Prima Secundae
30. Concupiscence, Ignorance and the Circumstances of Human Acts (Q.6, aa.7–8; Q.7, aa.1–2)
Class of 2011-10-06
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/11-prima-secundae/030-concupiscence-ignorance-and-the-circumstances-of-human-acts/

[0:00] Now, but concupiscence causes the involuntary, right? Gotta have a apple pie, just apple pie. The seventh one precedes us. It seems that concupiscence causes the involuntary.

[0:25] For just as fear is a certain passion, so also what concupiscence? But fear causes, in some way, the what involuntary. Therefore, also what concupiscence? I am

[0:45] afraid, Thomas, it's going to be a tough confessor. I think. Yeah, this. I think this is specific about what Father Merkelbach said about it. Concupiscence causes something to be more voluntary. Yeah. Yeah. Becomes more inclined to it, right? Yeah. You will then. Moreover, as to fear, the one who's timid or fearful acts against that which is what proposed, right? So the incontinent man can contain himself, control himself on account of what concupiscence, right?

[1:27] But fear, in some way, causes the involuntary. Therefore, also what concupiscence? However, knowledge is required for the voluntary, but concupiscence corrupts knowledge. For the philosopher says in the sixth book of the ethics that pleasure or the concupiscence, the desire of pleasure, corrupts the what estimation of prudence. Therefore, concupiscence causes the what involuntary? I blacked out.

[2:04] Was it as we said about in Italy? There, you know, if the husband comes home and finds his wife in bed with another man, and he kills the man, well, it's excusable, you know.

[2:21] It was the famous case when I was teaching in California. There, where the husband worked in the cement business, right? And I tell you the story I didn't know before. And he, one day at noontime, he happened to just be near home. You know, I said, "Well, let's stop and surprise away for that lunch with her," you know. And because he saw this little fancy, you know, convertible in front of the house, you know, so and so, and so I don't know who that is?

[2:47] So, so he opened the door. He could hear the voices in the bedroom, and he guess what's on. And he was so embarrassed that he walked out. You know. I'm going to drive off, but then he got second thought and backed up his cement thing and lowered the cement into this open convertible.

[3:07] Well, for one, for one case, I guess the the judge, you know, I sued him, right? The judge said, you know, case dismissed. I mean, it was justified, you know. Yeah, yeah. It's kind of a great story. Guilty for because of temporary insanity. I mean, served him right. Yeah, really. She offers

[3:32] such a deed there, and a fancy convertible deserves to have a load of cement in it. Um, but against this is what Damascene says, huh? That the what involuntary is worthy of what pity or indulgence, and what what is done, huh? What is done with sadness, right? Okay. Neither of these belongs to that which is done by concupiscence. Therefore, concupiscence does not cause the what.

[4:19] Now, Thomas answers. I answered. Should be said that concupiscence does not cause the involuntary, right? Huh? What more makes something voluntary? For something is said to be voluntary from this that the will is born towards it, right? But concupiscence, but through concupiscence, the will is inclined to willing that which is desired, right? And therefore, concupiscence more makes it about that something be voluntary than it be what involuntary, right?

[4:59] This reminds you of the arguments, you know, about whether something done to habit, like done to virtue, now, right, is more praiseworthy than something done without virtue, right?

[5:12] Well, if you done it to virtue, right, then you're really inclined even more to do it, right? Thomas takes example there of two of the the monks, someone who who obeys the vows, right? Huh? Is he less voluntary than the man doesn't have the vows and abstains from food or whatever it is in an odd hack basis, you might say, right? See. Well, if there's more to incline you towards doing this, right, then it's really more what more voluntary, yeah, yeah.

[5:51] That's something most people get mixed up on, you know. They get kind of. That's what often I think. Whenever somebody is recognized and praised for some courageous deed, they often will say, "Oh, anybody would have done that in the circumstance," because they recognize they may not have to have it, but in that circumstance they were compelled to do that, which is praiseworthy certainly. But they would often—I remember that man who, when the plane crashed in Potomac River in January, whatever it was, in Washington, and the people were drowning, and the helicopters coming, and they're pulling people out one by one.

[6:25] There was a stewardess in the water, and she kept giving the rope to other passengers to go up, and then finally she was the last one. And just as the rope came to her, she sunk under the water, and she was drowning. And there was a fireman on the shore. I remember watching it live when it happened. He just ripped off his coat, he jumped in the river, and he saved her.

[6:41] Pulled her out, pulled her out from under the water. And everybody praised him. He says, "Anybody would have done that." Okay, so he's not going to let me off in confession. I can see that this not going to go to confession. This guy going to get some some loose thinking. Some sloppy. To the first, therefore, should be said that fear is of the evil, right? Huh? But concupiscence regards the what?

