Prima Pars
20. Q.3, Art.7 Replies and Art.8: Why the Simpler Can Be More Perfect, Why God Is Not Part of Other Things, and Things That Are Other by Themselves
Class of 2006-02-23
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/020-q-3-art-7-replies-and-art-8-why-the-simpler-can-be-more-perfect/

[0:00] Now the first objection was saying, huh, that. God's effects should imitate and be like Him, right? But they're all composed, okay? So he says to the first. Therefore, it should be said that those things which are from God imitate God, huh? As the things caused imitate the first cause, huh?

[0:31] But is of the very what notion of being caused, huh? That'd be in some way composed, because at least it's what being is other than what it is, because it's receiving its what existence from God, right? So he's going to make that more clear later on. So it's the very idea of being caused that your existence is not what you are,

[0:59] and therefore you must have composition, right? So he's kind of not just saying, you know, that well the the creature is like God, but not perfectly like God, right? Now that that's true, but he's saying that the creature is caused by God, right? And it belongs to the caused as such to have composition, at least the composition of what what it is and and its existence, huh?

[1:30] Okay, because receiving its existence from God, right? If what it is and its existence are the same thing, then it would be uncaused, huh? I say

[1:50] that would be more manifest. We take up you know the effects of God, question fifty-eight down there. Now, to the second, it should be said

[2:03] that with us composed things are better than what simple things, because the perfection of the goodness of the creature is not found in one simple thing, but in many. But the perfection of the divine substance, of divine goodness, is found in one simple thing, as will be what shown below, right? Okay. Now maybe Thomas could be a little more unfolding himself there, right? Okay. Because there is a difference in creatures between the immaterial substances, what we call sometimes the angels, right?

[2:43] What the philosopher calls the separated substances, being separated from matter, and the immaterial substances, right? In the material world, it seems that the composed is more perfect than the what simple, but in the immaterial world, it's just the reverse. The the more perfect the angel, the more simple it is, huh? And one way that they

[3:14] see this is that as you go up towards God, an angel has fewer thoughts, but those thoughts what express more and more clearly than what the larger number of thoughts of the lower angel express, huh?

[3:42] Of course, I've heard you've got God who says and understands everything perfectly with just one thought, huh? You read my little poem, huh? You know, God the Father said it all with one word. No wonder when that word became a man, he spoke in words so few and said so much. He was the brevity and soul of wit. Remember that? Okay. But I take the that theorem right, you know, from the second book of Euclid, right?

[4:14] You see the comparison, right, little proportion, where I say that words are to what you say a little bit like the perimeter is to the what area, right? Okay. So what's contained, you might say, the meaning, huh? That's contained in in the words I say, right? Is something like the area that's contained by the perimeter, right? Well, you know about that great love I have in the fifth theorem of the second book of Euclid, right?

[4:57] Where he's showing with rectangles, right, that for all rectangles with the same perimeter, the square would have more area for the same perimeter. Remember that? It's a beautiful theorem because he shows that the difference in the area between the square and any oblong, right, rectangle, um, will be the square of the difference in the lengths of the sides. Okay, so you just exemplify that examples here: five by five, four by six, three by seven, two by eight.

[5:45] All of these rectangles have what a perimeter of twenty. Okay. But the area goes down from twenty-five to twenty-four to twenty-one to sixteen. As you can see in these examples. The difference in area is the square of the difference of the sides. Five and six is one. Twenty-four is one. Five and seven or five and three is one. Two, two squared is four. Twenty-one, right? Five and eight or five and two.

[6:21] The difference is three. Three is nine. Squared, nine is the difference, right? And then you realize it's possible to have one with more perimeter, say twenty-four, and an area only of what twenty, right? So you can contain more what area with less perimeter. That's kind of interesting, huh? It's also interesting that you could say in a way the square is the simplest of what figures, right? So in a kind of distant way, you're saying that the simpler contains more, right?

[7:03] You get A little anticipation. of what. You're going to find in the angels, right? The higher up you go in the angels, the better you understands, right? But the fewer the ideas or thoughts you needs to understand it. Until you get to God, his understanding is differently perfect, right? But God is only one thought. God the Father said it all in one word. Okay? He said himself perfectly, and everything else could be said.

[7:32] You know? He he had the last word, right? As well as the first word, right? You see? And so it's interesting in the immaterial world, as you go up in the angels, you have what? Fewer thoughts, they become simpler, but they're more perfect, right? And so they, in that sense, are much closer to God, right? For whom who who is most perfect but most simple, right? You see?

