Prima Pars
19. Summa I, Q.3, Art.7: Is God Altogether Simple? Five Arguments, Pure Act, and the Mistake About the First Cause
Class of 2006-02-23
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/019-summa-i-q-3-art-7-is-god-altogether-simple-five-arguments/

[0:01] In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of 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. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, pray for us and help us to understand all that you've written. Father, Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. So we're up to Article Seven here, if I remember correctly, huh?

[0:33] And now he's going to ask in general, right, whether God is altogether simple, but really whether God is in no way composed, huh? And he's eliminated up to this point six different particular kinds of composition that you find in creature. Composition of what? Quantitative parts like my head and my arms and legs and all my organs and so on, right, huh? That's one kind of composition you negate.

[1:01] As the first one, you negate of God, right? And then you have the composition of my body and soul, right? Matter and form. That's the second one he negates, right? And then because I'm a material being, what a man is is not identical with Duane Berquist. So it's a composition of what I am with my individual matter, right? And that's negated, in the? Third article. And then even on the angels, let alone us, what they are and their existence is not the same.

[1:34] There's a distinction between the two, but in God, there's no distinction of those two, right? And then he eliminates that there's any what mental composition of genus and what differences, which is no, is proportional to the composition of matter and form, right? Okay. And then finally, that there's no what accidents in God. So there's not a composition of like there is in me between me and my health or me and my knowledge or me and my shape or me and my color or something of that sort, huh?

[2:10] So he's eliminated every kind of composition that there is in what the creature, huh? And now he's going to conclude universally now, but he'll make use of that fact partly by an inductive argument, huh? Okay. Induction first means, you know, an argument from many singulars to the universal, right? But then we use the word induction for an argument from many less universals, right? Many particulars in the sense of less universal to something even more what universal?

[2:43] Okay. So that's classified as a induction, right? Okay. I think I mentioned how the order of the Summa Contra Gentiles is the reverse, right? Where he he first shows the general thing, and then he sometimes deduces some of the other ones, right? Okay, but this is more proportioned to the student, as I was saying. If you look at question one seventeen, article one on the teacher, you know the first way the teacher leads the student is from less universal statements he can judge more easily to a more universal statement.

[3:20] So this is more for the beginner. There was a joke: "This is for beginners." Well, more for a beginner, but yeah, for someone who's philosophy though, right? You already see the need to go back and learn more philosophy. I told you, you know the story of Monsignor Dionne. I guess he was first in the faculty of theology at Laval, right? And so he's teaching something. He's got to go back and explain the philosophy they don't have.

[3:50] Because well, I'm also going over and teaching the faculty philosophy then because this has to be learned first. So, but sometimes when you see these more difficult things, you tend to appreciate more the parts of philosophy that are especially relevant to them. So when you learn that God is say, pure act let's say, huh, and how that can be used to show most of these attributes, right,

[4:21] or all of them really of the substance of God, say, oh, it's even worse that that book on act and ability that Aristotle has is kind of you know a real preambula to this study of God, okay.

[4:41] So the seven one seventh article one proceeds thus: It seems that God is not altogether simple, for those things which are what by God, huh, from him they imitate him, right?

[5:07] Whence from the first being are all other beings, right? And from the first good are all other good things. But in the things which are from God, nothing is altogether simple. Therefore, God is not altogether what simple.

[5:30] This guy's more like us, in other words. Moreover, everything that is better ought to be attributed to God. It's kind of interesting grammatically, huh? And how we say in a lot of words, "hot" in the comparative is "hotter," it's made from "hot," and then the superlative "hottest," right? But we don't say with the word "good" in English, right? Good, gooder. You know, yeah, and I guess the Latins don't say what they say, "melius," right, rather than bonum than "bonum."

[6:10] Yeah, yeah. I don't know why why that is so. You know, but I mean, maybe there is some reason why. The same in Greek.

[6:21] I know have to think about that. Yeah, yeah, okay. But with us, composed things are better than what simple things, huh? As mixed bodies, huh, are better than the elements, huh? So gold is better than fire,

[6:48] and the elements. Then they're what parts, the matter and form. Therefore, it should not be said that God is altogether simple. Now, perhaps this is the reason why he has the what question on the simplicity of God, followed by the question of perfection of God, right? Because we're knowing God from creatures, but also by negation of what's found in creatures,

[7:15] and not only do you negate the what composition of creatures of God and the imperfection, you might say, but the idea that simplicity perfection goes together kind of is contrary to what you find in creatures. So the animals are more perfect than the plants, but they're more composite, and the plants are more perfect than the stones, right? And maybe the stones are more perfect than the elements it's made out of.

[7:42] So I think there is a reason why he puts those two together, right? Even though I think there is reasons for the other orders I've mentioned in the in the other works, huh? But he does bring out something. He has to emphasize that. But, again, this is what Augustine says in the sixth book about the Trinity: that God is truly and in the highest way what simple.