[7:17] Good, good. But the bad, as such, is contrary to the will. But the good is what in agreement to the will. Whence fear has more to itself to cause involuntary than to what concupiscence? Ah. That's interestingly said, Senator.

[7:44] To second should be said that in that which is done through fear, there remains repugnance of the will to that which is done, considered in what itself, right? But in that which is done through concupiscence, as in the man of lacking self-control, there does not what

[8:11] remain the prior will by which he what repudiated that which is desired, desired, but he is changed to willing that which before he repudiated, right? Yeah. Okay. And therefore, what is done through what fear is in some way involuntary, right? But what is done through concupiscence in no way.

[8:39] Just think of the penance he's going to give me. For the uh, in the man lacking self-control, huh? He acts against that which he. Proposed before, right? But not against that which he now wills, right? But the timid man acts against that which even now, as such he wants. Yeah.

[9:19] It's only because he grabbed that burning ember, right? Yeah. After the temptation, that was it. Yeah. You know, started Thomas there. That's. I I think that Father Harden talks about that because he said he doesn't refer to this as such, but he's talking about he's fairly frank about it. He said that at one point in his career, in his priesthood, didn't say where exactly when, but he said he knew some whether they were colleagues in a university or whoever it was, but they hired a woman to seduce him.

[9:52] To seduce him. To seduce him. Yeah. Because you know, it's one thing you know you teach certain things, but when you are in certain circumstances, nature takes over, and you can be very easily led astray. But um but thanks be to God, he didn't consent to it. He just he told the boysness go back to the ones that paid him. They lost their money.

[10:12] They, they, losing deal. But because I think of that, that how I think spies, you know, because they're that's that's like that's part of the business is yeah get something out of somebody, guy or a woman, you know. Yeah. And that's that's the easy, that's the weak link chain.

[10:34] Now, what about knowledge, right? To the third, therefore, should it be said that if concupiscence wholly takes away what knowledge, right? As happens in those who, under kind of concupiscence, become what out of mind, Out of mind, right? It would follow that concupiscence takes away what voluntary, Voluntary, right? Hmm. Nor nevertheless, properly there is the involuntary because in those things which do not have the use of reason, there is neither the voluntary nor the involuntary, right?

[11:11] Huh. But sometimes in those things which are done through concupiscence, not wholly is taken away what knowledge, huh? Because it's not taken away the power of knowing, right? But only the what. Actual consideration. About this particular thing being done, right? Huh. So in sense when Aristotle describes it, the man is saying, you know, this is adultery. Adultery is bad, right? This is pleasant, you know, and when he sins, then he is adhering to the one that this is pleasant, and therefore I would do it, right?

[11:51] Huh. So he's not really what. Think of the other thing, but he still was able to think about it at that time, right? We should have considered that.

[12:07] And nevertheless, this is voluntary, according as the voluntary is said to be what is in the power of the will, as to not act and not will. Likewise, in his power to not what consider, huh? Yeah. For the will is able to resist, huh? The passion, huh? I think Saint Alphonsus uses that expression. He says there's kind of willful inconsideration of certain things. I don't want to think about that right now.

[12:36] Yeah. I might not be able to do what I want to do. Yeah, yeah. Well, this is very much in terms of abortion, right? You don't want to consider what's actually being done, right? Just get it done. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's why even Obama, nobody really likes abortion. That was his assessment. Yeah. Why? Yeah. Why not? You don't want to think about too much, yeah. No, he says beyond his pay grade.

[12:57] No, no, that's that. I think his preface to that one: nobody really likes abortion, but da da da. They went on with that nonsense. Yes, when he was senator there in Illinois, he was, you know, opposed to the law against what they call partial birth abortion, or fetal abortion, when the person is being born, right? Yeah. That's really, you know, something even the Congress as a whole, you know, thought was they had to go against, you know.

[13:23] Yeah, yeah. Just what it is. Okay. Well, now fittingly, he goes on to now with the ignorance causing the involuntary, right? Okay. I want to go back here before we do the etern. Eighth article here, Whether ignorance causes the involuntary, right? To the eighth one goes forward. Thus, it seems that ignorance does not cause the involuntary.

[14:00] For the involuntary merits what forgiveness, I guess, as Damascene says. But sometimes what is done through ignorance does not merit what forgiveness. According to that of the first epistle to the Corinthians, if someone is ignorant, he will be ignored. Yeah. Interesting the way the word ignored. You know, in English, does it mean not known? It doesn't really mean that anymore. But you are ignored as if you were not known.

