De Anima (On the Soul)
Lecture 67: Is the Soul Man? Soul and Body Composition

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In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen. God, our enlightenment, guardian angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, order and illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. St. Thomas Aquinas, Angelic Doctor, and help us to understand all that you've written. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen. So we're up to Article 4 here in Question 75. And the question is, whether the soul is man, right? And because the soul is something subsistent, one might guess that the soul is man. Because something substantial can exist by itself, right? But Thomas is going to reason against that, huh? It seems, to the fourth, he proceeds that one proceeds thus. It seems that the soul is man, huh? For it is said in the second epistle of the Corinthians, chapter 4, verse 16. Although the outward, right, man is corrupted, right? Nevertheless, the inward man is renewed from day to day, right? So it doesn't fit the outward man. It's renewed from day to day, does it? And you're over the hill, you're going downhill. You know, but that which is within the man is the soul. Therefore, the soul is the, what, inside man, the interior man, huh? Second objection. Moreover, the human soul is a certain, what, substance. It's something in the genus of substance, right? But it's not a universal substance, like a species or a genus, right? Therefore, it is a particular substance. Therefore, it's a hypostasis or persona. Now, persona is a Latin word. Hypostasis in Greek, as far as the etymology is concerned, it was more naming an individual substance, huh? In general, but they became accustomed to be calling an individual substance of a reasonable nature or intellectual nature and hypostasis, huh? But in Latin, persona means exactly that, right? So if you study the treatise on God here, which maybe we'll do someday, but when you talk about a person, right, you always take the definition of Boethius, huh? An individual substance of a, what? What? Rational nature, yeah. So the human soul seems to be an individual substance and therefore to be a person, right? But Thomas will always deny that he's a person, huh? Because he doesn't have a complete, what, nature, huh? So when you pray, you know, St. Peter, pray for us. Thomas says that's a, what, figure of speech. Synecdoche, huh? St. Peter's not in heaven, but the soul of St. Peter's in heaven, right? Yeah. But Christ and Mary are in heaven. Yeah. I think I was mentioning how Deconic in his audience with Pius XII there made use of those things, you know, talking about the mystery of the assumption, right? Because it was fitting that Mary herself should be the person in heaven, huh? Not just her soul, given her importance and causality and so on. But against this is what Augustine says in the 19th book about the city of God, where he commends Varro, huh? Latin thinker, who, what, thought man to be neither just a soul nor just a body, but at the same time a soul and a, what? Body, huh? Now that three possibilities there reminds me of this dialogue of Plato. It's a very early dialogue. And I think it's the Alcibiades, huh? Alcibiades I. Sometimes they don't regard all those very early dialogues as authentic Plato, but I think they are. I know Strauss, you know Strauss thinks they're authentic and other people. But anyway, in the Alcibiades, Socrates raises the question in terms of those three possibilities. Am I a soul, or am I a body, or am I something composed of both? And Socrates, well, what, reason there that he's just a soul? And anyway, in the Phaedo, he seems to speak as if he were just the, what? Soul. Hmm. But most people think of themselves as just a body. Yeah. But maybe the truth is, where? In the middle. In between these two, yeah. Yeah. But see how Thomas here goes about showing this, huh? Mm-hmm. I answer, it should be said, that for the soul to be man can be understood in two ways, huh? In one way, that man be the soul, but this man is not a soul, but something composed from soul and body, as for example, Socrates, huh? Now, this sounds kind of strange at first, but you've got to kind of realize where the Platonists were coming from, right? Which I say because some laid down that only the form was of the, what? Definition of a species. And that matter was only a part of the individual, but not of the, what? Species, huh? Now, if you want to just stop and think about that a bit, huh? Um, in logic, huh? We talked about definition. We talked about genus as the first part of the definition, if you recall this, huh? Now, genus, if you recall from logic, if you take genus to mean the name, it's the name, right? Said of many things, right? Other in kind, right? Signifying what each is, huh? Remember that? Okay. Would you please say that again? Yeah, it's the name said of many things. Said with one meaning, first of all. Said with one meaning of many things. Other in kind, huh? Signifying what each is. So, for example, animal is a name said with one meaning of dog and cat and horse, which are other in kind, right? Different in kind, right? And signifies what each of these is. What is a dog? An animal. What is a cat? An animal, right? Okay. But, of