[8:07] What does Saint Teresa of Avila say? God is altogether simple, and the closer you get to God, the simpler you become. I think it's kind of beautiful too, right? huh? There's some simplicity in the what in the saints that there is in the rest of us

[8:24] sinners. Okay. Of course, no, no, is more complex than a sinner, right? Going off in all directions, right? Distracted, you know, by all kinds of temptations of the world and so on. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[8:45] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Because finally, doesn't psychology it it emphasizes the problems, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah. Like Saint Thomas says, "Prayer after communion," you know, he's kind of praying for the. You know, stopping all these motions in him. You know, so he can be concentrated entirely upon upon God.

[9:07] Okay, Thomas now comes to the body article. I answer. It should be said that God is altogether what simple, right? And this can be shown in many what ways, multipliciter huh

[9:27] And and notice in this article he has what five arguments, huh? In the body of the article, in most of the ones he just gave what three arguments, huh? And you know the old rule is three is enough, huh? I know it's comes a lot in in the sentences and on the sentences, but in the quaestiones disputatae he'll give two arguments and it's sufficient or something like that, you know.

[9:48] And because I think you know, human beings have a hard time taking holding on to more than three. If you add the fourth one, then you start to forget the first one, and you know. But because of this universality of the. Article seven, perhaps he wants to what? Emphasize. Yeah, yeah, and go a little bit more into it, right? And maybe three arguments is enough for each particular kind of composition, but omnino you know, simplex.

[10:14] He wants to give go all the way, you know, five. huh? It's like in those pages of Thomas he's holding up his hand, you know, he's going through the five.

[10:33] Okay. First, he says through the things which have been said above, right? Now this is the inductive argument. Okay. A lot of times in Thomas' in the Summa Contra Gentiles, if one of the many arguments that he gives in a in a chapter, if one of them is immediately based on what he said in the chapter before, you often give that argument what for first. It's kind of a pedagogical thing, right?

[10:59] So we've just gone through six particular kinds of composition that are in creatures, and he's eliminated each one of them one by one. Now he puts them all together and says, therefore, there is no composition of of any sort, huh?

[11:16] But notice, it would take a little while to realize that those are all the kinds of what composition that there is in the creature. huh? Because that would have to be seen in some way before you'd see that this was a what complete induction, huh? You can't make a complete induction from singulars because there's no end to singulars, but you can make the complete induction from the less universal if they're limited in kind, huh?

[11:47] Okay. So he says first through the things said above. Since in God there is no composition, and now he starts to enumerate them. Neither of quantitative parts, because he is not a body, huh? And that was the first article, right? Nor is there the composition of form and matter, which is what he did in the second article.

[12:14] Nor is there in him the composition of nature, meaning by nature what a thing is, right? And the suppositum, the individual substance, huh? The individual matter, and that was the what third one, right? Nor are the other in him his essence or what he is and his what existence, his being, huh?

[12:45] Now I mentioned how those three are very similar, right? Because in those three, the things that are put together. One is to the other as act is to ability, yeah, yeah. Well, in the case of the quantitative whole, huh? You wouldn't say that my arm is to my leg as act is to ability, but you say all the quantitative parts are to the whole as ability is to act.

[13:14] So in everything that's composed, you have some kind of composition of ability and act. But there's two ways that can be right. Either all the parts are to the whole as ability is to act, or also one part is to the other as ability is to act, and that's found in those second, third, and fourth kinds of composition. Okay. And so I mentioned how in the Summa Contra Gentiles he has a chapter showing that the composition of substance and existence in the angels is not to be mixed up with the composition of matter and form.

[13:51] Okay. Different kinds of things, but there's some similarity, right? So you want to make sure that the student understands the distinction between them. But of course it's perfectly ordered because the composition of what I am and my individual matter, my individual flesh and blood and bones and so on that distinguishes me from the rest of you guys that is closer to the distinction of matter and form than the substance and existence or what is in its existence.

[14:23] Okay. So it's perfectly ordered there. Then the next one is the terms of what genus and what difference, huh? And that's more on the what side of the reason, right? But distinction of or the composition of genus and difference in the mind corresponds to that of matter and form, not one to one, but that the genus is taken for as material of the thing and the difference from what is what more formal, right?

[14:56] And therefore, a lot of times we say that the what the matter is able to be formed in various ways, right? And the genus can be what determined by various differences, huh? So the real likeness there. But then the next one here, the composition of uh subject and accident. There, I think you're departing from the idea of a whole. You have what in the fifth book of wisdom would be called a unum per accidens, okay, or being by happening, right?

[15:32] Okay. Now it's not quite as accidental as a white geometer or a Swedish philosopher or something, right? But still, it's a what? Only form one thing, right? Me and my health, right? Okay. It's a healthy man, one thing. Like health is one thing, right? They don't even belong in? The same genus, right? Man is in substance, and health is in the category of quality. Yeah.

