Authors/Thomas Aquinas/metaphysics/liber9/lect6

Lecture 6

Latin	English
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 1 Postquam manifestavit philosophus quid est actus, hic intendit ostendere quando et in quali dispositione existens aliquid dicatur esse in potentia ad actum. Et circa hoc duo facit. Primo dicit de quo est intentio, dicens, quod determinandum est quando aliquid est in potentia, et quando non. Non enim quandocumque, et qualitercumque dispositum, aliquid potest dici esse in potentia, etiam ad id quod fit ex eo. Nunquam enim poterit dici, quod terra sit in potentia homo. Manifestum est enim quod non; sed magis tunc dicitur esse in potentia homo, quando ex praecedenti materia iam factum est sperma. Et forte neque adhuc est in potentia homo, ut infra patebit.	1832. Having shown what actuality is, here the Philosopher intends to show both when and in virtue of what sort of disposition a thing is said to be in a state of potency for actuality. In regard to this he does two things. First (1832), he states what he intends to do. He says that it is necessary to determine when a thing is in potency and when it is not. For it is not at just any time and when disposed in just any way that a thing can be said to be in potentiality even to what comes from it; for it could never be said that earth is potentially a man, since obviously it is not; but it is rather said to be potentially a man when the seed has already been generated from a preceding matter. And perhaps it never is potentially a man, as will be shown below.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 2 Secundo ibi, quemadmodum igitur solvit propositam quaestionem. Et circa hoc duo facit. Primo ostendit in quali dispositione materia existens, dicatur esse in potentia ad actum. Secundo quod a materia in tali dispositione denominatur solum id quod est in materia, ibi, videtur autem quod dicimus. Circa primum, considerandum est, quod sicut septimo superius dixit, quarumdam artium effectus contingunt etiam sine arte. Domus enim non fit sine arte, sed sanitas fit sine arte medicinae ex sola operatione naturae. Et licet id quod fit a natura, non sit fortuitum neque casuale, eo quod natura est causa agens per se, fortuna vero et casus est causa agens per accidens, tamen ex eo quod ille qui sanatur a natura, sanatur praeter intentionem artis, dicitur sanari a fortuna. Nihil enim prohibet aliquid non esse fortuitum in se, quod tamen dicitur fortuitum per comparationem ad aliquem, qui non considerat causam per se talis effectus.	1833. Therefore, in like manner (774). Second, he answers the question which was raised; and in regard to this he does two things. First, he explains the sort of disposition which matter must have in order to be said to be in potency to actuality. Second (1839), he shows that it is only what is in matter that gets its name from matter disposed in some particular way. In regard to the first it must be understood, as he said above in Book VII (1411), that the effects of certain arts may also come about without art; for while a house is not produced without art, health may be produced without the art of medicine through the operation of nature alone. And even though what comes to be by nature may not be fortuitous or a result of chance, since nature is an efficient cause in the proper sense, whereas fortune or chance is an efficient cause in an accidental sense, nevertheless, because the one who is healed by nature is healed without the application of any art, he is said to be healed by chance. For nothing prevents an effect which is not fortuitous in itself from being said to be fortuitous in relation to someone who does not consider the proper cause of such an effect.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 3 Dicit ergo, quod non quicumque vel in qualibet dispositione existens, sanatur a medicina vel a fortuna; sed est aliquod possibile in determinata dispositione, quod sanetur vel a natura vel ab arte. Quibuslibet enim activis respondent determinata passiva. Illud autem possibile, quod unica actione natura vel ars potest in actum sanitatis reducere, est sanum in potentia.	1834. Hence he says that it is not just anyone at all or anyone disposed in any way at all who is healed by medicine or by chance; but it is someone having the capability by reason of a definite disposition who is healed either by nature or by art; for to all active principles there correspond definite passive principles. And it is the thing having this capability, which nature or art can bring to a state of actual health by a single action, that is potentially healthy.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 4 Et ut plenius cognoscatur, subiungit definitionem huius possibilis, et quantum ad operationem artis, et quantum ad operationem naturae. Dicit ergo quod est possibile, quod ex potentia ente, ens fit actu ab intellectu, sine arte. Terminus enim, idest definitio est quando statim cum vult artifex facit id esse actu, si nihil exterius prohibeat. Et tunc potentia dicitur esse sanum, quia per unam operationem artis fit sanum. In illis autem, quae sanantur per naturam, dicitur esse aliquid in potentia sanum, quando non est aliquid prohibens sanitatem, quod debeat moveri vel transmutari prius quam intrinseca virtus sanans effectum habeat in sanando.	