De Anima (On the Soul)
Lecture 106: The Active Intellect as a Power of the Soul

Transcript
================================================================================

The ability to digest my food, right, huh? I'm eating my, acting upon my food, right, huh? The ability to grow, the ability to reproduce myself, right? Okay. And then you go to my sense powers, the ability to see and hear and so on, right? To be acted upon by color and sound and so on. But then you get up here to the, not up here, but way up there. Then you finally have, what? As Aristotle says in the Siddha Kanta there, huh? One part by which the soul is able to, what? Undergo all things, become all things, and the other part by which is able to, in a way, make all things, huh? Okay. So, this is the active understanding, huh? Yeah, how about the interior senses of an action? Well, then you have a little effect of that, yeah, yeah. But it's kind of, you know, a result, I suppose, of the reason being already, what, somewhat an act, right? Okay. So you act upon these things, huh? Just like you might say, you want to think about Jami now, and if you want to think about Jami now, my reason would be commanding my imagination to form certain figures, right? Okay. Okay? Yeah. And, but that's like, you start to talk about reasoning and things of that sort, right? Where the mind, already somewhat an act, can now, what, move itself to some extent, huh? Yeah. Okay? But basically, you say, we're being acted upon at the beginning of this. Yeah. Just like with the heart, the heart, you know, you're first acted upon, but then if you love one thing as an end, you can love something else as a means, because you love that as a, what, end here. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Okay? Now, this abstraction, or could you say, like, separating or drawing away, it's kind of a metaphor, like, it's, you're not really... Yeah, it doesn't mean that you're taking the very thing that's in there out of there and leaving something behind, right, huh? Yeah. It's more like, you know, when I take a piece of paper, right, and I, you know, get the image of the thing, right? Okay? I stole the image from it, right? You know, it's not exactly the same as that, but, I mean, it's not as if you, you know, you're, you know, you take it out, cut out the thing, you know? See, what you've made is something, what, like that, huh? You see? You're right, probably. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so the image, you might say, is an instrument of the act of understanding and making, what, the understandable an act, huh? Okay? This will come out better as it goes on here, because you'll talk about how the act of understanding is something actual in the line of the understandable, right? But the particular likenesses, right, of things are found in the images, okay? This will come up when you have the, but let's wait to the next article, because that's when he talks about whether the act of understanding is something of the soul, right? Because there's some people who said, no, there's some other substance, like an angel, you know, that is this act of understanding, right? Rather than just as an ability of the soul itself, right? And the problem for that was that it seemed like the soul was in, what, potency and in act with respect to the, what, same thing, right? And of course, you'll be solving an ejection in the next one, so let's wait for it until that point, huh? Okay, they just have to understand more fully exactly what the act of understanding is doing, right, huh? You see? Why you need the image in order to get the thought, right? And not just the act of understanding, huh? Okay? Okay, so leave it until you get to there. Now, to the third, it ought to be said that suppose the agent, right? Saktiviski. Oh, saktiviski, okay, okay, okay, yeah. And the second one, remember, was based upon the objection that what light is doing is not making these things actually sensible, it's just making the medium, what? An actual medium, huh? It's like if I was to say, the colors are really visible over there, but you have to see the colors through the transparent. Oh, yeah. And the air is only transparent in ability. And it's light that makes the air actually transparent. You can see, I thought you could think that, right? Okay. Okay? And once the air has been made actually transparent, then the colors can act directly upon the eye, right? Okay. Okay? And so this is saying, well, you know, there's no medium in the case of the understanding, right? Yeah. Okay, and then also Thomas' reply was that there's two ways that, or two thoughts that we'll have about what is the effect of light, huh? To the second, it should be said that about the effect of light, there's a two-fold opinion. Some say that light is required for sight in order to make the colors themselves, right? Visible in act, huh? Okay? And according to this, in a very likewise manner, right? In account of the same, the agent-like is necessary for understanding, right? In the same way the light is for what? Seeing with the eyes, huh? It's just as colors are not actually, what? Visible except through light, right? So the images of what's in the image are not actually understandable except the agent-like. And there the likeness is very great between the two, right? Okay? According to others, however, light is required for seeing, not on account of the colors, that they become visible in act, but only in order that the medium, the transparent, become lucid in act, or become transparent in act. As a commentator, which refers to Verwas, says in the second book about the soul. So, and