[16:12] So, as manifest and inductively, you could say that God is in no way is composed, but is altogether what simple, right? Now, again, notice the word "simplex," grammatically speaking, is what not a negation, right? Where it's understood really in a negative way, nullo modo compositus, right? In no way is he composed. Okay.

[16:41] You may recall Aristotle in the third book on the soul. He said that we know simple things by the negation of composed things, and this is true even in geometry, where Euclid defines the point as that which has no parts, right? But as you go from from body to surface to line and then to point, you keep on adding more negations, huh? Because a body is that which has length, width, and depth, and all that's affirmative.

[17:10] A surface has got length and width, but no depth. There's one negation there. A line has length, but neither width nor depth. But the point is neither length nor width nor depth, huh? You see, so as it gets simpler, you have more what negations, and that's because our reason's own object is that what it is is something sensed or imagined, and that something what composed, and you can't really imagine a point by itself.

[17:45] You can imagine a finite line, and so you could say that the point is co-imagined, but not as it were imagined by itself. Try to imagine a point by itself. You try to make a little circle or something, or a little, you know, its imagination can't really imagine something that has no no size at all, right? And that's why you know, you know, I know sometimes during class how a student will kind of think that points don't really exist, right?

[18:15] Well, they don't exist like a substance by themselves, right? But I've, I've, you know, shown you the kind of argument that I use to show that they exist, right?

[18:26] You know, I tell, I say there are some bodies around that don't go on forever, right? And so there's an end to the body, right? We call the end of the body a surface, and then I say, well, does the surface have any depth? Well, if it has any depth, you haven't come to the surface yet, the body, right? So you're forced to say that there is something has length and width, but no depth, and that's the surface.

[18:52] But you can't really shade that off, could you? You say you want to shade something off the top of the desk, you'd have to take part of the desk with it. So it's not something that can exist by itself, the surface of the of the thing. And yet, it does come to an end. It doesn't come to an end so long as it's any depth, right? Therefore, there really is something in the way of an accident that has length and width, but no depth.

[19:16] And then you can argue that since that comes to an end too, the surface, that if there's something that has length but no width, and since that line comes to an end, there's something that has what? No length at all, but it's real, yeah. But you're you're you're kind of knowing it from the other ones, and if it's your, when you try to say what it is, you use those negations, huh?

[19:42] So it shouldn't be surprising that we know God by what negation, and even the point is known by negation, huh? But some people confuse the point with God, right?

[19:57] And. You see, you know, you clearly could be a little more explicit there, because the point does have what position, okay? And you know, sometimes the the ancients saw that both the point and the one, which is the beginning of number, neither one has any parts; they're both altogether simple. But the point has position, which the the one doesn't have. So if you're talking about three points, you can talk, you know, whether they're on a straight line or not on a straight line; they can have different positions.

[20:36] It won't make any sense to talk about the three ones and the number three, right? And in a straight line or not, they don't have the ones don't have any position, right? Okay. So sometimes they would define the point as the one having position, right? So, and that's the sign Aristotle gives that arithmetic considers less as less to consider, and therefore is more certain than geometry. You'll see that you'll get Heath's edition of this, you'll see more controversy about things in geometry than there are about numbers, huh?

[21:10] And there's different ways you can, you know, sometimes you have to have different cases of the same figure huh? Or the same theorem. But God is something what indivisible, right? But he's not the indivisible that has a position in the continuous; he doesn't have any position in the continuous. That's important to see, right? That comes up even when he talks about the soul, how the whole soul is in every part of the body.

[21:39] But you have to understand, as Thomas will say, that the soul, although it's indivisible, is not indivisible like the point that has a position. So it's here; it can't be over here, right? Okay. a fortiori, this is true about God. It couldn't be everywhere. He is indivisible like a point having some position.

[22:02] You see, those who make that mistake of thinking if God is indivisible and being definitely some place, like the point is definitely some place, they're resolving to their imagination. You can't resolve to imagination. You talk about God. In the Boethius's De Trinitate, he has a you know little section on that, right? And then Thomas has one of his expanded articles on that, Where the one can deduce away to the imagination, right?

[22:32] And you can't do that. Can't do so in logic, either. It's a beautiful thing, and he uses a couple of articles. Beautiful passage in the Parmenides, you know, where Socrates is a young man and he's imagining universal, you know, to be like a sail carving the individuals, and he's resolving to imagination, something you can imagine. But you find in the modern logicians too who want to substitute class for universal.

[23:01] And the class is really what a multitude and something you can imagine and so on. And universal as universal, you can't sense or imagine. It can only be what understood. So in natural philosophy, your judgment's resolved to the senses and geometry to the imagination, but in logic to to reason and something like that. When you talk about God, that's why it's so difficult, right? You tend to want to resolve to the imagination.

[23:34] I bet if you talked a lot of Catholics in the pew, they would have the idea, you know, whatever it is must be somewhere and so on. There, they're tied to these things, huh? Okay.

