According to St. Thomas Aquinas, there are different ways by which the will (rational appetite) is 'moved' by 1) the intellect, 2) by itself, and 3) by God. This article discusses what exactly St. Thomas's thought is on the motion of the will. In particular, it will become clear how the ways in which the intellect and God are said to move the will in no way undermine the reality of free will.
Summary
The will is moved by the intellect insofar as the intellect presents to it its final cause. This is, first of all, what the will is necessarily and naturally ordained to: the universal good, or the bonum in communi. The intellect also presents any particular good, which the will freely accepts or rejects as an object of its appetition. The intellect does not necessitate the will's adherence to any particular good, because its causal function is just to present that particular good, and that particular good does not necessitate the will's adherence to it.
The intellect is not an efficient cause of the will's action. There are only two efficient causes of the will's acts. St. Thomas says that the will itself is the efficient cause of its own free acts, but that God, as the author of human nature, is the efficient cause and mover of the will's natural orientation towards its object, the bonum in communi.
Appetite
Aquinas understands the will (voluntas) as a faculty or a power of the rational soul which has as its object the universal or intelligible good. It is a kind of appetitus, a word which translates what Aristotle called ὄρεξις.
Inanimate things and plants have a kind of 'natural appetite' (appetitus naturalis) for their own good. This is an unconscious natural orientation to that which is proper to them given the kind of things they are. This includes conservation of their being as it is, directedness to their natural place, and anything else which follows necessarily from their substantial form. All these are the good (bonum) and what is conveniens for that thing.
Animals have sense cognition, whereby they know particulars by receiving the forms of sense objects in a 'spiritual' or 'intentional' manner. To this sort of cognition corresponds sensitive appetite, which has an orientation towards those things perceived which by natural instinct it recognises as good and conveniens, given its nature (and consequent upon this, an orientation to flee from what is perceived as bad). Brute animals desire these particular goods by natural instinct because they do not understand them with reference to universal good. Not having an intellect, they cannot grasp the intelligible reason for why they seek these particular goods, but are merely attracted to these particular goods by an instinctive recognition of their particular goodness.
Rational appetite and its fundamental object
The will is a rational appetite, consequent upon the intellect's mode of cognition. Because the intellect grasps universals, the will is not limited in its scope to being orientated towards a particular good, but has as its natural object the universal good or the bonum in communi (ST Ia IIae Q.10 a.1: Hoc autem est bonum in communi, in quod voluntas naturaliter tendit, sicut etiam quaelibet potentia in suum obiectum). This directedness towards bonum in communi is necessary given the nature of the will. It just is the sort of thing the will is for it to be an appetite for bonum in communi. For Aquinas, any power of the soul is defined by its object. The power of sight would not be what it was if it did not have colour for its per se object. The will would not be the will if it was not directed towards the bonum in communi as its object.
The necessity of desiring beatitude
It follows from this that it could not fail to desire a good which is immediately seen to be completely and perfectly good. This is because such a good would be infallibly seen to be infallibly without any defectus boni, the only possible motive for nolition. Such a good is felicitas or beatitudo (εὐδαιμονία for Aristotle), which, in the most basic analysis, is just goodness under the ratio of final end, and therefore complete or perfect. Aquinas compares this necessary orientation of the will towards the ultimate end to the role of first principles in understanding (ST Ia Q.82 a.1; Ia IIae Q.10 a.1), which are known to be true necessarily when they are cognised, and which any subsequent act of the intellect presupposes.