according to this, the likeness by which Aristotle symbolates the agent-like to light should be noted as regards this, that it's necessary for seeing, just as that is for what? Understanding, but not exactly in the same way, huh? Okay? But thus, the first way of understanding exterior light would be better as a what? Light is what takes place up here, huh? Okay? But notice later on, when we talk about the other two lights, the supernatural lights, the light of faith, right? And the light of what? Glory, right? Well, the light of faith is like the natural light of reason in that it makes something understandable that wouldn't be understandable without it. Okay? But the light of glory is a different thing, right? There, the light of glory, it means that what? It's a disposition of our soul, or a disposition of our understanding, to receive God himself as the form by which we're going to see God. You see? It's not to make God understandable. God in himself is most understandable, right? He's the most understandable thing there is. He's the most knowable thing there is, huh? Not to us, right? But he's the most understandable thing there is. So there's no need for light to make God understandable. But in order to see God as he is, we have to receive God, right? As the form by which we understand, huh? In your light we shall see light, it says in the Psalms. In order to receive God as a form, our soul, or our reason, our understanding, has to be disposed, right? And that disposition is called the light of glory, huh? See? So there, the word light, like here, is something necessary to see, right? Right? But it's not to make understandable and act something, right? So it's not to be understandable and act without that light, huh? God doesn't need his light itself. You see? You know, as Thomas says, looks vera, right? Remember that in the communion prayer? Looks vera. This is the teaching vision, right? True light, huh? So I just mentioned that because, you know, here, that using the word light there in a different way, right? Just like here in the second explanation, right? It's necessary, but in a different way, right? Okay. But if you understand light in the first way, then it's exactly very much like this other, like the agent's elect is. In the third way, are you dropping part of the meaning? Well, no, you're keeping the idea that it's something necessary in order to see, but not to make colors actually visible, right? But if you say light is necessary to make colors actually visible, then it's very much like the agent's elect is, you know, spiritual light, right? It makes something actually understandable. Thank you. actually visible in the sense to the mind, right? Okay? So I usually give the first opinion myself, because it's... See? But in terms of likeness there, it helps you to understand it better, right? Okay? So are they both... But I say, the use of the word like, even if you understood the second way, right? You still use the word like, but you'll be using it with a little difference in the reason why the likeness would consist only in that it being necessary to see, right? Okay? In the same way I was saying that the light of glory is necessary to see God as He is. But it's unnecessary to see God, by making God understandable, because He's not understandable as such, right? Okay? So would they both be extensions by a proportion? Well, it would be a different kind of reason, say. Okay? Or would they both be a proportion, a different proportion, or...? Well, I don't know if you use the word proportion there, but you'd say that what is necessary before you can see something is called light. Okay? But if light is necessary in the first way, according to the first opinion, right, then the likeness is, what? Much more what a proportion, huh? Okay? Yeah. Just like I was saying about those three lights. That's the natural light of reason, the light of faith, and the light of glory, right? The light of faith is more like the light of reason, right? As far as what it does, huh? See? See? But by the light of reason, I can see that a whole is more than one of its parts, right? And therefore I assent to the statement that a whole is more than one of its parts, right? By the light of faith, I assent to, what? Three persons in God, or God became man, or something like that, right? I see. But the light of glory is doing something a little different, right? It's not illuminating the object, in the sense, for us, right? Oh, yeah. See? It's not making the object understandable, right? Except that what? What it is doing is making our understanding, right? Disposed, we see God as a form by which we now understand. Which we now see God as He is. When you say the light of reason, it seems like sometimes that doesn't refer to the active ability of the creation to principles or something. No, they partake of it, in a sense, you see? Because sometimes, I think the very well speaks of the first things you understand, right? We see them in the light, very much of the ancient intellect, huh? And so they're kind of like tools of the ancient intellect, huh? And then they're used to know other things, huh? So they already partake of that light, huh? Of the ancient intellect, okay? So, I mean, the conclusion is, you know, you're enlightened, in a sense, by the principles, right? But the principles are enlightened by the ancient intellect, I think. So that's a start for us. Now, he says to the third thing, it should be answered, that supposing an agent, it happens, well, that diversely has received its likeness in diverse things in account of their diverse disposition. But if the agent doesn't