course, it can only signify in a general way what each is because it has only one meaning, but it's being said of many things other in what? Kind, huh? Okay. So, to say completely what any one of those particular kinds of things are, you have to add what they call the difference, huh? There should be more than one difference, huh? And the difference is separate these particular kinds of things, one from another. And they also are what the particular kinds of things have in addition, right? So, quadrilateral, for example, is the genus of square, but equilateral and right-angled are the differences that separate square from other quadrilaterals. And equilateral and right-angle are what the square had in addition to the genus, huh? Okay? Now, we define the difference, of course, as a name said with one meaning of many things other than kind, but signifying how they are what they are, right? Signifying how they are what they are. But now, what's the name of those particular kinds? What's the name given to those particular kinds? particular kinds of things under the same genus. Well, in Greek, the common term was eidos. In Latin, the common word was species. Now, in English, sometimes we take the word species and use that. But sometimes, instead of using eidos or species, or species in particular English, we use the word form. Now, that's rather close to eidos and species. Eidos and species, if you know the words a little bit of the Greek, in Latin, they indicate more of the form that you see, right? So, eidos is related to the Greek word for seeing, identi, and species, you know, to speculare, to look at, and so on, right? So, it's a form that I see in some thing. So, we could say, for example, that democracy is a particular kind of government, right? But we might call it a species of government, right? Or we might call it a, what? One form of government, right? So, that which is defined is called a, what? Form. And, it's kind of interesting, this use of the word form, because if you compare the form to the genus, huh? It's a little bit like form is to matter, right? I could say the difference maybe is the genus too, as form is to matter. So, when I say quadrilateral, for example, the genus, I have a four-sided figure, and those four sides can be equal or unequal, right? They can meet at right angle, or obtuse angles, or acute angles, right? But the differences determine one or the other, right? So, the genus is like matter in some ways, huh? And the difference is in the species more like, what, the various ways the matter can be formed, huh? It's not the same thing as matter form, but there's a likeness there, huh? So, it's not by chance that we use the word, what, form there, huh? Genus is related to a generation, right, huh? You have many offspring and so on. But now, when you turn around and compare what the philosopher calls the lowest species or the lowest form, huh? When you compare that to individuals, it's a bit like, what, form to matter too. Because the same kind of thing can be realized in this flesh and blood, or in that flesh and blood, right, huh? Or what it shares can be realized in this metal, and in this metal, and in that metal, right? So, in a way, you think of that which is defined as being form, as opposed to what? Matter, right, huh? So, that, even our way of speaking there could kind of make you think that the definition is of the form only, and the matter pertains to the individuals in whom that form is, what, realized, huh? Okay? Of course, this could be strengthened even if you're thinking of form in mathematics, right? Or you might say, well, sphere is a form, but you could realize sphere in wood, or in glass, or in steel, or in some other material, right, huh? But the form is the same, right, huh? And the word for nature, huh? If you ever study the word for nature there in the fifth book of wisdom, the sense of nature that's relevant here, what a thing is, huh? Is the one derived from nature the sense of, what, form, huh? So, if you see that Platonists is coming into natural philosophy in a way through the study of logic and so on, they tend to think of what can be defined as being just, what, form, huh? Okay? And that's why this comes into this particular text here. I'm saying, I see it out of the blue here, but if you realize the Platonic background of these things, huh? But Thomas is saying now, like we saw in natural philosophy, that if you're going to define a natural thing as opposed to a mathematical thing, you have to bring in, at least in a general way, some kind of what? The matter. Some kind of material, yeah. So you're not going to put my flesh and blood and bones in the definition of man, right? Right. Or your flesh and blood and bones, right? Right. But you're going to understand in general that a man has what? Flesh and blood. Flesh and blood and bones, right? Mm-hmm. Okay? The same thing for the natural things, huh? So if you're talking about a geometrical sphere, there's no matter there. If you're talking about the Earth, which is more or less a sphere, or the Sun, it's not just a sphere. There's some kind of, what, matter there, huh? So he says, which is not able to be true, for to the nature of the species pertains that which the definition signifies. But the definition in natural things