[23:47] So that's the first argument, then the inductive argument. Now the second argument. Second, he says because everything that is composed or composed is the Latin word for what put together, right? Everything that is put together, that is composed, is what posterior after the things putting it together, and it depends upon them, right? But God is the first what being, right? Now first means what not after anything, huh?

[24:20] Before everything else, right? So how can God be composed? There'd be something what before him which is not God, huh? And he would be dependent upon that, huh? Okay, so that's his second argument, huh?

[24:36] And the third argument because everything composed or put together has a cause. For things which, as such, are by themselves, are diverse, do not come together to form something one, except through some cause that is uniting them, right? But God doesn't have a cause, huh? Since he is the first what efficient cause, huh? So he's saying everything composed or put together has a putter together, and therefore has a cause, right?

[25:17] And God doesn't have any cause because he's the first cause, so he can't be one of those put things put together. Now the fourth one is going to make use of what God being pure act, huh? In everything composed, right? There necessarily is potency and act or in English you could say, ability and act, huh? Which are not found in God. Now he doesn't give the argument there because what God is pure act, right?

[26:03] Okay. Now where where in the Summa did he show that God is pure act, huh? Where does he first say it explicitly? wasn't it in the proofs for God's existence? Well, he could have deduced it from that, but did he say it explicitly in the question on existence of God? Huh? See, now he actually said it here in the first article, in I think the second argument, the first article.

[26:30] He's showing that there's no what God is not a body, right? Just look back to the to the body of article one, right? The the second argument, right?

[26:49] Secondly, because it is necessary that that which is the first being to be an act and in no way in potency, huh? And notice, first means what before all the rest, right? So you have to understand the before and after of act and ability. It goes back to the ninth book of wisdom, right? And so he repeats the teaching of the ninth book of of wisdom. For although in one and the same thing that goes forth from ability to act, it is an ability before it is an act in time, right?

[27:23] Nevertheless, simply, right, without qualification, act is before ability. Why? Because what is an ability is not reduced to act except through a being already in act. And we talked about that before in the ninth book of wisdom, huh? And we said that the mistake about the first cause, the main mistake about the first cause is to think the first cause is what matter. Okay. And what kind of a mistake is that to think that the first cause is matter?

[28:02] Must be a confusing sense of cause, right? Confusing kinds of cause. Saying something simply. and... Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I mentioned before how in the book on sophistical refutations, Aristotle distinguishes thirteen kinds of mistakes. Okay. And you shouldn't try to you know remember all thirteen at first, right? But the more common ones, right? And I like to emphasize with students the first kinds of mistakes from words, right?

[28:49] And the first two kinds of mistakes outside of words, okay? And each of these four kinds of mistakes. Involves overlooking some distinction that you should have seen, right, or misunderstanding some distinction, okay. And I was talking the other day. I was talking about how we tend to use the word "mixed up" almost as a synonym for mistaken, right? So, if I think a cat is a dog, I'm mixed up, right?

[29:27] I don't see the distinction between the dog and the cat. And sometimes you see it as a little child, you know, who's been has attention called to dog, you know, and then he'll call a cat a dog, right? So he's really understanding by dog kind of a little four-footed animal, right? But he's not really seeing the distinction between the dog and the cat.

[29:50] And so, corresponding each of these kinds, of, mistakes is a kind of distinction, and so. I think you can. One of these helps the other, right? If you understand the kind of distinction that's involved there, right, that'll help you to understand the kind of mistake being made, huh? But vice versa, seeing that kind of mistake being made, right,

[30:25] calls your attention to the importance of seeing that distinction. Okay. So the first kind of mistake from words is usually called the fallacy of equivocation, but I think it's more clearly said to be the mistake for mixing up the senses of a word.

[30:46] So happiness is the end of human life. The end of human life is death. Therefore, happiness is death. Anything wrong with the argument? Okay. Roger Maris hit sixty-one homers of the bat. The bat is a flying rodent. Therefore, hit sixty-one home runs of the flying rodent. Huh? Well, if you can easily see the distinction of the words, you're okay, right? Feuerbach argued, you know, man's mind is infinite.

[31:16] Infinite is God. Therefore, man's mind is God. Convinced Karl Marx. Yeah, that's it. You know. But there he was mixing up two different senses of the word infinite. It's interesting in the first book of Natural Hearing, the so-called physics, Aristotle is pointing out how Melissus is mixing up two senses of the word infinite, different ones, than Feuerbach was mixing up, But it's only the same kind of mistake, but with the same word, right?

[31:50] And it's like the the moderns had never heard of these kinds of mistakes. Let alone did they recognize them, right? Even if you know these kinds of mistakes, you might possibly make that kind of mistake. Nevertheless, right? But if you don't even know the kinds of mistakes, how are you going to recognize this kind of mistake is being made, huh? Now the second kind of mistake from words is like the first one, except it's with a a speech rather than a name.