preexist, the disposition of the one receiving will do nothing for, what, getting the thing, huh? But the understandable act is not something existing in the nature of things, as far as the nature of sensible things is concerned, right? Which things are not subsist without matter, or apart from matter. And therefore, for understanding those things, the materiality of the possible understanding does not suffice, unless there be present the agent intellect, which makes understandable in act by way of abstraction, right? There's a text of Thomas somewhere else where he explains the word abstraction. It doesn't mean that you cut it out and take it with you, you know, huh? You see? Just like, that's why I was comparing it a bit, you know, if I take a tracing paper and I, you know, do this over a gravestone or something, or, you know, I get the, I take away the form, right? But I don't, what, cut it out with the material and take it with me, right? Okay. So in a way, the agent intellect, you might say, makes the understandable in act, right? With the help of the image, right? Which contains a likeness to that, in particular, but not in an understandable way, because it's singular, okay? So it, it, it, it gets a likeness from the image, right? But what it gives itself is the, what, actual universeality, right? The actual understandability, therefore. And we'll see a little bit in the next article, right? Okay. Let's go on, I'm going to use a little of the scripture later, maybe take a break for the scripture, okay? Okay. Whether the acting upon understanding is something of the soul. To the fourth, one proceeds thus. It seems that the acting upon understanding is not something of our soul. For the effect of the act of understanding, or the agent intellect, or the acting upon understanding, however you want to translate that, is to what? Illumine to understanding, right? But this comes about to something that is higher than the soul, right? According to that of John 1, verse 9. First chapter of the Gospel of St. John. For this was the true light, which enlightens every man coming into this world, huh? This is said about the Word there. Remember in the Gospel of St. John? We did that a long time ago, right? Therefore it seems that the acting upon understanding is not something of the soul. So notice what this argument is saying, huh? The, what, act of understanding is enlightening us, right? Okay? But it's the Word, right? It enlightens everybody who comes into this world, right? Therefore the act of understanding is not, what, something of our soul, an ability of our soul, but it's something outside our soul, right? Like the Word, right? Okay? That's a very interesting objection, right? And the point is that there is a connection between, what, the act of understanding and the Word, huh? Okay? Well, that come on in reply to the objection, right? Okay. I mean, it's true that he's the true light. I know it's the true light, which enlightens every man coming into this world, huh? But it's that in part by giving us a light, which is the act of understanding, right? Okay? Moreover, the philosopher in the third book about the soul attributes to the act of understanding that it does not at one time understand and at the other time not understand. But our soul does not always understand. But sometimes it understands and sometimes it does not understand. Therefore, the acting upon understanding is not something of our soul. That's a famous text, if you remember that, in the Dianima. And a lot of people misunderstood the text, right? See? What Aristotle does there in the Dianima is to talk, first of all, about this ability to understand, right? And what its object is and so on, right? And then he sees the need for this second ability, right? And then he sees that, what, understanding is an essential result of both of these abilities together, right? And then he talks about the combination of both, right? You see? And that's what the ejection, but Thomas puts it in there because it's a very common ejection, right? People misunderstand what Aristotle is saying afterwards, right? He's talking now about the combination of these two together, right? And there you have our actually understanding, right? And then in that combination, both sometimes understanding and sometimes not, when the two are working together, now you're what? Always actually understanding. You see? So there's understanding the text. You have to go back to the Greek, you know. But that's where Thomas reads the text very carefully, right? If you ever read Thomas' refutation of Averroist, of course, there's many of them in different places. But the day you need to talk intellectuals on Contra Averroist, this is kind of the definitive work, right? It would have been a masterful thing. Thomas goes, you know, to the text, and if you go through that, you know, word by word, Thomas does, you're absolutely convinced that Thomas is correct, right? And he gets through it so thoroughly, you know. He says, he borrows, how likely they err, you know. You know, just don't have the, you know, that devotion to the word, right? As Thomas says, you know, to be teachable, you have to, you know, apply your mind to the words of those wiser than you, right? Carefully, frequently, with reverence, right? And Thomas does that with great respect for Aristotle or Augustine or something like that. I was trying to find a text incident the other day there, and I couldn't find it, but I ran across the old text of John Paul. Paul II, and what would be the, one of the adversities of Augustine's life, you know? Oh, yeah. It's kind of a, really, I mean, it's a