Infinite Dignity

'Infinite dignity' is a phrase that, shall we say, can be used unhelpfully and in a slipshod manner. On the other hand, St. Thomas does make very beautiful, clear, illuminating, and edifying use of this term, in describing a 'sort of' (quandam) infinite dignity which the three greatest possible things that can 'come to be' (fieri) have, namely the Sacred Humanity of Christ, created beatitude, and the Blessed Virgin Mary, precisely because of their relation to the infinite good, God.

humanitas Christi ex hoc quod est unita Deo, et beatitudo creata ex hoc quod est fruitio Dei, et beata virgo ex hoc quod est mater Dei, habent quandam dignitatem infinitam, ex bono infinito quod est Deus. Et ex hac parte non potest aliquid fieri melius eis, sicut non potest aliquid melius esse Deo.

My translation:

'The Humanity of Christ, from the fact that it is united to God, as well as created beatitude, from the fact that it is the enjoyment of God, and also the Blessed Virgin, from the fact that she is the Mother of God, have a certain kind of infinite dignity, on account of the infinite good which is God. And for this reason, there cannot come to be anything better than these, just as there cannot be anything better than God.'

(St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiæ, Prima Pars Q.25 a.6 ad.4)

The Extraterrestial Error

Are aliens heresy? Ita videtur!

Th error of Zanini de Solcia, condemned in Cum sicut by Pius II:

"That God created another world than this one, and that in its time many other men and women existed and that consequently Adam was not the first man.”

Furthermore, one of the errors Giordano Bruno was condemned for was holding that there is a plurality of worlds.

Humani Generis condemned Polygenism.

But maybe they aren’t men? Well no. If they’re rational animals, they are humans. 

Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange:

“Some men seem to be of the opinion that on other heavenly bodies perhaps there are rational animals of another species than man. But this seems to be false, for the term “rational animal” seems to be not a genus but the ultimate species, according to the principle of continuity; for the highest in the lowest order, for instance, the sensitive life, touches the lowest in the highest order, namely, the intellective life. Hence there is no conjunction of the highest in the sensitive life with the lowest in the intellective life, except in one species, and this is not susceptible to either increase or decrease.”

The Relationship between Eudæmonia and Contemplation in Aristotle's Ethics.

Contemplation (θεωρία) plays a central role in Aristotle’s account of εὐδαιμονία. In fact, he says that θεωρία is the highest εὐδαιμονία. What does he mean by this? What does this mean for the moral virtues? Such questions have caused controversy, interpretational difficulties, and many attempts to tackle them. My account of how Aristotle sees the relationship between θεωρία and εὐδαιμονία relies upon my understanding of the principles from whence Aristotle derives his understanding of this relationship. When one understands these principles, which concern Aristotle’s views on man, the divine, natural teleology, the noble, νοῦς, and εὐδαιμονία, I believe that a lot becomes clear.

What is εὐδαιμονία? Perhaps we can begin with its etymology. It literally means a state of being ‘well-daimoned.’ Is the idea here that a daimon, some form of divinity is well disposed towards you? This seems so. Aristotle, in Book VIII of the Eudemian Ethics, distinguished two kinds of εὐτυχία: a divine kind, which is when this fortunate man gets things right διὰ θεὸν, and another kind which is more like ‘chance’, where the fortunate man happens to get hold of good fortune despite his impulses, and only accidentally (hence it is not continuous). We might also say, though, that εὐδαιμονία involves the εὐδαίμων person being well disposed towards the divine. Indeed, the εὐδαιμονία of someone is found in the ἐνέργεια of the εὐδαίμων person’s soul, while the fact that the divine is well-disposed to the εὐδαίμων person seems to be more of a cause of this. At any rate, εὐδαιμονία is something thoroughly divine in where it comes from and where it goes to. Interestingly, Aristotle talks about how the person who is “active in accord with the intellect (νοῦς), who cares for this, and is in the best condition regarding it” is most dear to the gods (θεοφιλέστατος), on the grounds that he is most like the gods and it is reasonable for the gods to delight in what is best and most akin to them (NE 10.8, 1179a22-27).

There is a recurring emphasis throughout the Aristotelian corpus on the central idea that all creatures seek to imitate the divine – even become the divine – so far as it lies in their power. The various limitations of various things mean that there are different levels and kinds of imitation. Human beings have νοῦς, and this makes them very special indeed. This is the highest faculty and the most divine in human beings. Just like everything else, the perfection of human beings lies in them imitating the divine so far as is possible for them, and since the νοῦς is the highest and most divine, this must at least entail perfecting the νοῦς as far as possible. The so called ‘function argument’ in Nichomachean Ethics 1.7 is often misinterpreted as boiling down to what is unique to man, when in fact the argument has to do with showing that there is a good functioning of man qua man given man’s essence, such that we can judge whether or to what extent a human being is fulfilling the perfection (proximity to the divine) which man is capable of. This is made clear in 10.7, where Aristotle explicitly rejects the idea that man’s good functioning has to do with what is merely unique to man. Indeed, φρόνησις and the moral virtues are unique to man, but θεωρία, which is shared with the gods, is better. Man should not simply strive for what he happens to have that other things don’t have. Rather, as with everything in the universe, man should strive to imitate the divine so far as he is capable. His capabilities follow his essence and the highest and the most divine thing that his essence allows is θεωρία. So, Aristotle says: “one ought not – as some recommend – to think only about human things because one is a human being, nor only about mortal things because one is mortal, but rather to make oneself immortal, insofar as that is possible, and to do all that bears on living in accord with what is the most excellent of the things in oneself” (NE 10.7, 1177b31-34).

When Aristotle calls νοῦς the most divine of the things in us at Nicomachean Ethics 10.7, he also says that it concerns the most noble and divine objects: ἔννοιαν ἔχειν περὶ καλῶν καὶ θείων (1177a15). This accords with the end of Eudemian Ethics VIII, where Aristotle talks explicitly about contemplation of God as the highest activity (τὴν τοῦ θείου θεωρίαν). Furthermore, in Nichomachean Ethics 6.7, Aristotle describes the intellectual virtue of wisdom (σοφία) as intellection (νοῦς in the sense of a grasp of principles) and science (ἐπιστήμη) of the most honourable things (τῶν τιμιωτάτων). It is obvious that the virtue which θεωρία corresponds to is σοφία. Aristotle emphasises that σοφία is higher than φρόνησις. The virtue of φρόνησις just concerns human matters but human beings are not the best things in existence (NE 6.7, 1141a20-22), for “there are other things whose nature is much more divine than that of a human being” (ibid 1141a34-1141b1). 

