Prima Secundae
Lecture 293: The Soul's Essence and Grace: Species, Powers, and Properties

Transcript
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There's a man with some reason. You could say in some sense both, right? What does the great Shakespeare say? What is a man? To his chief good and market his timing, but to sleep and feed, it'd be still more. He goes back to what is a man, right? Then later on he's talking about what reason, right? That is what he's doing, yeah, yeah. So you could say man, to his reason, right? I think so. To his will, he wills, right? One's a what? Mover, the other, right? One is a source of the other. Third objection. Moreover, if the essence of the soul was the proper subject of grace, right? It would be necessary that the soul, insofar as it has an essence or nature, is capable of grace, right? But this is false. Because that's what found that every soul was capable of grace. Therefore, the essence of the soul is not the proper subject of grace, right? Of course, he's thinking of the soul. There's animals that have a soul. In fact, they're named for manima. And even the plant, right? My wife believes when I talk about the plants there. He's trying to figure out a plant. And they say, they've got souls, you know, real estate. Are they going to go to work? Well, sometimes Aristotle will say, you know, just the plant have a part of the soul, right, huh? Because they don't have the full part of the soul, right, huh? So this is solved in some way easily. To the third, therefore, it should be said that the soul is the subject of grace according as it is in the species of a, what, understanding or rational nature, right? Now, the soul is not constituted in the species through some power, right? Since the powers are natural properties of the soul following the, what, species, huh? So is this number two because it's half of four? Yeah, yeah. So you can't say that it's two because it's half of four. I mean, somebody might say that, right? But you've got to be kind of careful about that, right? You might infer that because it's half of four, it must be two, right? But then you're reasoning from the property back to the, what, species, yeah, yeah. It's really half of four because it's two. And it's also, what, a third of six because it's two, right? Isn't it? So is it two because it's half of four because it's a third of six? Or because it's a fourth of eight, right? Or a fifth of ten, right? It doesn't make any sense to say, you know, these are not the same thing, huh? They're not the same relation, are they? They're the same thing to be half of something and to be a third of something and to be a fourth of something and a fifth and an infinitum, right? But they're all following from its being, what, two, yeah, yeah, okay? But notice we kind of know the difference between souls by their, what, properties, right? Okay? And when Thomas is explaining, you know, the Latin word intellectus, right? They sometimes, what, etymologically say it means to read within, okay? Yeah, to read within, intelligiate, right? To read within, huh? And in English now we say understanding, right, huh? But again, when you understand something, right, you're getting to what stands under something, right, huh? When you read within, you're getting to something that's kind of within the thing that you hear or can sound, huh? So, because we come to know a thing through its effects or through its, what, properties, huh? They're more sensible or closer to sensible than the other, right? Yeah, yeah. But it's not reason that makes my soul to be the kind of soul it is, but it's because my soul is the kind of soul it is, that it has reason as a property. That's important to see, right? So he's explaining this, right? The soul is the subject of grace according as it is in the species, right, of an understanding or rational nature, huh? But it is not, the soul is not constituted in species through some power, since the properties, the powers, rather, are the natural properties of the soul, following in consequentes species, following upon the species. And therefore the soul, in its very, what, nature, right, or according to its own nature, its own essence, differs in species from other, what, animals, from that of the brute animals, right, and of the plants, right? And in account of this, it does not follow, if the essence of the human soul is the subject of grace, that just any soul, right, can be the subject of grace, huh? Because this belongs to the essence of the soul, insofar as it is a, what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just as you might say that four is an even number, right? Because it's a number, because there are numbers that aren't even, right? So, four is half of eight, right, huh? Because it's a number, because it's this particular number, right? This species of number, four, right? And four is the only number that is half of eight to my knowledge. Did you see that? It's the only number that is a third of twelve, and the fourth is sixteen. So, it's, what, this particular species of soul, right, huh? Yeah, yeah. Now, sometimes, you know, they speak, you know, the distinction of the soul into three kinds, the animal soul, and the plant soul, and the human soul. It's being kind of a potential whole, right, huh? Because the whole power of the soul is, in a sense, found in what? The whole power the soul can have is found in man, right? And something less in the animal, and even less in the plant, right? Did I tell you about this text there? Did you hear there with Thomas when he talks in the sentences there about, well, he's leading into the discussion of the power of the, of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and so on. He's got to talk about