a lot left over and so on. Can't we have something else? Another way, through a direct contrite to one's own good, just as the, what, potters have? Abominate other potters, that's our famous example. Not insofar as they are potters, but insofar as, to them, they lose their own proper excellence or their own lucrum, right? Which they desire, which they desire as their own, what, good, huh? The competition between Dickens there and Thackeray, right, huh? Who could write the greatest novel, you know? I guess there's kind of a, you know, enmity between them because of that, you know? And I guess towards the end of our life there, you know, they pass each other on the steps of this building, and one of them turn around and extend his hand. And that guy turned around and extend his hand. Kind of a beautiful gesture, right, huh? But Washington Irving speaks of the friendships between painters and poets, huh? And how they have enough affinity or likeness to be drawn to each other, but they're not in competition, right? It's like two painters might be in competition or two poets, you know? And, um, it's kind of interesting, huh? Yeah. Human, human, uh, weakness is all over the place, of course. Now, what about the ruling over the others, huh? The first, therefore, it should be said that since there is a certain coming together of the one commanding to the subject, right, there is there a certain, what? Right. Yeah. Nevertheless, according to a certain, what? Excellency. In that, to what? Command and to stand before retains to the excellence of what's own good, for it belongs to the wise and the better to rule and to... Reside. Reside. Savient is just ordinary, right, huh? Whence through this there comes about in man the imaginatia, the imagining of his own goodness, huh? Like that choice of the word, imaginatia, right? Doesn't say the understanding of his own goodness, but the image of it, right, huh? Got a lot to do with the imagination, right? How you imagine yourself to be. Or through the fact that man rules and is over others, he benefits others, right? Which is what? Delightful, right, huh? Okay. So you go back to the previous article's cause of pleasure, right? But also, that last one. The second, it should be said, that that in which the delights, yeah, even though it is not like sadness, right, it is nevertheless another way, like the man, what? Who is sad, right, huh? Because sadnesses are contrary to one's own good, or the one's own good, or the one who is saddened, huh? And therefore there is desired pleasure by those who are in sadness as conferring or contributing to their own good, huh? Insofar as it is, what? Yeah, the contrary. And this is the cause, wherefore bodily pleasures, to which are contrary certain to what sadness, are more desired than intellectual pleasures, because they do not have the contrariety of sadness, huh? That's a very interesting thing, you know? I was convinced I was on the right path in my vocation of life, you know, I read that, you know. There's no sadness in this, huh? Oh, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah. But you can always, you can always. Thomas quotes scripture there at the beginning, he said, what kind of gentile is about that, you know, when he was late to me, and it was different. In that passage in Aristotle and the parts of animals there, where he talks about the object is more the cause of what? It's more delightful than the mood. You know, in the first book, in the premium there to the animal, right, he says that one knowledge is better than another because it's about a better thing, or because it's more certain, right? He doesn't say which of those criteria is more important. But then in the premium to the parts of animals, he says that even imperfect knowledge for a better thing is more delightful than a leisurely knowledge of something that is not that great. So people who are, because, for example, a glimpse of someone you love is more to you than a leisurely view of the boss or something like that, right? It seems like seeing this, which you don't care about, particularly, or you dislike. Now some college that we had, of course, in the philosophy department. I don't care about it. I don't care about it. I don't care about it. I don't care about it. which is called natural theology. And that was the excuse for doing the Summa up to the Treatise of the Trinity, but not the Treatise of the Trinity, right? So you did the parts that natural reason could do. It's like my favorite course, you know. Very interesting to learn about God. You know, you see it very imperfectly, right? More delightful, you know, than the leisurely knowledge of the stock market or something. That kind of reduces your mind. And from this it is that all animals naturally desire, what, pleasure, right? Because always the animal labors through sense of motion. On account of this, the young, most of all, what, desire pleasures. On account of the many, what, changings going on in them, existing in them. When they are in the state of, what, growing, you know, their bodies are all in turmoil, you see. And also, the melancholy ones, vehementary, huh? Strongly desire, huh, pleasures, huh, to expel their, what, sadness, huh? Because the body of these is corroded with a bad humor, huh? This is said in the book of the