[8:06] So as you approach God going up from the lower to the higher angels, you get simpler and simpler, but more and more perfect. But we, you know, we terrible material creatures, and

[8:22] we kind of what get mixed up, right? Because in us the composed is what More perfect More perfect Well the more perfect is more composed, right? Okay. But we can, you know, see a little bit of what we're missing, right? You see, in this beautiful theorem of Euclid, right, where the simplest of rectangles contains the most area, right? And it can even contain more area with less perimeter.

[8:57] And and if people are are are a little bit of wonder, right? That arouses some amount of wonder, right? That I can, you know, enclose more area with less fence than you, huh? You know, you're kind of dumb. You use more fence, but you enclosed a smaller area. What do you mean? How could

[9:19] that be, right? You know, and and they say the the ancient geometres, you know, the crooks, you know, they would buy and sell land by perimeter, and then they would get more land. You think you're getting a good deal, right? Okay? Because you're getting, you know, more perimeter, right? Or it could take me longer to ride around this piece of property than that. That this piece of property takes me longer to ride around is is smaller.

[9:44] Doesn't make any sense, doesn't it? You know? But that's kind of anticipation, right? And then you see something like that in these authors, right? Thomas was saying more with fewer words, and the same thing is true about Aristotle, right? But as the Bible says, the fool multiplies his words, huh? And people use a lot of words and say practically what nothing, you know. So it's not such a waste of time to watch TV.

[10:15] You know, they hardly say anything, you know, and they talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, and they hardly say anything. Um, like a faculty meeting or something, right?

[10:26] I remember first at a faculty meeting. It's the same Meredith College night. First talk, you know, and you know we had these terrible faculty things on Friday afternoons. I remember this one distinguished man who he'd been in Arthur's administration in Japan for more, So I can see back there; he's so fed up with the professor going on, on, talk, talk, talk. He's not saying anything. I remember saying that he's a very distinguished gentleman.

[10:50] I mean, it was so true; he does say anything, Talk, talk, talk. talk. And so sometimes you see even this terrible material world, right? You see a little hint, right? That there might be, right, this other thing where the simpler is more perfect, right? It was kind of a glimpse of a world that is what much different from our material world, okay?

[11:18] So one place it takes place is this wonderful theorem of Euclid, right? Another place they say you can see in human beings, right? They say more with fewer things than the moderns, right? You know, Locke. Locke apologized at the end of the essay concerning human understanding human understanding, you know, for his being so prolix, right? But he's too lazy, he said to the back of the room, right, cut it down, see, okay.

[11:44] Um, but another example of that too, you see, sometimes in the fine arts. In the book about the poetic art, there, Aristotle takes up you know tragedy and epic, right? Kind of together, right? Tragedy first and an epic, but they're they're very similar, huh? And like I mentioned before, you know the the saying among the Greeks, you know, that Sophocles is Homer writing tragedy, and Homer is Sophocles writing epic, and they saw the similarity of these two great, those two greatest poets of the Greeks, obviously, and.

[12:35] But Aristotle he makes comparisons and so on between them. Then he asks, which is the greater literary form, the tragedy or the epic, right? And he's not saying who's greater, you know, Sophocles or Homer, because he calls Homer the poet, right? You see, but nevertheless, he he maintains that tragedy is a higher form, a more perfect form than the epic, huh? Because they basically, he says, have the same what effect on they move.

[13:06] Pity and fear, right? But the tragedy does so in a much more compact way, huh? See, by the by, the effect of the Ilias like that is spread out over a long thing, and so you could say, in a sense, that the tragedy is simpler than the epic, right? But it gets the same effect, right? Okay, sometimes somebody's more powerful, almost. So you have kind of a hint, you know, that the simpler could be more perfect.

[13:40] Okay, that's that's an interesting thing to see, huh? And I don't know music in a very technical way, you know. But I'm going to talk about, say, a very perfect piano concerto, Mozart, and say that the 23rd piano concerto, which is my brother Marcus's favorite concerto, and my friend Warren's favorite one, my my wife Rosalie's favorite concerto, and I said one of my favorite too. But to describe, you know, how simple he wrote the thing, huh?

[14:13] And they talk about, you know, how they compare Mozart and Haydn. Haydn will, you know, go from one key to another kind of just do a variety of spice of life, you know. But in Mozart, you know, he's much more sparing in the use of these things. And when he changes the key, it's for a very good purpose, you know. You realize, in some sense, that Mozart is simpler, but far more profound than than Haydn or anybody other composer, huh?