[32:18] Okay, and you know my favorite example there: the Bible is the word of God. The word of God is the son of God. Therefore, the Bible is the son of God. Okay. Um.

[32:33] Well, word of God is what I mean, right? Okay. Um. That's interesting distinction, I think. Aristotle says, you know, that wisdom is the knowledge of God in both senses, right? That's very important to see. Knowledge of God can mean what? A knowledge which is about God, and it can mean the knowledge which God has. Or Shakespeare's definition of reason is is a knowledge of reason. In both senses.

[33:10] Euclid's definition of square is a knowledge of reason in only one sense. It's a knowledge had by reason, right? But the definition of reason by Shakespeare is a knowledge of reason in two senses. It's a knowledge which reason has about itself, right? That's very interesting, right? I like Shakespeare's calling the philosophy of nature the wisdom of nature, right? Because the wisdom of nature is about the wisdom of nature.

[33:39] The wisdom of nature, in the sense of the philosophy of nature, is about the wisdom that nature shows and what it does. huh There's something of the divine art in things. And you can say the word of God, in the sense of the Bible, is chiefly about the word of God, in the other sense, as Vatican II teaches us. Okay. So you have the distinction of the senses of a word, and especially a word that's equivocal by reason, and the distinction of the senses of a speech, right?

[34:08] But they correspond to the first two kinds of mistakes from words. Now the first two kinds of mistakes from things, not from words, is a mistake for mixing up the through itself and the through happening, or the as such and the by happening, and this is the kind of mistake Aristotle says deceives even the wise, as it did Plato. And then the second kind of mistake is mistake for mixing up what is so simply and what is not so simply, mixing up what is so simply and what is so only in a very qualified and perfect way.

[34:48] And if you ever read the Meno, the dialogue called the Meno, in the middle part there, that's the kind of mistake Meno makes, and Socrates tries to reply to it, he makes the same mistake. Or you may recall when he talked about the natural road, the first road in our knowledge, and Aristotle points out the distinction between what is more known to us and what is more known simply, and Descartes confused the two, right?

[35:18] Okay. Well, this is also the kind of mistake made at the end, knowing the first cause, because ability comes before act in some qualified way. They conclude, therefore, it comes before simply. So they're making the mistake of simply and not simply. So you have at the beginning, people misunderstand the natural road, and at the end of philosophy, when they make the mistake about the first cause.

[35:54] So Aristotle here in that first article there, in the second argument there, is recalling the teaching of the ninth book of the Metaphysics, wisdom, right? Where Aristotle shows that although in some way. Ability is before act, namely the thing that goes from ability to act, because it goes from ability to act only because of something already in act. Simply, act is before ability. Now, first means what?

[36:22] Before all the rest. So the primum ens, the first being, must be what? Most in act, must be pure act. But if you make the mistake of simply and not simply mixing them up, and then you think that ability simply is before act, then the first being would be what? The first matter, what is most in ability and at least in act?

[36:56] And that that leads to the great problem of what? Of what's the end of our knowledge? Right to know the best thing or to know the first cause? Huh? Could they wouldn't be the same in this case, would they? If ability was simply

[37:15] before act, then the first cause would be the least perfect of things. Okay, and therefore, what would be the end of our knowledge? To know the first cause or to know the best thing? You got a split personality, right? But if the first cause is pure act, and act is better than ability is, he shows also in the ninth book, then with the truth all things harmonize, right?

[37:41] Um. Now, what one thing I like about my favorite book, the Summa Contra Gentiles is that he has a whole chapter devoted to showing that God is pure act. huh See, So it's more pulled out and say, "Hey, this is something you know you want to see," and then you know he uses it. But here it's kind of stuck in the middle of the first article, right?

[38:06] But he draws upon it in other articles, right? And now in the in the universal article, article seven, this is in the what fourth argument, right? Okay. So, and this will be used to show that God is perfect and many other things about God, huh? He's infinite and so on. So it makes some sense what the Summa Contra Gentiles does, huh? But as I think I mentioned before,

[38:36] Thomas, in an earlier work, is sometimes, huh? More explicit, enfolds the thing more than in the later work, huh? Okay. I told you my my my my famous example there. You know, I used to get thinking about order as I do, and I thought order meant basically before and after, right? And then I'd see texts in the Summa, or texts in the Quaestiones Disputatae, where Thomas will say, following Augustine, that there's an Ordo Naturae in the Trinity.

[39:21] And Thomas will say there, not the order of before and after, but the order of this from that. And so I got thinking, gee whiz, there must be two kinds of order, right? And I made a mistake, right? But then I didn't have it that time. The sentences, you know, it's kind of hard to get that. Finally, got to copy it. But the in the sentences, he unfolds the whole teaching about order, right?