thing, it's a really, really, really, very well written, you know, a very rich thing. I mean, if you wanted to, you know, kind of have a little reading there for, to, you know, urge somebody to read Augustine, you know? Yeah, really, it's something I share, you know, I really, really, I just been looking at it the other day, and I agree with that an awful lot to learn from my custom. Okay. So I say the way the text goes is Aristotle takes up this first, say, and then he takes up the actual understanding, right? Then he takes up the combination of the two, right? And that's what he's talking about, this text is based on, but this understanding is if you're talking about this ability all by itself. Well, actually, understanding is a combination of the work of both of these together. Moreover, the agent and the patient suffice for acting. If, therefore, the possible understanding is something of our soul, which is the undergoing or passive power, and likewise the active understanding, which is the active power, it follows that man can always understand when he wants to, which is clearly false, right? Therefore, the acting upon understanding is not something of our soul. Well, as we'll find out, the active understanding doesn't contain the likenesses of all these sensible things, or imaginable things, but what it has is what? Understandability, you know, it's actually immaterial, right? And it's acting in that line, so it needs the, what, particular likenesses drawn from the, what, senses or the imagination, huh? And that's why, you know, without experience, you're not going to have, what, the thoughts you need, right? And you need experience of cats before you can separate out what they have in common, right? If you don't have that experience, you're not going to be separating out cats, are you? If I've separated out cats, yeah, I don't know. Now, this fourth objection I was talking about earlier with your, your, your, your objection, Father. Moreover, the philosopher says in the third book about the soul, that the acting upon understanding is a substance, an act, huh? Sure, being an act. But nothing is, with respect to the same thing, an act in nobility. If, therefore, the possible understanding, which is in potency to all understandable things, is something of our soul, it seems impossible that the act of understanding be something of our soul. It'd be both an act and an ability with respect to the same thing, right? That's a good objection, because it's going to force Thomas to point out exactly what is the role of the act of understanding, huh? Moreover, if the act of understanding is something of our soul, it's necessary that it be some ability, some power thereof. For it is neither a passion nor a habit, huh? For habits and passions don't have the definition of an agent with respect to the passions of the soul. But passion is more the action of the passive power. And a habit is something that follows from acts, unlike our habits are acquired by repeated acts, huh? But every power flows from the essence of the soul. It would follow, therefore, that the act of understanding proceeds from the essence of the soul. And thus it would not be in the soul by the partaking from some superior intellect. That's going back to the first objection, in a way, right? Which is inconvenient. Therefore, the agent intellect is not something of our soul, right? Of course, Thomas would be able to solve that by saying, hey, but the soul comes from God too, right? So the fact that the agent intellect is the power of the soul and flows from the soul, right, doesn't mean that that agent intellect isn't derived in some way from, what, the one who enlightens everybody who comes into this world, because the soul, which that power flows, comes from God, right? Okay? But against all this is what the philosopher says, right? In the third book about the soul, it is necessary for there to be these differences, huh? The active and the passive powers there in the soul, namely the possible understanding and the agent, huh? It's going back to the quote we had there, previous article. I answered, I'd have to be said that the active or acting upon understanding about which the philosopher speaks, huh? The one that makes understandable act what is in the, what? Images, yeah. It's something of the soul, huh? To the evidence of which it should be considered that above the human understanding soul, it is necessary to lay down some superior understanding, huh? From which the soul obtains the power of what? Understanding, huh? And what's the reason for that? For always what partakes of something and which is mobile, right, and which is imperfect, presupposes before itself something that to its essence is such, right? And that is immobile and perfect, huh? And obviously what partakes, presupposes what is so essentially, right, huh? What is mobile depends upon the immobile, huh? That's why the mouse, as Aristotle says, has a hard time getting across the pile of grain, because it won't... It's immobile to push off. Yeah, yeah, it is an immobile part, right, huh? Okay. And that's why you can't walk in the water, right? Unless you're Christ. And the imperfect depends upon the perfect, just as the potential, right, upon the actual. But the human understanding soul is said by partaking of intellectual power. And what's the sign of this, huh? That the whole of this soul is not understanding, right, huh? We have all these other powers, right? The sensing powers and the digesting powers, the reproducing powers, right? So it seems we only have this in a kind of partial way. Only according to one of our parts, right? We're kind of