[14:41] You know, when they talk about some some Mozart's great pieces, you know, one of the simplest things he ever wrote, you know, and say, how does he do this, right? How does he do this? So you get a little bit of a hint there in in those two examples I was giving you from tragedy and epic, and then from you know Mozart, who is the composer. How sometimes the more perfect seems to be, but simpler, right?

[15:18] I know when I read you know novels or something like that, you know, very rarely they say it. I can remember that line, and it's it said so well. How can we say it so well, you know?

[15:30] And but with Shakespeare, you often struck up a line. I say this is something, you know, and so there are sometimes even this crude material world, a hint, you know, that some things are simpler and more perfect. But doesn't seem to fit the material world as as a whole, right? Huh? See, and so we're kind of puzzled we turn to God, huh? That that we don't we're surprised in a sense it should be at least the first time around that that God is

[16:13] both infinitely perfect and completely simple all together right I think that's and Thomas was struck by that huh and that's why he has these two questions next to each other the question of simplicity and the question of perfection of God right it was something that is brought out by putting those two together that does not brought out in the well he has the same they're next to each other in the Summa Contra Gentiles too but not in the in the compendium you know but there's something very striking for us material creatures when you go into this huh in case you take a little break here since we're at Now, the eighth article.

[16:57] Now, why does the eighth article come by itself here after the general article, right? Well, what's the difference between the first seven, let's put it that way, all together, and the eighth one? The first seven is looking to God in Himself, whereas this is looking at the relationship to others. Yeah, yeah. And as a student of the philosopher Anaxagoras, right, I mentioned how he shows actually the reverse order here, but he shows in that DK twelve there that the greater mind is not mixed with other things; otherwise, it couldn't rule over them, right?

[17:37] And then later on, he says it's the thinnest of all things and the purest of all things, right? And I said at first I thought when he's saying purest, he's merely saying affirmatively what he had said negatively before. The second we said that God is in no way composed, and we said God's altogether simple. Not really saying something different, but simple is grammatically, you know, affirmative, but really it's understood through the negation of composed.

[18:08] But then, in second thought, I said, no, maybe by saying it's the purest of all things, he means that the greater mind is not a mixture of things itself; is not put together. But when he's before, he's saying it's not, you know, entering into mixture with other things, and this would make sense if it's being the thinnest of all things that it can't be a mixture of things, because then there'd be something thinner than it.

[18:34] Okay, well, something like this, except the order here is is the reverse, right? And and God Himself is not put together, and then he doesn't help to put something else together, together. Okay.

[18:52] To the eighth one proceeds thus: it seems that God comes into composition with other things; that God is put together with other things, you might say, right? We've eliminated that God is put together Himself, but and when you see that he's he put together other things put together other things, for Dionysius says in the fourth chapter the celestial hierarchy—that's about the angels, right? Or with the great commentary that Thomas did on the divine names, but Albert has the one in the celestial hierarchy.

[19:24] But Thomas refers to a lot, huh? He talks about the angels. The esse of all things is the essay which is what, which is the divine being, right? Okay, the higher one.

[19:50] He's saying, in a sense, that God is the being of all things. Okay. Well, this is partly misunderstanding of what Dionysius. Means by that, right? But why does Dionysius say that God is the esse omnium? That it seems to enter into that God is the esse that is mixed with all things, right? Or the esse that is said of all things? I mentioned how in Summa Contra Gentiles Thomas have a chapter, you know, devoted to showing that I am who am is not the esse that is said of all things.

[20:23] Therefore, God comes into composition of other things. Moreover, God is a what form? For Augustine says in the book about the words of God,

[20:46] that the Word of God capitalized there, which is God, is a certain form that has not been what formed. Okay, but the form is a part of composite of matter and form. Therefore, God is a part of something composed.

[21:05] Moreover, whatever things there are and differ in no way are the same. But God and first matter are, and in no way do they differ. Therefore, they are wholly the same. But the first matter enters into the composition of things. Therefore, God. Now, so so David of Dinant, I don't know if he mentions David of Dinant here, but he's a guy who said that you know the two are the same.

[21:38] Stupidly taught, as Thomas says, but then God would would would be mixed with all things, right? This would be a kind of what pantheism, huh? Okay. Now the proof of the middle here: whatever things differ, differ by some differences, and thus is necessary that they be composed. But God and the first matter are omnino simplicia, altogether simple. Therefore, in no way do they what differ, huh? Okay.