the active life and the contemplative life, right? And before he talks about the active life and the contemplative life, he talks about life, okay? And he goes back to what's most known to us. Did I talk about this before? Well, what's the first notion you get of life? See? Yeah. It moves itself. See? So, I used to take the example in class. You're, you're walking in the woody path there in the forest, let's say. You step upon something, but not kicking it, right? And as soon as you step off it, it goes up and across the... Ick! It's alive, you say! See? Now, if you kicked it, you wouldn't say, Ick! It's alive, right? No. You'd kick a stone along there and roll it and say, oh, it's alive. But if the thing seems to, what, move itself, right? Okay. Now, I was thinking of my old teacher, the Surik, right? And still, a few things he just said that are stuck in my mind, you know? As long as they come in handy, you know? But he says, you can tell a man's understanding of something even by... examples he gives, right? So when Thomas says that we call something a lie first because it seems to move itself, right? He gives two examples. What do you think they are? Well, he takes one from the plants, that's also to some extent found animals too, of course, and one from the animals, right? What he takes from the plant is that they grow. Not that they reproduce, right? Which is more involved, right? Not that they can, in some sense, feed themselves, right? They can pull in things, but that's more hidden, right? But growth, yeah, yeah. You know, as soon as you have a plant, I didn't think that plants died. You see, it hasn't grown at all, right? And what he takes from the animals, locomotion, right? Change your place, right? See, those are the best examples, right? Yeah. And then when you use the word motion in an analogous sense, right? Or understanding or sensing, right? Are examples of what? Motions, but the really operations, not motions in the original sense. They're not the act, the imperfect act, right? But a perfect act, right? You know that difference when Aristotle talks about that, he says that, it's my example actually, when you're walking home, have you walked home? No. So it's, by its very nature, an imperfect act, right? So long as you're walking home, you haven't walked home. It's not complete. So it's by its very nature. And when you have walked home, are you walking home? No. So whenever this act of walking home exists, by its very nature, it's by its very nature, perfect, right? But is seeing or hearing in that sense? See? Do you hear me? Well, when you hear me? Well, when you hear me, you have heard me, right? Is it? And when you understand, right, something, you're understanding something. Have you understood it? Yeah. Yeah. And so I say to the girls, now when someone's loving you, have they loved you yet? Of course. Because those are perfect acts, right? And Thomas Thomas goes on to say, well, we call those motions in an extended sense, right? And that's the example of life that you can sense, you know, that you can understand, that you can love, and so on, right? That's not where life is most known. It's in the growth of the plants, of the plants, and the locomotion of the animals, right? I got thinking about that because I'm kind of running on the idea of, inspired by Thomas in the disputed questions on power, where he said that all of our, he's talking about, I think, the proceeding in God, right? Procession in God. And then, of course, you've got to explain this word, right? You know, the Son proceeds from the Father, and the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son. But the word procession, going forward, goes back to the senses, right? And Thomas says, well, all of our naming goes back to the beginning of our knowledge, which is the senses. But then he says, the senses don't transcend or go beyond the, what? Continuous, right? And what's most manifestly continuous in the operations of life? Well, growth, right? Which is increasing your size, and size is a, what? Continuous quantity, right? And the most obviously continuous motion is locomotion, right? It's divisible forever, right? And so, life is most known in the growth of the plants and animals, and in the locomotion of the animals, right? And these are, what? Continuous, right? All our thinking begins with the, what? Continuous, or what is found in the continuous. Now, this word is very important when we talk about form, right? What's the first meaning of form? What's the shape of this glass, right? Which is something in the, what? Continuous, right? The shape of a ball, the shape of a cube, you know? It's something in the continuous, huh? When we say God is indivisible, right? We suddenly fall back upon the point, which is indivisible, right? But the point is, has a position in the continuous, right? And it's indivisible that this guy has no position in the continuous, right? You know, very indivisible, right? So I'm kind of struck by Thomas taking those two examples. Talking on the phone today to Warren Murray, saying, you know, I was quoting a, because he said, you can tell a man's good mind about the examples he took, huh? We used to make fun of the modern philosophers, like to take some kind of a example, you know, that appeals to the imagination, you know, because it's colorful, you know? And Aristotle or Thomas would take just the right example, you know? It's a substance, a man or a dog. That's what a substance is. Modern talk about substance, you wouldn't know what they're talking about, huh? But on account of this, it does not follow if the essence of the human soul is the subject of grace. That just any soul can be the subject of grace, right? But this belongs to the essence of the soul