One way of describing εὐδαιμονία is acting well and living well. What it means for human beings to act and live well will depend on the acts of those faculties whereby man can imitate the divine. But also, what it means for human beings to act and live well will depend on the circumstances. Because we are composed of body and soul, certain circumstances mean that acting and living well include what are called the moral virtues, the ἀρεταὶ ἠθικαὶ. These moral virtues dispose the good human being to act well in the relevant moments. This acting well is defined by achieving a certain μέσον – a right amount or a right determination. This μέσον is prescribed by right reason (ὀρθός λόγος) and right reason seeks τὸ καλόν – the noble, the beautiful, the honestum. Aristotle says that “the σπουδαῖος person, insofar as he is σπουδαῖος, delights in actions that accord with virtue and is disgusted by those that stem from vice, just as the musical person is pleased by beautiful melodies and pained by bad ones” (9.10, 1170a8-11). It is Aristotle’s conviction that, because of their intrinsic nobility, these actions are chosen for their own sake within those circumstances, but that those circumstances are not so final and choice worthy for their own sakes (cf. NE 10.7, 1177b4-20). What those circumstances are ordered towards is a state that is most final and in which man can maximise that which is best in him without any further concern. This most final activity of man is θεωρία (contemplation), the most perfect activity of that which is most perfect in man, the νοῦς. In a time of war, when the opportunity arises of action in accordance with the moral virtue of ἀνδρεία, a human being can act in accordance with the vice of cowardice and flee the danger, or choose what is noble in the moment, on the grounds that it is noble, and thus act courageously. However, the circumstances that gave rise to this act of courage are not final and ultimate. The war was not raised for its own sake. Rather, as Aristotle says, war is ordered towards peace, as also politics is to σχολή (leisure). But, in times of σχολή, an even better activity is apt, that is θεωρία. 

When Aristotle contrasts the practical and contemplative lives in Nicomachean Ethics 10.8, what should be understood by this are the lives dominated by the practical or by contemplation. The first is a life where φρόνησις and the moral virtues are dominant, whereas the second is where σοφία and, its activity, θεωρία are dominant. Aristotle calls the contemplative life εὐδαιμονέστατος (NE 10.7, 1178a8), while he calls the morally good practical life εὐδαίμων in a secondary sense (δευτέρως; 10.8, 1178a9). This practical life, where the moral virtues are maximised and most conspicuous, is εὐδαίμων in the sense that the person acts well and as he ought in the circumstances in which he is involved. It happens that the circumstances which his life is centred around are ones that focus on the practical side of life, rather than the contemplative side of life. That the life that focuses on θεωρία is more εὐδαίμων and, in fact, εὐδαιμονέστατος is apparent from what has been discussed above, as well as the several arguments Aristotle gives for the superiority of θεωρία in 10.7. Aristotle is not suggesting that the man who lives this contemplative life will never practice moral virtue. The point is that, as opposed to the man who lives the discussed practical life, he has much less opportunity for exhibiting the moral virtues (cf. 10.8, 1178a23-34). However, he still has a body and requires external things. To the extent that he engages in the practical realm in order to meet the needs entailed by these, he must act according to moral virtue. Hence, Aristotle says: “But insofar as he is a human being and lives together with a number of others, he chooses to do what accords with virtue [viz. moral virtue]” (10.8, 1178b5-7).

Why must he act in accordance with moral virtues in those circumstances? He must act so in order to be a good man.Even if θεωρία is the best activity and a better activity than those of the moral virtues, it remains true that the moral vices would render one to be a bad, shameful, ignoble, blameworthy, and not good man. Therefore, in order to be act well and live well in those circumstances where one can be virtuous or vicious, and hence to act in accordance with εὐδαιμονία, one must act in accordance with the relevant moral virtues.

 

Is there something in the nature of θεωρία that entails that one would act in accordance with the moral virtues where they are relevant? Whether or not is not so important because it is true about φρόνησις and Aristotle says that φρόνησις is required for σοφία (cf. NE 6.12). In 6.13, Aristotle ties together φρόνησις and moral virtues, saying that the one cannot exist without the other. We could ask the question why fundamentally the φρόνιμος person would choose the moral virtues and choose to obtain and exercise σοφία. The reason is that φρόνησις is the perfection of practical reason and practical reason chooses actions in accordance with what is noble. The actions pertaining to the moral virtues are chosen because they are noble, and σοφία and θεωρία are noble and concern the most noble things.  

As opposed to the emphasis in the Nichomachean Ethics on the centrality of σοφία and θεωρία, in the Eudemian Ethics Book VIII, the highest virtue is said to be καλοκἀγαθία. This virtue might be taken to be just an aggregate of all other virtues. However, I think that this would make little sense. How could a single virtue be many virtues? On the other hand, we could see clearly enough how a single virtue could be the root and cause of the other virtues. Therefore, I think that καλοκἀγαθία is best understood as being a fundamental disposition of the rational appetite in loving and choosing what is noble. Therefore, καλοκἀγαθία would be a disposition towards the noble qua noble. As Aristotle says, “one is καλός κ'ἀγαθός because goods that are noble are his on their own account and because he is the sort who does noble actions also for their own sake. And the goods that are noble are virtues and virtuous actions.” (Eudemian Ethics 8.3.6). In fact, καλοκἀγαθία plays the role of caritas in St Thomas Aquinas as the forma, motor, and radix of all other virtues. This virtue would also dispose one most of all to the highest activity, θεωρία, and, since θεωρία concerns the noblest and highest things, these are the ones most especially the objects of love. The central role of καλοκἀγαθία, which I believe is implicitly a natural form of love of God[1], makes for a more integrated structure to the organism of the virtues, because it serves as a common root of θεωρία and the moral virtues. Nevertheless, it still allows room for a high importance to be placed in θεωρία. Indeed, it would seem that the love of the noble would render one to favour contemplating the noblest. Indeed, that θεωρία would be the preferred activity of one who was καλός κ'ἀγαθός is evident from the end of the Eudemian Ethics: “So, whatever choice and acquisition of natural goods (either goods of the body or money or friends or other goods) will most effectively produce contemplation of God, that is the best and this is the finest limit; and whatever choice and acquisition of natural goods impedes, either by deficiency or by excess, our cultivation and contemplation of God is base” (ibid 8.3.16).

Since εὐδαιμονία is living well and acting well and the activity of θεωρία is that in which man lives and acts the best, θεωρία will be the highest εὐδαιμονία. Since εὐδαιμονία is goodness considered as a final end and as perfect, and θεωρία is the most final and perfect activity, θεωρία will be that in which εὐδαιμονία is most properly found. Since εὐδαιμονία is activity (ἐνέργεια) in accordance with virtue, and since, according to Aristotle, θεωρία is the activity of the highest virtue (σοφία), εὐδαιμονία is especially found in θεωρία. Since θεωρία is the most perfect activity of that which is most divine in man (the νοῦς), θεωρία would be that by which man most of all imitates the divine. However, even when considering the emphasis on the centrality of σοφία and θεωρία in the Nicomachean Ethics, we can see that this no way completely throws aside the moral virtues, since they are necessarily connected by φρόνησις. And φρόνησις seeks always what is noble, which is really what is divine or most participative in and reflective of the divine. As Plutarch says, μέτρον γὰρ τοῦ βίου τὸ καλόν (Consolatio ad Apollonium 111.D.4)

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[1] Perhaps suggested in Eudemian Ethics 8.3.15: “God is not a commander in the sense of giving orders but as that for the sake of which prudence gives orders.” οὐ γὰρ ἐπιτακτικῶς ἄρχων ὁ θεός, ἀλλ ̓ οὗ ἕνεκα ἡ φρόνησις ἐπιτάττει. Cf. also Metaphysics Λ7.

 

Is Aristotle really just an egoist? Friendship, love, unity, and the noble good in the 'Nicomachean Ethics.'