[14:40] That's what we say when you when you put on hold. I call be put on ignore. Moreover, every sin is with ignorance, according to that of Proverbs chapter fourteen. They err who do something bad, right? Aristotle says that too. Thomas Aristotle, doesn't affect. If therefore ignorance causes the involuntary, would follow that every sin is involuntary, which is against Augustine's saying that every sin is what voluntary, right?

[15:22] Moreover, the involuntary is with sadness, as Damascene says. But some things are done ignorantly and without what sadness, Sadness. as if one kills what enemy. Yeah, whom he what sought to kill, right? Huh? Thinking he was going to what kill a stag, I guess. huh? Yeah. But why did he say any host of the enemy? The enemy.

[15:53] So he did this ignorantly. He killed the enemy, but he doesn't. He's not sad about it, right? Yeah. Okay. Okay. There is a movie. What is that one? The English movie there, where the guy is sent back to Europe there during the Second World War, First World War, I guess. Um, he's supposed to get rid of somebody who's going to be. But has to identify the guy first, right?

[16:17] And in the, I think this guy must be the guy, and they decide to kill him, of course, and find out that he's not the guy. You know, now they really feel guilty, right? You know, it's the sadness that they realize that they killed the guy who's not really the spy that they thought he was. And now they're confronted with this real nice wife, you know, very close and.

[16:38] They're convinced he was the guy, you know. Okay. Against this is what what both Damascene and the philosophers say, right? That the involuntary is what some kind of involuntary, huh? Quod is the ignorance, right? Huh?

[17:08] I answer. It should be said that ignorance has to be a cause of the involuntary by reason of the fact that it lacks knowledge, right? Which is required for the voluntary, right? That was the definition of voluntary, right? With no, it was within, but the knowledge, right? Nature, it was without knowledge, right? That was a distinction between the two, right?

[17:34] But not every ignorance is of such a kind as to deprive us of knowledge, and therefore it should be known that ignorance, in three ways, has itself to the act of the will. In one way, concomitant, huh? Accompanying it, right? Another way, consequently. Another way, what? Yeah. So before, after, and with, huh? During, yeah. Okay.

[18:06] Concomitant, when the ignorance is of what is what done, right? Huh? Nevertheless, if it were known, it would nevertheless what be done? Be done, right?

[18:24] For then ignorance does not induce to what willing that this thing come about, but it happens together with something what done and ignored, as in the example what posited on the third argument there.

[18:43] When someone wishes to what kill the enemy, right? But ignorantly he does this, right? Thinking he's killing a. Stag, yeah. And I appreciate some examples of that in fiction too, right? Right. Someone does that. Yeah. I think that's a great story for

[19:06] it. Yeah. And such ignorance does not does not make something involuntary, right? Huh? As the philosopher says, huh? Because it does not cause something that is in fact repugnant to the will, right? But it makes something what not voluntary, right? So the distinction he's making between not voluntary, right, and involuntary, right. One is merely a negation of the voluntary, right? The other is opposed to the will, right?

[19:37] Huh? Because that is not able to be an act willed, that is what is Not known not known, right? So, in shooting at that stag, did you will to kill that man? No,

[20:01] that's not against your will either, but so you're not involuntary, right? Because you didn't know that he was behind that. So, if you disguise yourself as a like the lamb, like the fox, disguise yourself like a lamb, disguise yourself as a servant, as a stag, you might be killed. Anyway,

[20:28] consequently, ignorance has itself to the will in so far as ignorance is itself what voluntary, right? Huh? And this happens in two ways, according to two ways of the voluntary above laid down. In one way, because the act of the will is done in ignorance, right? As when someone wishes to what Be ignorant, That he might have an excuse of what sin that covers a lot of people there.

[21:01] It's very common. Or that he not what be what withdrawn from sinning, right? Huh? According to that in Job chapter twenty-one, we do not will or wish the knowledge of your ways,

[21:20] and this is called affected ignorance. Yeah. Catholics don't know it's a church. Says about these things, right? Oh, I didn't know that. What is like when our Lord said the Pharisees who saw John's baptism, and they, as I like to say, studiously reply, "We don't know."

[21:42] So they considered the options and they preferred ignorance. In another way, ignorance is said to be what voluntary, of that which one is able to know and ought to know, right? Huh? For thus to what not not act and not to will is voluntary, as has been said above, huh? And in this way, it is called to say ignorance, right? Huh? Whither with when someone in act not does not consider what he ought to consider, right?

[22:22] Able to not consider. Okay, which is the ignorance of a bad choice, or from passion, or from some habit, right? Just as when someone the knowledge which he ought to have, he does not care to acquire, right? And according to this. Way ignorance of the universal things of law, which when is held to know is called voluntary, as a word arriving through negligence, right? Ignorance of law is no excuse.

