Prima Secundae
129. Aquinas on Habits: How They Are Corrupted and Diminished (Summa I-II, Q. 53)
Class of 2013-09-19
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/11-prima-secundae/129-aquinas-on-habits-how-they-are-corrupted-and-diminished-summa/

[0:00] In the Name of the Father and Son, Holy Spirit. Amen. Thank you, God. Thank you, guardian angels. Thank you, Thomas Aquinas. Deo gratias. 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. Help us to understand what you have written So we had

[0:41] passages in Timothy. Are reading Timothy now, and you're? No, we have a different schedule. We have a different schedule. There's one, that, in chapter three, I think it is, in the first epistle to Timothy, around verse sixteen, something like that. Where the church is said to be the the pillar of truth, right, and foundation of truth. So I say, I can look it up in the Greek, see what it is.

[1:03] You know, of course, the word pillar is stolos, right? But the other one, I think, was edraioma or something like that. I think it comes from the word to for a chair, right? But they kind of give it as the meaning of simply foundation, right? But you know how you call Mary the seat of of wisdom, right? It's actually it's kind of the seat of wisdom to the church, but it's kind of funny because in the Trinity Home, you know, they talk to these people, you know, who came into the church, you know, from some Protestant thing.

[1:32] Of course, you know the one thing that catches them eventually is this sola scriptura, right? And the guy had come across a text, you know, the church is the the foundation, the pillar of truth, right? Well, I mean, how can be how can that be true? this sola scriptura, right? Yeah. You know, usually get caught because how do how do you decide the canon? You know, They've got to have a church to have the canon.

[1:55] but also this is another text they get right sometimes. It's a beautiful little text in Timothy. Advice to to being a bishop, you know. Gotta be a man with just one one wife, there, right? That kind of scandalizes people.

[2:13] That's what they did that reading accidentally at an ordination. I think it was at our ordination. Our ordination, and the deacon was he read the wrong reading. It was that one. And the bishop looked at his Monsignor. He says, "Since when do bishops get married? " When

[2:33] actually did the Western discipline come in, anyway? For the East, you mean? Yeah. Or the West? The West. When did the discipline of celibacy for bishops? That was pretty early, I think. Because yeah, I think at least in the East, I know always the clergy. It was common to have them have married priests, but the bishops were always celibate, always. And that's why, generally speaking, they were always monks, and to this day, the Maronites.

[3:00] The bishops, even if they're diocesan clergy, when they become a bishop, they get a hood because it's a sign of their celibacy and the consecration of the mass. I don't know this the history. I seen it all talked about Father Patwa, you know, but he's got rights and to say Mass in the Maronite. Maronite, yeah, he's he's got connections. Is his mother's Lebanese? I don't know, but somebody told me that the other day.

[3:27] Actually, they have those along, yeah. So Father Weiss's parents, and I think his mother's Lebanese, and I think he studied in Beirut or something. but he was theology Yeah, yeah, he's a lot. He has a lot of those foreign languages, you know, under his belt. He did biblical studies, yeah. He's spoken one of the parishes there up in Northborough, you know, right next door, and so we have the places packed.

[3:48] You know, it's a surprise they got that good a number. Sure. He's a way of kind of talking his belt to kind of catch it a little bit sometimes. Okay, so we're up to the corruption and diminution of habits, huh? That's maybe what's happened to my geometrical habit there, right? You know.

[4:11] Then we're not to consider about the corruption and the diminishing of habits, right? Huh? And about this, three things are asked. Huh? First, whether a habit is able to be what corrupted? Corrupted, huh?

[4:33] He's got to be in the article, a chapter in the prima first book of the Summa Contra Gentiles where God has habitual knowledge. Well, no, no. It's kind of beautiful way he one of the arguments he had was that the the one who has habitual knowledge is substance and his operation not the same thing because having habitual knowledge doesn't always have that operation, but he always has a substance, right?