“One gains a profoundly personal, selfish joy from the mere existence of the person one loves. It is one’s own personal, selfish happiness that one seeks, earns and derives from love,” so says Ayn Rand in The Virtue of Selfishness. 

She also once remarked that there are three A’s who alone are worthy of her recommendation in the history of philosophy: Aristotle, Aquinas, and Ayn Rand. In fact, I believe that it is an insult to Aristotle and Aquinas to lump them together with her own depressing philosophy. That it is depressing should be manifest to most people. One may sometimes hear people claiming that we only really care about other people and other things for the selfish sake of ourselves. However, apart from followers of Ayn Rand (and even more troubling groups), they will say this without any enthusiasm, but rather as a sad brute fact that just objectively describes the raw, basic, and ignoble reality. Does Aristotle admit this supposed reality? Does he delight and glorify in it? 

In fact, Aristotle is acutely aware of the nobility of loving others (those who are worthy of one’s love) for their own sake. It is noble and that is why it is depressing to admit its non-existence. Of course, the fact that it is noble means, therefore, that it is a noble good for the one loving. Hence, it is in no way against a good self of love, and, in fact, is in complete harmony with such a love of self. Such a harmony does not make this love of others superficial and ordered purely to self, as in the doctrine of Ayn Rand. Aristotle’s account of friendship is not egoism in disguise. Furthermore, his idea of friends as other selves does not make his account egoist, but in fact is a part of how he shows that egoism is not entailed by ‘eudaimonism.’ Also, while Aristotle thinks that love of self is primary and is the model of love of others, I believe that this is both reasonably argued and is consistent with a genuine love of others in themselves. His account of a virtuous love of self does present interesting questions, which I believe a proper understanding of the noble good can help us answer. Together, Aristotle’s ideas of union and of the noble help us to understand loving others for their own sake. 

Because there are three kinds of things that are loveable, Aristotle sees that there are three fundamental ways we can have love in relation to other people. In Nicomachean Ethics 8.2, he describes how ‘the loveable’ (τὸ φιλητόν) can be ‘good’ (ἀγαθὸν), ‘pleasant’ (ἡδὺ), or ‘useful’ (χρήσιμον). However, Aristotle would not deny that people desire the pleasant as good (indeed, for its own sake) and desire the useful as good. A good is desired as useful when it is desired for the sake of another good. Aristotle discusses such derivative and secondary goods in Book 1. Clearly, something is good in a higher sense insofar as it is sought after as an end (and is a good in the highest sense if it is sought after only as an end). As he says many times, including in 8.2, the pleasant is loved as an end. But he also says here that ‘the good’ is loved as an end. 

What he means by ‘good’ here, as contrasted with the pleasant and the useful, is ‘good’ in a special sense, and it is, in fact, what I shall refer to as the noble good.[1] I call it this because it seems to be identifiable with a fundamental concept in Aristotle’s philosophy: τὸ καλόν. This term can be translated as ‘the beautiful’ and ‘the noble.’ Throughout the Nicomachean Ethics,[2] this appears as something emphatically final. It is also described as what the rational part of man aims at for its own sake. It is what ὀρθός λόγος recognises as fundamentally good. It is grasped by the νοῦς. For example, the courageous man will endure very frightening things “in the way that he ought and as reason commands, for the sake of the noble (τὸ καλόν), for this is the end of virtue” (3.7, 1115b12-13). Our idea of ‘beautiful’ can help us understand this term. When we find something beautiful, we love it for its own intrinsic beauty, and therefore delight in it. I have translated it as ‘the noble’ because it is especially used by Aristotle to refer to intelligible beauty. 

Before we return to the noble in the context of love and self-love, let us consider what I will call imperfect friendships. There are relationships that are called by the name of friendships which are established for the sake of utility or pleasure. These are not friendships in the strict sense (κυρίως) but only by a certain similitude (ὁμοιότητα), as opposed to those friendships of good human beings insofar as they are good (8.4, 1157a29-32). He is also very clear that “those who love each other on account of utility do not love each other in themselves, but only insofar as they come have something good from the other; and it is similar with those who love on account of pleasure, for people are fond of those who are witty, not because they are of a certain sort, but because they are pleasant to them” (8.3, 1156a10-14). Wittiness is a virtue and is intrinsic to the person who has it; but the cause of the quasi-friendship is not delighting in that intrinsic virtue, insofar as it is a perfection within that person, but rather the cause is the pleasure received by the person simply insofar as it pleases him. What the quasi-friend ultimately loves then, insofar as this imperfect friendship is concerned, is the pleasure that his quasi-friend causes rather than something intrinsically good about the person himself. Hence, “these are friendships accidentally (κατὰ συμβεβηκός); for it is not for being what he is that the person loved is loved, but only insofar as he provides, in the one case, something good, or, in the other, pleasure” (ibid 1156a16-19). As has been said, the useful, insofar as it useful, is simply that which is desired for the sake of a higher good. The motive of the friendship of utility is some exterior good (or goods) to which that association is ordered, whereas the motive of the perfect friendship (τελεία φιλία, 8.3, 1156b6; that of the good insofar as they are good), is the good residing in the friend himself. The virtue and goodness of this friend are noble and beautiful, and so intrinsically loveable. 

The starting point of friendship is said to be εὔνοια (‘goodwill’; 9.5, 1167a3-4). Is there a form of εὔνοια that corresponds to the imperfect friendships? In fact, Aristotle refuses to recognise εὔνοια corresponding to imperfect friendships (ibid, 1167a12-14). This is because εὔνοια results from perceiving some good in someone (cf. ibid, 1167a18-20) and, on this basis, desires good things for that person because he is good, whereas friendships of pleasure and utility are for the sake of exterior goods. He says that even “he who wishes that another fare well”, and so does desire good things for that person, but only “because he hopes to be well taken care of by this person” does not properly “have εὔνοια towards him but rather toward himself” (ibid, 1167a15-17). When he says that εὔνοια seems to be the starting point of friendship, then, this it to be taken as the starting point of perfect friendships. Is there absolutely no εὔνοια possible in friendships of pleasure and utility? This would not seem to follow because, since εὔνοια is only a principle of perfect friendship and does not necessarily entail it, it is possible for some sort of εὔνοια based upon some sort of good perceived in someone to coincide with friendships of utility and pleasure (without those friendships necessarily turning into perfect friendships). But this εὔνοια would not serve as the cause or principle of those friendships of utility or pleasure – rather the exterior goods sought after are the causes or principles. 

To counter the claim that Aristotle’s account of perfect friendship is egoistic, we could point out the several times Aristotle repeats the claim that, in such friendships, a friend x will love a friend y in himself because y is good in himself and will wish good things to y for y’s sake (eg. 8.3, 1156b8-10). Someone wishes his friends good things for his friends’ sake (ἐκείνων ἕνεκα) because they are good in themselves (καθ' αὑτούς), since, as was said, the good is loveable. 

Again, this is the noble good. There is something intrinsically beautiful, and therefore loveable, in the soul of the friend. And it is not hard to understand that such love of complacency (loving the good in itself) inspires love of benevolence (desiring good to the loved). 