insofar as it's of this particular species, right? And as you can say, you can say that man has senses because he's an animal. And every animal has what? Senses, right? But could you say that man has reason because he's an animal? No, because then every animal would have reason, right? So he doesn't have reason because he's an animal, but because he's a man. Yeah. And so the soul can be what? But the subject of grace, huh? Proper subject of grace, because it's a human soul, right? A rational soul. The understanding, understanding soul, as Shakespeare says. I was thinking this other definition of reason, right? Reason, you know, we're told to know yourself, you know. But it turns out that reason's the only part of us that can know itself, right? Does a hand know what a hand is? And does an eye even know what an eye is, huh? It might see itself in the mirror, but doesn't we know what an eye is? Reason is the only thing that knows itself, right? So I define reason as the ability to understand and reason and order itself in others. Or my friend Shakespeare defines it as the ability for a large discourse, looking before and after, huh? I think both definitions, you know, are in harmony, huh? One makes maybe distinct something, the other doesn't, huh? Right, Leavis and Thomas. So what would we do without you? Whoever the essence of the soul is before its powers. Well, now we're getting down to some sense here, right? Most of the objections are, you know, further away from the truth, and as you get closer, you get closer to the truth, right? That's some very good, huh? And what sense is the essence of the soul before the powers of the soul? Before in time? I mean, even, is two, two before it's half of four? It could be simultaneously, you know, something in its potencies. The third sense is what? Well, it doesn't seem to me that you're talking about that, no. But you're talking about the, what? Attach, a sense attached to the second sense, right? It's the cause before the effect, right? Ah, but now he's talking about the sense you're talking about, right? My goodness. So I'm not the injector, but I'm not the injector. Yeah, yeah. That's what you were thinking about, right? For the first can be understood without the, the before can be understood without the posterior, right? That's the, what, third sense of before, right? Therefore it follows that grace can be understood in the soul with no part or power of the soul being understood. Let's do it. either the will nor the understanding nor any of the sort which is unfitting, right? Because we come to know the soul through its powers, right? Aristotle in the book on the soul says that we know the soul by its powers, right? And its powers by their acts and their acts by their objects so there's a great lengthy discourse To the fourth, it should be said that since the powers of the soul are the natural properties, right? That's what's going back to porphyry there, right? In the ice of goge, right? They're natural properties following upon the species, right? So half of four set of what? Two is a property set of its species, right? Having interior angles equal to right angles is a property set of the species triangle, right? Which is a species of equilateral I mean, rectilineal plane figure Since the powers of the soul are natural properties following upon the species the soul is not able to be without these, huh? But even given that without them it could be, right, huh? Nevertheless, huh? The soul would be said according to the species to be what? Understanding or rational Not because an act it had these powers, right? but an account of what? Being a species of such a nature from which are naturally, right? Act to flow forth powers of this sort It's probably not before them in the sense that it could be without them but they could not be without it but it's probably before them as a cause as before an effect as he's saying if I only follow upon this but in terms of the third sense of before maybe it's for us to be verse, right? That we know the soul through the powers that it has, right? See, reason is the only and reason is the power that can know itself, right? And most people's reason hasn't come to know that, hey, I'm not a body but Aristotle has reason helps reason to know in the third book on the soul that it is not a, what? A body, right? A number of ways of showing this, right? Most people will be disappointed Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah One of my former students has told me about the brain surgeon when I was up in Canada, right? He was, you know stimulating parts of the brain, right? And the guy says oh, I taste chocolate, you know you know, like this, you know and getting all kinds of reactions, right? From simulating this part of the brain but you can never get there oh, I just willed something I just chose something He never did, right? So just from his not being able to find any part of the brain the guy would say, you know hey, I just made a choice He began to think that the will is thought was a part of the brain, right? And he was right And I was just thinking I thought it was the same thing when he did something the guy's arm moved Yeah And the guy said to the the doctor said to the patient he said do that again and he said I didn't do it you did it You did it Yeah, yeah I did not make a choice to do it Yeah, yeah, yeah That's it Yeah, yeah Now against this is that by grace we are born again, right? Generated again, huh? That's interesting I've seen the word born again but you're not saying regenerated into being sons of God But generation before ends with what? Essence, right? Then to the powers So nature which is another word for generation in living things First arrives at the nature of the