[5:01] So his substance is not the same thing as operation. When God doing the same thing, substance operation, say, can't have habitual knowledge. It's kind of a subtle argument. You wouldn't expect that to be to show up in there, but it's kind of kind of beautiful the argument he has in there. Prejudice, you know.

[5:24] Secondly, whether it is able to be what weakened or diminished, right? And third, about the way of corruption and diminution. To the first, then one goes forward. Thus, it seems that habits a habit is not able to be corrupted, right? Huh? Why? Because habit is within as a certain what nature, like a second nature we call it. Whence, the operations according to habit are what pleasant, delightful, right?

[6:03] But nature is not corrupted, remaining that of which it is a nature. Therefore, neither can a habit be corrupted, the subject remaining. Moreover, every corruption of a form is either by the corruption of the subject or by the contrary.

[6:34] Just as sickness is corrupted when the animal is corrupted, or it's also corrupted by health coming upon one. But scientia, science, which is a certain habit, cannot be corrupted through the corruption of its subject, because the understanding, which is the subject of this habit, is a certain what substance and is not what corrupted. Sometimes use the word intellectus or the intellectual soul, right? As is said in the first book about the soul.

[7:17] Likewise, it cannot be corrupted by its contrary, because understandable species are not contrary to each other. The definition of vice is not contrary to the definition of virtue.

[7:36] Therefore, the habit of science in no way is able to be what corrupted. Moreover, every corruption is through some motion, some change. But the habit of science, which is in the soul, cannot be corrupted through motion as such of the soul, because the soul, as such, is not what moved. Is moved only accidentally by the motion of the body, right?

[8:12] But no bodily transformation is able to would seem to be able to corrupt the intelligible species existing in the understanding, because the understanding is the place of species without the what Body. It's in the anima too, huh Locus specierum Whence, as they lay down the nearness of old age, oh my gosh, nor through death are these habits what corrupted, right? Therefore, science is not able to be corrupted, and consequently neither the habit of virtue, which is also in the rational soul,

[8:56] as a philosopher says in one ethics, the virtues are what more permanent than the disciplines, right? So I could lose geometry more easily than by justice, let's say, if I had justice.

[9:13] Now, what does the master say here? The answer that some form is said to be corrupted as such through its what? Contrary, right? You skipped the said contrary. Oh, excuse me. Oh my God! What a

[9:36] we would be lost. We wouldn't understand. But against this is what the philosopher says in the book on the length and brevity of life. Sounds like a good treatise to read. Yeah. That forgetfulness and deception are corruption of what? Of knowledge and science. Yeah. And by sinning, someone is able to lose the habit. Of what Virtue virtue, right? And from contrary acts, virtues are both generated and corrupted, as is said in the second book of the ethics.

[10:17] I answer, Thomas says, it should be said that as such, as the Quintum says, she translates as such, I think probably the best way, some form is said to be corrupted through its contrary, but by accident through the corruption of its what subject. If, therefore, there be some habit whose subject is corruptible, and whose cause has a contrary, in both ways it is able to be corrupted.

[10:53] Just as is clear about bodily habits, to wit, such as health and sickness, right? You know that, Thomas. Alternation of health and sickness, in life.

[11:11] They could be corrupted through the corruption of the body, too, right? Those habits whose subject is incorruptible are not able to be corrupted by accidents, right?

[11:23] But now he's going to see a distinction here. There are, however, some habits which, although chiefly, principally, are in the what incorruptible subject, in a secondary way, they are in a what corruptible subject. Just as the habit of science, which is chiefly in the possible understanding, but secondarily in the sense of grasping powers, as has been said above, they're in the so Thomas used that word what apprehensiva, right?

[12:05] He often calls the two powers there the grasping power and the desiring power, right? I was kind of struck, you know, thinking about this word discourse. You know, you have in Shakespeare's definition of reason, and of course Thomas did an article where the knowledge of God is discursiva. It's not, but it's kind of interesting that grasp comes from the act of the hand, and discourse comes from the feet, right?