How the intellect can be said to move the will
Unlike appetitus naturalis, which just follows the inherent substantial form of the thing, sense appetite must follow an object presented by sense perception, while the rational appetite must follow an object presented by the intellect. If there were no object apprehended by the intellect, there would be no rational appetition. Therefore, there is a way in which Aquinas thinks we can speak of the intellect 'moving' the will, namely by presenting its object (ST Ia IIae Q.9 a.1: Et ideo isto modo motionis intellectus movet voluntatem sicut praesentans ei obiectum suum). However, 'motion' here does not mean efficient causality. Rather the intellect moves the will by presenting to it its object, and that object moves the will as a final cause (ibid: Et hoc modo intellectus movet voluntatem, quia bonum intellectum est obiectum voluntatis, et movet ipsam ut finis). St Thomas explains that movere can be taken in two ways: uno modo, per modum finis; sicut dicitur quod finis movet efficientem...Alio modo dicitur aliquid movere per modum agentis; sicut alterans movet alteratum, et impellens movet impulsum. As is clear from discussions of the four causes throughout the Thomistic corpus, Aquinas thinks that the final cause is a kind of causa causarum, without which no efficient cause would act, but he does not think that the final cause is an efficient cause of the efficient cause. Rather, the efficient cause is always an agent which acts for the sake of an end. Elsewhere, Aquinas explicitly denies that the intellect moves the will as an efficient cause. Here it is clear enough. To move as an efficient cause is to move per modum agentis. This is how the will can move the intellect to its operation, as well as all the other powers of the soul. It is not how the intellect moves the will. If we are looking for the efficient cause of the action of the will, St Thomas directs us partly to the will itself and partly to God, as will be discussed later.
That the intellect is not the efficient cause of the will (whereas the will is often the efficient cause of the intellect) is also clear enough in Ia IIae Q.9 a.1, where St Thomas distinguishes between two ways in which a power of the soul has to be moved, quantum ad exercitium vel usum actus and quantum ad determinationem actus. The first is ex parte subiecti, which is responsible for acting or not acting (quantum ad agere et non agere...quod quandoque invenitur agens, quandoque non agens). This is clearly the efficient cause of the action. The second is ex parte obiecti, which specifies the action as being an action of this or that (quantum ad agere hoc vel illud... secundum quod specificatur actus). The general object of sight is colour in general, but sight will be of a particular colour according to the specific colour of the object. In this article, St Thomas simply repeats that the object of the will is the bonum in communi and that the intellect presents this to the will. In this way, the intellect is responsible for the specification of the will's object (Bonum autem in communi, quod habet rationem finis, est obiectum voluntatis... Et ideo isto modo motionis intellectus movet voluntatem, sicut praesentans ei obiectum suum).
The liberty of the will to accept or reject particular goods
While it is true that that the intellect is also responsible for presenting any particular goods which are capable of becoming or which do actually become objects of the will's appetition, that they do become determinate objects of the will is not due solely to the intellect's apprehension of them. As St Thomas makes abundantly clear, the will has the liberty to accept or reject any particular good as an object of its appetition. As should be clear from above, the object presented by the intellect does move the will ex necessitate, if we are understanding the bonum in communi. However, this does not hold for particular goods. The necessary object of the will is bonum in communi, under which many particular goods can be either accepted by the will as coming under its object or rejected on the basis of a perceived deficiency of good (Ia IIae Q.10 a.1 ad 3: Cum igitur voluntas sit quaedam vis immaterialis sicut et intellectus, respondet sibi naturaliter aliquod unum commune, scilicet bonum...Sub bono autem communi multa particularia bona continentur, ad quorum nullum voluntas determinatur; Ia IIae Q.10 a.2 ad 1: sufficiens motivum alicuius potentiae non est nisi obiectum quod totaliter habet rationem motivi. Si autem in aliquo deficiat, non ex necessitate movebit; cf. Ia Q.82 a.2 ad 2).
When discussing the act of consent, St Thomas makes it clear that the final decision of whether to accept a particular good resides with the will, rather than the intellect: quandiu enim iudicandum restat quod proponitur, nondum datur finalis sententia...Finalis autem sententia de agendis est consensus in actum. Et ideo consensus in actum pertinet ad rationem superiorem, secundum tamen quod in ratione voluntas includitur (Ia IIae Q.15 a.4). Here he makes it clear that consent, an act of the will, is what determines whether a sententia is finalis. This would be true of electio as well, inasmuch as they are only differentiated insofar as there are multiple ways of action consented to, which need to be reduced to one last choice.
