ST I q.76 a.4: Is There Another Substantial Form in Man? The Objections (with Digressions on Antonomasia, Synecdoche and Mixture)

Orientation #

He says “I think it was three we did last time, and four they went in today”: article 3 asked whether there are other souls in man besides the understanding soul; article 4 asks about a more fundamental substantial form, the one that would make something a body. He says the replies to the objections will come later (“we’ll see the way he solves that”). The previous class worked through the replies of the article on whether the three souls in man are one substance; the next takes up this article’s body and replies. A text-matching system reports a handout (“Shakespeare’s Understanding of a Play”, p. 25) read in this session; in the transcript only short Shakespeare lines appear (see Texts).

The class, in order #

1. Opening aside and the question of article 4 (“whether there is in man another form”) #

He introduces q.76 a.4: whether there is in man another form, “meaning another substantial form,” besides the understanding soul, and contrasts it with a.3 (other souls, i.e. more particular substantial forms), whereas here even the form “that would make something be a body” is in question.

• Aside: a book on angels with a Padre Pio anecdote (singing in an empty chapel explained as angels singing for souls released from purgatory), which he connects to Horatio’s “flights of angels sing thee to thy rest”: “Shakespeare’s not too far off.”

2. Why men get into these positions (“man is on the horizon between”) #

The point: the positions of a.3 and a.4 come from not understanding how the human soul can be the form of a body and yet have activities not in the body.

1. The understanding substance is immaterial and so seems to be just form; a form of a body would seem to exist only in the body and have no operation except in the body.
2. Hence thinkers want man either entirely in the immaterial world (then he has no body really) or entirely in the material world (then he cannot understand). The Arab philosophers said man is “on the horizon” with one foot in each world; “we are kind of a strange being.”
3. That man is material we know from intimate experience: having a tooth pulled, a fortiori an amputated arm or leg, is “you losing part of yourself,” not a chair losing a leg; the Ronald Reagan film where he wakes without a leg, “where’s the rest of me?”
4. Yet we experience understanding the universal, and the form by which one understands a universal cannot be a form in matter, “a form in the continuous,” since such a form is by that fact tied to the singular.
5. So they either put the soul wholly in the immaterial world or posit another form to make the body, “a few strange positions”: that the form by which I am a body, or digest and grow, or sense, differs from the form by which I understand. Conclusion: seeing the difficulties these positions get into (they “split up man, deny the unity of man”) forces one back to the truth: the soul by which man understands also gives what the lower forms give, “but something what more.”

3. Friendship, numbers, cat and angels (“the higher form gives what the lower form gives”) #

The point: an analogy from something better known to us shows how a higher form contains the lower.

• Aristotle’s three friendships (useful, pleasant, virtuous): friendship based on virtue gives what the lower give and much more. Two bad men alike in “the same devilry” enjoy each other, but in something not naturally pleasing (two cowards); two courageous men are alike in something naturally pleasing, so more reason to enjoy each other; and the virtuous man (courageous, prudent) is also more useful in battle and in advice. “With friends like that, you don’t need enemies.”
• So, Thomas says, the higher substantial form gives what the lower gives plus more; that is why in “the eighth book of wisdom” (and Plato before) forms are compared to numbers: four contains what three contains and something more, three what two contains and more.
• The difficulty restated: people could not understand how the human soul could give what forms existing only in matter give, and yet have something in common with the angels.
• Cat anecdote (the cat wanting ham, the earlier cat “invited” to steak night): “I have something in common with the cat” in liking meat, “and I have something in common with the angels” in understanding and willing. “So I have the higher in the lower way and the lower in the higher way. That’s kind of interesting.” His emotions are more elevated than the cat’s; his understanding and will “kind of depressed” compared to the angel’s.

4. Objection 1: the definition of the soul, with antonomasia and synecdoche (“taken from the very definition of the soul”) #

The point: obj. 1 reads the definition “first act of a natural body having life in potency” as making soul one thing and natural body another.