[12:37] So when Shakespeare says, or Friar Friar Lawrence says to Romeo, you know, wisely and slow they stumble that run fast, right? The first meaning of that is running too fast, you know, and you stumble. And the second meaning is in your actions in the course of your life, right? You act in haste, repent at leisure, as they say. And then the third sense is the act of reason itself, right?

[13:04] So it's taken from the word running, discursus Discourse. It's interesting that you know these are our hands and our feet are kind of very much where are those two parts? But it's interesting to take the word grasping from the hand, I guess, and running from the feet and apply them to the mind, right? Called the grasping power, right? This Shakespeare calls it discursive power, right? huh? Interesting, huh?

[13:35] so dependent upon our senses to name things, right? Okay, so he's going back here. He's saying that the science is chiefly in the what understanding, the possible understanding opposed to the act of understanding, but secondarily in the what sense grasping powers.

[14:17] Aristotle says that we don't think without what images, right? And those involve the sense powers, right? And therefore, on the side of the possible understanding, the habit of science cannot be corrupted gradually by the corruption of its subject, but only on the part of the inferior sense powers, right? So as your imagination declines, right, then you're what? Yeah. Corruption there, right? Huh? You know, in the modern science, there you know most of the people who get the Nobel Prize again for some idea again in their twenties or thirties, right?

[14:57] Not some idea again in their sixties or seventies, right? You know, it's kind of pitiful. You think of Einstein in those later years, you know, he keeps on working, you know, but he announced something and it's supposed to fall through, you know. But when he's you know back in in what 1905 was it, you know, he had three papers, you know, you see all three of which are really worth the Nobel Prize.

[15:19] It's a fertile imagination, but the imagination goes, huh? So in some sense, the younger scientist is more productive, right? That's not so true of the philosopher because he uses more just the reason, right, to depend upon the imagination. The scientist does, you know. I used to wonder about Mozart's magic flute, you know. Somebody called it a potpourri, a potpourri, you know. He's taking melodies so it's useful.

[15:52] He could orchestrate them better or something, you know. But I don't know if that's true or not. It therefore should be considered if these habits are able to be per se as such corrupted, right? That would mean by their what contrary, right?

[16:21] If therefore there is some habit which has something contrary, either on the part of itself or on the part of its what cause, is able to be what per se corrupted, huh? If, however, it does not have a contrary, it cannot be per se corrupted, right?

[16:42] Now it is manifest that the understandable form, right, existing in the possible understanding, does not have some what contrary. So health and sickness are contrary in the body, but not in the what understanding, not the reason, right? Okay.

[17:03] Nor again to the active understanding, which is its cause, is able to be something what contrary, right? Whence, if there is some habit in the possible understanding, immediately caused by the agent what intellect, such a habit is incorruptible both per se and what per accidens. And of this sort are the habit of first beginnings, both in speculative things and in practical things, which by no forgetfulness or deception are able to be what corrupted, right?

[17:46] As the philosopher says in the sixth book of the Ethics about foresight, that is not lost through what forgetfulness, huh? Augustine's argument there against the academics, you know, in the De Trinitate, he said we don't know anything, you know. Just like today, he said, "Well, we know we're alive." He says, "Huh? Because even if we're deceived, we're alive." You know, people accuse you know, Descartes of stealing that from Augustus, that was probably dead.

[18:20] He said, I know that I am alive, and I know that I know I'm alive." So I get all the many things I know. That's what Augustine says. But there is

[18:41] some habit in the possible understanding caused, right, from reason, right? To wit, the habit of what conclusions, right, which is called science, huh? So I can, as an English, I call that reasoned-out knowledge, huh? Reason out understanding.

[19:06] To the cause of which there can be something contrary in two ways, right? In one way, on the side of those propositions or statements from which reason what proceeds, goes forward. Yeah.