a, what? What? Not purely intellectual, are we? No. No. Remember Guston there complaining about his... He's got a bad tooth, do you remember, huh? Those days were my story of dentistry, you know, and then it kind of lays up Augustine for a while, right, or interferes with the higher life, huh? It pertains also to the understanding of truth, or it attains to the understanding of truth with a certain discourse and motion, right? Remember how Shakespeare defined reason as the ability for a large discourse, right? And discourse comes in the word for running, huh? So, it has a kind of motion whereby it gets to know something. So it's going to depend upon, what, some mind that knows without discourse, huh? And when you study the angels, and therefore it's the area of God, there's no discourse in them. There's no motion, right? It's amazing. This text I was going to show you just immediately illuminates it, huh? It's amazing. Look at that text once more. You can see that. Now you see that reading Thomas, you know, it's amazing, it's really amazing. Drop the press, drop the press! That's amazing, huh? The text I want to talk to you about is in James' epistles, the first chapter, the 17th verse, right? And I won't try to say the whole thing, you know, but this is a famous passage there where he says, Pasa dosisa agathe, every good giving, right? Kai pandorema, every, yeah, pandorema, every gift, right? Teleon, right? Every perfect, right? Gift, right? Okay. Anothen, from above, right? Esten is from above. Katabainan, coming down, right? Okay. From whom now? Apo, to, from, patros, huh? The father. But he's called ton, photon, the father of lights, huh? Okay? Now you know how on the Our Father we are taught to ask everything from the father, right? Our father, right? But here he's called, what, the father of lights, huh? That's what I wanted to talk about a little bit, see? Okay? Okay? But then, what's the rest of the sentence? Parho, with whom, uk, isn't, huh? Any, paralage, there's no change, right? Or, tropes, aposchiasme, not even the shadow of a turning, right? Okay? I've often seen Thomas quote that last part of the phrase when he's talking about God as being unchanging, right? That's a common text, right? It's a very important one. There's not even the shadow of a change or a turning in God, right? Absolutely no change in God whatsoever. And that's kind of the authoritative text, right? You know how I can assume that kind of Gentiles, he'll give the reasons for those things that you can give reason for, right? And some of these things you can know both by reason and by faith, and he'll give the reasons, and then he'll give the scriptural passages. He used to be a famous one for that, right? But just thinking of that now here, see? That he's the father of lights, right? And why does it connect those two things, right? That every perfect gift is coming down from above, from the father of lights, right? And therefore we're getting, in a sense, the gift of our light here, right? But the fact that he is what? He's unchanging, right? You're coming down here to what? Thomas was saying that we have discourse, right? Motion, right? So part of the reason why the light of our mind is derived from the light of God, is that our mind has what? Our mind is changing. Yeah. Our mind understands by emotion, huh? And therefore it must depend upon a mind, right? A higher light and so on, that is unchanging, right? And so it's interesting that he adds that here. I mean, it fits in very well with the texture, huh? Kind of strikes you that way, huh? We'll come back to that text again, but just, I was kind of looking at it, you know, I said, gee, I was wondering why he adds that there. I mean, what might's appropriate there, but it might be more than one reason why it's appropriate. It's kind of interesting the way he speaks there. You have, in the paralagia, there's uk in the paralagia. Paralagia means change, I guess. They use the word aposchiasma, right? Which, ah, ah, the idea of shadow change, right, huh? I mean, another thing, too, especially in the sentences, Thomas quotes some of the early thinkers there who spoke of our mind as having an intellectus obum bratus, huh? You see that? That's a very common thing, huh? An overshadowed, what? Understanding, right? And that's why we need to have discourse, huh? You see? You know, they'll tie those two things together, right? Well, why the angels don't, are not spoken of as having intellectus obum bratus, right? Because they understand everything right away, and without need for any discourse, right? Where our mind is kind of overshadowed, you know, kind of in the dark, mainly, you know? And gradually being enlightened as we reason things out, like we're trying to do now, right? Being gradually, you know, getting a little bit of light on these things, a little bit of light, getting a little bit of light in the cracks, so to speak, as we reason, right? So I think it's kind of beautiful the way it says that, right? Because it says, it has that reference to light and shadow there, right? There's not even the shadow returning in God, huh? You know? That word Aristotle is always using the different sciences. Each science has its own tropas, its own way of turning, right? And you have to turn your mind a different way, right? I've seen that in one of my favorite authors there, Washington Irving there, you know? And Mount Joy, a beautiful story. But this young man is found under the influence of a teacher who's more poetic than philosophic. And he's got these beautiful poetic words, you know, but he's mistaking for the pearls of wisdom, right? He's just this