• Digression on “the philosopher”: antonomasia, a name from the rhetoricians, no real English word; giving the name of the general to a particular that stands out (or vice versa). Examples: Aristotle “the philosopher”; Homer “the poet” in the Poetics; the Federalist Papers quoting “as the poet says” a long farewell to all my greatness, which he later found in Henry VIII; Paul “the apostle” in Thomas, Peter and Paul “princes of the apostles”; “Christ” the anointed one; “the Bible” the book. The reverse: a Romeo, Don Juan, Casanova, a Hamlet for a hesitant man, an Einstein; Senator Dirksen nominating Taft, “Mister Integrity, Mister Republican.” The general-to-particular direction is more common; Plato gives examples in the Symposium without the term.
• Student: how does the second form differ from synecdoche? Answer reached with the student: synecdoche is part for whole in a composed, integral whole; antonomasia concerns the universal whole; he classifies them next to each other for their likeness. Examples: “the Word was made flesh” (part for whole; heretics misread it as Christ lacking a human soul, but scripture also says “to you all flesh must come” and counts “souls” perished; the lesser part may be chosen to stress that Christ “went all the way down”); the French king “l’état, c’est moi” [ed.: transcript garbled] ; “he’s a brain.” Student: is the reverse rarer in synecdoche? He allows it. These figures matter for reading scripture, fiction and speeches. Pericles’ funeral oration: the young men dead “as if spring had been taken out of the year,” a metaphor (an old man as winter).
• “Physici” in the definition is a transliteration of the Greek phusis, nature; physical means natural; physiology really means natural science as a whole.
• The objection: soul is to body as form to matter; but the body has some substantial form by which it is a body; therefore some substantial form precedes the soul in the body. On this reading the natural body “is a body through something other than the soul.” Thomas will reply that the definition is being misunderstood.

5. Objection 2: self-motion (“man and every animal moves itself”) #

The point: obj. 2 divides the self-mover into mover and moved and argues the moved part must be a body by a form other than the soul.

1. Man and every animal moves itself; self-motion is the common meaning of life.
2. Nothing moves itself as a whole, so a self-mover has a mover part and a moved part (Physics VIII); the mover is the soul.
3. The other part must be movable; first matter cannot be moved, being only in potency (Physics V); everything moved is a body (Physics VI). Conclusion: in man and every animal there is another substantial form constituting the body. He notes the ambiguity of “moving” in English.

6. Objection 3: the order of forms toward first matter (“before and after are said in comparison to some beginning”) #

The point: obj. 3 says a soul joined immediately to first matter would rank among the most imperfect forms.

• Aside on Metaphysics V (“fifth book of wisdom”): the first word treated is principium, arche, beginning; later, among the parts of one, proteron and husteron. Having given six meanings and a common notion (beginning is what is first in being, becoming, or being known), he does not simply list senses of before and after as in the Categories but distinguishes them according to senses of beginning, because before and after are said in comparison to a beginning. In ordering, what is closer to the beginning comes next: numbers from one, “four before five, because four is closer to one.”
• The objection: if the rational soul adhered immediately to first matter, it would be in the order of the most imperfect forms. Illustration: letters, words (arrangement of letters), sentences, paragraphs; putting the arrangement of the sentence directly in the letters makes it the lowest form.
• Thomas’s coming reply, as he previews it: the soul gives the lowest thing a form can give (to be a body) and all the higher things too. Numbers: if five only had two in it, it would be the lowest; but it has two, three and four, and something more.

7. Objection 4: the mixed body, and the unity of man (“the human body is a mixed body”) #

The point: obj. 4 argues the forms of the elements remain in the mixed body; he says this proceeds from a principle Aristotle and Thomas reject, and defends man’s substantial unity.

• Mixture in Aristotle and Thomas vs. mixture in our sense: cinnamon and sugar in a shaker are small pieces juxtaposed, not one thing; in the strict sense the elements are replaced by something one.
• The objection: the human body is not simply earth, air, fire or water; a mixture does not come about in first matter only, else it would be mere corruption; so the elements’ forms, which are substantial, remain; so there are other substantial forms in man besides the soul.
• His comment: Aristotle and Thomas deny that the forms remain; the new substance has “something of the power of the different elements” but its own substantial form. Boundary cases: hydrogen and oxygen “form” water and can be got back from it, which shows they are in it “in some way,” but whether actually distinct is not clear; Schrödinger says elementary particles coming together become “blurred,” in reality not just in our knowledge, and lose their individuality; the Pauli exclusion principle, where occupied energy levels exclude others, shows things not acting “like independent individuals.” Twentieth-century physics “much closer to the truth.”
• Julius Caesar, Octavius praising Brutus, “the elements so mixed in him… this was a man”: said according to ancient knowledge, a finer and more balanced mixture in those better disposed; excess of fire the irascible, water dropsy, earth the melancholic.
• Moderns think of us as many-celled, a “colony” of one-celled things (“makes me kind of crawly”); in some lower forms it is hard to say whether the colony is one thing, but our cells do not function as complete individuals like an amoeba; otherwise we would be chaotic.
• Moral and legal argument that we are one substance: a Holy Cross student beating an Assumption student does not justify beating any Holy Cross student; a Palestinian shooting a Jew does not justify shooting any Palestinian; black-white retaliation likewise unjust, for the other man lacks that kind of unity. But if you hit me with your right fist I may hit your chest, not your fist; and the state may give twenty lashes on my back for what my fist did. If I were a combination of cellular substances, that would be as unjust as beating a student from another school. So law and morals recognise that a man is one substance in a way a student body or a people is not.