Everyone seeks the good and εὐδαιμονία in the broad sense. When the broad sense of εὐδαιμονία in Nicomachean Ethics 1.4 is defined simply as ‘doing well and living well’, this is rather all encompassing. The term ‘well’ (εὖ) is as broad and general as ‘good.’ Any act we choose to do must be considered as a good act for us to do. People disagree about what ‘doing well and living well’ actually entail. But, nevertheless, from this, it follows that everyone must love themselves in some sense. It is manifest that those who place their last end in sensible pleasures or external good love themselves in some form. They desire sensible pleasures or external goods for themselves. However, those who recognise that the last end is to be found in the goods of the soul will both love themselves and will be capable of loving others for their own sakes. Why is that? Because loving others for their own sakes could be a noble activity of the soul, and therefore fall under ‘acting well and living well,’ which is the most universal ratio under which man must act. Nevertheless, even if one loves and delights in the intrinsic good of the other person, in and of itself, this would still be good for the one loving (assuming that this loving of the other is noble and fitting) and noble for them (because they are doing it). If someone chooses to live and act well and does so in the right way, then this makes them noble and perfects them. Therefore, desiring to love your friends for their own sakes entails loving something noble for yourself. But, considered so far, the fact that the loving is noble for the one loving appears as a necessary consequence, rather than necessarily what is directly intended and focused upon by the person loving.[3] But can the person reflexively turn in on the nobility of the loving of a friend and the doing of good to a friend, and delight in those things? Yes. He can delight, first of all, in their intrinsic nobility, and, then also, in that nobility as applied to themselves. They can delight in the nobility as applied to themselves because they love the noble thing in and of itself and they love themselves; therefore, they can delight to see the noble thing in themselves. 

Why do they love themselves? Given that we are talking about the virtuous person here, a key answer is that the virtuous person loves himself because he is virtuous. Corrupt people are depressed with themselves because “since they possess nothing lovable, they feel in no way friendly towards themselves” (9.4, 11166b17-18). However, the virtuous person has something truly loveable in himself and something loveable in a final, not merely a useful, way: the noble. The virtuous person will love virtuous people, virtue and virtuous actions universally, and virtue and virtuous actions in virtuous people – these are all noble and intrinsically loveable. Aristotle says that “the σπουδαῖος person, insofar as he is σπουδαῖος, delights in actions that accord with virtue and is disgusted by those that stem from vice, just as the musical person is pleased by beautiful melodies and pained by bad ones” (9.10, 1170a8-11). This clearly provides ample explanatory power for why the virtuous person loves himself, his virtues, and his actions in themselves, and loves his virtuous friends, their virtues and their actions in themselves. These are all intrinsically loveable and noble. 

But why does Aristotle think that the good man loves himself most of all and desires what is noble for himself most of all? This is because intensity of love depends on the level of unity. Each man is most united to himself. He is one substance with himself and the same person as himself. Furthermore, the good man has ὁμόνοια with himself most of all: “this decent person is of like mind with himself and longs for the same things with his whole soul” (9.4, 1166a13- 14). He also shares in sufferings and joys with himself most of all (ibid, 1166a27-29). 

Along with the concept of the noble good, the concept of union is the other key part of Aristotle’s account of friendship that I wish to highlight. Aristotle says of perfect friends that “in loving their friend, they love what is good for themselves, since the good friend becomes a good for the person to whom he is the friend” (8.5, 1157a33-4). He also calls a friend “another self” (ἄλλος αὐτός; eg. 9.4, 1166a31-32). Does this undermine what I have said about loving friends for their own sakes? I do not think so. Quite the opposite. This helps us understand why friends love and wish good things for their friends’ sake so intensely. Furthermore, when Aristotle describes the friend as becoming a good of his friend, he does not mean a useful good but a noble good. The friend is not a merely instrumental utility desired for some ulterior motive. Rather, the whole being of the friend is encompassed and loved as an extension of oneself. Is it just oneself one is loving? Not entirely because the friend does remain a distinct person! But the person of the friend is so united to his friend that what is good for each friend is a good for the other. 

The importance of union for the love of friendship and how the level of unity determines the level of intensity is seen also in Aristotle’s description of the loves of parents for their children, children for their parents, siblings for each other, and relatives for each other. For example, he says that “parents feel affection for their children on the grounds that they are something of their own, whereas children feel affection for their parents on the grounds that they themselves are something that comes from them... (8.12, 1161b18-19). Aristotle uses language of union to demonstrate the level of love: “the begetter feels more united (συνωκείωται) in kinship to its offspring than does the offspring to its maker... (ibid 21). Furthermore, like in the description of friends as other selves, Aristotle says that “parents love children as they love themselves, for those who come from them are like other selves (ἕτεροι αὐτοὶ) separately existing” (ibid 27- 29). In a lower but still strong degree, there is unity and a corresponding level of intensity of love between siblings: “brothers [or perhaps to be translated generally as ‘siblings’] love each other because they were born from the same parents” (ibid 30-31). What’s more, we have the same motif used to explain the love of the benefactor for those he has benefited. Benefactors love those they benefit in a way analogous to how poets love their poems “and feel affection for them just as if they were their children” because “in his activity, the maker of something somehow is the work; he therefore feels affection for the work because he feels affection for his own existence” (9.7, 1167b31-1168a9). 

To conclude, I have used two important concepts to help us understand Aristotle on friendship and love: the doctrine of the noble good and the doctrine of union. These shed light on Aristotle’s views on friendship and love, which the likes of Ayn Rand and Martin Luther failed to apprehend. Therefore, the former fell into an extreme egoism and the latter was convinced that all love of self is evil (though unavoidable). “It is an error to maintain that Aristotle’s statement concerning happiness does not contradict Catholic doctrine,” wrote Martin Luther in his, often overlooked, theses against Scholasticism. Indeed, “virtually the entire Ethics of Aristotle is the worst enemy of grace” according to him. Both these views I see as exceptionally pessimistic and depressing. And furthermore, for me, the three A’s will always be Aristotle, Augustine, and Aquinas. Now, ignoring the manifest axes to grind in the introduction and conclusion, I hope that my actual focus on Aristotle has shown that his account of friendship is not egoism in disguise. Of course, he does believe that the good person will love himself (specifically the higher part of himself, his νοῦς) most of all, but that does not entail that he only ultimately loves himself for his own sake. He is more unified to himself than anyone else and Aristotle emphasises that the level of unity determines the level of intensity of one’s love. However, those who are unified to him in different degrees will be loved in and of themselves, and good will be desired for them for their own sakes, with an intensity corresponding to that degree of unity. 

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[1] Thanks to the thought and development of Cicero, Pseudo-Dionysius, St Ambrose, St Augustine, St Isidore and St Thomas Aquinas, we find this evolve into what became in the Scholastic tradition the bonum honestum.

[2] It is also found throughout the Aristotelian corpus eg. De Partibus Animalium 1.5; De Generatione Animalium 2.1. 

[3] The good act will still be willed insofar as it is a good thing for the person to do, as any act must. But this ratio is all encompassing and does not necessitate a focus on self, other than implying, of course, the agency of the person doing the act (anything we wish to do must be something we wish ourselves to do). 