[22:56] That's right. That's the kind of law. no excuse. Since such ignorance is voluntary, and our will, such ignorance or ignorance itself, is voluntary in one of these ways, it cannot cause simpliciter right? Well, they do help those simpliciters. They couldn't have quit, huh? The sum would be a lot shorter.

[23:28] It cannot cause simply the involuntary, right? Huh? It caused nevertheless secundum quid in some way, right? The involuntary, insofar as it precedes the motion, the will to. Doing something right, huh? Which would not be if the knowledge were what present, right? Antecedent of it, even has itself to the will when it is what not voluntary, and nevertheless is the cause of willing something that otherwise, I guess, a man with what not will, right, huh?

[24:25] Just as a man is ignorant of some circumstance of the act which he was not bound bound to know, right, huh? And from this he would do something, right, huh? That he would not do if he knew, right? To just excuse Oedipus there when he married his mother.

[24:48] That's why in the other Oedipus play, Oedipus at Colonus, you know that play. You know he's he's forgiven in a sense, right, huh? Or he's the plays that he's kind of taking the gods, right? Because he he didn't knowingly do this, right? Even though he puts out his eyes, right? Horrible tragedy, huh? And similarly, killed his father, right? Not knowing he's just his own father.

[25:21] Shakespeare has in history plays there, you know, War of the Roses and so on. The father has one father has mistakenly killed his own son, right? In battle, the other one, the son has killed the father, and discovered this and was in the sixes weeping over the sad state of the unintended war. As when

[25:48] someone using diligence, right, not knowing that someone is going through the way, he shoots out an arrow, right. That's stock example by which he kills the one passing along, right?

[26:06] Remember, old teacher desert there, you know. You guess he did some hunting, you know, but he was getting kind of nervous about the the free shooting hunters, you know, who who something moves and bang bang it off and goes and could be a man moving as well as a beast, huh?

[26:26] So you think you have to stop this? Get the injury, yeah, but get out and start drinking. That's the end of it. Yeah. And such ignorance causes the involuntary what? Simpler, right? Okay That's ignorance that you're not something you're not expected to know, right? Or not able to know,

[26:53] like that. Well, and to this is clear the response to the objections. For the first argument objection proceeds about ignorance of those things which one is what held to know, right? Huh? So that's an ignorance that doesn't merit forgiveness, right? Okay. And second is about ignorance of what choice, right? Which in some way is voluntary, as has been said, huh? And the third about ignorance, which is concomitant here, huh?

[27:40] Coming itself to the will, right? Huh? So it's involved in the question of ignorance caused involuntary, right? You have to see all these distinctions that Thomas makes. Let me

[28:04] see. Time to do another article here. Question seven, about the circumstances of human acts, circumstantial evidence. Then we're now to consider about the circumstances of human acts,

[28:24] and about this are sought four things. First, what is a circumstance? Secondly, what are the circumstances? What are the circumstances are about what? Human acts to be known by theologians. Yeah, they should be known by theologians. Third, how many circumstances there are, and which in them are the what chief ones?

[28:58] To the first, then one proceeds thus: it seems that a circumstance is not an accident of what human acts. For Tully, that's Cicero, right? In the Rhetorica,

[29:17] says that a circumstance is that to which, right, speech adds authority and strength to a what argument, right? But speech gives strength to an argument, especially from those things which are the very substance of the thing, as a definition, genus, species. Now, this is what those three have in common: definition, genus, and species.

[29:56] Yeah, they all say know what the thing is: the definition more distinctly than the genus and the species. From which also Tully teaches the orator to what Argue. argue, right? Therefore, the circumstance is not an accident of the human act. You know what Cicero said about Aristotle's rhetoric? It's a golden river.

[30:28] I guess you know that's one task that Plato put his student Aristotle to work on in rhetoric. huh. Of course, you have a number of dialogues where Socrates talks to these sophists who practice rhetoric. I guess the different sophists had different specialties, right? But rhetoric was kind of a common, common thing that they had, and they all tried to teach something about the art of persuasion.

[30:59] It's interesting word, persuasion, through the sweet, right? I got some notes there on the persuasion and there in the scripture, right. Yeah, yeah. of course we'll talk about that. huh Cindy I used to say that persuasion is found first in music, and then in fiction, and finally in speech.