His words #

• Antonomasia; giving the name of the general to a standing-out particular, or vice versa; a figure named by the rhetoricians.
• Synecdoche; part named for the whole (or vice versa) in a composed, integral whole.
• “The philosopher,” “the poet,” “the apostle”; Aristotle, Homer, Paul, by antonomasia.
• Wisdom; the Metaphysics [ed.: Metaphysics], as in “eighth book of wisdom,” “fifth book of wisdom.”
• Natural hearing; the Physics [ed.: Physics].
• Physici; transliteration of phusis, nature; “physical” means natural.
• Understanding soul; the intellective soul [ed.: anima intellectiva].
• Ability; power [ed.: potency], “the ability to understand and the ability to choose.”
• Beginning; principium, arche; what is first in being, becoming or being known.
• Before and after; proteron, husteron; said in comparison to some beginning.
• Mixture; in the strict sense, elements replaced by one new substance, not juxtaposed.
• First matter; being only in potency, not able to be moved.

Texts #

Read in class

• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I q.76 a.4, objections 1-4 (read and translated, with his glosses).
• Aristotle, On the Soul II: the definition of the soul as quoted in obj. 1. Mentioned
• Aristotle, Physics VIII, V, VI (as cited in obj. 2); Metaphysics V (beginning; before and after) and VIII (forms as numbers) (inferred loci); Categories (senses of before and after); Poetics (Homer “the poet”); Nicomachean Ethics on the three friendships (inferred).
• Plato, Symposium (examples of the figure, without the term).
• Shakespeare: Hamlet (“now cracks a noble heart”), Henry VIII (“a long farewell to all my greatness,” via the Federalist Papers), Julius Caesar (Octavius on Brutus). Verified-source list: handout “Shakespeare’s Understanding of a Play,” p. 25, reported read; not identifiable as such in the transcript.
• Scripture: John 1:14 (“the Word was made flesh”) (inferred), “to you all flesh must come,” “souls perished.”
• Pericles’ funeral oration (Thucydides, inferred); Schrödinger on blurred particles; the Pauli exclusion principle.
• Verified-source list: DHB Vol. III, The School of Aristotle, pp. 1234-1377 (printed volume matched).

His questions #

• Why do men get into these positions (another form besides the understanding soul)? They cannot see how the soul can be the form of a body and yet have operations not in the body; they want man wholly material or wholly immaterial.
• Is man in the material world? Yes: losing a tooth or a limb is losing part of yourself, not like a chair losing a leg.
• How can the higher form give what the lower forms give? As friendship of virtue gives usefulness and pleasure and more; as four contains three and two and more.
• What does “the philosopher” in the objection mean? Aristotle, by antonomasia.
• How does antonomasia (particular for general) differ from synecdoche? Synecdoche deals with the integral, composed whole; antonomasia with the universal whole.
• What does “physici” in the definition mean? Natural, from phusis; a transliteration.
• Why are before and after said in comparison to a beginning? Because ordering starts from a beginning and places what is closer to it first (four before five).
• What do Aristotle and Thomas mean by mixture? Not juxtaposed pieces (cinnamon sugar) but elements replaced by one new substance with its own form.
• Do the forms of the elements remain in the mixed body? Aristotle and Thomas deny it; the objection proceeds from a mistaken principle. Whether hydrogen and oxygen are actually distinct in water he leaves open.
• Is it just to punish a man’s back for what his fist did? Yes, because he is one substance, unlike a student body or a people.