[39:49] And then he's very clear that the basic meaning of order is before and after. And what you do when you talk about the Ordo Naturae in God is to keep a difference and drop the genus. You see, you see. So I was misunderstanding their text because Thomas was too brief and didn't unfold himself.

[40:11] Um, uh, someone was was writing something on one of the arguments of God, right? Huh. And Thomas is very brief in in those proofs of God, but you go back to some earlier works or some other works, and he unfolds it much more, right? Huh. Okay. But even the Summa Contra Gentiles say the arguments for motion. If you look at the Summa Contra Gentiles, there are two arguments for motion instead of one, and even the first argument, you know, you have the the two premises you have here, but instead of backing up one argument, you have three arguments backing it up, three arguments backing it up, right?

[40:51] See, it's unfolded, right? So sometimes a a earlier work is fuller, right? And that's why I used to always kind of laugh, you know, when the scriptural scholars to say Mark is the first gospel because it's the shortest. Well, I know myself from my own writing, and I know from Thomas's writing, right, that sometimes I am really thinking about something and I and I work it out, you know, and then at a later date I come back to it and I more briefly explain the thing, right?

[41:23] Sometimes it's the reverse. I mean, you know, sometimes you you think something, then you say, "I should, should develop that a little more," you know, and then you come back to and you develop it more, right? But both things are done, right? So we kind of have a little bit of of appreciation of that fact, right? Okay. So I kind of appreciate the way the Summa Contra Gentiles will give a whole chapter, you know, six arguments to show God's pure act, you know, and and considered by itself and gives a kind of prominence here, right?

[41:56] You don't have any article where the God is pure act, you know. Um, in the Summa Contra Gentiles, you know, there's no potentia passiva in God, right? Okay. Just equivalent to saying it's pure act, but it's got a whole chapter to itself, right?

[42:16] Here he doesn't do it, right? That's where he seems to first develop here, as far as I can remember here in the in the Summa, in the middle argument in the first article, okay. Well, what in in the in the Summa Contra Gentiles before he even takes up the simplicity of God that he's not composed, right? He's already had a whole chapter devoted to God being pure act, okay.

[42:43] And of course, that's that's closer to you might say, you know, the beginning there in the ninth book of Wisdom, right, where you you learn about act being simply before ability, and he goes back to it, calls it here in that middle argument, huh? Okay.

[43:01] So this is the fourth argument then in the article seven. And notice he's also he doesn't even touch upon that though does he? He doesn't even mention pure act there, does he? No. But but he's assuming that you will bring that in, right?

[43:18] Okay. Just as quod in deo non est. Okay. Um. But notice in bringing out the other premise that in everything composed there is act and ability, he manifests that distinction that I did, right? Mm-hmm. That because either one of the part is act with respect to the other, right? And that's what you had in the what second, third, fourth, fifth, and even the sixth articles, right? Or at least saltem at least I guess all the parts are as ability with respect to the whole, and that's the what quantitative whole, right?

[43:59] Okay. Or again, if you're talking about the even the word cat, C A T, right? You wouldn't say one letter is to the other letter as act is to ability. Oh. Okay. That's not the quantitative whole, right? Mm-hmm. But C A and T are able to be the word cat. Mm-hmm. They're able to be the word act. They're able to be the initials of Thomas Aquinas College.

[44:26] I get that on T A C all the time. They always refer to themselves as T A C, you know. Um. So all the letters are to the word cat as ability to act, right? That's where the quantitative whole is, right? Okay. And the same with the chair. You might say the the legs and the seat and the back one is not as act to the other, but all of them are to the whole chair as ability is to what act, huh?

[44:54] Okay. When you study the the four kinds of causes, huh? And Aristotle distinguishes the four kinds of causes: matter, form, mover, end. And then he gives the three corollaries, and then he comes back upon the four causes and shows how you can understand them more universally. And he says that what parts are to the whole as matter is to form. You can see, you know, he's defined matter as that from which something comes to be existing within it.

[45:27] So wood is the is the matter of the chair. The wooden chair comes from wood, and wood is inside the chair, right? We can see that the parts are like that, right? Because the whole comes to be from its parts, and the parts are in the whole, right? So parts like matter. So the the parts of the whole like matter is to form. You see. But ability and act, right?

[45:54] But in this kind of a whole, it's a quantitative whole. You don't have matter and form. One part not to the other, right? All the parts are to the whole, as as matter is to form, as ability is to act. But the thing composed of matter and form, like you and I are, composed of body and soul. The soul is the first act of a natural body composed of tools.

[46:16] Aristotle tells us. Okay. But the body composed of tools, because there's a quantitative whole, one part is not to the other as act is to ability, but more the parts are to the whole, like ability is to act.

[46:40] And fifth, because everything composed is something that does not belong to what each of its parts, huh? And this, in wholes of dissimilar parts, is altogether manifest, right? For none of the parts of man is a man, huh? Okay.