now, as opposed to mathematical things, does not signify the form only, but the form and the, what, matter. When matter is a part of the species in natural things, right? Not individual matter, which is what they mean by signata materia, which is the, what, source of individuation, but matter in this common way, right? For just as it pertains to what this man is, that he be from this soul and these, this flesh and these bones, so it also pertains to the ratio, the notion of man, that he be from a soul and from flesh and bones, huh? For it is necessary to pertain to the substance of the species, right? Whatever is commonly, right? Whatever is common about the substance of all the individuals contained under that species, huh? So you're trying to say, what is a dog in general, right? You've got to say, what all these individual dogs are in general. But it's common to all of them, right, huh? And it's common to all of them to be flesh and blood as well as soul, right, huh? Okay. What is materia signata again? What did you say that was? Yeah. It's another way of referring to this matter, right, huh? Man is pointed out, huh? Oh, okay. Okay. Now, in another way one can understand this saying, that someone might say, not just that man in general is just soul, but this man is what? Soul plus individual matter. But the other way of understanding it is to say that this soul, my soul, is me, huh? That this soul is this man, right, huh? Okay. And Thomas has a kind of interesting point to make here, huh? Going back to the third article, right? And this could be sustained, this opinion he says, if one laid down that the operation of the sensing soul was its own without the body. See? See? Man is a what? An animal with reason, right, huh? Mm-hmm. But he has reason because he has this understanding soul, right? Mm-hmm. But he also has what the animal has, the sensing, huh? Abilities, huh? So if he's an animal because he senses, and his sensing was something the soul did, without the body, right, and not in the body, then you'd have reason to say that the soul alone is what? Me, right? He's going to go on to give the reason for that, huh? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Because then all the operations which are attributed to a man would belong to the soul alone, right? Yeah. Yeah. Sensing as well as what? Understanding and... What? Willing, right? And now notice the reason he gives there. For that is each thing which does all the operations of that thing. That's kind of obvious if you stop and think about it, huh? For that is each thing which does the operations of that thing. Okay? Make sense? Okay. So if the soul by itself sensed as well as understood, right? So that all these operations that we have, like sensing as well as understanding and willing, operations just of the soul, then the soul is what would be me, right? Why do you need a body at all? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whence that is man that does the operations of a man, right? But it has been shown, however, that the sense is not an operation of the soul alone, huh? So clearly touching involves the body, right? And tasting involves the body, right, huh? And even, what, sensing involves the eye being acted upon in some way by color, right? And hearing the ear being acted upon by sound, right? And that's why we said that the intensity of sound, you know, excessive sound can actually hurt the, what, ear, right, huh? Right. I was hearing on the, every Christmas time there's some group, you know, that puts out warnings about Christmas toys. Oh, yeah. You've probably heard about them, right? Mm-hmm. So, toys that they consider to be dangerous, huh? Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I guess they just put out their, this Christmas list, there's 25 toys in there, I don't know. But some of the toys, of course, are dangerous, you know, because, you know, they come apart and little pieces can be swallowed by a little baby and so on, or a child, right? But other toys were considered dangerous because they're too noisy, they're too loud for the baby's, child's ear. That's what he's talking about, right? They're a good example of what they're talking about here, huh? But they're not, they, you know, they notice this, doctors, you know, with the young people going to these horrible rock concerts, you know, that they're, apart from their morals being corrupted, which is a minor thing, of course. Their ears are being corrupted, right? They go, like, in death in their ears. And especially that ear that's, that's turned to it, huh? You see? It's not just like my, my old friend there, Jim, the boxer, you know, he's a little hard in hearing one ear, but you can't get him, you can't hear him. So, but, just sound itself alone can, can produce, what? Hardness of hearing, right? Right. So, clearly this involves the body, huh? When sense to sense is a certain operation of man, right? That's a matter of inward experience, right? That I hear the music of Mozart, right? I see the road, I see the plants, I see the trees, right, huh? I taste the food, right? So, it's a part of my experience that the one who sees and hears and smells and tastes is the one who thinks about what he sees and hears and smells and tastes, right? So, the one thinking, right, is also