 

St. Thomas on why Beatitude is found in God alone

It should be prefaced that the following is in no way to be interpreted contrary to the magisterial statement of Pope Pius XII in Humani Generis, in which he insists upon the possibility of God creating intellectual natures (humans and angels) without ordering them to the beatific vision. This insistence is important for ensuring our recognition of the gratuity of the supernatural order, a fact so emphasised by, amongst others, P. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange O.P., as against the dangerous ideas that were popular in the 'new theology.' To be sure, as Garrigou himself recognises, an intellectual creature such as man even naturally has a desire to see God face to face in the beatific vision (and this natural desire shall be the topic of our discussion below), but, without grace, this desire remains conditional and inefficacious (furthermore, it is also, as is abundantly clear from the various texts of St. Thomas, an elicited rather than an innate desire). Nevertheless, the following deals with the notion of 'perfect beatitude.' Perfect beatitude is such a perfect good that so totally satisfies the appetite, that there is nothing else to be sought after. It turns out that such a beatitude is proper to the Divinity, and cannot be attained by an intellectual creature's natural powers. An intellectual creatures's level of natural beatitude or, more properly, felicitas is always capable of increase without reaching the immediate vision of the Divine Essence. At any rate, the will's natural ordering towards universal good means that, implicitly, it calls out for, as it were, at least a natural knowledge and love of God (it might not possibly will these things, but I mean that God, at least naturally obtained, is objectively wherein the will's desire for good is found). The very nature of the will means that it cannot be satisfied with any good other than God. But, as we shall see, the nature of the intellect means that it only reaches its greatest perfection when its object is God directly. And, when the cause of nature is known by the light of natural reason, a natural desire, albeit conditional and inefficacious, is elicited to see the essence of that cause in itself. Hence, the will can only be perfectly or totally satisfied - that is, so satisfied that nothing further is left to be desired or sought after - by God as obtained by a direct intellectual vision of his essence. With supernatural grace, which is at the same time very fitting for God to give but also free and gratuitous for him to choose to give, there is infused supernatural hope, a far loftier desire than the merely conditional and inefficacious natural desire for utterly perfect beatitude. 

According to St Thomas, beatitudo can defined as "the perfect good of an intellectual nature" (ST Ia Q.26 a.1: Nihil enim aliud sub nomine beatitudinis intelligitur, nisi bonum perfectum intellectualis naturae). Only in God, who possesses total perfection essentially, can there be an entire identification of esse and bonitas. Creatures are good secundum quid by merely existing, since their esse by itself is a certain good thing, but to be good simpliciter, they must acquire some further perfection or act (Ia Q.5 a.1). In physical things, the form perfects the matter as its first act, but the form itself is ordered towards operation as a further perfection. This is also true for angels, in whom there are distinctions between their essence, the actus essendi which actualises that essence, the powers that flows from that essence, and the operation which the angel is ordered towards as the perfection of its nature (Dionysius, Caelest. Hier., cap. XI: caelestes spiritus dividuntur in essentiam, virtutem, et operationem). Like God and angels, humans are intellectual, and like angels and material things, humans are creatures. Therefore, for humans, beatitude is a perfection to be acquired and an end to be obtained.

 

St Thomas calls beatitude a perfect good which totally satisfies the appetite (Ia IIae Q.2 a.8: Beatitudo enim est bonum perfectum, quod totaliter quietat appetitum). Since beatitude is the perfection of an intellectual nature, we are here dealing with the rational appetite, the will. It is precisely because of the nature of the intellect and will that a being with intellect and will cannot be perfectly satisfied by anything other than God. The intellect presents to the will its fundamental and natural object, which is universal goodness (ibid: Obiectum autem voluntatis...est universale bonum). The will is a power of soul which is defined as being an appetitus for such an object. Because beatitude is a perfect good which totally satisfies the rational appetite, a good would not be beatitude si adhuc restaret aliquid appetendum (ibid). And because the object of the rational appetite is universal goodness, it will not be totally satisfied with a good that falls short of universal goodness (Nihil potest quietare voluntatem hominis nisi bonum universale). Therefore, any good that falls short of universal goodness will not be beatitude. St Thomas then says that the will's desire for bonum universale cannot be satisfied in anything created but only in God, since all creatures have only participated goodness (Quod non invenitur in aliquo creato sed solum in Deo: quia omnis creatura habet bonitatem participatam). As was said above, only God is identical with his own goodness and possesses his entire goodness and perfection essentially. Everything created neither possesses its partial goodness of mere esse simpliciter essentially, nor its complete goodness. Its substantial act of esse is received from an extrinsic cause and its complete good is achieved by further perfection, namely the acquiring of any accidents necessary for its perfect operation, and ultimately by that perfect operation (Ia Q.6 a.3). This means that everything created possesses goodness by participation and not per se. Therefore, no created thing can be that in which is found the unqualified and unlimited goodness that alone can correspond to the will's appetite for universal goodness. The will's appetite for universal goodness is an appetite for goodness itself, which everything created participates in but falls short of. However, God is complete and unlimited goodness itself. As the argument of the Fourth Way goes, the maximum in any genus will be the cause of that genus. So also, the maximum in being and goodness will be the cause of all being and goodness. The maximum of goodness will be that which has goodness per se, which is the ultimate cause of anything which has participated goodness per aliud. Therefore, God is that which can totally satisfy the rational appetite (Ia IIae Q.3 a.1: ultimus hominis finis est bonum increatum, scilicet Deus, qui solus sua infinita bonitate potest voluntatem hominis perfecte implere). The rational appetite is at rest at the attainment of this good, needing nothing else for its contentment: beatitudo perfecta...habet congregationem omnium bonorum per coniunctionem ad universalem fontem totius boni; non quod indigeat singulis particularibus bonis (Ia IIae Q.3 a.3 ad 2).

 

As well as focusing on the nature of the will, we shall now turn to the nature of the intellect, which tells us more about how the greatest good, God, is to be perfectly obtained. If the perfection of anything is the greatest level of goodness and actuality it can reach, given its nature, and if, as has been said, everything created is perfected and made good by an operation superadded to its substantial being, then man will be perfected by his best operation. Therefore, beatitude, the perfect good of man, will be the optima operatio hominis (Ia IIae Q.3 a.5). It follows intuitively that this will be the operation of the best power with respect to its best object (ibid: Optima autem operatio hominis est quae est optimae potentiae respectu optimi objecti). St Thomas holds that the best power in man is his intellect and that its best object is God (Optima autem potentia est intellectus cuius optimum obiectum est bonum divinum). 

 

In Ia IIae Q.3 a.7, he argues that the proper object of the intellect is truth (proprium autem obiectum est verum). Arguing from a similar point to the will's appetite for perfect and universal goodness, St Thomas says that anything which has truth by participation, when contemplated, is not able to make the intellect perfect with the greatest perfection (Quidquid ergo habet veritatem participatam, contemplatum non facit intellectum perfectum ultima perfectione). Connecting truth and being, St Thomas says that everything which has being by participation has truth by participation. Because all creatures have esse by participation, they all have truth by participation, whereas God is veritas per essentiam. Therefore, God is the object able to make the intellect perfect ultima perfectione. But only that which perfects the intellect with ultima perfectione can be perfecta hominis beatitudo. Anything less than this will be imperfecta, relative to the perfect beatitude of the intellect knowing the divine essence. 