[22:15] Now back to the great mistake about the first cause, in a sense. Okay. But against this is what Dionysius says in the second chapter about the divine names, that there is neither what touch, right, of him God, nor any other

[22:37] communion, right, of being mixed together in parts. And moreover, it's said in the book De Causes, huh? by the Arab philosophers, going back to the Neoplatonic philosophers, was thought to be by Aristotle at first, but the Thomas realized was not by Aristotle. But it's an interesting book, pretty good. That the first cause. Thomas the commentary on it, right? That the first cause rules all things, without being what mixed with them, okay?

[23:13] Now he says, I answer. It should be said that about this there were three errors, three mistakes, huh? For some laid down that God was the what soul of the world, huh? In the footnote here saying it was Varro who said that, right? Okay. Um.

[23:38] And Augustine touched upon this in the seventh book of the City of God, right? Discussing these Roman thoughts. And to this opinion, also could reduce the that of those who say that God is the soul of the first heavens, huh?

[23:55] Okay. Others say that God is the formal principle of all things, huh? And this was said to be the what? Yeah, I don't know who he is, but this in here

[24:15] followed the doctrines of Amalric of Bène, Carnutensis de Chartres, huh? Yeah, yeah, okay. And I suppose to actually reduce the one who would say that he would be the being of all things in the sense of mixed with all things as their being, huh? And the third was the error of David of Dinant, who most stupidly taught

[24:49] that God was first matter, right? Now, as we say, you know, we always defend Thomas about not being, you know, attacking people, you know, with things. You couldn't be further away from God if he's pure act. When you say God is pure, what passive ability, right? He couldn't have made a greater mistake if he just said God was nothing or something. But

[25:13] if he's something, you know, you couldn't get something further away from God, huh? All of these contain a manifest what falsehood, huh? Nor is it possible for God, in some way, to come into composition with something else, right?

[25:41] Neither as a formal principle, right, nor as a what material principle, huh? Notice, the first two opinions would be making him kind of a formal principle, right? And the third you know, but he's in the material principle, right? Okay.

[26:00] Now the first he's going to get back to his three reasons. First, because. We said above that God was the first what, efficient cause, the first maker, huh? But the efficient cause, with the form of the thing made, does not come together the same in what, number, okay? But but only the same in species, right? So man generates man, right? Huh? Same in kind, but not the same in number, right?

[26:35] So when your mother makes Christmas cookies, you know, and you stamp the dough with the Christmas tree thing, you give it the same shape, right? But is it the same in number? No, no. Then you wouldn't be able to go for one together, right? You left it there at the first one you made. Yeah, yeah.

[27:04] And matter even less, so, right, because matter doesn't come together with efficient cause, the same in number, and not even the same in what form or kind, right? Okay.

[27:18] So the dough, right, doesn't agree, right? Even even in kind with the thing, because this is an ability, meaning passability, that is an act, right? Okay. That's his first argument, right? God is the first efficient cause,

[27:39] the extrinsic cause. Secondly, because since God is the first efficient cause, it belonged to him to act through himself and first with nothing before. But what comes together into composition with another is not first and by itself acting, but more the what? The composite itself, right? So the form of the composite is that by which it acts, but it's not what acts. Okay.

[28:21] For the hand doesn't act, but the man acts through the hand, right? Mm-hmm. And fire heats through heat, huh? Mm-hmm. Hence, God is not able to be the part of something composed, huh? Third,

[28:49] because no part of something composed can be simply what? First among beings. First among beings. Neither matter and form, which are parts, neither I suppose, which are the first parts of composed things. For matter is an ability, but ability is after act simpliciter. And the form which is a part of the composed is a form that is partaking, huh? Mm-hmm. And just as the one partaking is after that which is through what?

[29:33] Essence, right? Essentially so. So also the thing partaken. Just as fire in things kindled is after that which is fire essentially, But it has been shown above that God is the first being what? Simply, huh?

[29:59] So the first two arguments are taken from God being the first efficient cause, right? And where He doesn't agree with the matter of form in what number, right? And sometimes not even kind, right? Okay. And then the other argument from the efficient cause being what first and through itself acting, right? So if God was just a part of something else, He would not be first and through Himself acting, but this composite would be through Him, right?

[30:31] Okay. And then the third argument is from what? From God being again the first what being, right? Okay. Then he gets kind of separate argument that therefore matter can't be the first being because ability is after act, right? Simply. And a form God can't be a form of some other composite because then He would be what partaking, yeah. Okay.

[31:10] So you are convinced God doesn't enter into composition of other things. Okay. Now you apply the first objection from Dionysius. He says that the deity is said to be the being of all things, not what formally, but what effective as an efficient cause and as a what exemplar, right? Okay. You know how when I talk about God as a cause and t here is four kinds of cause, right?