the one sensing, huh? And digesting, for that matter, without going even that far. And therefore, I'm both, what, soul and body, huh? Mm-hmm. And not just one, huh? Since, therefore, the sense is a certain operation of man, although not one that is, what, private to him, right? Propria can be taken there as private, huh? I think a lot of times, you know, we have a problem there in translating propria into English, you know, people want to translate it proper. Right. And proper in English sometimes is just as opposed to, what, improper or something, right? Yeah. But a lot of times, proper in Latin has a sense of what? Private. Yeah, yeah. Okay? I mean, belonging to one alone, right, huh? Mm-hmm. Okay? So, he's saying to sense is an operation of man. It's not one that's private to man. It's something that he shares with the other animals, right? Yeah. It's not like understanding, which is private to man compared to the other animals anyway, right? Mm-hmm. Okay? It's manifest that man is not only a soul, but he's something composed from soul and, what, body, right, huh? Plato, however, laying down that the sense was private to the soul, right, I mean, private to the soul as opposed to the body, right, was able to posit that man was a soul using a, what, a body. Mm-hmm. And notice, here's another example here of where the truth is in between two, what, extremes, huh? Sure. And when you ask yourself, you know, why should people have thought either one of the extreme positions or the false positions, right? If the truth is that middle position, there's a basis in what is, for those who think man is just a soul. Sure. And there's a basis in what man is for thinking he's just a body. At least that's some part of the truth. But if the whole truth is he's just a soul, if man was just a soul, why should anybody have thought, as most men seem to think, that you're a body, right, huh? Now, why would he say, you know, anybody home, anybody home? Any soul home. Yeah. See? But vice versa, if the truth was that man was just a body, you know, like most people seem to think, you know, why would anybody ever think, right, that any brains, there's just a soul, you see? Well, the truth is, what, that he's both body and soul, so there's a part of truth in both of these positions, right? Dequanera Stow's in ethics there, right? And he's dealing with the probable opinions, the opinions of all men or most men or other philosophers and so on, about what happiness is and so on. And many men act as if sense pleasure, right, was happiness, huh? That's the greatest thing, huh? And Aristotle says, well, they wouldn't think this if there wasn't some element of truth in it, right? That the human happiness, the best thing in life, is not sense pleasure, but the best thing in life will be something pleasant to have, you see? So there's some element of truth in this, huh? Why somebody, you know, thought that the best thing in life is pain, I don't see any basis for that in the truth at all, do you? Any element of truth in that, huh? You see? But if someone thinks the best thing in life is sense pleasure, he sees something of the truth, right? You see? Because even Scripture speaks, you know, of the torrent of pleasure in God's house, right? You see? But it's a spiritual pleasure and much different from the sense pleasure, but it is a kind of pleasure, right? And there's some element of truth, therefore, right? Yeah. Do you see that? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Let me mention that again when we're talking about the definition of the soul, right? And those who think of the soul as an accidental form of the body, right? And those who think of the soul as a complete, what, substance, huh? Independent of the body. They both have a part of the truth, right? The soul, the whole truth, which Aristotle was the first to see, is that the soul is a substantial form of a body composed of tools, right? So the accidental form, people, saw part of the truth, that the soul is a form. But they're mistaken as to this being an accidental form. Those who saw the soul as a complete substance saw part of the truth, that it's something substantial, right? But they're mistaken in thinking this was the whole man, right? Okay? But they're mistaken in thinking this was a complete substance, right? Now, I mentioned before how when you get to the two chief mysteries of the Catholic faith, which are the mystery of the Trinity, and the mystery of the Incarnation, two chief ones. When Thomas is defending those against all the heresies, right, he knows that the heresies are extremes, right? And have nothing in common, right, with the truth, huh? So you have Sibelius who says that there's, what, one person? And we call him Father and Son and Holy Spirit because he does different things. So they're saying that there's, what, as there's one nature, there's one person, right? Then you have Arius and people like that who's saying, whereas there are three persons, there's three natures, and only the Father is really God and the Son is something less and the Holy Spirit even less, right? Well, if the truth is that there's one nature and one person, why should anybody think there are three natures and three persons? There'd be no basis in the truth at all for that, anybody going astray in that