[31:23] So moving them to the to the sweet right. Actually, the Greek the Greek says in the definition, you know, the fiction thing, you know, that it's sweet in language, right? Yeah, but music is even more persuasive. It's interesting, you know, how if you're with somebody and they're humming a melody, someday you'll pick it up without involuntarily, and so on. And

[31:52] yeah, it's the it's the Dryden's poem there, you know, where Alexander's there and they play one kind of music, you know, and then he's back in battle, you know, and they play another music and he's putting his arm around the girl, you know, and so on. And you know, people get you know how Hitler was so taken up with Wagner, you know, and he was was moved by him.

[32:19] So they didn't, you know, for years they wouldn't allow Wagner to be performed in Israel, right? You know, because he's so associated with with Hitler and so on.

[32:32] During the was it during the the Revolutionary War, but they'd have the little band come in and play these these melodies, you know, these kind of string melodies, and I volunteer, you know, to play, you know. Yeah, yeah. When I was a little boy, I used to always be looking for marches on the radio, you know, so on. Even now, I still like some of these good marches and the good ones.

[32:54] And you know, have my delusions of grandeur, you know. My dad when he had the computer used to have the the Marine Corps anthem. You know, when he started up,

[33:08] he just loved it. He just thought it was the greatest thing. It's very stirring. Well, some people in the parish there, you know, would go down to see the Holy Cross, and they play, you know, West Point, you know. And if it's a good day, and on Saturday, then they'd have the cadets marching out. Of course, they I don't know if you're seeing them march to West Point, but they come out, you know, one after another, one these companies after another, you know, and they march around, you know.

[33:30] Oh, they just get carried away, you know. These the civilians, you know. But it was all say everyone was a pray. That was the all the all saying, you know, these things.

[33:48] Okay. Further, it's what proper to accident to be in something, right? It's a subject. But what stands around something is not in it. What's more, outside, right? It's a starting from the word. And therefore, circumstances are not accidents of what human acts.

[34:12] Moreover, of an accident, there is not an accident, but human acts themselves are certain accidents. Therefore, circumstances are not accidents of acts. Against this, the particular conditions of any singular thing are said to be accidents individuating.

[34:39] But the philosopher, who is this philosopher? He's always talking about. But the philosopher in the third book of the Nicomachean Ethics, huh Causes circumstances, what Particularia, Particularia huh Particulars. That is particular conditions of singular acts. Therefore, circumstances are what.

[35:02] Yeah. Well, what's Thomas going to say? The answer. It should be said that because names, according to the philosopher, are signs of what things understood, right?

[35:21] It is necessary that, according to the proceeding of our intellectual knowledge, there be also a what proceeding in naming, right? But our knowledge, intellectual knowledge, proceeds from things that are more known to things that are what less known, huh? And therefore, among us or with us, from more known things, names are carried over, right, to signifying things less known, right? That's the word transferunt, right? Sometimes Thomas will use the the noun called the you see the expression translatio nominis.

[36:12] Now you know the word translation in us, and the word metaphor, right? They both have exactly the same etymology. They both come from what? Carry over. But in English, metaphor, you carry over the name, but not the meaning. So if I call my wife honey, I'm carrying over the name honey, but not the exact meaning, right? But translation, you're not carrying over the name, but you're carrying over the meaning, right?

[36:48] That's kind of arbitrary that one should have been used for carrying over the name and the other for carrying over the what meaning of the name, but not the name. Okay, here he's got transferunt, right? He's talking about carrying over the name, right? So translatio nominis will mean carrying over, obviously the name. That's what you're talking about.

[37:12] And therefore, hence it is that, as is said in the tenth book of the Metaphysics, tenth book of Wisdom, from those things which are according to place, local, proceeds the name of what distance to all contraries. You see, what are contraries? Well, contraries are the species, particular forms, right, that are furthest apart, right, most distant, right. And so, like in the genus of color, white and black are the contraries; they're being furthest apart, right?

[37:51] In the genus of habit, it's virtue and what vice, right? Like continence and incontinence are in between, right? Okay. So, in the incontinent man. there's some conflict, huh? When Don Giovanni who's got the vice, right? Ah, there's no conflict, right? Huh? He only does these things, right? Okay. So, but that idea of being most distant is taken from what place, huh? Okay. And in Greek, you know, you say, let's say, diaphora

[38:38] or in Latin, what is the difference, right? What means what? To carry apart. Okay. So, but in logic, a difference or diaphora is what separates species under the same genus, right? But the actual origin of the word is what? What carries them apart? And that's taken from locus, which means what place there, right? Okay. A lot of these things are named, right? Just like this idea of going forward, right?

[39:11] Now it's originally taken from locomotion, huh? My face went from what white to red when I got embarrassed. It went. Yeah. So he's gone. He's gone. That's very good. Say, you mean he's dead? But no, we do say he's gone, though, right? Gone. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, it's taken from these things, huh?