[31:45] I say, in how many senses of cause is God a cause? What? No, no. But I sometimes say He's a cause in two and a half senses. Okay. Because when Aristotle talks about form, he distinguishes between the form and the exemplar or the model, right? And the form is is is intrinsic to the thing which is a form, right? Where the exemplar is outside of the thing, right?

[32:15] But something is what imitates it, right? Or is made like it, huh? Okay. My father's company they made farm wagons, and we had the patterns up on the wall, right? And they would take them down when they're going to make a wagon, right? So you are making a form in this other matter, this new matter you brought into the woodshop, like the pattern on the wall, right?

[32:38] Okay. So God is a cause in the sense of end and mover or maker and exemplar, but not the intrinsic form. So I say half and and not at all for this matter. So He's a cause in two and a half senses, huh? Okay. Although sometimes we kind of run together, fish and exemplar together, right? You know, we see them sometimes speaking that way. So we just speak of God as the Alpha and the Omega, right?

[33:09] But another way you could say God is a cause and two and a half senses, huh? So when we're said to be made to the image and likeness of God, then you're speaking of God as a cause, what, as exemplar as well as the maker, huh? Okay. So that's a way to understand Dionysius, huh? Dionysius has to be explained sometimes by Thomas, huh? Okay. And and Augustine, Augustine, Augustine too, right?

[33:36] You know, not just to understand these guys, but to not misunderstand them, right? Okay. Okay. And once in a while it has to do with Aristotle too, you know, but um, because Aristotle's talking about what does God know in the twelfth book of Wisdom, right? And he he seems almost to be saying that uh, it would be unworthy for God to know anything less than Himself, right?

[34:06] Okay. And some people understand Aristotle to mean that God knows only Himself and doesn't know other things, right? And yet, you know, we have at least two places where he attacks Empedocles' opinion because according to Empedocles' opinion, we know something God doesn't know, and Aristotle says that's absurd, right? So I think Thomas tries to understand that what Aristotle is doing is trying to say what is what is that God knows chiefly, right?

[34:36] Huh? Okay. And he doesn't mean that he doesn't know anything else, but he's going to know anything else by knowing Himself, right? And nothing else could define the divine mind because nothing else would be worthy of the divine mind, right? You see? And and nothing else could be the primary object, you might say, of his mind, right? Other than Himself, because it's something other than Himself to be the perfection of his mind, right?

[35:03] So it has to be Himself. But some people misunderstood that as if God didn't know anything but Himself, huh? And Aristotle, you know, in at least two places we have, you know, takes it being absurd that this rejection the absurd of the argument of of Empedocles, huh? You know, Empedocles says by love we know love and by hate we know hate and by earth, earth, and by air, air, and by fire, fire, and by water, because we have these things in us, we know them, right?

[35:33] But then he he says that there's no what, a hate in God, huh? Just interesting, he says that, right? But then if there's no hate in God, then God would know hate, and we'd know something He didn't know, which is an absurd consequence, huh? So sometimes you have to explain even Aristotle, but. But more so, Augustine and Dionysius, you know. But you know my real thumb, right?

[36:03] Aristotle means what Thomas says he means. But I think I think is a very good principle, and I think you could say we're all as too. Augustine means what Thomas says he means too.

[36:18] But sometimes you might be stretching a bit there, you know. And Dionysius means what Thomas says he means. It's good enough for Thomas. It's good enough for me.

[36:35] Okay, the second argument was saying that God is what was taken from form rather than esse was taken from form rather than esse Right the first one's taken from esse. Okay, and he says, "Well, God is a form, but the form in sense of exemplar, right? Not the form which is a part of the composite." This comes up again when Thomas is explaining. the beatific vision, huh? Because how do we see God as He is, right?

[37:04] And we can't see God as He is by a created form. So God Himself has to be what joined to our mind, right? So God is both what we see and that by which we see Him. And Thomas always gets the objection well: God is not a form or something else, right? But in that union, God is not joined to our mind to to make one thing, right?

[37:36] But simply as that by which you are going to understand him and see Him as He is, right? Thomas has to defend that, huh? Because without that, you are not going to see God as He is, and that's a matter of faith that you are going to see Him as He is. But you can't see Him as He is by a created form because that would be limited and be up to it.

[37:59] I see. But God is not joined to our mind as if He's what a form of a composite thing. Now that you are making up here, right? Like body and soul, right? But just as that by which you understand in this case, that's kind of interesting, huh? That this will come up for a subtle thing.