Ethics, huh? That's what, in some way, you could say the literal sense of that passage of the psalm, being of the divich of cora hominus. It's in the Proverbs, too, or something, it talks about drink wine, to get away from saying, I can't remember the exact words, but to... Well, it's supposed to throw your stomach in one place. Well, that's a medicinal use. To the third, it should be said, huh, that bodily goods consist in a certain, what, measure. And therefore, the excess of similar things corrupts one's own, what, good, huh? On account of this, one is rendered, what, worrisome and saddening, insofar as it's contrary to a man's own, what, good, huh? Okay, now it's into the philosophy right now, where the wonder is a cause of pleasure, huh? To the eighth, one goes forward thus. It seems that wonder is not a cause of, what, pleasure. For to wonder is of an ignorant nature, as Damascene says, huh? Aristotle says, too, Plato. But ignorance is not, what, delightful, but more knowledge. Therefore, wonder is not the cause of, what, pleasure, huh? Talk about an argument, and this is the point, huh? So Hirstall talks about wonder in the, what, premium to the metaphysics, huh? And Plato talks about it where? It's in the denigrature, isn't there? It's in the dialogue called Theotators, right? Yeah. In the beginning of the dialogue with Theodorus, who's a teacher of Theotators, he's introducing his pupil, Theotators, to Socrates, huh? And he says that his pupil is something of a philosopher. Just by way of introduction, right? Well, then, in the course of the conversation between Socrates and Theotators, Theotators breaks out in wonder. And then Socrates stops and he says, Theodorus seems to have guessed right about your nature. And then he says in a very strong word, huh? There is no other beginning of philosophy than wonder. Very strong, you know? So you realize how much, you know, Aristotle got from Plato, right? Both Albert the Great and Thomas, you know, they say that Plato and Aristotle are the chief philosophers. To be a complete philosopher, you have to know Plato and Aristotle, even though Aristotle might be, you know, someone greater. But Plato is really, along with Aristotle, the chief philosopher is amazing. That's a beautiful text in Theotators. There's a lot of things in Theotators besides that, of course. But these things are kind of scattered around in Plato. That's a beautiful, beautiful text. Theotators was a real guy in the history of math, you know. So it's appropriate to ask him, you know, what his episteme is. Because maybe you had some experience of that. Moreover, wonder is the beginning of, what? Wisdom, huh? Because it is a road to inquiring, what? Truth. Truth, huh? As is said in the beginning of the metaphysics, huh? But it is more delightful to contemplate things now known than to seek, what? Unknown things. As the philosophy says in the 10th book of the ethics, huh? So God is more delighted in knowing himself than we have in trying to know him, right? There's no wonder there, right? Sensus inquiry has difficulty and, what? Impediments, right, huh? But the other does not have that, huh? But pleasure is caused from an operation that is not, what? Impeded, as is said in the 7th book of the ethics, huh? Therefore, that's the first thing we talked about in the first article, right? Where the operation is the cause, right? Of pleasure. Therefore, wonder is not the cause of pleasure, but it more impedes pleasure, right? I think what's interesting here is that this goes, these arguments obviously go against one's experience, right? Of the pleasure one gets when one, what? It's wonder, right? And of course, experience is a starting point in ethics, right? When you get the objection that goes against your experience, then you're kind of forced to understand your experience better, right? See how these objections can. Moreover, each one delights in things that he's accustomed to, huh? Whence operations and habits acquired through what custom are what? Delightful, right? But customary things are not wonderful, as Augustine says in his work on John. Therefore, wonder is contrary to the very cause of pleasure, right? But against all this nonsense is what the philosopher says. Now, who's the philosopher with a capital P? Sorry? No, no, wait. Are we going to get pale? Aristotle calls Homer the poet, huh? And in the, it's mentioned in the, no, no, no, in the Defense of the American Constitution, Madison, and the articles in the New York Times, we call those things, can't we think of it now? Oh. Yeah, yeah. At one point they say, you know, talking about the importance of the union, they were arguing for it, you know. And if you don't have this union, then in the words of the poet, a long farewell to all my dreams. The poet is not named, right? But the poet is obviously Shakespeare, right? It's like the talk, you know, when he describes reading, I think it was Henry IV, the first time in a log cabin in the United States. And all he found in these log cabins was maybe a Bible and a play or two of Shakespeare, right? That kind of shows you the excellence of Shakespeare, right? That he's the only thing you find there besides the Bible. Marvelous. That's why he first read one of these plays of Shakespeare, I mean, he's right out of painting, but he marks that. So the