[39:51] Okay. And likewise, right? Names pertaining to what locomotion, huh? We use to signify other notions, right? Huh? In that bodies, huh? Which are what? Circumscribed, right? In place. In place. Are most of all what known to us, huh? So when you study the early Greek philosophers, they seem to speak as if change of place is the only what? Change. Change, right? And that these changes that seem to be change of what quality, right?

[40:30] Huh? Is really a what? Change of place. Yeah, but disguised you disguised, right? Huh? And I used to give them a classic example, you know. Berkowitz, they give Berkowitz a cup of coffee, right? Huh? And Berkowitz takes a sip and says, "This is really bitter," you know. And then he gets distracted and so on. So put some sugar in there, right? And Berkowitz says, "Oh my goodness, the coffee has changed from one quality of being bitter to now it's sweet," you know.

[41:00] So now I've discovered another kind of change besides change of place, huh? Well, some of the fragments say, you know, short-sighted, you know. What has taken place actually is just a change of place. That the sugar that was in the sugar bowl has now it's down inside the the you know. Well, I would see it. Yeah, but it's so small you can't see it, right? And so there's really not that.

[41:26] In Einstein, you know, in his book there, the evolution of physics, huh? Which is kind of nearest thing to a history of physics about some of the main things. He talks about the early theorems about heat, right? And if you put a you know cold body and a hot body together in the same room, and leave them there together for a while, the hot body will not be so hot, and the cold body will be a little warmer, right?

[41:50] And of course, the idea was that there was a substance, caloric, that flowed from the hot body into the cold body, right? So was there a change of quality? We just that's just a dumb name for what is a kind of a hidden change of what place, right?

[42:11] And so the oldest part of even of modern science is about change of place on mechanics, huh? And then when they when they started to deal with heat and so on, they tried to understand it as being a kind of disguised form of change of what place, right? So it's that well, no, right? And and so then gradually that they came to you know, forced by the truth itself to see some other kind of change, say, change of place, huh?

[42:44] That's the first kind of change Aristotle picks up in particular, though he studies it in general. So when Aristotle takes up, say, like in the fourth book of the physics, the name, the words in and out, right? Huh? And then Thomas orders them the way Aristotle, taught us to order them, but the first meaning of of in is in place, huh? In this room, huh? And you order them from that.

[43:15] And hence it is that the names circumstances from those things which are in place are derived to human acts, right? Huh? Now those things are said in places to stand around something, right?

[43:35] Which is extrinsic from the thing, right? But nevertheless touches it or approaches it according to what place. And therefore, whatever conditions are outside the very substance of the act, huh? But nevertheless, attain to it in some way, in some way to the human act, are called what? Circumstance. Circumstances. Circumstances. I'm sorry, I'm the wrong sentence. Okay.

[44:04] But what is outside the substance of the thing, but pertaining to that thing, is what? It's accident, right? Whence the circumstances that human acts should be called their what Accidents right of human acts should be called their what? Accidents, right?

[44:23] Whence the circumstances of human acts should be called their what? Accidents, right? They they affected in some way. Now, what about this firming? this argument from Tully, right? To the first, therefore, should be said that speech gives strength to an argument, first from the substance of the act, right? But secondarily from those things which what? Secondarily. Yeah. So that you that in the courtroom a lot, right?

[45:00] Huh? That these circumstances, what? Make it less severe. Sometimes they augment, right? Huh? But sometimes they tend to what? Make it less severe, right? Huh?

[45:14] Just as first someone is rendered what? Accusable. From what? The fact that he is what killed a man, right? Huh? But secondly, from this that he did it what? By deceit. Yeah. Or an account of money. Money. Or in a time or in a sacred place. Yeah, sacred time or place, right? Huh? Or something else of this sort, huh? Okay. I guess if you rob and you have a gun, that's that's worse.

[45:45] Yeah. Then if you you know you steal, that's circumstance, right? Robbery is robbery, you know, but but the circumstance is going to make it robbed, you know, it's called. You kill a man. Armed armed robbery, you know. You kill a man. It's bad. Kill your father. It's worse. Yeah. Yeah.

[46:04] And therefore, significantly, he says that through circumstance, speech joins what, or adds some strength or firmness to the argument, as it were, secondarily, right? Huh? Okay.

[46:25] The second the second argument was the one about the accident being in the thing and not being outside it, which the word circumstance seemed to say, right? The second should be said that something is said to be an accident of something in two ways. In one way, because it is in it, right? As white is said to be an accident of Socrates, right? Another way, because together with it, it is in the same what?