beautiful rhetoric, so to speak, yeah? And, but it appeals to the guy because he had this poetic turn of mind, huh? So he uses that expression, the turn of mind, right? And I say, that's exactly, you know? People's minds are turned the wrong way, and then they can't, you know, understand philosophy, they can't understand theology, they can't understand something, you know? Because their mind just turned the wrong way, huh? But there's not even the, what, shadow of a turning, it says here in St. James, huh? It's getting a marvelous passage here, huh? And it has an imperfect understanding because it does not understand all things, like the angel does or God. And because in those things which it does understand, it proceeds from, what, potency to act, huh? So he's talking about how our understanding must have its power derived from a higher mind, right? Because of these three reasons, huh? Okay? It only partakes of understanding, right? Or sometimes we'll call an angelic mind an intellectual superior, right? It's like its whole nature is to be that, huh? So we partake of understanding, huh? We have understanding by motion, right, huh? We have more discourse than understanding, huh? In the way Shakespeare defines it, it's very good, huh? Its ability for a large discourse, looking before and after, right? Like it's seeking to understand, huh? So it's in motion, and it's, what, doesn't understand all things, obviously, and it's in potency, right? Even to the things that it, what, can understand, huh? Okay? Therefore, it's necessary that there be some higher understanding by which the soul is aided to understanding, huh? And so I'm always praying to my guardian angel there, right? It's presumptuous of me to try to understand something without invoking the help of my guardian angel, huh? But it's kind of beautiful, you know, if you read the tomatoes of Plato, right? Where tomatoes is trying to discourse about the whole universe, right? And he says, well, we should pray first, right? And he says, well, I mean, you know, you should pray before doing anything, really, you know, he says. But especially if you're going to talk about the whole universe, right? I mean, you know, there really need to be, you know, some help. You know, it's kind of marvelous, I mean, huh? You know, our nitwits, you know, in the modern academic world wouldn't think of praying before they study, you know? I mean, that would be, you know... They make, as you say, fun of it, right? You know, like, I guess there's some kids there, you know, in the Catholic schools who don't study and pray and expect to pass, you know? And that's challenging God in the wrong way, obviously, you know? They should study as hard as possible, but you have to pray, nevertheless. Even if you're Thomas Aquinas, you should pray, right? You know, you have Thomas' prayers, you know, that you're saved before prayer, okay? Now, but having said that, you know, Thomas says, now, some people go a little bit astray, right? Some... People lay down that this, what, understanding that's in a separated substance, right, that that is the agent like which Aristotle is talking about, right? They confuse this ability that we have in our own soul to make understandable and act what is in the images, right, with that superior understanding, right, from which our soul, maybe, as well as our power of understanding is derived. You see the difference, huh? I'm sorry, can you repeat that, Dr. Yeah. Some posit, right, and he gives some of the Arabs down there in this footnote here, the Avicenna, where it was, huh? Some posit that this understanding is according to a, what, separated understanding, right? Or, excuse me, they posit that this intellect that is in a separated substance from man to be this act of understanding, right, which, as it were, enlightening, or the images, makes them to be understandable and act, huh? He says, given, huh, that there be some separated, right, active understanding, huh, nevertheless is necessary to posit in the human soul itself some power partaken of from that superior understanding through which or by which the human soul makes things understandable one act, and he starts to give you the reason for this. For just as in other natural things that are perfect, apart from the universal agent causes, they have their own powers, right, in each of these perfect things, huh, derived from the universal agents. For not only does the soul generate man, but also in man there is the, what, generative powers, right, sexual powers, and likewise in the other perfect animals, right? The sun, is it? Yeah, oh yeah. I mean, it's the sun. Yeah. Okay. They had some universal causality here. But nothing is more perfect among inferior things than the human soul, whence it is necessary to say that in it there would be some power derived from a superior understanding to which it can, what, understand, or not understand, but illumine the, what, images, right? Okay. And notice if it didn't have that, it wouldn't really have, what, Libra of Arbitrum, as we say it later on, huh, wouldn't have really free judgment, huh? So its understanding would simply depend upon its exterior substance, right? And therefore wouldn't really have free judgment, huh? And therefore freedom. But Thomas here appeals not to that, but to the experience that we have of separating the universal from the singular, huh? And this we know by experience, right? When we perceive that we separate universal forms from particular conditions, huh? Which is to make things understandable and act. And you can see that when you're doing geometry, right? And you're learning about the parallelogram