[47:06] Nor is any of the parts of the foot a foot. Nor is any letter of the word cat the word cat. Okay. But in wholes of similar parts, although something that is said of the whole is said of the part, as a part of air is air, right? And a part of water is water, right? Something nevertheless is said of the whole that does not belong to each of the parts, huh?

[47:33] For if the whole water is bicubit, huh? Ah. The part won't be bicubit, right? Okay. The whole line is a foot. Part of the line is not a foot long, right? Okay. Thus, therefore, in everything put together, there is something that is not it. Is anything in God that's not Him? And that's kind of funny. I'm thinking about what a strange creature I am, or a strange being I am.

[48:02] Right? There's something in me that's not me. A lot of things do that. And because, of course, as I tell the students, you know, you got you got matter, right? Huh? And and the matter that's in you is able to be a lion or worms or something else, right? So something in me that's able to be something other than me, huh? I'm in a very precarious

[48:29] situation, huh? Ah. Now this, although it's able to be said about something having a form, that it has something that is not it. For example, in the white, there's something that does not pertain to the what definition of white, right? Nevertheless, in the form itself, there is nothing what alien, huh? Okay. There is, no alien number. Hence, since God is what, ipsa forma, divina substantia forma est, as Plotinus tells us, or, rather what to be itself right I am who, or rather, what, to be itself, right?

[49:21] I am who am. In no way is he able to be what, composed, huh? And this reason, Hilary, the great Hilary, touches upon the seventh book of the Trinity. God who is strength, right, is not contained from things that are weak, huh? Nor he who is light itself, huh, is fitted together from obscure things, huh?

[49:52] Looks very as, Thomas calls it there in the prayer after communion, huh? That's a little kind of subtle argument, right, huh? Okay. God doesn't have anything that isn't Him. Notice in the healthy, can there be something besides health? Yeah. But in health itself, can there be anything besides health? Say. Well, that's what God is, huh? God, in what exists, there can be something besides its existence. But in existence itself, can there be anything other?

[50:47] No. But everything composed there is something that isn't. Therefore, God is not composed. That's a little more difficult argument, right? The three arguments in the middle are shorter and easier to to see, huh?

[51:14] Notice the difference, a little difference here between the second and third argument. I often puzzle. I look at the Summa Contra Gentiles or the Summa, for that matter. They often say God is the prima causa and the primum ens. He's the first cause and the first being, and I say to myself,

[51:35] and obviously the first cause and the first being are the same thing, maybe, but are they synonymous? Those two phrases, I say. Because being does mean the same thing as cause, does it? So to say God is the first being is not exactly to say the same thing as He's the first cause. And then I get into thinking, you know, what what sense of first is involved in these two, right?

[51:59] Because first means what? Before all the rest, right? As you know from the chapter twelve, there is other categories. There are four central meanings of before, and then he brings in the fifth, the crowning sense. So you have the same sense of before when you speak of the first being and the first cause. Obviously, you speak of the first cause. You mean the cause is before all other causes, okay?

[52:28] The causes before the causes that are also effects. Okay, but that that that's obviously tied up with with the crowning sense of before and after. The causes before the effect. But what sense is the you talk about the first being? Yeah. If you take first there to mean defined by before in the sense of cause before effect, then you have the same meaning exactly, right? You know.

[52:53] Are you going to take it the the second central sense of before? I kind of like to do that, but I'm not sure Thomas is exactly doing that. The second sense of before is if this can be without that but not vice versa, then this is before in being. That's kind of nice later on when you get into taking up you know the divine causality because Thomas wants to explain that creatures don't follow from God by natural necessity, that the free act of his will, right?

[53:26] And so it's important to see that God is before creatures not only as a cause before effect, but also that he's before creatures in the sense that he can be without them and they can't be without them. See, Aristotle's example there when he's talking about cause before effect, he wants to distinguish it before from the sense in which something's before in being, right? And so he takes an example where the cause and the effect are simultaneous.

[53:53] I am sitting, and it's the statement that I'm sitting is true. Now I don't sit down, and then that statement gradually becomes true. No, it's like that, right? And so anytime the statement is true, I'm sitting. Anytime I'm sitting, that statement is true, right? You see, so he's showing that that that sense of before and after is not the same as in being, right? But God is before creatures in both senses.

[54:22] Okay. So is that the sense of before, right? A lot of times Thomas will take to the idea that when saying God is a perfect being, he's the fullest being, right? The most perfect being, and then you seem to be looking at the fourth sense of before in goodness, right? Okay. So

[54:45] now if you look at the second and third argument, they're a little bit different, aren't they? But they're very similar, aren't they? See, everything composed or put together is after the things put together in it, right? And dependence exceeds, right? Okay. He doesn't say an effect of, right? Okay. Well, when I'm trying to explain that the crowning sense of before is not fifth in order, right? I always try to explain that it's most like the second sense, because in the second sense, what is before in being, ah, or rather what comes after in being, I should say, depends upon what is before in being, right?