[46:58] Subject, right? So if you say I am a a white philosopher, right? Does my whiteness reside in my philosophy? No, but they're in the same subject, right? Okay, and that's the example Thomas gives. Just as white happens to what being musician, right? Insofar as they belong to one, right,

[47:26] and in some way what touches the other in one subject, and through this way, circumstances are said to be accidents of the acts, huh?

[47:47] not as existing what in in in the other, right, but as existing with it in the same what subject, right. the third, should be said that an accident is said to happen to an accident on account of their coming together in a subject. But this happens in two ways. In one way, according as two accidents are compared to one subject, without any order, right? Like being white and being a musician, right?

[48:44] And just as white and musician to what Socrates, right? Another way with some order, right? That is when a subject receives one by means of what another, right? Just as a body receives what color by means of the surface, right? It's the surface of the body that is colored. So there is some connection between having a surface and having a color, right? And having a surface is more fundamental, right, than the than the color you have.

[49:20] And in that way, one accident is said also to be in the other, right? For we say that color is in the what surface, right?

[49:33] But in both ways, circumstances have themselves to the act. For some circumstances are ordered to the act because they pertain what to the agent, not by. I mean, yeah. By means of the act, as for example, place in the condition of the what Pers person. Others, because what by means of the act as the way of what acting.

[50:07] Time for one more, or not? Yeah. Whether. the circumstances of human acts should be considered by the theologian, right? To second one proceeds thus: it seems that the circumstances of human acts should not be considered by the theologian, right? It's wrong in these theologians.

[50:38] For human acts are not considered by the theologian except according as they are what of some sort that is good or bad, right? But circumstances do not seem to be able to make acts of some sort because nothing is qualified, formally speaking, from that or by that which is outside of it, right? But from that which is in it, right? Therefore, the circumstances of acts should not be considered by the theologian.

[51:16] Moreover, circumstances are accidents of the acts, but to one thing an infinity of things can happen. And as is said in the sixth book of metaphysics, no art or science is about being praeter, except what sophistry make the theologian a sophist. Therefore, theology does not have to consider the circumstances of human acts.

[51:50] Moreover, the consideration of circumstances pertains to the rhetorician. But rhetoric is not a part of theology, is it? Therefore, the consideration of circumstances does not pertain to theology. It's an unusual article, isn't it?

[52:10] And you know, if you're a confessor, don't you have to take into account the circumstances? That's that's my I don't know how to resolve the objection, but I'm thinking something's wrong with this objection. Moreover, but against this is that ignorance of circumstances causes the involuntary, as Damascene and Gregory of Nyssa say. But the involuntary excuses from guilt, right? Consider which pertains to the theologian, right? Therefore, the consideration of circumstances pertains to the theologian, right?

[52:46] Answer: It should be said that the circumstances do pertain to the consideration theologian, and for three reasons. First, because the theologian considers human acts according as through them man is ordered to what beatitude. That's why we considered beatitude in the beginning, in the prima pars, right? Prima secundae. But everything that is ordered to an end must be what Proportioned to that end.

[53:20] But acts are proportioned to an end according to some what kind of measurement, right? It comes about through what suitable circumstances, huh? Whence the consideration of the circumstances pertains to the theologian, right? He couldn't judge how these things were or were not proportioned to the to the end, yeah, yeah.

[53:50] Should I be more prayerful in the church than in the dinner table? You smoke while you pray, or pray while you smoke? Or in the movie theater or someplace? Okay. That's what I think theology on tap. That's what. If you want to talk about theology while you're down at the bar with the guys, that's great. I don't know if going down to the bar to do theology is the right way to do it.

[54:19] Secondly, because the theologian considers human acts according as in them is found the good and the bad, right? And the better and the what worse, huh? And these are diversified according to circumstances, as will be clear below, right? That's what we're thinking. Yeah. You know, so You notice how it comes out so clearly in the Greek plays. There, you know, what the idea that can you kill your own mother, right?

[54:51] You know, but she's guilty of killing your father, right? But does it pertain to the son then to kill his mother? Maybe someone, maybe the state should, you know, punish her. But but you know, so he kills his own mother, right? Who has killed his father, right? And then he's pursued by the, you know, yeah, yeah. So this is a circumstance, right? This woman is not only guilty of killing this man, but and knowingly guilty of killing your father, but she's also your mother, right?

[55:25] So you know, that's you can see how the problem there, right? Does that right? You know, can a can a son revenge his father's death by killing his mother? Yeah, so there's that circumstance that's interesting. There was a story based on fact. I remember this one scene. It was horrible scene. It was on television years ago. Where there was a family, the father was beating the children and terrorizing them.