[38:27] Now the third objection is a different kind of objection, right? But it fails to understand the difference between what. In the Latin, they express it by.

[38:41] In a way, yeah, yeah, yeah. Diverse as as opposed to what? Yeah. See, in strict sense, things differ; they have something in common, and then they need something in addition to what they have in common for by they differ, right? So the dog and the cat cat, right, they have in common they're both a four footed animal, et cetera, right? But the one mouths and the other meowls and, the other barks or something, right?

[39:05] And and maybe more essential differences than that, huh? See, well, that's not the way to understand the difference. You want to say the difference between God and first matter, right? Huh? Okay. They're other by what themselves, huh? And not by a part of themselves which is their their their difference, huh? Okay. But you know this comes up even when you talk about

[39:38] the difference between the cat and the dog, right? Because they have the genus in common and they differ by their differences, right? Now, someone asked, "But what do the differences differ from each other? " Well, if you don't see the differences differ from each other by themselves, but by Another difference. Well, then you you have to ask, but what do they differ? And you you have differences, you know, differing by differences by differences going on forever, right?

[40:06] So there must be some things that are other by themselves and not other by a part of themselves, which is their difference with the other thing. Okay. So Thomas is going to go into this a little bit here. Simplicia, simple things, right, do not differ by some other differences, huh? For this belongs to what composed things, huh? For man and horse differ by what rational or irrational differences, huh?

[40:40] Which differences do not differ further from each other by other differences? Because then you have to have those differences also differing by other differences, and those and so on forever, right?

[40:57] Whence he says, if you want to make this explicit in words, right? If you want to make strengthen the words, they do not properly, they're not properly said to differ, but to be what? Different. Yeah, or you could say in English simply other, right? Okay.

[41:14] For according to the philosopher, whoever that guy is, he comes up a lot in here. For according to the philosopher, in the tenth book of wisdom, tenth book of the metaphysics, other or diverse is said absolutely right. But everything differing in the strict sense differs by something, right? Okay.

[41:40] Whence, if one wants to make strength here in the word, the first matter and God do not differ by something, but they are other by themselves.

[41:54] Whence it does not follow that they are the same, huh? Okay. Huh. Look, at that when you say the ten highest genera, right? Do they differ from each other by differences? No. Then you have to have a genus for the for the highest genera, right? There is no, right? You'd say they differ by themselves, right? They're other, right? What a thing is in its size, they're other, right?

[42:33] You don't look for another difference by which they differ, right? They differ by themselves. But something that is composed of genus and difference, they would differ by what? Not by themselves, because by themselves they involve the same genus, right? So it's by the difference that they differ, not by themselves, huh? Okay.

[43:01] But the differences differ by themselves, okay? But maybe you shouldn't say differ; they're other by themselves, right? I mean, that's a little bit of the equivocation, now, okay? Um,

[43:17] and you might—you were suggesting the word distinct, right? You say, okay? But things are distinct at which one is not the other. Ability is not act, okay? But the ability and act differ by something else. No, they're other one from the other by themselves, huh? Especially if you are talking about something that is nothing but act, which is God, right? And and the first matter, which is nothing but ability, right?

[43:52] You see, then they can't what differ by something other than themselves, right? They're other by themselves, huh? It's a very important thing to see. You agree?

[44:12] You don't think that everything can be other than everything else by something other than itself? Do you? Because everything would be completely other than everything. I mean, you always have to have a difference for every difference, right? Unless you've been going on forever, right? Yeah. So you don't even know the difference between anything, right? People are the ones defining words. Thinking about that, well, what do you mean by that?

[44:40] Yeah, you always have to know the difference before you know anything is different, right? Yeah. A A and B are different because of these differences they have, right? Okay. But why those differences different? We have to know some other difference whereby they differ, right? Before you can know they they are different, and then you have to know the difference by which they differ before you can know that.

[45:04] You always have to know some other difference before you can know anything. So unless you saw that reasonable and unreasonable, or rational and irrational, are other by themselves, right? You don't need another difference. You

[45:22] say, what's the difference between an odd number and even number? Right, they're both numbers, right? Yeah. Well, you'd say, well, the even number has a middle.

[45:36] The odd number doesn't have a middle, right? Now, but what does have a middle and not have a middle differ by something else? No, they're other by themselves, right? Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. What's the difference between something and nothing? Do they differ by something? Do they differ by nothing? No. Something and nothing differ by themselves. It seems to me, right? To be or not to be—that is the question, right?