thing, right? And to that you come to the powers Therefore grace is before in the essence of the soul than in its powers And this had kind of been anticipated we said from the third article right? Where we saw that grace is in the soul to the light So he says I answer right at the beginning It should be said that this question depends upon the preceding one, right? For if grace were the same thing as virtue, right? Difficulte and ratione in definition Let's take this simple example and I'd say Is a lion 36 inches long and a lion 3 feet long the same line? Was 3 the same as 36? Is a foot the same as an inch? So 3 feet and 36 inches aren't the same length are they? You have to say they are the same length right? The same length Yeah and they're just defined a little bit differently, right? One by 36 in foot and the other by you know That's kind of a simple example but it's easy to see you know So if grace is the same thing as virtue different only definition it would be necessary that in the power of the soul that was in the power of the soul as in a subject right? For the powers of the soul the power of the soul is the proper subject of a virtue different virtues and different powers right? So I've got geometry in my reason and will yeah and courage in my irascible appetite my father's nickname for me was Tuffy my wife thinks that's very funny but everybody tells me my father's nickname would be Tuffy I don't know why I might be up to Doctor's son across the way but I don't know why because we became quite friendly you know because he's got a vineyard now in California anyway if our grace differs from virtue right it cannot be said that the power of the soul is the subject of grace because every perfection of a power of the soul has the notion of a virtue right as has been said above once it remains that grace just as it is before virtue right so it has a subject before the powers of the soul so that's based upon the axiom of before and after as Breckless says right that nothing is before or after itself right so if reason was the virtue of the soul it would be before itself which is impossible right it's kind of interesting because Thomas is talking today I think I was reading the sentences there he's talking about the Ten Commandments right and the first the first article the first question is whether they should have been put in stone right or they should have written down right and one of the objections is that the Ten Commandments pertain to the natural law which is written in our hearts therefore what do you need to write it down right and what Thomas points out you don't have to write down the axioms in speculative philosophy like the O is more than required put it on a thing but he says because of our passions and so on and our bad customs right the natural understanding of the what natural law is what darkened over right I don't quite see anymore right I was reading there that Hillary Clinton you know she even accepts partial birth abortion which is pretty gross you know and clouded over you know it's kind of you heard about this thing at the at the Super Bowl right they had a thing for Doritos right and the mother had a baby in here and of course they were showing the little baby in there and he was moving and we talk about things that are exciting. And NARAL, you know, the National Abortion Right is, they're, this is humanizing, you think, right? And I guess some woman, you know, they know they're pregnant, but they don't really fully realize until they see that, right? I guess some mothers started, you know, they had a picture of the little one in there, and they started sharing these pictures. They were very angry about that because it's humanizing. You know, it's really how perverse they are, you know? Which tells you that what they're doing is deeper. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lady, a young mother, she had a glass ball, and when she was expecting, she sent me a photo of this on the ground, and I also found the way it was, maybe it was the same thing, but she was so excited about the baby, she wanted me to see the first picture she had of it, which was just a blurry thing, but still, she was so excited, this is the baby. Yeah, yeah, yeah. These are stories about Bernard Davidson, the beginning of his conversion, the scene on abortion performed on ultrasound and actually seeing the human body. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was the title he gave that documentary, about the silent screen, the child you can see is opening his mouth when they're pulling his legs in. Yeah. Wasn't that the movie that Regan had shown to the staff of the White House, you know? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, we saw that on cover, first of all, there was a professor at the school here, there was a movie to see it. You could see his baby was terrified. I was hearing about a case there, you know, where the abortion clinic, you know, because they did the ultrasound because they want to see where the baby is to grab it, but they don't show it to the patient, right? But I guess in this bigger case, it revealed there are twins in there. She just couldn't go through it, so she came back and showed it to the woman. She's out of the abortion clinic, you know, but I mean, you don't need two babies, but that's just, I mean, two babies. It's just something struck her. She couldn't, you know, keep it hidden from the woman. The abortion, and they did the abortion, went home, and some weeks later, whatever happened, I don't remember the story before this was, but they didn't realize there were twins in there. Yeah. And they left one of the babies. Oh, yeah. And that baby came to turn and was born. Yeah. And basically now I think, I can't remember who