[19:25] For to the statement that the good is good is contrary the one which says that the good is what not good. According to the philosopher in the second book of the Peri Hermeneias, that's the book on statements, right? What a statement is, what statements are contrary, what ones are contradictory, and so on.

[19:47] In another way, as regards the process or going of reason itself, right? In so far as a sophistical syllogism is opposed to a dialectical syllogism or a what. Demonstrative, right?

[20:05] A little bit, sloppy there, Thomas, right? Beginning of the book on dialectic. there, he distinguishes four syllogisms, right? huh? So you have the demonstrative syllogism and the dialectical syllogism, both of which are good, although one is necessary, the other is only probable, right? And you have two that are opposed to it, right? The sophistical one is opposed to the dialectical one, and then the one they call the falsigraphus right, is opposed to demonstration, right?

[20:32] Yeah, yeah. It's a little sloppy here, Thomas, huh? Stepping up a little bit, you know. Maybe he wrote this in his old age. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course, he died when he was 49, and Aristotle says the mind is best at the age of 49. Yeah, I got one year left. Yeah, I've been going downhill for. quite a few years now

[20:54] I got one year left to do something. They should increase professor's salary up to a certain point, and then start to decrease his salary, you know, until they force him out. Yeah.

[21:10] They should increase his salary if he publishes his retractions. Yeah, that's great too. By the way, that's an in In that confession, I mean, that confession is the, they treat that you know, thank God for whatever has come from you, and ask forgiveness for whatever has come from me. This is beautiful. What a what a what a mind what a man he is. Okay. Thus, therefore, it is

[21:44] clear that through a false what, reasoning, can be corrupted a habit of true opinion, or even one of what? Knowledge Yeah. Whence the Philosopher says that deception is a corruption of science, right?

[22:07] Now, virtues some are intellectuals, intellectual, which are in reason itself, as is said in the sixth book of the Ethics, right? On the second, third, fourth, and fifth books, he talks about the moral virtues, right? Which are not in reason, but they're in the will or in the emotions, right? In the concupiscible or irascible appetite. But then, book six, he's talking about the virtues of reason, huh?

[22:34] Amongst the greatest is wisdom, right? Tell you about my little grandchild, Sophia. Is that called Lady Wisdom? I? Asked her twice last time there. What is wisdom? She says, "The knowledge of God." Ooh,

[22:51] She's on her way. We can we have the the feast of Saint Sophia. So Sophia yes? was yesterday? No, two days ago. Tuesday. Saint Sophia her three daughters, worth their faith, hope, and charity. Yeah. Yeah. I- I- I'm kidding about what is a philosopher lover of Sophia, right? Don't we

[23:16] can quote scripture, right? Yeah, quotation of words, right? But some are in the desiring part of the soul, which are the moral virtues, right? Where's the word moral come from, by the way? Custom Yeah, yeah. Mos Mos. You have to get accustomed to these things. You have to be repeated action yeah.

[23:56] And the same reason is true about the opposite vices, right? Now the habits of the desiring part are caused through this that reason is naturally apt to move to the desiring part, right?

[24:16] Whence, through the judgment of reason moving in the what contrary in some way, either through ignorance or from passion or from choice, is corrupted the habit of what virtue or vice, huh?

[24:34] Now he's got to reply to these objections, right? To the first, therefore, it should be said that as is said in the seventh book of the Ethics, habit has a likeness to nature, right, huh? But nevertheless, it falls short from it, huh? It's not as stable as nature, right? But you know, in the distinction, what's the distinction between habit and what disposition? You know, like in the categories, right?

[25:00] Well, disposition is a what easily moved, right? Disposition, but a habit is a stable, Stable. Yeah, Hardly move. but still disposition, right? So it's like nature, but.

[25:19] And therefore, since the nature of a thing is in no way removed from it, a habit is removed with what difficulty, right? Now, what about the second one, right? Although to understandable forms, nothing is what contrary to statements or enunciations, right? And to the process of reason, there can be something what contrary, right, huh?