[46:18] The question because you can't both be and not be, right? You must be one or the other. So, are they different? To be and not to be. But are they different by some difference?

[46:34] See, they're different by themselves, right? Now, someone might speak that, and another might, you know, say one exists in variables, he says, right, and say, well, strictly speaking, if to differ means to have a difference, right, whereby you differ, then they don't differ, but they are what? Diverse, but I think in English we'd you know, in the English word for diversity would be other, right? Because diversity is taken as the opposite of idem or idem, same and other, right?

[47:09] Okay. So maybe instead of diverse in English, you could say other, huh? Okay, other by themselves, themselves, huh? Okay. Now maybe we should take a perfection next week, huh? Okay.

[47:40] Let's go back for a moment, though, to the the proemium to this consideration of the substance of God. Huh? Let's see what Thomas said in that proemium If he said anything that we've forgotten here. It's at the beginning of question three, where he gives the premium to the consideration of the substance here a little bit, Okay.

[48:15] Knowing about something that whether it be right, we know whether it is. We know that God is, for example, it remains to inquire in what way it is right that we might know about it what it is. But because about God we're not able to know what He is, but what He is not, we are not able to consider about God in what way He is, but more in what way He is not.

[48:43] Okay. First, therefore, it ought to be considered in what way He is not. Secondly, in what way He is known by us, right? Now, that would be question what twelve, right? And third, in what way He is what named, huh? Okay. Now the order there is that we we name God as we know him. So you take out the knowing in twelve and the knowing naming in thirteen.

[49:10] Now one is able to show about God in what way He is not by removing, right? That means negating from Him those things which do not belong to Him, as, for example, composition doesn't belong to Him, right? And motion, right, and others of this sort, huh? Okay. That's interesting, Thomas. He mentions composition, motion, explicitly, and then others, right? Because in both the Summa Contra Gentiles as I mentioned before, and in the Compendium, he first removes motion from God, and then composition, but those two first, right?

[49:49] Okay. But then he goes on. He says, "First, therefore, one ought to inquire about His simplicity." Through which is removed from him composition, and that's what we've done now in the articles of question three, right? But then he gives a reason, kind of, right, why he's going to go to perfection second, it seems, huh? And because simplicity. the simple things, the the simples in in bodily things, are imperfect, right?

[50:23] And like parts, right? Secondly, one inquires about his what perfection, right? Okay. So after you show that God is altogether simple, you and your material mind, right, are apt to then think next what Imperfect. he must be very imperfect, right? Okay. And and you could say in material things when you're going towards the first matter, you get something simpler, right? So the atom, you know, even our modern science is simpler than the molecule, and the proton or the electron, something is simpler than the the atom, right?

[51:09] Okay. So it's kind of natural then to think that God might be imperfect because he's altogether simple, and so we're going to correct that thinking of you right away before you you do worse. So then we take up secondly the perfection of God, right? Okay.

[51:34] And then third, the what? Infinity of God. Now, when you study the infinity of God, you see how it's very closely related to his perfection, right?

[51:53] Because in a way, you're talking about the infinite perfection of God, so it it kind of could fall right upon that. And then fourth, about his being what? Unchangeable, right? And in a way, you can argue to God's being unchangeable because he's altogether simple, and we learn in the first book of Natural Hearing that whatever changes is composed, right? So you can syllogize from God being simple to his being unchangeable, and I always mention when we do the first book of Natural Hearing in philosophy of Nature, you know, that you come away from the first book of Natural Hearing with this statement in your mind that whatever changes is composed.

[52:35] But then after you show in theology that God is not composed, you've got a syllogism in the second figure that God does not change, right? Okay. But also, when you realize that God is perfect, and perfect in the way that Aristotle says he's perfect in the fifth book of Wisdom, he's universally perfect; he's lacking in nothing, right? He's not merely lacking in nothing of his kind, but he's lacking in nothing of any kind.

[53:05] When you see he's universally perfect, then that's another reason why he can't change, right? There's nothing he could acquire, right? And also, when you see that God is infinite, right? Even guys who thought this material infinity thought things were unchangeable, right? Like Melissus thought of it. So you've got three reasons to see that God is unchangeable, right? And it kind of prepares the way, right? Especially for we natural philosophers, right?

[53:32] Who make a big deal about the fact that change would be impossible unless the thing that changes was composed. That's what comes out very clearly in the first book of the physics. You know, you know how can the healthy become sick? You know, you know how Heraclitus says day is night because day becomes night, night becomes day. But how can the healthy become sick? Because health can't be sickness.