Aquinas repeatedly brings up Aristotle's discussion of 'rational potencies' in Metaphysics θ.2, which are capacities for contraries. These are not determined to either contrary nor moved of necessity, as irrational potencies are. Aristotle explains this on the basis that, in intellectual knowledge, the same λόγος makes clear both the positive thing and its lack. The intellect can understand something as good but as falling short (according as the intellect sees it) of total goodness, and Aquinas says that defectus cuiuscumque boni habet rationem non boni (ST Ia IIae Q.10 a.2). According to simultaneous diverse considerations, the will can choose to accept or reject the object: quaelibet particularia bona, inquantum deficiunt ab aliquo bono, possunt accipi ut non bona, et secundum hanc considerationem, possunt repudiari vel approbari a voluntate, quae potest in idem ferri secundum diversas considerationes. For example, to speak can be good but also to be silent. Speaking can be seen both as being good to some extent, but also defective insofar as it eliminates the good of silence. Therefore: ad illa opposita prosequenda se habet voluntas, quae sub bono comprehenduntur, sicut moveri et quiescere, loqui et tacere, et alia huiusmodi, in utrumque enim horum fertur voluntas sub ratione boni (Ia IIae Q.8 a.1 ad 2).
How the will moves itself
St Thomas devotes an article to explaining how the will moves itself (ST Ia IIae Q.9 a.3, Utrum voluntas moveat seipsam). This kind of movement is not that of final causality, as is that of the object presented by the intellect, but of efficient causality (ad 3: non eodem modo voluntas movetur ab intellectu, et a seipsa. Sed ab intellectu quidem movetur secundum rationem obiecti, a seipsa vero, quantum ad exercitium actus). St Thomas emphasises the importance of affirming the self- movement of the will. If the will did not have the power to move itself to any act of will, then it would not be the domina of any of its acts (voluntas domina est sui actus, et in ipsa est velle et non velle. Quod non esset, si non haberet in potestate movere seipsam ad volendum). How does it move itself as an efficient cause? For St Thomas, no inanimate thing is capable of self-motion based upon a proof in Aristotle's Physics Book VII. In a living organism, one part can move another. But the will is itself one part or power of the soul. How can it move itself? Indeed, in the respondeo of the article in question, St Thomas does not just limit this sort of self-movement to the will. He also affirms it of the intellect. He says that the intellect, by way of knowing principles, can reduce itself from potency to act, as regards the knowledge of corresponding conclusions (intellectus per hoc quod cognoscit principium, reducit seipsum de potentia in actum, quantum ad cognitionem conclusionum, et hoc modo movet seipsum). The will moves itself in a similar way: et similiter voluntas per hoc quod vult finem, movet seipsam ad volendum ea quae sunt ad finem.