 

Another argument deals with both the intellect and the will, and argues why the vision of the divine essence itself must be perfect beatitude. In Ia IIae Q.3 a.8, St Thomas argues from the natural desire to know causes to the desire to the know the first cause as he is in himself. The intellect has for its object quod quid est, or the essentia rei. Therefore, the perfection of the intellect is relative to how much it knows the essence of something (unde intantum procedit perfectio intellectus, inquantum cognoscit essentiam alicuius rei). According to St Thomas, we can know the existence of God by reasoning from created effects that there must be a first efficient, exemplar and final cause and primum ens, who is pure and infinite act, being, goodness, and perfection. By natural reason, the way of causality can get us to a first cause, the way of remotion can lead us to deny any composition in that first cause, and, by the way of eminence, we can reason that such a purely simple first cause must have all perfection eminently. However, this demonstrative reasoning does not get us to see the divine essence in itself. Since the proper object of the intellect is quod quid est or the essentia rei, and the perfection of the intellect is proportionate to how far is knows some essence, when the human intellect reasons to the existence of such an infinitely perfect first cause from its effects, there is a natural human desire to know the very essence of that cause in itself (Et ideo remanet naturaliter homini desiderium, cum cognoscit effectum, et scit eum habere causam, ut etiam sciat de causa quid est). This is a desire of admiratio, which prompts inquisitio. No inquisitio will be sated until it reaches the knowledge of the essence of the cause it is wondering at (Nec ista inquisitio quiescit quousque perveniat ad cognoscendum essentiam causae). However, since man is not perfecte beatus while there still remains something to be desired and sought (quandiu restat sibi aliquid desiderandum et quaerendum), man will not be perfecte beatus unless he sees the very essence of the first cause (Ad perfectam igitur beatitudinem requiritur quod intellectus pertingat ad ipsam essentiam primae causae).

 

According to St Thomas Aquinas, man is of such a nature that he has an appetite for an infinite good. This is because he has an intellect that can conceive of universal goodness, and a will whose object is that unrestricted notion of goodness which the intellect presents to it. No finite, restricted, limited good can match up to such an appetite, so as to fully satiate it. Therefore, only the attainment of an infinite good can fully satiate it. According to St Thomas, the intellect is the faculty which can essentially attain that infinite good. The will shall not be perfectly satiated by anything other than the intellect's direct apprehension of the very essence of that infinite good, since otherwise there remains a natural desire to know the cause as it is in itself. With this desire unsatisfied, there cannot be perfect beatitude, because this is a perfect good which totally satisfies the rational appetite, such that nothing further remains desiderandum et quaerendum.

 

St. Thomas on levels of cognition and separation from matter

For Aquinas, a sense receives the form of what it senses in a certain 'spiritual' way without matter. However, it receives the form 'with individuating material conditions,' and the object which is sensed by means of the received 'similitude' is a certain particular. The intellect can abstract from matter in different ways, all however requiring recourse to phantasms.

 For Aristotle and St Thomas, sense perception, let alone intellection, is irreducibly different from other kinds of change. Clearly, we are not dealing with quantitative and local change, but there is also a very significant difference from ordinary qualitative change. Although all kinds of sense perception require in some way the use of corporeal organs, they are not merely changes between the basic dispositions of matter as, for example, hot and cold, dry and moist, rare and dense. Something hot can heat something else up, but it does not thereby cause that thing to feel heat. Aquinas distinguishes between immutatio naturalis and immutatio spiritualis (ST Ia Q.78 a.3). The first is when a form is received into that which is changed secundum esse naturale, or in a 'physical' manner. Such a physical mode of receiving a form occurs when form determines matter, and the matter receives that form. The example Aquinas gives of this is heat in something heated. In receiving the form of heat, the object thereby becomes hot. As opposed to this, a form may be received secundum esse spirituale. There is a real sense in which we 'receive' a colour when we see it. Aquinas says that the form of the colour is, in a way, in the pupil, but not in a way that makes that pupil coloured. Clearly immutatio spiritualis is irreducible to immutatio naturalis and cannot be explained by it alone. According to Aquinas, in sight, there is only immutatio spiritualis, but in other senses there is also immutatio naturalis. Nevertheless, that immutatio naturalis does not suffice to explain the sensation. If it did suffice for sensation, then all natural bodies would sense when so altered (ibid: si sola immutatio naturalis sufficeret ad sentiendum, omnia corpora naturalia sentirent dum alterantur). If the physical presence of something explained the cognition of that thing, then there would be no reason why, for example, fire would lack knowledge, since having fire, it would have awareness of fire (Q.84. a.2: si oporteret rem cognitam materialiter in cognoscente existere, nulla ratio esset quare res quae materialiter extra animam subsistunt, cognitione carerent, puta, si anima igne cognoscit ignem, et ignis etiam qui est extra animam, ignem cognosceret).

 

A constant refrain of St Thomas is that whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver. When it comes to inert and inanimate physical things, they can only receive forms that determine their matter in some physical way. Sense operations are operations of body and soul combined. The mere receptivity of matter for form cannot explain sensation, but, at the same time, sensation does require the use of corporeal organs. Each of the powers of sense which an animal has receive, secundum esse spirituale, the form of that aspect of something which they are determined to so receive. The power of sight, according to Aristotle and St Thomas, receives the form of colour. They say that it receives the form without its matter. For example, the power of sight receives the colour of gold without the gold (Q.84 a.1: forma sensibilis alio modo est in re quae est extra animam, et alio modo in sensu, qui suscipit formas sensibilium absque materia, sicut colorem auri sine auro). Also, sight sees the colour of, for example, an apple, without the smell of that apple (Q.85 a.3: visus enim videt colorem pomi sine eius odore). 

 

St Thomas says that sense receives the form of the cognised thing sine materia but cum materialibus conditionibus or cum materialibus conditionibus individuantibus (Q.84 a.2). The colour as physically existing in the gold or the apple does not enter into the eye, but the colour seen is still seen 'with material conditions.' To understand this, we should note that the sense of sight is 'in act' when it receives the form of the thing sensed. This form is a certain similitudo of the sensible thing (Q.85 a.3: similitudo rei sensibilis est forma sensus in actu). Similitudo does not simply mean a mere symbol, which somehow represents the thing it signifies. Rather, it is the same forma which exists physically in the matter-form composite (the gold or the apple) and spiritually or intentionally in the sensus. The sensus has the ability to receive this form in a non-physical way. By 'same' forma, I mean that they are identical in species, not numerically. This is why this spiritually received form can be called a 'sensitive species' and can be called a similitudo of the forma physically existing in the matter-form composite. Second, although this impressed similitudo is that by which (id quo) the sensus senses its object, it is not that object itself (ibid: species sensibilis non est illud quod sentitur, sed magis id quo sensus sentit). The object of sensation is not the colour qua spiritually received as a similitudo by the sensus, but, rather, the colour, through that similitudo, is seen as being in the external object (the gold or the apple). This means that the similitudo or sensitive species does not just put the sense of sight in contact with 'yellow' or 'green' in general, but with that particular shade of 'yellow' or 'green' as it is seen in the particular external object. This seems to be at least part of what St Thomas means by the form being received cum materialibus conditionibus individuantibus(Q.84 a.2). This mode of receiving the form means that the object that is sensed will be a particular. Although the similitudo is received without the matter actually in the gold or the apple, the object of the sensitive power will be a form existing in a material body (Q.85 a.1: obiectum cuiuslibet sensitivae potentiae est forma prout in materia corporali existit. Et quia huiusmodi materia est individuationis principium, ideo omnis potentia sensitivae partis est cognoscitiva particularium tantum). Furthermore, although sight sees the colour of an apple without the smell, if it be asked where the colour is, which happens to be seen without the smell, that colour will be in no other place than in the apple. The sight receives the similitudo of the colour, through which it sees the colour in the apple, but it does not receive the similitudo of the smell in that apple, and so is not perceptive of the smell in that apple (Q.85 a.3: visus enim videt colorem pomi sine eius odore. Si ergo quaeratur ubi sit color qui videtur sine odore manifestum est quod color qui videtur, non est nisi in pomo; sed quod sit sine odore perceptus, hoc accidit ei ex parte visus, inquantum in visu est similitudo coloris et non odoris).