of the rhombus, right? That you're separating out these things. But no action belongs to something except through some principle or source that is formally inhering in it, as has been said above when we spoke about the possible understanding. Therefore, the power, which is the principle of this action that we experience in ourselves, must be something in the soul. And therefore, Aristotle compares the act of understanding to light, which is something we see in the air. But Plato compares the, what? Separated intellect, pressing things upon our soul to the sun, as the mystic says in his commentary in the third book about the soul. But the separated intellect, according to the documents of our faith, is God himself, right? Who is the creator of the soul, and in which alone, and in whom alone, it reaches its beatitude, huh? As we'll be clear below. We take that at the end of man. Whence from it the human soul partakes of intellectual light. According to that, according to that of Psalm 4, sealed upon us is the light of your, what, face, O Lord, right, huh? It's been impressed upon us something of the light there, huh? Okay. Okay, now I'm going to start to reply to the objections, huh? To the first, therefore, it should be said that that true light illumines as a universal cause, from which the human soul partakes a certain, what, particular power has been said, right? So you might say that the natural light of our soul, which is this active intellect, right, that light is enkindled by the word of God, right? Okay. But nevertheless, we have a light, huh, in our soul, which is a partaking of the, what, divine light, huh? Yeah, that's what I'm wondering about. I mean, is it a part of the divine light? Is it induced, like, heat? Well, you say part, partake, we don't mean that you divide up the divine light, huh? Okay. But that you are, what, receiving something like it, but in an imperfect way, right? Right. Or part means, what, imperfect, right? In the way St. Paul used the word sometimes, now we know. It's partly, yeah, yeah, imperfectly, right? In the mirror, darkly. Yeah, okay. So we have the power to separate the universal, we experience that act, yes. Sure. Okay. So that ability is something that we have gotten from God, huh? And so we say, you know, this is the light which enlightens every man that comes into this world. You can understand that in more than one way. But you could soon use it as referring to the natural light of reason, huh? And if you have to kind of respect the natural light of reason, as well as the light of faith, right? Because they're both derived from God. And when Thomas will say, you know, that reason and faith can't really be in contradiction, right? Among the many reasons he'll give is that both lights are, what, derived from God, right? So the light of reason, the light of faith can't really be in opposition, however it might appear sometimes to be, right? And so I have to respect both lights, huh? And of course, when he says, this is the light which enlightens every man that comes into this world, you seem to emphasize almost the natural light of reason, because not everybody has faith, right? So maybe not everybody is, you know, actually it might have been by the light of faith, huh? Okay. Now that second one was the text that I mentioned that, let's go back to the Greek to show that Thomas' interpretation is, it's the text, huh? But Thomas is, first I was talking there, and they said, first of all, about the passer with a possible understanding, the ability to understand, and then he sees a need for the ability to make understandable an act, what is in the images, and the need for the act of understanding, that you have these two, and then he talks about the, what, combination of the two, right, huh? Where the two working together give us the state of actual understanding, right? And in that state, we're not sometimes understanding, so he's not understanding. That's what's being misunderstood, huh? So the second one ought to be said that the philosopher, that those words of the philosopher, the philosopher in those words, I should say, is not speaking about the act of understanding, but about the understanding and act, right? Whence Supra, huh, above, he set forth that the same is, what, knowledge of the thing according to act, huh? Or if he understands this about the age of intellect, huh? This is said, not because on the part of the act of understanding, it sometimes understands, and sometimes you don't understand, but on the part of intellect, which is in, what, potency, that we sometimes understand, sometimes don't, huh? See what he's saying there? No. Okay, there's two ways he's solving this, right? One is to say, like, he does it in the comic book of Daniela, where he says that Aristotle was part in there about the combinations to intellect and act, right? Right. And he said, now, when these come together, right, huh? Yes. Then you're actually understanding, right? And when you're actually understanding, you're not sometimes understanding, sometimes not. Mm-hmm. But you're actually understanding, the two are, okay? If you want to take it in another way that refers just to this, right? All right. Then he's saying that the fact that we sometimes understand, sometimes don't, isn't due to the defect of this power. This is already, always accurate, you might say, right? Mm-hmm. But it's due to the defect of this one, right? Mm-hmm. Okay? Maybe the images, too, right? Mm-hmm. Okay. It's another very interesting text that Thomas wrote. When he talks about the two things in knowing, grasping. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.