way, huh? Because there'd be no foundation in the truth, huh? But vice versa, if the truth is that there's three natures and three persons, why should anybody think that there's one person and one nature, right? There'd be no basis in the truth, in reality, in what is, for that opinion, right? But if the truth is something more difficult to see and to understand, that there's one nature but three persons, then you can see how either heresy could, what, arise, huh? In the same way that Empedicry said, right, huh? You know? Having seen a part of life, they boast of having seen the whole, right? You see? That they see that one part of the truth, huh? Now, with the great mystery of the Incarnation, in a way it's just the reverse, huh? There you have one person, but what? Two natures, huh? But you have, likewise, two extreme errors, right? One, like Nestorius, right, who gets up and says, you shouldn't be called the mother of God, called the mother of Jesus, right? And Nestorius started a riot, I guess, in the church there, because they knew there was something wrong with what this guy was saying. But as there are two natures, there must be, what? Two persons, he thought, huh? And then you have the Monophysites and so on, right? Hittiches, I guess, and so on, who says that as there's one person there, there's really, what, one nature, right? Okay? And, again, the truth is more difficult, right? Because you have to understand that there's one person subsisting in two natures there, right? But then there's a part of the truth in both of the, what, currents of heresy, right? But if one of those was the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and the other would have no basis at all for it at all, there'd be no reason to think that at all, and vice versa. The other one was the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, huh? There'd be no reason why anybody would think that, huh? So that sense, the true being in between the two extremes is, explains them, right? Right? But they can't explain it. And that's another sign that you have the truth, huh? That you can not only, you know, defend it by itself, but you can also show why people should have thought other things, right? But if one of these positions is trying to defend itself, it can't explain why somebody thought the contrary, extreme. The sign of truth being that you can explain the opposing, yeah. So in a way, moral, intellectual virtue, in that present, resembles a bit moral virtue, which is in between two extremes, huh? Like courage is in between cowardice and foolhardiness, right? And liberality or generosity is in between stinginess and extravagance, huh? You see? But that's what Shakespeare and Thomas sometimes do, but Shakespeare will say. If he says more or less than the truth, he's a villain in the sun of darkness, huh? False death says. But notice, huh? What it means to say more than the truth is to say what is not is. And to say less than the truth is to say what is is not, huh? So in the midst of the incarnation, the man who says that as there's one person, there's one nature, he's saying that what is is not. And the man who says that as there are two natures, there are two persons, he's saying that what is not, that second person, is. He's saying that what is not is, is to exceed the truth, right? And the other is to fall short, huh? And I think I mentioned that before in logic there. You don't often see people understand that phrase we use in the courtroom, right? I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. When you say the whole truth and nothing but the truth, you're not just repeating, again, you're promised to tell the truth, but you're excluding the two ways you could depart from the truth, huh? See? So I always give as a simple example in class, if I'm called upon to testify who was present at the bar at nine o'clock, and let's say John and Thomas were there and only John and Thomas were there, that would be the truth, right? But if I left out John or Thomas, I would be what? Not telling the whole truth, would I? I'd say John was there, but I'd leave out that Thomas was there, too. Then I'm not telling the whole truth. I'm cutting the truth, is where I'm clipping it, as Shakespeare says in another phrase, huh? Okay? I'm saying that what is, or what was in this case, was not. But if I say that John and Thomas and Paul were there, when I know that only John and Thomas were there, then I'm adding to the truth, right? I'm saying that what was not, was, right? In other case, what was not, what was, was not. You see? Two ways to go. So, sometimes we say that intellectual virtue is a bit like moral virtue, right? That it's in between to, what, extremes, huh? And he said again and again in the history of human thought, huh? That men go to extremes when they're mistaken, huh? So, let's go back now to the reply to the first objection, which was taken from the text of St. Paul there, which speaks of an inner man and outer man, huh? There were people, you know, used to kind of make a joke, you know, with those words, you know, when they're hungry, you know, they've got to go and satisfy the inner man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not the way he's using the term inner man, but they used to, you've got to satisfy the inner man