 

The intellect also receives according to its mode of receiving. The intellect is not a power of any bodily organ, and so is an immaterial power in a unique sense. Bodily things are particular, mobile, and contingent. How then can the intellect know anything about them? If it could not, then the whole of natural philosophy would be impossible. Aquinas thinks that the intellect somehow knows these things with an immaterial, universal, and necessary knowledge (Q.84 a.1: anima per intellectum cognoscit corpora cognitione immateriali, universali et necessaria). The reason why this is possible is because we can still identify something necessary, stable, universal, and formal about even contingent, mobile, particular, and material things. For example, all motion supposes something permanent. A substance persists in accidental change, and even in substantial change, matter persists (ibid: omnis motus supponit aliquid immobile, cum enim transmutatio fit secundum qualitatem, remanet substantia immobilis; et cum transmutatur forma substantialis, remanet materia immobilis). Another example is that, although Socrates does not have to sit, it is necessary that whenever he does sit, he must be in a certain place (Socrates etsi non semper sedeat, tamen immobiliter est verum quod, quandocumque sedet, in uno loco manet). Therefore, even about mobile things, 'immobile knowledge' is possible (et propter hoc nihil prohibet de rebus mobilibus immobilem scientiam habere). Furthermore, natural philosophy deals not just with matter but also with form, and not just with individual matter but with 'common matter.' Form gives determination and stability of identity to a particular substance. And any sort of physical thing must be composed of the relevant form and some matter, but not necessarily this or that individual matter. Therefore, a sort of thing (an essence) can be considered apart from individualising and contingent conditions. 

 

This brings us to the question of abstraction. In response to the second objection in ST Ia Q.85 a.1, St Thomas outlines three grades or levels of abstraction. The most basic kind is the abstraction of the 'species of a natural thing' from individual sensible matter. To merely sense something or imagine something through a phantasm, we are restricted to a particular. What the intellect can do is abstract from the phantasm the general species rei naturalis from an image of just a particular individual example of one of that species. Over and above 'this flesh' and 'this bones,' the agent intellect can abstract 'flesh' and 'bones' in general. The former is what is called materia signata vel individualis and the latter is called materia communis. This is achieved by a general idea of flesh and bones. However, this general idea cannot be considered without reverting back to the phantasms that provide examples of it. We cannot understand the essence of water without making use of a particular image of water, even though, through our intellect, we are able to consider that which is common to any water aside from the individuating conditions of this particular image. Therefore, the intellect abstracts intelligible species a phantasmatibus, which allows it to understand the natures of things universally, but it understands those natures in phantasmatibus (intellectus noster et abstrahit species intelligibiles a phantasmatibus, inquantum considerat naturas rerum in universali; et tamen intelligit eas in phantasmatibus, quia non potest intelligere etiam ea quorum species abstrahit, nisi convertendo se ad phantasmata). 

 

The second grade of abstraction is mathematical abstraction, where we consider quantity over and above any qualities such a quantified thing would exhibit in nature. Even here, though, we still require phantasms. Although, we understand triangularity regardless of whether a triangle is red, blue, or whatever colour, we need to utilise an image of triangle which does have a certain colour. 

 

Finally, the intellect can abstract from all matter, in considering those things which are able to exist apart from any matter (quae etiam esse possunt absque omni materia). However, the human intellect in its present condition can only think about these things by comparison and analogy with material things. Therefore, phantasms of those material things are required.

 

Different levels of immateriality correspond to different levels of cognition. Sensation is not wholly a material process, but it does require a corporeal organ and terminates in a particular existing in a material individual. The intellect can know about the universal nature of material things, quantity abstracted from any quality which it must co-exist with in a physical object, and immaterial things by comparison and analogy with material things. All of those three ways of knowing require the utilisation of phantasms.

St. Thomas and persistence after death

This article will deal with St Thomas Aquinas's understanding of the unique nature of the human soul, in comparison with the souls of other living things, and how its possession of an immaterial power entails its incorruptibility. I will also consider how the human soul's normal reliance on the body for its proper and immaterial operation does not undermine the persistence of this soul after death. Finally, I will touch on the question of whether Aquinas's views about the human soul are compatible with the survival of the person after death.

In physically extended beings (bodies), Aquinas holds that there is a principle of potency called matter and a principle of act called form. No concrete being can be purely potential because 'to be' is to be in some way actual. The way that a physical body exists is its form, which stands as a principle of determination to the otherwise undetermined material principle of the thing. This material principle of the thing is called prime matter, which is the most basic and fundamental principle of potency in a thing because it is a principle of potency to the very substantial form of the thing itself. Although prime matter, being a purely potential principle, cannot exist of itself, it is a real principle of physical things because, in generation and corruption, where one substantial form is replaced by another, the substratum of change which the corrupted thing and the generated thing share is this basic material principle. Aquinas says that it is not insofar as a living thing is a body that it is alive because, in that case, every body would be alive (ST Ia. Q.75 a.1: manifestum est enim quod esse principium vitae, vel vivens, non convenit corpori ex hoc quod est corpus, alioquin omne corpus esset vivens, aut principium vitae). For a physical body to exist in must be actual to some extent. It must, for example, be hot or cold, moist or dry, rare or dense, heavy or light. For Aquinas, these are the basic dispositions of matter (SCG II C.68: invenimus enim aliquas infimas formas quae in nullam operationem possunt nisi ad quam se extendunt qualitates quae sunt dispositiones materiae, ut calidum, frigidum, humidum et siccum, rarum, densum, grave et leve, et his similia). Such bodies are omnino materiales et totaliter immersae materiae (ibid), not in the sense that they are purely potential prime matter, but that they merely have one of each of the contrary dispositions which an existing material body must necessarily have. However, Aquinas says that although form and matter when united always form one being, nevertheless the matter does not always equal the being of the form (ibid: quamvis autem sit unum esse formae et materiae, non tamen oportet quod materia semper adaequet esse formae). Indeed, the more noble a form is, the more it surpasses matter in being (immo, quanto forma est nobilior, tanto in suo esse superexcedit materiam). For Aquinas, above the forms of elemental bodies are the forms of mixed bodies, above which are the forms of things like plants, above which are the souls of brute animals, above which are the forms of humans. The form of any living thing is called a soul, defined by Aquinas as the primum principium vitae (ST Ia. Q.75 a.1), for 'to live' is 'to be' for living things (SCG II C.57: vivere enim est esse viventis). 