[25:56] So what did poor Melissus say, right, huh? If being was. Generated, it had a beginning, but it was not generated. Therefore, it had no beginning. Does that follow?

[26:13] You're saying if A is so, then B is so. But A is not so. Therefore, B is not so. Does that follow? I don't think so.

[26:29] Unless there's a dependence, I guess. Well, see the same thing. B could what follow from anything besides A, right? huh? I used to say to the students. You know, if Perkins dropped dead, then you'd be absent from class, right? He's absent from class. Therefore, you. Yeah, see that's not that's we still think it's it's not logical.

[27:02] But likewise, you say if Perkins dropped dead, he'd be absent from class. He didn't drop dead. Therefore, he would not be absent from class. Does that follow?

[27:12] No. We got fed up with the whole thing. I said, I'm going on vacation. Going to Kansas City. Got lost in the woods or?

[27:24] Happens to the best of us. So. But to the statement, you know that two is half of 4 is contrary, to statement 2 is what. Not half. Yeah, yeah. So there's contrariety between statements, right? Between arguments, good and bad arguments.

[27:55] In English, sometimes they they speak of the enunciation, and sometimes they speak of the proposition. But I think the real word in English is statement. Proposition originally was what for the premises of a syllogism, pro posito, placed before, right? But then they got accustomed, you know, to calling any statement a proposition. But it still follows, it seems to me. It's one thing. It's late

[28:25] to custom. Yeah. To the third, it should be said that science is not removed by bodily motion as regards the very root of the habit, right? But only as regards the impediment of the act, right? In so far as the understanding needs in its own act the sense powers, to which an impediment is brought through the bodily what change. So if I can't imagine the geometrical figure, I can't really go back over the theorem, right?

[29:12] Maybe I can't even invent that, but since I can't recall that, right? But through the understandable motion of reason can be corrupted the what? Habit of knowledge, even as regards the very root of the habit, huh? Interesting you use the word root there, huh? And likewise can be corrupted the habit of what? Virtue. Nevertheless, what is said that the virtues are more permanent than disciplines, huh? Ought to be understood not on the part of the subject or the what cause, but on the part of the act itself, right?

[29:53] Why? Because the use of virtues is continuous throughout all of life. You got to eat every day, right? So you got to act. For moderation, you know, you don't think of geometry every day. Even I don't.

[30:09] Not over the use of the what disciplines, huh? Now the question of the lesser one, right? Whether habits are able to be what diminished, huh? The second one goes forward. Thus, it seems that a habit is not able to be diminished. For a habit is a certain quality quality and a simple what Form. form. But the simple, either the whole is had or the whole is what lost, like a point I suppose, right?

[30:52] Therefore, the habit, not though it's able to be corrupted, it is not able to be what diminished, right? Moreover, everything that belongs to an accident belongs to it as such, or by reason of its what subject, huh? But the habit, by itself or as such, is not intensified or remitted. Otherwise, it would follow that what some species is said of individuals according to more or less, right?

[31:33] I should talk about that, and I said, "What do you mean all men are equal, right? " Is one man more a man than another man? Is one dog more a dog than another dog? One species is not said more or less than their individuals, huh?

[31:54] Even the genus is a dog more or less an animal than a cat. I go to mass this morning and see this lady out walking two dogs. Says I call it two dogly. That's numbers, right? That's not you know. Yeah. Thank

[32:18] you. If therefore, according to the partaking of the subject, it diminished, right? It would follow that something happens to a habit, huh? It's proper that is not common to it and the subject, huh? For to every form there belongs something proper apart from its subject. That form is what. Separable. That whatever form it is belongs. Therefore, it follows that the habit is a separable form, which is impossible.