now. Remember that. To the first, therefore, it should be said that according to the philosopher in the ninth book of the Ethics, that most of all seems to be each thing, right, that is principle or chief in it, huh? Just as what the ruler of the city does, the city is said to do, right, huh? So, if George Bush declares war in Iraq, you know, tomorrow, the papers will say U.S. declares, what, war, right? Or if the Congress, you know, declared war in Japan, right, huh? U.S. declares war in Japan, well, it's really the Congress that is so, but they're kind of the head there, right, huh? Of the country, huh? Okay. So, what did the French king say? L'état, c'est moi, huh? Yeah. Because he said the principle one, right, huh? So, what the pope does, you know, if the pope declares someone a saint, right, we'd say what? The church has declared so-and-so a saint, right, huh? That's a common way of what? Speaking, right, huh? And in this way, sometimes, right, what is principle or chief in man is said to be the man, right? Yeah. Sometimes the intellectual part, according to the truth of the thing, right, is called the interior man, huh? But sometimes the sensitive part with the body, according to the estimate of some, huh, who are detained only in sensible things, huh? They can't rise above sensible things, right? So, they think of themselves simply as being a body, right? And this is called the outside. Man, the exterior man. So Aristotle says in the Ethics there, at the end there when he's dealing with happiness and how it involves the highest operations of reason and so on, and he'd say, for reason, more than anything else, is man. Right? Because reason that really separates man from the beast, right? So reason most of all seems to be what? Man, right? And that's even stronger than saying the soul is man. So he's explaining then how the words there of St. Paul should be understood. Just like when you read St. John and he says, and the word was made flesh, right? Well, one heresy is that the word was changed into flesh. That's very gross, right? Another one is that the, what? That in Christ there's human flesh, but no human soul, and the word is in place of the soul. That's another heresy. Okay, because he had that in Arius and so on, huh? But when he says the word was made flesh, as Thomas explains in the commentary, that's a figure of speech, synecdoche, right? Or the name of the, what? Part is given to the, what? Whole, right? And if it's in Scripture, you know, to you all flesh must come, right? Okay? But sometimes in Scripture we're called souls, too. So you give the name of the part to the whole, synecdoche, huh? But we do that in daily life and in speeches and so on, huh? So we say, yeah, he's a brain, huh? Well, he's not a brain. That's what he's a part of. But because that part stands out, you say he's a brain, right, huh? See? Or this, what's his name, Vinatieri, the guy who kicks for the Patriots, right? He seems to always get his kick, you know? And he won the thing for them, you know, the final games, you know, last year, you know, in the playoffs, right? He kicked his field goals, you know, and so on. So I saw him the other day, he's kicking the ball right through there, you know? Doesn't seem to miss. Maybe he misses some guy. I don't ever see him miss, you know? But they call him, you know, Vinatieri, the toe, you know? They call him the toe. Because he's got a, you know? But you get these nicknames, these people, because of some part of their, what, body, you know? You know? Somebody calls somebody muscles, you know, somebody like that, because he's pulching, you know, as he goes around with his fist. My poor Cyrano de Brijrack might be named from his nose, because that stands out, some part of it stands out, huh? Okay? Hiya, big ol' eyes, you know, people's eyes just stand out, big ol' eyes. My head. Okay. That's a fairly common figure of speech. Now, to the second, he says, it ought to be said that not every particular substance is a hypostasis or person, but only one that has the complete nature of the, what, species, huh? Whence is the hand or the foot cannot be called a hypostasis or person, and likewise neither the soul, since it be a part of the human species, huh? That's a text that Thomas often quotes from the book of Job, you know. He's talking about the resurrection. And in my flesh I shall see God, right? It doesn't mean you're going to see God through your eyes, right? But it means your soul will see God face to face, being in your, what, body, the soul, right, huh? Okay? You're not going to see God through the folly eyes, no. But you're going to be seeing him with your soul again joined to your, what, body, right, huh? Now, I'm going to take a little break here because we'll try to divide evenly between these two articles, right? We're going to Article 5, huh? Okay, the fifth article now is kind of a strange article, but you find, you know, sometimes the earlier writer is speaking of some kind of spiritual matter for the soul, and so it's not so much a question for us, but it comes up once in a while. To the fifth, one proceeds thus. It seems that the soul is composed to a matter and form, huh? Now, he says, potency or ability is divided against act, huh? But all things which are in act partake of the very first act, which