1835. And in order that this kind of capability or potency may be more fully known he adds its definition both with reference to the operation of art and to that of nature. (1) Hence he says that the capable or potential is what comes to exist actually from existing potentially as a result of intellect or art. For “the intelligible expression,” or definition, of the capable is this: it is something which the artist immediately brings to actuality when he wills it if no external impediment hinders it. And the patient is then said to be potentially healthy, because he becomes healthy by a single action of art. (2) However, in the case of those who are healed by nature, each is said to be potentially healthy when there is nothing hindering health which has to be removed or changed before the healing power within the patient produces its effect in the act of healing.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 5 Et sicut diximus de sanatione quae fit ab arte, ita potest dici de aliis quae per artem fiunt. Nam tunc materia est in potentia domus, quando nihil eorum quae sunt in materia, prohibet domum fieri statim una actione, nec est aliquid quod oporteat addi, vel auferri, vel mutari, antequam materia formetur in domum. Sicut lutum oportet transmutari, antequam ex eo fiant lateres: ex arboribus autem oportet aliquid auferri per dolationem, et addi per compaginationem, ad hoc quod componatur domus. Unde lutum et arbores non sunt potentia domus, sed lateres et ligna iam praeparata.	1836. Now what we have said about the act of healing, which is brought about by the art of healing, can also be said about the other activities produced by the other arts. For matter is potentially a house when none of the things present in the matter prevent the house from being brought into being immediately by a single action, and when there is nothing that should be added or taken away or changed before the matter is formed into a house, as clay must be changed before bricks are made from it; and as something must be taken away from trees by hewing them and something added by joining them so that a house may be brought into being. Clay and trees, then, are not potentially houses, but bricks and wood already prepared are.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 6 Et similiter est in aliis; sive habeant principium perfectionis extra, sicut sunt artificialia; sive intra, sicut naturalia. Et tunc semper sunt in potentia ad actum, quando nullo exterius prohibente, per proprium principium activum possunt reduci in actum. Tale autem nondum est sperma. Oportet enim quod mediantibus permutationibus multis ex eo fiat animal. Sed quando iam per proprium principium activum potest fieri tale, scilicet actu existens, tunc iam est in potentia.	1837. And the same holds true in the case of other things whether their principle of perfection is outside of them, as in the case of artificial things, or within them, as in the case of natural things. And they are always in potency to actuality when they can be brought to actuality by their proper efficient principle without any external thing hindering them. However, seed is not such, for an animal must be produced from it through many changes; but when by its proper active principle, i.e., something in a state of actuality, it can already become such, it is then already in potency.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 7 Sed illa, quae oportet transmutari antequam sint statim reducibilia in actum, indigent alio principio activo, scilicet praeparante materiam, quod interdum est aliud a perficiente, quod inducit ultimam formam. Sicut patet quod terra nondum est in potentia statua; non enim una actione nec uno agente reducitur in actum; sed prius per naturam transmutatur, et fit aes, et postea per artem fit statua.	1838. But those things which have to be changed before they are immediately capable of being brought to actuality require a different efficient principle, namely, the one preparing the matter, which is sometimes different from the one finishing it off, which induces the final form. For example, it is obvious that earth is not yet potentially a statue, for it is not brought to actuality by a single action or by a single agent; but first it is changed by nature and becomes bronze, and afterwards it becomes a statue by art.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 8 Deinde cum dicit videtur autem ostendit, quod a tali materia, quae est in potentia ad actum, denominatur mixtum. Et circa hoc tria facit. Primo ostendit qualiter mixtum a materia denominatur; dicens quod id quod fit a materia, non dicitur hoc, sed ecininum, quod Latine non dicitur, sed per consuetudinem Graecum est denominativum ad significandum illud, quod est ex altero tamquam ex materia: ac si dicatur: materia non praedicatur in abstracto de eo quod est ex materia, sed denominative. Sicut arca non est lignum, sed lignea, et lignum non est terra, sed terreum. Et iterum, si terra habeat aliam materiam priorem, terra non erit illud, sed ecininum, idest non praedicatur de terra in abstracto, sed denominative.	1839. Now it seems (775). Here he shows that a compound derives its name from such matter which is in potency to actuality; and in regard to this he does three things. First, he shows how a compound derives its name from matter, saying that what is produced from matter is not called a that but a that-en (ecininum). This expression is not used in the Latin but it is used according to the custom of the Greeks to designate what comes from something else as from matter, as if to say that matter is not predicated abstractly of what comes from it, but derivately, as a chest is not wood but wooden; and as wood is not earth but earthen. And, again, if earth should have another matter prior to it, earth would not be that matter but “that-en,” i.e., it will not be predicated of earth abstractly but derivatively.