Without going into too much detail, the argument in Physics Book VII only applies to the physical motion of extended material things. The intellect and will, however, are immaterial. Nevertheless, there is another argument in Physics Book VIII, which, although in its precise context it has to do with material things, can be analogically stretched to apply beyond material things, insofar as it utilises the more fundamental principles of act and potency. St Thomas brings this argument up in Objection 1: Omne enim movens, inquantum huiusmodi, est in actu, quod autem movetur, est in potentia, nam motus est actus existentis in potentia, inquantum huiusmodi. Sed non est idem in potentia et in actu respectu eiusdem. Ergo nihil movet seipsum. Neque ergo voluntas seipsam movere potest. A mere passive potency, insofar as it is such, cannot be the active agent which brings it to its corresponding act. It can only act insofar as it is already somehow in act, because only what is somehow actual can be an agent. Secondly, that 'somehow in act' must make it a proportionate agent to the effect brought about, either by having the effect formally or virtually. Neither of these considerations presents an unsolvable problem for the self- motion of the intellect or the will. When we say that the will moves itself, we are not saying that it is the will's mere potential to want a certain thing that moves it to will that certain thing. We are saying that the will itself, as an already active agent, moves itself to will that certain thing. Therefore, it is not in act and in potency in the same respect: voluntas non secundum idem movet et movetur. Unde nec secundum idem est in actu et in potentia. The question then is whether the will is sufficiently active in order to be a proportionate cause of the effect of its willing that certain thing. St Thomas thinks that, when it wills an end, it is a sufficiently active and proportionate cause for it to move itself to will means to that end, just as the intellect, in knowing principles, is a sufficiently active and proportionate cause for it to draw out the conclusions that necessarily follow. Sed inquantum actu vult finem, reducit se de potentia in actum respectu eorum quae sunt ad finem, ut scilicet actu ea velit. This seems to be because the will, in already willing the end, and the intellect, in already knowing the principles, contain the effects they move themselves towards virtually. The will, in willing an end, has the sufficient virtus to move itself to will means towards that end.
How God moves the will as universal mover to its universal object
The will, therefore, can move itself ad exercitium actus to will certain things, but this always presupposes that it already wills a certain end. Aquinas would not call the will a self-mover of its appetition for its necessary and natural object, the bonum in communi, or the bonum under the ratio of final end (felicitas or beatitudo), just as he would not call the natural motion of elementary bodies to their natural places self-motion. Therefore, the primal motion of the will ad exercitium actus is by nature (ST Ia IIae Q.9 a.4: necesse est ponere quod in primum motum voluntatis voluntas prodeat ex instinctu alicuius exterioris moventis). The will moves itself freely in all subsequent acts, sed non potest seipsam movere quantum ad omnia (ibid ad 3). Just as St Thomas would call the generator of an elementary body the motor of that body towards its natural place, by giving it the relevant form, so St Thomas would say that the cause of the nature of the will moves it to its primal natural motion (ibid ad 1: Sicut et primum principium motus naturalis est ab extra, quod scilicet movet naturam; ST Ia IIae Q.9 a.6: motus voluntatis est ab intrinseco, sicut et motus naturalis...naturalis autem motus eius non causatur nisi ab eo quod causat naturam. Unde dicitur in VIII Physic. quod generans movet secundum locum gravia et levia...Voluntatis autem causa nihil aliud esse potest quam Deus). Yet the latter is even more so than the former. The celestial body which is the generator and motor of the elementary body does not need to continually act upon that body. However, God, who is the creator of the human soul, and therefore the will (ibid: voluntas est potentia animae rationalis, quae a solo Deo causatur per creationem), continually conserves the will in existence and continually conserves it as being precisely the thing it is. If this action was taken away, then the will would cease to be the will, and cease all its willing. All the acts of the will rely upon this divine influence, but this does not damage the freedom of the will with regard to the specification of those things which it wills that presuppose its natural orientation to the bonum in commune. As Thomas says in reply to the objection about evil actions of rational agents, God moves the will as universalis motor to its universal and general object, while he leaves it to man's free will to determine whether he will any particular good: Deus movet voluntatem hominis, sicut universalis motor, ad universale obiectum voluntatis, quod est bonum. Et sine hac universali motione homo non potest aliquid velle. Sed homo per rationem determinat se ad volendum hoc vel illud, quod est vere bonum vel apparens bonum (ST Ia IIae Q.9 a.6 ad 3).
Conclusion
The above discussion is important because it shows how St Thomas does not think that the intellect's role or God's role in volition undermine genuine human free will. He is not an intellectual determinist, nor does he subscribe to the view that God infallibly necessitates all human actions. God's primal motion of the will is to its general object, the bonum in communi, and any further operation of the will presupposes this. But, while, to such an extent, this initial motion is a cause of these further operations, it does not necessitate the specification of these further operations, since these are left to the free determination of the will, which can move itself to these subsequent acts.
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