[33:00] Let's you understand that for a moment. Moreover, the ratio and the nature of the habit, just as of any accident, consists in being concrete to its subject, right? Whence every accident is defined through its what? Subject, right? If therefore the habit, according to itself, is not intensified, or weaken, nor also would it be what? Able to be diminished according to its what? Concretion to its subject, being partaken of by its subject, and thus in no ways is diminished.

[33:43] But against this is said that contraries are apt to come about about the same thing. The growth and diminution are contrary. Since therefore a habit can be increased, it seems that it can also be what? Diminished. He says, "I answer that habits can be diminished in two ways, just as they can be increased, as is clear from the things said before. We talked about the growth of them before, I think, in the summary.

[34:15] And thus, from the same cause, they are increased of which they are generated. So also from the same cause, they are diminished from which they are what? Corrupted, yeah. For the diminution of a habit is a certain way to what? Corruption. It's Corruption, right? Just as reverse, the generation of a habit is a certain foundation of its what? Growth. My

[34:42] brother Mark was talking about a priest, you know, who occasionally he would teach Greek, right? Every time he taught, he had to learn it again. Disappearing. It's been such a long time since he taught it. That's what I remember about St. Robert Bellarmine. It was said that he was assigned to teach Hebrew to a bunch of people. He had he'd never learned Hebrew. Yeah. So he was one less than the head of the students in the class.

[35:05] Not to the first objection. That is a simple thing, right? To the first, therefore, it should be said that a habit, considered by itself, is a simple form, right? And by this, or according to this, there does not happen to it diminution, right? But according to a diverse way of being partaken, which comes about from the indetermination of the potency of the one partaking, which in diverse way is able to what?

[35:46] Partake of one form, right? Or which is able to extend itself to more or to fewer things, right? So I'm trying to extend myself to more theorems in geometry, right?

[36:00] But you can also understand the same theorem what better right? Huh? I've been to the Summa Contra Gentilis many times, so is my mind extending to more conclusions? And Thomas comes to in the Summa Contra Gentilis. I don't think I am, but I seem to understand the arguments better, right? Huh? Intensifying. See, I'm partaking of his arguments more and more.

[36:30] To the second, it should be said that argument proceeds if the essence of the habit is in no way what diminution, yeah. But this is not what we're laying down, but that there is a what diminution

[36:55] of the habit does not have its principle from the habit itself, but from the one what partaking of it, huh? It's interesting, huh? So Thomas's argument becoming stronger or weaker? No, but maybe our mind is. I'm partaking. I'm partaking of the more, more or less substance of his argument more and more, right? More or less and less.

[37:30] Yeah. If you hadn't looked at the proof in geometry, it's kind of hard to remember proof, right? Huh? Embarrassing. Get off the board. You can't. Put it back together. See, partaking less of the argument, right? The argument itself is not more or less, is it? No, and it's fixed. It's fixed.

[37:57] To the third, it should be said that in whatever way an accident is signified, it has a dependence on its subject according to its very definition, right? But in different ways, huh? For an accident signified in the abstract implies a habitude or relation to the subject, which begins in the accident and is terminated at the subject. For whiteness signifies that by which something is what white. And therefore, in the definition of an accident in the abstract, one does not lay down the subject as it were the first part of the definition, which is the genus, but that which is what second, which is the difference.

[38:45] As for example, we say simitas, right? Snubness, right? I think it's an optic. Is the curvature of the what? Nose. Nose. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Or secondly, say say health is a good condition of the body, or something of this, right? Okay. Well, body is not the genus there; it's a good condition. you know? Mm-hmm. We say wisdom is the, you know, the greatest perfection of reason, the highest perfection of reason, wisdom.

[39:18] So if you love reason, you should love wisdom, and if you love wisdom, you should love reason, right? Okay. But notice, reason is not the genus there, right? Huh? You're saying wisdom is the highest perfection of reason, right? You're defining wisdom in the abstract,

[39:41] but in the concrete, the habitude relation begins on the subject and ends in the accident, right? As the white is what has whiteness, right? Okay. You might say that the wise are those who have wisdom. The heaven is before that the wisdom.