philosopher says that wonder is the cause of pleasure. I answer it should be said that to obtain things desired is what? Delightful, as has been said. And therefore, the more for some thing, what? Love, that desire increases, right? More through the obtaining of it, does what? Pleasure grow, right? And also, in the very growth of desire, it comes about a growth of pleasure. That's kind of strange, he said, right? He said that. According as, there also is hope of the thing loved. Just as has been said above, that the desire from hope is pleasant. So if the man wants the woman, but he has no hope of getting there, that's not going to give him any place. But if he wants the woman, and he seems to be, you know, accepting this, then there's hope, you know? Now, wonder is a, what? Desire of, what? Knowing, huh? Which happens in man from this, that he sees the effect, and is ignorant of the, what? Cause, huh? Now notice the second thing he says, though. This is kind of like a different kind of wonder. Or from this, that the cause of such an effect exceeds, what? The knowledge, or the ability of him. Now, when you read Aristotle in the Premium, and he's talking about wonder being the beginning of philosophy, then he says that it's going to end in the opposite of this, right? And the geometry no longer wonders whether this is going to be so, because he knows it is so, right? When Aristotle arrives at the first clause in the 12th book of Wisdom, right? And then he realizes that God is always in this wonderful state that we can only sometimes be, right? And in a much better way. Then he says it compels our wonder, right? That's kind of wonder in a somewhat different sense, right? Because the first wonder is corresponding to our ignorance of something, right? And therefore, it's a kind of desire to know what we don't know, right? But the kind of wonder he has in the 12th book arises from the excellence, huh? The beauty of this thing, right? Okay? When I see a really beautiful girl, I wonder, you know? I'm filled with wonder, you know? I always talk with one of my grandgirls, you know, grandchildren, you know? It's just, you know, it's beautiful, you know, huh? You see, you know? And so you kind of sort of wonder, right? But this proceeds from seeing something that's so beautiful, right? Augustine says, you know, too late have I come to know thee, you know? Ancient beauty, isn't that way it begins? And so you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know There's a movie out about it, Gus and I don't know anything about it. No, I heard, but I think the Pope praised it. I heard, I don't know where I saw it. Maybe it was in the register or something. The Pope praised it, the Pope said it. It's done well, it's done well, that's good. American film? I don't even know. Yeah, I think it's in our theaters now, I think, yes. Come on, come on. So Isaac, wait, don't want to see this or not, you know. Maybe it's done well, but that's good. Double check. We're not in that loop on those kinds of things. And therefore wonder is a cause of pleasure, insofar as it has joined to it the hope of what? Tending knowledge of that which one desires to what? To know, huh? That's the first kind of wonder, right? An account of this, all wonderful things are delightful, right? Just as those things which are what? Rare. And all representations of things, even of those things which in themselves are not what? Pleasant, huh? For the soul rejoices in bringing together one thing to another. Because to bring together one thing to another is the proper and natural act of reason, huh? That's the discourse of what Shakespeare speaks, huh? As the philosopher says in his book on the poetic art, An account of this, to be freed from great dangers is more delightful because it is more admirable, as is said in the one, what, rhetoric, huh? And now what is that play there? The Winter's Tale there by Shakespeare, right? You know, at the end there, you know, when the long-lost daughter's thing. The way Shakespeare describes the wonder people, it was a perfect description, I've never seen it. You know, do you know that, the one? It's just amazing. It's like a whole world of the discovery. You know, it's kind of like this one. The way he says it, I can, you know, do justice to the words here now. Sometimes Aristotle speaks a little bit of wonder as being proper to, you know, to tragedy, right? More than, say, to comedy, right? And, you know, in the arguments of Zeno, you know, Aristotle says, well, one of the arguments, you know, this doesn't really substantially differ from this other argument of Zeno, but it's said with a certain tragodia. And Thomas says, you know, certain magnification of words to arouse wonder, you know, the Achilles, you know, the fastest and the rich, you know, can't catch up with this blow. And it's really the same argument as the other one about you can't get out of the room, you know, but arouse more wonder, you know, you see? And, but, no, the word tragodia, right? The word tragedy, right? As if it's more proper to tragedy, huh? At the end of, I remember seeing a book there where, it's called war or wonder, taken from the words at the end of Hamlet, right? You would see war or wonder, you'd come to the right place, there's all these dead king, queen. All these days, you're