is God, huh? By the partaking of which all things are good and beings and living, as is clear through the teaching of Dionysius in the book about the divine names. Thomas wrote a commentary in the book of the divine names, huh? It's kind of interesting because the book is in between the two kinds of teaching that you have of Thomas, huh? Thomas, in his commentary on the Psalms, where he says, whoever teaches, right, teaches either things or words. Kind of a funny way of dividing it to first sight, right? He says when we teach the faith and morals, we're teaching things, right? When we teach sacred scripture, we're teaching words, huh? Now, you've got to understand what he's saying there, right? Because, obviously, in talking about the words of sacred scripture, you're going to talk about the things that they signify and so on, right? But up front, you've got to explain the words in front of you, right? You see? Everything revolves around the words. Well, in, say, the Summa Theologiae, you're talking about the thing. It's about God or it's about the Trinity or it's about the soul, right? You know, they're going to use words in talking about God or the, you know, soul. And occasionally, you'll stop and talk about the words you use, right? Nevertheless, up front, you're talking about the thing, right? Okay. That's kind of a nice contrast, right? Where's the distinction from, words versus things? It's in the commentary on the Psalms, where one of the Psalms is talking about things and words. From St. Thomas. Yeah, Thomas' commentary says, whoever teaches, teaches either things or words, but he's contrasting the kind of work that the Summa Theologiae is, let's say, from his commentaries on John or his commentaries on St. Paul, right? Okay? Now, if you take Cornelius the Lapidae, and I have the Cornelius the Lapidae in my office, and Cornelius the Lapidae is commenting on the whole Scripture, just about. And the thing you notice is, when you comment on the words of Sacred Scripture, you're going to find in many different texts it being said that God is what? Sure. Look, you find in many places that you're taught that God is what? Good, let's say, right? Right. Or you're taught metaphorically that God is fire, right? Or God is water, right? So, if you're commenting on all the words of Sacred Scripture, every time the word good comes up to explain what that means said of God, see? Well, then you'd have to be repeating yourself, what? Many times, right? Okay? Right. So I noticed, like, in Cornelius the Lapidae, I forget, it might be in the Acts of the Apostles, you know, where the Holy Spirit comes down as a fire, right? Okay. It might be there that he's very expansive about the reason for calling God fire, metaphorically, right? And then, in other places, where maybe the word fire comes up, he will, what? Refer you back to that passage, right? Right. Okay. Well, then you're starting in a way to, what? Bring together, right? Everything that could be said about fire in one place, right? Okay. Okay? What the Divine Names is doing, and apparently some of his other works of Dionysius, is, what he's done is to take the names that are said properly of God, like good and just and so on and beautiful and so on, and explain those, right? So, it's not in the context of one particular Scripture place, right? But for the whole of Scripture now, right? In time the word God is said to be good, we could go and read what Danisha says about the word good said of God, right? So it's sort of in between what you do in the Summa, right, and what you do in Scripture, right? Because when Thomas is explaining, say, that God is good here, well, I can point where it is, right? You know, question, what, five and six, you know, four, five, and six about the good, right? God, right? It's all there, right? See? But if you're talking about Scripture, God is good here, God is good there, God is good there, right? You see? And you have to kind of talk about it many times, you know? And so Dionysius is talking about good in just one place, but the name of the book is about the divine names, right? So it's like he's talking about names, but now he's kind of, not just in the context of the commentary in particular, the book of Scripture, right? Yeah. And we bring together maybe texts from different parts of Scripture to illuminate what good means said of God, huh? It's the attributes of God that he talks about? Yeah, but I mean, the name of the book is not about God, but about the divine name, see? See? So he's talking about names, but kind of in a way like Thomas talks about God, huh? You see? But you can kind of see the transition there from just coming on Scripture to talking about these things outside of Scripture, right? Okay, so, potency is divided against act, or ability is divided against act. But all things that are in act partake of the first act, which is God, by the partaking of which all things are good and beings are living. It is clear through the teaching of Dionysius in the book about the divine names. I'm sorry, I've got a question. I mean, there are non-living things that exist in participation, aren't there? Yeah, he's not going to deny that they partake of God in some way, too. So why would he say that they're living? Oh, he says bona herencia, beings, huh? Beings