[40:09] And the kind of which, in the definition of this sort of accident, the subject is laid down, which is the first part of the definition. For we say that the snub is a curved nose, right?

[40:30] We say the wise man is a man who knows God, right? Thus, therefore, that which belongs to accidents from on the side of the subject, but not from the definition of the accident, is not attributed to the accident in the abstract, but in the what? Concrete.

[40:58] And this what? And of this sort is the intensity and the emission in certain accidents. Whence whiteness is not said to be more or less, right? But white is said to be more or less, right?

[41:22] And wisdom is not more or less, but the wise are more or less wise, right? And the same reason is in habits and other qualities, except that some habits are increased or diminished. through a certain addition, right? I add theorems to the theorem a day, right? Something like that. Now, where the

[41:52] habits are corrupted. To the diminution or diminished by only ceasing from operation, right? To the third, this is I got to be careful here, right?

[42:08] To the third one goes forward thus. It seems that habits are not corrupted or diminished through only cessation from work, right? Well, habits are more permanent than what undergoing qualities, as it appears. But undergoing qualities are not corrupted nor diminished through the cessation from act.

[42:35] For whiteness is not diminished if it does not what change the sight, right? Nor heat if it does not what heat something, right? Huh? Therefore, neither are habits diminished or corrupted through cessation from act. Moreover, corruption and diminution are certain changes, right? But nothing is changed without some cause moving it. Since, therefore, cessation from act does not imply any moving cause, it does not seem that through cessation from act there can be a diminution or corruption of the habit.

[43:23] Moreover, the habit of science and virtue are in the understanding soul, which is above time. But those things which are above time are not corrupted nor diminished through length of time. Therefore, neither are those habits corrupted or diminished through the length of time, if someone remains without exercise. Well, I know what they say about language: is either use it or lose it. Yeah, yeah. My French is worse now than when I was in Quebec.

[43:58] You know, haven't even really talked for a long time in French now, so I'm pretty rusty. Yeah. But against this is what the philosopher himself says in the book on the length and brevity of life. He says that the corruption of science is not only through deception or by deception, but also oblivion, right? Forgetfulness, huh? And in the eighth book of the ethics, he says that many friendships are dissolved by one not calling upon the other, right?

[44:38] In I guess in apolatia. That's an interesting word. Yeah. Not calling reminds me of a country western song my mom told me about, where the guy's lamenting. He says. If my phone still ain't ring, and I suppose it still ain't you. I think that's a good definition of inapplicatio. Yeah, yeah.

[45:01] Yeah, people say they say we've drawn apart and things like that. Don't say no more. Fell out has a beautiful kind of reflection, kind of mournful reflection on on that image. Four men, though. In your mind, yeah, it's good. It's good stuff. But they didn't know Oh, did you? Yeah, it's a good. It's a good. He calls it the worst thing in the world, friends. Fell out.

[45:28] Yeah. The worst thing in the world, friends, because of this, they just drift apart. He says the worst thing. Yeah. The best thing in the world is sleep. At least in the circumstances where they're. I answer: It should be said that, as is said in the eighth book of the physics, something is able to be a mover in two ways, right? In one way, as such, what moves things according to what?

[46:05] The definition of its own form, right? As fire, what heats? Heats. In another way, by accident, as that which removes what prohibits, right? As far as moving the pillar, right? Then. To fall down, right? And in this way, cessation from act causes corruption or diminution of what habits, huh? In so far as the acts are removed, which prevent, it causes corrupting or diminishing the habit, huh? For it has been said above that habits are per se corrupted or diminished from their contrary what agent, huh?

[46:49] Whence, whatever habits, huh, contraries, what increase through the passage of time, I guess, which are able to what. Be subtracted through act by the what proceeding from the habit. These habits are diminished, or even taken away entirely, through a long cessation from act, as is clear both in science and in what virtue, right now.