 

Aquinas thinks that the souls of brute animals are not 'subsistent' (capable of existing by themselves) because, although the powers that such a soul has surpass the basic and necessary dispositions of matter, these powers are not powers of the soul alone, but of the soul and the body (ST Ia. Q.75 a.3). Every operation of the brute animal is, according to Aquinas, an operation which a corporeal organ plays an essential part in. The same is not the case for the operations of intellect and will in a human being. For, although Aquinas thinks that ordinarily the operation of the intellect presupposes phantasms from which to abstract, which in turn presuppose sense perception, he does not think that the human body or any of its corporeal organs plays an intrinsic or essential role in the very operation of the intellect in itself (ST Ia Q.75 a.2, ad 3: corpus requiritur ad actionem intellectus, non sicut organum quo talis actio exerceatur, sed ratione obiecti).

 

Although Aristotle makes an analogy between the relationship of intellect and phantasms and of the power of sight and colour, Aquinas does not interpret this to mean that it informs the 'possible intellect' but that an 'intelligible species' derived from the phantasm does, in the same way that the colour actually in a stone does not inform the power of sight but that a 'visible species' does. It is through these respective 'species', which become in some way the forma of the intellectus possibilis and of the potentia visiva, that the intellect is in contact with the phantasm and the power of sight is in contact with the colour in the stone (SCG II C.59). The intellect is immaterial, and it does not 'receive forms' in the same way that a material thing does. A material thing receives a form in such a way that it becomes that thing physically (or else it carries it in a virtual sort of way like air does with sound), but the intellect's reception of form is a form being received by a form. The potency of the intellect is not a material potency to become that thing physically but is a potency to understand (intellegere) something in an immaterial way. Intrinsically and of itself, the operation of the intellect is not an operation of any corporeal organ, but of the soul without any corporeal organ. 

 

As has been said, though, for humans, this bodiless operation ordinarily presupposes bodily operations. Aquinas explains that humans are the lowest of intellectual creatures (ST Ia Q.76 a.5: anima autem intellectiva...infimum gradum in substantiis intellectualibus tenet), and do not have knowledge immediately natural to them like Angels, but obtain knowledge ex rebus divisibilibus per viam sensus (ibid). Aquinas uses the axiom that nature of anything is not wanting in necessities (natura autem nulli deest in necessariis) to explain why the nature of man requires that his soul not only have the power of intelligence, but also of sensation, and therefore be united to a body with the necessary corporeal instruments (ibid). However, since the intellectual power of the soul is itself immaterial, the human soul is subsistent even apart from matter. Since it has an operation that is not material, it has an existence that is not material. Generation and corruption are only of material things, and so the human soul is incorruptible. Since all the powers and corresponding operations of a brute animal are powers and operations not of the soul alone but of body and soul, when the body is destroyed, all those powers are destroyed. Aquinas seems to think that if all the powers of a soul are destroyed, then that soul is destroyed. This seems to be because, even though he thinks that powers of a soul are not identical with the essence of that soul (ST Ia Q.77 a.1), the powers of that soul are proper accidents, like risibility is of man or having angles add up to 180⁰ is to triangles. However, since the very intellectual power of man is completely immaterial and a power of the soul alone, it would still continue to exist apart from the body, even if it never operated. This is because, even if the separated soul never actually carried out its intellectual operation, it would still have the latent power to carry out that operation. On the other hand, without their bodies, all the powers of brute animals are destroyed. However, as Aquinas points out, if an animal happens to actually lack the exterior sensibles necessary for actual sensation, the animal still continues to exist, so long as it has its body. With the body gone, the intellect does not lose its subsistence, just as an animal does not cease to be something subsistent when it lacks the exterior sensible things necessary for sensation (ST Ia Q.75 a.2, ad 3: sic autem indigere corpore non removet intellectum esse subsistentem, alioquin animal non esset aliquid subsistens, cum indigeat exterioribus sensibilibus ad sentiendum). 

 

Would the intellect continue to exist in a sort of sleeping state with no possibility of knowledge whatsoever, in this case? This would only follow if knowing things in the properly human way (via phantasms) was the only way that humans could know things. This need not be the case, if a human's separated intellect was externally assisted by a higher power, such as an Angel, or God himself. The separated human intellect would always have at least the potential to be so enlightened by a higher power. 

Many have found it strange that Aquinas seems to deny that the very person continues to exist after death but only a part of that person. However, this is, to a large extent, just a linguistic problem. Aquinas says that there are two ways to speak of a 'this something' (hoc aliquid). It can be taken as anything subsistent (pro quocumque subsistente) or as something subistent that is complete in its own nature (pro subsistente completo in natura alicuius speciei). The first way is applicable to the human soul, but the second way is not (ST Ia Q.75 a.2 ad 1). However, Aquinas defines a 'person' as the second sort of hoc aliquid (ibid a.4 ad 2: non quaelibet substantia particularis est hypostasis vel persona, sed quae habet completam naturam speciei). Because, in his explanation of the individuation of distinct human souls after death, Aquinas thinks that the soul continues to have a certain habitudo or commensuratio or intrinsic ordo to a numerically individual body (SCG II C.75; C.8; cf. In I Sent. D.8 Q.5, a.2 ad 6), the second way of defining hoc aliquid may be in some way applicable to humans after separation of soul and body. However, it is undeniable that the separated human soul is actually lacking something proper to its nature. If, therefore, on the other hand, we were to grant that this fact means that the human persona does not continue to exist after death, all this means is that the separated soul lacks the body which it is proper to its nature to inform. In fact, if this is the case, I think that the word persona would be being used in an unfitting way. The very reason why Aquinas thinks that the body is not something external to the human being's substance, which is merely used by a human soul, is that it is the man himself who feels or senses in the relevant bodily operations. If this is so, then it makes equal sense to say that, when a human intellect separated from the body thinks, it is the man himself who thinks. Otherwise, who do we attribute the act of thinking to? Therefore, I think that Thomistic principles about the soul make it right to say that the very human person survives after death. This does not mean the soul becomes entirely identical to the human person in ratio, even if it is the only thing left of him, because the soul, as stated, still has a habitudo or commensuratio to an individual body, and as Eleanore Stump points out, the soul being all that is left of the person does not entail that it is entirely identical to the person: "Because constitution is not identity for Aquinas, however, a particular can exist with less than the normal, natural complement of constituents. It can, for example, exist when it is constituted only by one of its main metaphysical parts, namely, the soul. And so although a person is not identical to his soul, the existence of the soul is sufficient for the existence of a person."[1] That the soul's continued existence is not sufficient for the existence of the person would only be the case if 'person' were defined in such a way as being only a human who actually has a body. But, as I have said, I do not think that that would be a good way of defining 'person.'

Therefore, Aquinas can consistently account for the existence of the human soul after death, as opposed to the souls of brute animals, and, furthermore, I think that Thomistic principles about the soul make it fitting to say that the human person survives the separation of soul and body.

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[1] Stump, Eleonore, ‘Resurrection and the Separated Soul’, in: The Oxford Handbook of Aquinas, 463