living with dead vines. Yeah, yeah. And he says war or wonder, right? But he's talking about the emotional effect of the Shakespearean thing. Wonder is more an effect of tragedy than comedy, right? Just a question about these two senses of wonder, particularly in Aristotle, it's interesting because they're so closely united I mean, he uses veil here. So you either have it because you see the effect and you want to know the cause, or you've seen the cause in some way, but it exceeds your ability to understand it. Yeah, yeah. It's almost univocal. I mean, these kinds of wonders. Is it kind of that way in Aristotle as well? In other words, when we've seen... Well, no, see, Aristotle says in the premium that when we get to the end, right, and know the cause, then the wonder, what, disappears. Now, that's the beginning, right? And he says we're going to this opposite thing, right, which is to know, and the better thing, right? It's better to know than just to wonder, right? But then when he gets to the first cause in the 12th book of wisdom, then he, what, has this wonder about God, right? And this proceeds more from knowing the excellence of God. How could it be something so excellent, you know? How could it be something so superior to us, you know? How could it be, you know, he says, you know, God is in this state, you know, that we can only sometimes be in knowing some wonderful truth, right? We can't be thinking about, you know, we've got to eat, we've got to sleep, we've got to do this, you know, wreck the bees. And we can't do this very often, right? But even when we're in that, we're not in it the way he is, right? Always, right? So he says this compels our wonder, right? But is it because the second kind of wonder, you realize that the cause exceeds your capacity of knowing the full? So there's still that... Yeah, yeah, yeah. But there's not so much a desire to know, but to kind of flabbergasted by the excellence, the beauty of the excellence of this wonder. Yeah, and even in Latin, I was thinking of this, we have the word expression in English, if you suddenly realize something in terms of like a cause, you say, well, no wonder. Now you know the cause. No more wonder. And in Latin, it's the same expression. No wonder. No wonder anymore, because I know the cause. I mean, sometimes in English, you know, they use the word curiosity for wonder, which you've got to be careful because it's used for the name of vice there for Thomas, right? Curiosity to us, right? But sometimes we use the word curiosity to find scientists using it and so on. You're not using it for the vice, you know, but just something for the desire to know, right? And that's the one kind of wonder, right? Sometimes it's called curiosity, not in a bad sense. And then the other kind of wonder, they use the word sometimes admiration, right? Okay? So when I admire somebody, I admire much of the honor of somebody, I admire them because of what I know about them, right? I'm curious about something that I don't, you know, if this thing went up, you know, suddenly, you know, I'd be curious as to why it went up, you know? Yeah, yeah. And, but I don't admire it going up. I was sure a star would seem to be, what, contradicting himself, unless you saw this distinction between these two, huh? Mm-hmm. So he says, but there's a similarity there, because as you say, it goes beyond you, right? You can't comprehend it, eh? And so that's based more on what you know, Yeah. Whereas the other one is based more on what you don't know. Well, that's what I was wondering about. When you come to the knowledge of the first cause, and you come to see that the first cause exceeds your capacity of knowing, that you cannot know him as he is. Is that ignorance, though? Then is that the first cause, is that the first sense of wonder? Well, see, now, see, I mean, as a Christian, I want to see God as he is, right, huh? I have that desire, maybe from studying theology, right, desire to see God as he is, right? Mm-hmm. But when I see God as he is, I'll never get bored, because I'll always be filled with this kind of wonder, that there could be something that's excellent, right? Mm-hmm. Because I never comprehend him fully, right? But it's not so much a desire to know at that time, it's something resulting from knowing how excellent he is, huh? Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's like, because you're ignorant in the first sense, because it's a kind of wonder, it's not, it's a lack, whereas it seems, the second one is more that you can't grasp it, it's not just, it's not a lack on your part, you can't comprehend it, you're not able to contain it. So it's certainly, it's not a lack on your part, it's an excess on the other part. And they are very close, because in a sense, there's a little desire there, right? You know, the angels never, they always want to contemplate the face of God, because they never comprehend it, you know, they don't know it as much as it is known upon. So to, and that's the first objection, right, is ignorance, doesn't, I guess, some people, I think, in this country, that's the way to live. Ignorance is bliss, they used to say, but now I hear that strange expression. It was bliss, and ignorance would make you happy, but, I mean, pleasant, to the first thereof, it should be said that wonder is not pleasant, insofar as it has, what, ignorance, huh? But insofar as it has a desire of learning the cause, right, huh? And insofar as the one wondering, learns something new, right, huh? To it, something to be, which he did not, what, estimate to be, right? I want to study the angels, I was saying, they're an undergraduate. Anytime, he says, you start. Now, isn't it more pleasant to, to know, than to wonder, and so on. To the second should be said, that pleasure has two things, huh? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? one is resting in the good and secondly the perceiving of this what rest now as he guards the first since it is more perfect to contemplate truth known than to inquire the unknown right the contemplations of things known per se speaking right are more delightful than the investigation of things what unknown nevertheless progences this is important progences as regards a second it sometimes happens right that investigations inquiries are sometimes right more delightful according as they proceed from a greater what desire right for desire is more what excited from the perception of ignorance you know for opposites alongside each other stand out for when most of all man delights in those things which he newly what finds or has learned right huh so something you didn't know before it's important and all of a sudden you see it oh get more rejoicing out of this and all these other things you know right you know just uh now what about the customary things huh shakespeare calls what custom old custom has made things pleasant sometimes so different nationalities are accustomed to different foods and they take pleasure really more pleasure in those foods usually right though sometimes you know other people take pleasure in the food because it's something they haven't really tasted right i first want to take it back there is to go out these two guys and and there's kind of a mixture you know american food so to speak and some chinese food you know and i had to like chinese food you know and uh so these two guys are the chinese food and i don't know that stupid american food look how interesting he had you know you know pineapple chicken and so on yeah it's kind of good you know but uh the truth should be said that those things which are customary are delightful to do insofar as they are what kind of natural right so the saying is that custom is a second nature right sort of talks about that that's what thomas says you know he's talking about whether um the existence of god is per se known right he says some people think it's per se known because they're accustomed from childhood to call upon god and prayer and so on right and so it becomes kind of natural to think that there's a god right and so it's custom rather than nature right that makes it seem to be what obvious right so that shows a tremendous force of custom it's something that is not obvious can seem obvious because of custom right where aristotle in the second book of wisdom talks about how custom makes the method you use seem to be the way to what proceed right used to be amused you know in faculty committees you know you're a guy from this sociology and a guy from philosophy a guy from history and so on and they all approach the same differently you know and as we were sociologists saying you know i suppose you're doing a word count in thomas just trying to give me something i understand and uh i said what the hell would i be doing a word count in thomas that's the last way i studied thomas you know how many times don't you use it but that's what they do you know that's what i could imagine i mean what else would be doing making big word counts and funny though it's just the force of custom right it didn't realize that that's how everybody today a lot of people they approach everything in life is in terms of computer programming and so that that kind of that kind of statement tells me that's a programmer statement he's going to do a data thing and then blah blah blah whatever and yeah that's one thing that just from my experience with working with wood is curious that what they call western type tools versus oriental tools like a western saw i've told you this before you you cut when you push but the oriental is when you pull and they also have we have hand planes that you cut when you push you better watch out what you're doing you're going to run a hand off or something yeah but the japanese the japanese make hand planes that they pull yeah to shave the woods on it it's just you cut them in the opposite of what we expect i don't think it makes really any difference just whatever one you sure sure require i have you see that language you know in these idioms and so on what the french did choose to say now don't fight it just accept it that's the way they say it in french i know it's crazy i know it's crazy that's what i knew it okay but nevertheless those things which are rare are able to be what delightful either by reason of knowledge because one desires knowledge of them right insofar as they're wonderful or by reason of what operation because from desire the mind is more inclined to operate intensely in something what new new as i said the tenth book of the ethics any more perfect operation will cause any more perfect pleasure huh take our little break here now