[47:26] For it is manifest that the habit of moral virtue makes a man prompt to choosing the middle, both in doings and in passions, emotions. But when someone does not use the habit of virtue to moderate the passions or his own operations. It is necessary that there come about many passions and operations apart from the mode of virtue, right, of the mean of virtue, from the inclination of the sense appetite and of other things which move one in exterior way, right.

[48:05] Whence the virtue is corrupted, or diminished through the cessation from act. Likewise, also on the side of the intellectual habits, according as a man is prompt to judging rightly about the things imagined. When therefore a man ceases from the use of the intellectual habit, there rise up extraneous imaginations, right, and sometimes ones leading to the what, contrary.

[48:40] Such that, except through a frequent use of the intellectual habit, these are in a way what, cut off, huh, or compressed, right, and a man is rendered less apt to judging what correctly. And sometimes he's totally disposed to the contrary. Those lazy monks, you know, you got to watch them, you know.

[49:08] Um, and thus through cessation from act they are diminished or even what, corrupted intellectual habit, right. So to the first objection, it should be said that heat, through cessation from heating, is corrupted if through this is increased what, the cold, which is a per se corruption of what, the hot, huh.

[49:40] To the second, it should be said that cessation from the act is moving one to corruption diminution as a what, removens prohibens, right? That's a that's an accidental cause, right? Okay. So what do you do? Pull the pillar out, and the wolf came tumbling down, huh?

[50:06] Interesting accidental cause, removens prohibens. Aristotle talks about that. So you have to understand this distinction between the per se and the per accidens, and the cause of removens prohibens is one kind of what. Death. Yeah. About a way of way of being corrupted. Yeah.

[50:32] So if I move the pillar, am I the cause of your death? Per accident, yeah. Wouldn't say it's accident, though, right? No. It's special kind of. I mean, if you didn't foresee the consequences, I was going to be there. But if you you planned it that way, I think you'd be. If I'm holding a big rock up over your head, there, you know, and I leave my hand, the rock descends and hits you on the head, finishes you off.

[51:05] That was that. You didn't touch him. I didn't touch him, brother. I had nothing to do with it. Punish the rock. Yeah, put the rock in jail.

[51:17] Okay. The understanding part of the soul, as such, is above time, but the sensing part is subject to time, and therefore through the what? Course of time, right? Course of time. When in the course of time, right? As it says in the Peri Hermeneias documents, there is a change as regards to passions, and sensitive part, and also as regards to the grasping parts, the sense grasping parts, right? Whence the philosopher says in the fourth book of physics that time is the cause of what oblivion, right now?

[52:01] Okay. We're saying that the kind thing we're talking about that in the fourth book there, you know, kind of an argument against, you know, the idea that, of course, time's going to be evolution, right now? Because time is is more the cause of corruption than it is of what generation. Yeah, yeah. So if you leave the house there, you know, don't try to knock it down, don't try to improve it.

[52:25] Of course, the time is going to go. Apart. Yeah. I used to say, you know, if you don't clean off your desk once in a while and so on, of course, in time it gets to be a mess, right?

[52:40] You're not trying to make a mess of your desk, but you're not trying to order it either, right? But they get your papers out of order and everything.

[52:48] Things accumulate. The passage of time. Yeah. Shakespeare talks about that a lot in the sonnets, right? Time is more the cause of corruption than perfection. So I just sit here for a while and get a bit dimmer. Why is it? I'm not doing any thinking.

[53:22] Sometimes I'm laying there, either laying in bed, I can't sleep at night, you know. And if it's worse, try to recall something, you know. Call those, eight arguments that Thomas had in that chapter or something, you know. Yeah. Out

[53:38] there is doing all the arguments about God being good. There, you know, but I'm going to see if I can get them all now in order. Yeah We can. Take a little break here now.