this is. I heard about this testimony somewhere, and I said, because I should be dead, but my mother didn't know I was still in there, and the doctor didn't know I was still in there. Yeah. Yeah. That's really, yeah. And if I, people you know, you know, even so-called nice people, you know, people seem pretty good in many ways, but they think you're going to have an abortion because you've been raped, right? Yeah. And I noticed that the pro-life marches now, they have a bunch of women who were the product of rape, you know? Yeah. And they've got a right to be too, you know? Yeah, yeah. And someone's here talking about, you know, eliminating someone because it's a product of rape, you know? They say, I don't have a right to be, you know? And that's really powerful when they don't realize someone might be there who's actually the, yeah, yeah. Once it remains that grace, just as it is before virtue, so it has a subject before the powers of the soul. There's a proportion there, right, huh? A portion of before, right? It's Thomas looking before and after, I'd say. He's obeying Shakespeare, right? That's the definition. His reason is in harmony with... He's looking before and after. He's looking before and after. Yeah, he's looking before and after. That's what is in the essence of the soul, right, huh? Once it remains in grace, just as it is before virtue, so it has a subject before the powers of the soul. Thus it is in the very, what, essence of the soul. But that's also because of regeneration, whereby you become a son of God, right? You know, when John talks about the Vedic Visionary, he recalls the fact that we are called the sons of God. And we are, in fact, he says, right? It's very explicit, huh? Just then as through the understanding power, man partakes of divine knowledge through the virtue of what? Faith. And according to the power that is called the will, right, huh? He partakes of the divine, what, love, through the virtue of charity. So also through the nature of the soul he partakes, according to a certain, what, likeness of the divine nature through a certain regeneration or recreation. Why does he add that, recreation? Yeah, we don't get our soul, the soul of the dog comes from his parents, right? But the soul of man doesn't come from your mother and father, but it comes from God immediately, right? So I have my body, I get my body from my mother and father. You can say I get my body from God, but through my mother and father, right? But do I get my soul from God through my mother and father? I get my soul as created by God, right? At the time when my body is disposed to receive it, right? So the preparation of my body as being disposed to receive this kind of a thing, that's a proper subject for this kind of a form, is due to my mother and father, right? Due to God in a remote cause. But my soul is there, right? And by an act of what? Creation, right? So it's interesting to me that he's using the term there, recreation, right, huh? As if I've been, what, created again, right? Born again. Yeah, yeah. But if you just said regeneration, you might say, well, okay. Then you might think the other day, right? So it's just… The same body as a new creation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's beautiful the way Thomas' text of care that he has, huh? Animal soul comes from its parents through natural generations. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because it doesn't transcend the body, see? See, in other words, for a soul to come from its parents, it has to come to be through the transformation of matter, right? But our soul can't come to be that way because then our soul would be, what? Tied to matter, right? Which is what a matter of the soul is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Aristotle, you know, in the Book of the Generation of Animals, he says that the human soul doesn't come from the parents, from the other, from the parents. So he knows that. He knows that because of his study of the soul in the third book of the soul, right? Where he argues that the soul doesn't depend upon what matter for its being, right? The way it goes is, you know, that if the soul had existence only in the body, if its existence was tied to the body, then it would have only operations in the body, right? And he proves that the understanding of the universal and so on, the large discourse in one sense, is, what? Not in the body. Therefore, its being can't be, what? Immersed in the body, right? Yeah. A very concrete way Thomas will use that term, huh? You know, that the soul of the other animals is entirely immersed in the body, right? But ours is like something, you know, partly in the body but partly above the body, right? Yeah. But Aristotle said at the beginning, when he's raising the problems, right, we all want to know whether the soul is immortal or not, right? Whether it can exist when the body seizes, and this is dependent upon this other question, right? Is there any soul, any operation of the soul, right, that is not in the body? Because that other question has to be solved by whether there is or not, right? Okay. I remember, one time I'd have a guy in the Course on the Dianne Mother, you know, it would be a brain, a brain is your mind and so on. And so I'd kind of, you know, restate their arguments, you know, more forcefully than they could, you know. I'd say, a blow in the brain, you know, a blow in the eye interferes with seeing, right? Therefore the eye is the organ of sight, right? A blow in the brain interferes with thinking, right? Alcohol going to the brain interferes with thinking. And so therefore the brain is the organ of thought. Is that a good argument? And they'd all say, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.