[55:34] Even though it's not a cause, right? And so it's a little bit like cause and effect, right? What's interesting, he uses the word depends here, right? In the second argument, and doesn't use the word cause, right? And then the third one, he says everything that's composed has a cause. Okay.

[55:53] And then he reasons from God being the first cause, the first efficient cause, that he can't be composed, right? Okay. So I mean, the fact that he had those two arguments is probably. A sign that that they're not entirely synonymous. First cause and first being, even though the first being is the first cause and the first cause is the first being, right? Okay.

[56:18] But again, it's a beautiful example of how closely those things are related, huh? Because in Aristotle argues, you know, that act is simply speaking before before ability, right? He seems to be talking about the before and after in being more than before and after in cause and effect. Although they're involved too, right? Because what goes into ability to act does so because of something in act, right?

[56:48] But it shows you how tight these things are, huh? You know. I was explaining the great turnaround, and you know, I was teaching metaphysics this semester, and you may recall that when Thomas gets to the fifth book of wisdom, in his division of the book of Aristotle, he says this is the beginning of the consideration of being as being and the one and the many, right? And since being and one are said in many ways, Aristotle distinguishes the senses of the words being used here before he does anything else.

[57:25] So, book five is the beginning, right, of the consideration of being and one, but is devoted to distinguishing the meanings of being and one and the other words like that. But I also say to the students, you could also consider this as the end of the what consideration of the axioms, because they are the same words that are used in wisdom, most of all. They're also used in the axioms, and if you can't distinguish those meanings, you know, you you can't understand the axioms distinctly, and you can't answer the objections that come from the sophists, like you know, my my sophistic argument from whole and part and so on.

[58:05] So, what is the end of the of the defense of the axioms is the beginning, right? Well, that shows you know how how what how strictly ordered these things are, right? That the end of one is the beginning of the other. I know. It's like I was saying to students, saying that you go north and you get to the to the end of the United States, and that line up there is also the beginning of Canada, right?

[58:35] Now, the fact that the end of the United States is the beginning of Canada, you know, that imaginary line there that divides into countries shows that there is no country between us and Canada, right? You know. It shows you how strict the mind is there, right? Huh? As you go from the consideration of the axioms to being as being, right? The end of one consideration is also the beginning of the other.

[59:03] You see, it's marvelous, huh? Well, you could say here, huh? That when he goes to the consideration of being as being, and the culmination of that is a consideration of act and ability in the ninth book of wisdom, right? He goes from that to what he's going to do in the last books, eleven through fourteen, determine the truth about the first causes, right? The before and after in being almost seems to be the same thing as the before and after in what causes, right?

[59:33] Okay. And when you're talking about one or the other, you tend to use the words for the other one, right? When you're talking about how act is before being or ability simply, you do so by pointing out that the thing that goes from ability to act, although it's an ability before it's an act, it's because the cause being there's something already an act, right? Okay. And and vice versa. When you're arguing, you know, for the first mover, actually the unmoved mover, where you're you're arguing from the fact that what's in motion is inability, right?

[1:00:12] And it can't give itself the act it doesn't have, and so on. So you're going back into that, But shows you how how closely knit those things are.

[1:00:22] There's not any cases too hard between each other, right? Number two and number number three, right? Is that clear enough for me? See how a lot of fun this got amusing.

[1:00:41] You got you got to stop and kind of what you know, chew on what he says and so on. And I know myself, you know, from years of reading Thomas and Aristotle. When I first read some texts, you know, I understand some things, some things I don't, right? And I make an attempt to understand them at the time, you know, but sometimes say, you know, I'll be back here someday, you know, you know, understanding better next time, right?

[1:01:09] You know, and it kind of makes you come back and see, I know that all the things are in there. So when my teacher Kasurik would give me something, tell me go read that, Duane. I'd come back and ask more questions, and he'd say, Duane, you know, read very carefully. And he'd go ahead and show me what's written in the thing, you know. So you can imagine, you know, after that kind of a line from him, you know, but I started to read more and more carefully, right?

[1:01:42] But but you know, the tag used to say when he came to lecture, "There'll be all," you know, just teach us how to read Thomas, huh? And read him carefully, you know.

[1:01:56] Most authors aren't worth reading that carefully because they're not a very careful writer, huh? But somebody like you know Aristotle or Thomas or or Shakespeare for that matter, right? They're worth reading carefully. And essentially you have to read them carefully to to really profit from them, I think sometimes people, you know, they they get indigestion because they try to do too much at a time and and really, you know, they kind of lecturing.

[1:02:26] He had maybe his finger there, you know, and then he'd stop and he'd talk about it. And sometimes you go in talking about some modern philosopher who's got a dog in the fight because he doesn't see this little point here, you know. And that's kind of the way you have to do it, right? So and come back to another thing, and then you you read out something else to kind of cast light upon that, huh?

[1:02:55] Okay.