[53:58] The healthy as such can't be sick, right? Unless there's something in the healthy besides health, it's impossible for the healthy in any sense to become sick, right?

[54:11] And so you begin to realize that what changes must be composed. Is composed to the contrary, like health and the subject of the health, right? So once you have that firm in your mind that what changes composed, and then you see the simplicity of God that he's not composed. Well, then you've got the second figure, right? Where the same thing is affirmed of one and denied of the other, right?

[54:36] It's like the way Socrates argues in the Phaedo, right? When he's arguing that the soul is not the harmony of the body, right? He takes three things that are said of one and denied of the other, and he has the arguments against it, right? But that's what they call the second figure, the syllogism, where the the middle term is is the predicate in both premises, but it's affirmed of one and denied of the other, okay?

[55:07] A mother is a woman. Socrates is not a woman, therefore Socrates is not a mother, right? That kind of argument. Okay. Socrates argues the the soul is just the body. Sometimes like the man is just an inclination of the body, but the harmony of the body doesn't mean just the body, right? Okay.

[55:31] So that's the way he argues, right? This is the way we argue. Now, why did you take up unity last? Because in some ways that's very closely related to composition, right? But it's also related to God being infinite. Could it be more than one infinite thing?

[55:56] And if you know it changes, he is in no way multiple, right? But but the main thing I'm going back to the the premium for here is that connection that he makes explicitly between why he seems to be taking up the perfection of God next to his simplicity right and that's because your experience of what the simple and the composed and the perfectly imperfect is screwy as far as understanding God

[56:26] you know because you you're you're you're thinking of the composed being what more perfect right okay just as Jim would say it's topsy turvy yeah yeah yeah you're thinking of that beautiful church you're talking about down in Tampa Florida right and all these different colors and so on all this composition and so on right huh okay and you know going back to Shakespeare for a moment I think Shakespeare's sonnets are pretty good you know But I don't think I put the sonnet and see His sonnet, any of his sonnets are as perfect as King Lear or you know Hamlet or these plays, right?

[57:05] So, can a sonnet be as perfect as a play? I don't think so. But it's simpler. So you get you get this, you know, you're all messed up as far as understanding the way God is, right? So I think that's that's significant that he he says that, huh? Yeah, I have a question I want to ask about the third objection again, the reply response to the third objection in Article Eight.

[57:35] Yeah. In when he when he says that, okay, so for for man and horse differ by rational and irrational differences. Yeah. Which certainly, okay, but then the he says the differences can differ by further differences by by further differences that have to simply be other. But if we if we take instead of the example of man and horse, if we were to take say say Socrates and Plato, two two men, two they differ not by different the different what they differ by would be their matter rather than by a difference.

[58:12] And so, couldn't I say that their their okay? Well, what does this matter differ? Does this matter differ? Socrates' matter differ from Plato's matter simply in that they're other. But

[58:29] that's really really a a a different kind of distinction, right? Yeah, yeah. Because you know, the Thomases sometimes distinguish between what he calls a material distinction, right? And that's tied up with the continuous, right? Yeah. Okay. So, what's the distinction between

[58:50] the two endpoints of a straight line? You see, because the points are exactly what same kind of thing, and and they don't differ by what a difference, right? Well, they differ because one's here and one's there, you know. And he's not really considering that kind of a distinction here in this objection. I think he's thinking of the formal distinction, right? Yeah. And then the question is,

[59:24] is all formal distinction by a difference that is not you? And that gets you into this. Yeah. Other problem that you have to have infinity differences for them to differ. Okay. Say A and B differ by X and Y, and X and Y differ by you know C and D, and and and you always differ by something other than yourself. Well, then you're going to have to have what infinity differences before you think we're going to differ.

[59:56] And you might you might say go back to the great principle there the axiom that it through another is after the through itself right okay so things that are other by another presuppose things that are other by themselves right okay

[1:00:21] so if everything different by a difference other than itself then you'd have nothing differing by itself yeah You don't just mind everything Yeah. Yeah Yeah

[1:00:37] Yeah You don't say it's the modern philosophy, it's a similar mistake like this you know They'll identify kind of I don't see any difference between being which is sort of everything and matter huh? Because they both seem to be what simple okay and

[1:01:02] that's a big mistake too right it was probably that mistake of mixing up the cause of all the cause of all right but mixing of all right but mixing up because of their simplicity and having nothing by which they differ

[1:01:19] so if we have nothing by which we differ we must be the same and not seeing this other possibility that they are we could be other by ourselves okay

[1:01:35] you see okay so so much for the simplicity of God thank