[55:53] Yeah. And the young boy, the teenager, was trying to protect his sister who was being being brutalized by the father, so he killed his father. Mm-hmm. And that was third. That was the what the movie was about was the circumstance. Yeah. Yeah.

[56:12] Third, the theologian considers human acts according as they are meritorious or demeritorious. Which belongs to human acts, and to this is required that they be what voluntary, right? But human acts are judged voluntary or involuntary according to knowledge or ignorance of the what circumstances.

[56:38] So Oedipus was guilty of marrying his own mother? He was ignorant of the circumstance that this woman was his mother, right? And therefore, and the consideration of circumstances pertains to the what theologian, yeah.

[57:00] To the first, therefore, it should be said that the good ordered to an end is called the what useful, which implies a relation Whence the philosopher says in the first book of the Ethics that that which is good for something, right, is useful. And those things are which are said towards something, right? Something is denominated not only from that which is in it, but also from that is yeah adjacent.

[57:36] This is clear and right and left, right? Equal and unequal, and similar things, right? And therefore, since the goodness of acts pertains to them in so far as they what are useful, useful to the end, nothing prevents them from being good or bad according to a proportion to those things which lie outside, right? That's a dangerous reality, reality of the relative, right? Reality of the relative.

[58:15] Now, the second should be said that accidents which are entirely accidents are left aside by every art by every art, right? An account of their incertitude and their infinity, right? So the man who manufactures butchers butcher knives, you have to consider the fact that somebody might kill his spouse with this. Will that prohibit you from cooperating in production? Butcher knives. Yeah. Lawyers. That's the impossibility of the lawyers, the legalese.

[58:49] Yeah, or the accident, an accident. I mean, an axe, right? but such accidents do not have the what definition of a circumstance, right? Because by definition, circumstances are thus outside an act that they nevertheless in some way touch upon, right? Ordered to it, huh? But accidents, as such. accidents which are, excuse me, per se fall under art, right? It belongs to the geometer to know that the interior angles of a triangle are two right angles.

[59:33] So, to third, it should be said that the consideration and circumstances belongs to all three of these: to the moral philosopher, right? The political one, right? And to the rhetorician, right?

[59:52] To the moral, because according to them is found or overlooked the middle of virtue in human acts and passions, right? So, on Thanksgiving Day, maybe I should eat more than I eat on other days, right? I know you. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And so on. Okay. And. Maybe uh if I'm gonna drive, I shouldn't drink so much, right? Shouldn't have one for the road. huh

[1:00:27] One for the tree. They just arrested one of the one of the associates of ninety seven thousand dollar a year associates of the governor of the state here, you know. It means he had only had two beers. I don't know. So I said, a man should be able to drive better than that. on two beers, it seems to me, you know.

[1:00:50] But anyway, but some people can hold theirs and some can't. That's the circumstance you have to take into account, I think, huh? Yeah. Okay. Apparently, women

[1:01:10] can can hold less than a man, right? That's different, biological fact, as they say. Okay. Okay. To the political man, and the rhetorician, according as from circumstances acts are rendered laudable or what?

[1:01:35] Vituperation, huh? Vituperable. Excusable or accusable, right? Huh? These are interesting words we're getting here in Latin. But diversely, huh? For the what? Rhetor persuades, right? And the politicus he what? Judges, huh?

[1:01:57] But to the theologian, to which all the arts what? Serve, right? Subservient. It pertains in all the foresaid ways, right? For he has consideration about virtuous and vicious acts with the moral what philosopher, huh? And he considers acts according as they merit punishment or reward with the rhetorician. The politician. Yeah. So when Aristotle, you know, divides rhetoric into three kinds, basically, right? And there's the political rhetoric, and then there's the courtroom rhetoric, and then there's the the Fourth of July rhetoric, huh?

[1:02:39] So of course, the Fourth of July rhetoric you have to take into account too, the circumstances, right? And obviously, in the courtroom, you have to, right?

[1:02:48] Yeah. But even though these, you know, skirmishing now about the political candidates, right? You know, they're trying to look up any bad thing they can on their

[1:03:01] past, you know, huh? Yeah. Yeah. And but I remember when Bush was running there, they found some some arrest for. Speeding or something there, you know. Back when he was a young guy, you know, so that didn't seem to affect too much his campaign. They looked at every little thing they could, you know. Somebody when when Perry was announcing he was going to run there, you know, someone put in a award, you know, for any woman in Texas who would reveal having had an affair with him, you know.

[1:03:33] Just see if you know that there must be some woman out there who's had some some time, you know. But it wasn't any base of it all. It's just you know somebody's hoping to get some some dirt, yeah, you know.