are going to include everything, right? Okay, so God is I am who am, right? Right. So all things that are, insofar as they are, seem to partake of God in some way, right? Or God alone is good, as Christ says, right? He's goodness itself. So all things that are good are partaking of the divine goodness in some way. They're having an imperfect way, but God has more perfectly. And God is life itself, right? So all things that are living partake of what? Life, which is God himself, right? Now he's arguing by kind of analogy here. Therefore, whatever things are in potency, right, partake of the first, what? Potency or ability. But the first potency is the first matter. Therefore, since the human soul is in some way in potency, which appears from this that man sometimes is understanding in potency, right? It seems that the human soul partake of first matter as if it were a part of itself, huh? Okay? Now, notice, huh? When Thomas is teaching that God is not material, he's not a body, and so on, he sometimes mentions the opinion of David of Dinah, huh? Who most stupidly taught, as Thomas says, that God is, what? The first matter, right? Oh. Okay? Now, Thomas is not just gratuitously insulting for David of Dinah, but he's saying that he's taking what is furthest away from God, right? Yeah, right. Because God is, what? Pure act. Pure act, huh? And everything else in between is, what? Partly in act and partly in ability. So, everything insofar as it's an act is partaking of God, right? So, you might think everything insofar as it has some potency or ability is partaking of what is pure ability, right? See? Okay? And that's the way I'm just proceeding, right, huh? So, since there's potency in the soul, it must not be partaking of this, huh? Now, you might need a little bit of the Manichaean thing, you know, where they say, what? God is good as itself, right? So, insofar as things are good, they, what? Share what God has, right? Okay? And then they want to imagine that there's a, what? Badness itself, right? And so they have a good God and a bad God, right? And everything in between that has something good about it, or something bad about it, is what? And it's sharing in both, right? Okay? Well, of course, if you know what badness is, you realize that that's a, what? Impossibility of something to be bad itself. Because you find out that, basically, what the badness is, is the lack of something you're able to have when you should have it, right? Right, huh? Okay? So, therefore, you have to have the ability for something good, an ability, something good that you should have, and when you don't have that, that's bad, right? Okay? So, badness always presupposes something good, even in the thing that is bad. So, there couldn't be something that's badness itself, it would be nothing. See? So, there is no such thing as that, huh? But there is a first matter that is pure potency, right? Mm-hmm. And so, it seems like just as everything that is actual partakes of pure act, so likewise, everything that is pure, what? There's potential in some way, must be partaking of pure potency, right? Just like if there was a badness itself, right? You think, well, everything bad must be partaking of the badness itself, insofar as it's bad, just as it partakes of God, insofar as it's good, right? Okay? Interesting argument, huh? Moreover, second objection now. In whatever is found, or are found, the properties of matter, there is found matter. But in the soul are found the properties of matter, which are to be subject to, to be transformed, huh? For the soul is subject to, what? Knowledge, huh? And to virtue, and is changed from ignorance to knowledge, huh? And from vice to virtue, right? Therefore, in the soul there is matter, huh? Interesting, huh? Yeah. Now, people should be prepared, kind of, to answer that, because, in your study of the Dianima, right? When Aristotle got to talk about the senses and about reason and so on, he said that sensing is an undergoing, right? And then he said that understanding is an undergoing, right? But he was careful to distinguish the meaning of undergoing there from the undergoing of what? Matter, right? Right, huh? But there, nevertheless, there's a certain likeness there which can deceive us, huh? But you can kind of suspect that Thomas is going to point out, what we saw in Aristotle already, that these words are not unirical, they're in exactly the same meaning when said of the soul, right? Instead of matter, huh? So, you know, one of the most important examples they always give is the fact that in matter, when you receive one opposite, you lose the other opposite that you had, right? So, for example, if my body receives, what? Health, then sickness will be, what? Out of my body, right? And if my body becomes sick, then health will be expelled, right? But when my soul understands what sickness is, an understanding of health is involved in that, isn't it? When the soul understands what abnormal blood pressure is, normal blood pressure is in the understanding of abnormal blood pressure, isn't it? But my blood pressure, if I have high blood pressure, I don't have normal blood pressure at the same time, do I? So one opposite excludes the other, right? That's the characteristic of change in the body, right? So sometimes we say matter receives