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 9 Ita tamen fiat talis praedicatio, quod semper id quod est in potentia secundum modum determinatum, praedicatur de eo, quod est immediate posterius. Ut terra, quae non potest dici potentia arca, non praedicatur de arca, nec in abstracto nec denominative. Arca enim neque est terra, neque terrea, sed lignea. Lignum enim est in potentia arca et materia arcae. Universaliter est quidem lignum arcae, particulariter vero hoc lignum huius arcae.	1840. Yet such predication is made, because what is potential in a definite way is always predicated of the thing which immediately comes after it. For example, earth, which cannot be said to be potentially a chest, is not predicated of a chest either abstractly or derivatively; for a chest is neither earth nor earthen but wooden, because wood is potentially a chest and the matter of a chest. Wood in general is the matter of a chest in general, and this particular wood is the matter of this particular chest.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 10 Si vero est aliquid primum, quod non dicitur de alio ecininum, idest quod non habet aliquid quod de eo quidem denominative praedicetur modo praedicto, hoc erit materia prima. Sicut si aer est materia terrae, ut quidam dixerunt, aer praedicabitur de terra denominative, ut dicatur terra est aerea. Et similiter dicetur aer igneus et non ignis, si ignis est materia eius. Ignis autem, si non denominatur ab aliqua priori materia, erit materia prima, secundum positionem Heracliti. Sed hic oportet adiungere: si sit aliquid existens, ad differentiam universalis; nam universale praedicatur etiam de aliis, et alia non praedicantur de eo; nec tamen est materia, cum non sit aliquid subsistens. Universale enim et subiectum differunt per hoc, quod subiectum est hoc aliquid, non autem universale.	1841. But if there is some first thing which is not referred to something else as a “that-en,” i.e., something which does not have something else predicated of it derivatively in the above way, this will be first matter. For example, if air is the matter of earth, as some have said (86), air will be predicated derivatively of earth, so that earth will be said to be of air (or airy). And similarly air will be said to be of fire and not fire, if fire is its matter. But if fire does not get its name from any prior matter, it will be first matter according to the position of Heraclitus (87). But here it is necessary to add “if it is something subsistent” in order to distinguish it from a universal; for a universal is predicated of other things but other things are not predicated of it—yet it is not matter, since it is not something subsistent. For a universal and a subject differ in that a subject is a particular thing whereas a universal is not.
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 11 Secundo ibi, ut puta ponit similitudinem praedicationis denominativae: dicens, quod sicut id quod subiicitur passionibus, ut homo, corpus et animal, recipit denominativam praedicationem passionum: sic, id quod est ex materia, recipit denominativam praedicationem materiae. Nam passio est musicum et album. Dicitur autem subiectum, cui advenit musica, non esse musica in abstracto, sed musicum denominatione: et homo non dicitur albedo, sed album. Neque etiam homo dicitur ambulatio aut motus abstractive, sed ambulans aut motum, ut ecininum, idest denominatum.	1842. For example (776). Second, he gives an example of derivative predication, saying that just as the subject of modifications, for example, man, body, or animal, has modifications predicated of it derivatively, in a similar fashion matter is predicated derivatively of that which comes from matter. Now “the modification is musical and white”; but the subject to which music accrues is not called music in the abstract, but is called musical derivatively; and man is not called whiteness but white. Nor again is man called walking or motion in the abstract, but what walks or is moved “as a that-en,” i.e., what gets a name [from something else].
lib. 9 l. 6 n. 12 Tertio ibi, quaecumque quidem ponit comparationem utriusque denominationis: et dicit, quod quaecumque sic praedicantur denominative, sicut ista accidentia, ultimum, quod sustentat ea, est substantia: sed quaecumque non praedicantur sic denominative, sed id quod praedicatur denominative, est quaedam species, et hoc aliquid, ut lignum aut terra, ultimum in talibus praedicationibus quod sustentat alia, est materia et substantia materialis. Et convenienter accidit dici ecininum, idest denominative secundum materiam et passiones, idest accidentia, quae ambo sunt indeterminata. Nam et accidens determinatur et definitur per subiectum, et materia per id ad quod est in potentia. Ultimo epilogat quod dictum est, et est manifestum.	1843. Therefore all (777). Third, he compares both methods of giving names to things. He says that all those names which are predicated derivatively in this way, as the accidents mentioned, have substance as the ultimate subject which sustains them; but in all those cases in which the predicate is not derivative but is a form or a particular thing, such as wood or earth, in such predications the ultimate subject sustaining the rest is matter or material substance. And it is only fitting “that the term ‘that-en’ happens to be predicated” derivatively “of matter and the modifying attributes,” i.e., accidents, both of which are indeterminate. For an accident is both made determinate and defined by means of its subject, and matter by means of that to which it is in potency. Lastly he summarizes his remarks, and this part is evident.