THE THOMIST
A SPECULATIVE QUARTERLY REVIEW
OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY

EDITORs: THE DoMINICAN FATHERS OF THE PRoviNCE OF ST. JosEPH

Publishers: The Thomist Press, Washington, D. C.

VoL. XXXIV

APRIL, 1970

No.2

GOD: HOW NEAR A RELATION?

I

F THE ABOVE title suggests anything to the reader, the
danger is that too much might be implied. I do not
propose to treat of all the aspects of the " nearness " of
God to man, nor attempt to investigate all th; Pl)plications of
the category of " relation " commonly used in our effort to
give an adequate theological account of the links that exist
between the creature and the Creator. There are, however, a
number of questions that have been placed insistently before
the Catholic theologian recently that demand from him a more
adequate interpretation of God's involvement in our world and
in our history. This statement implies a position that the
standard position is not strong enough. Though, as will appear,
I have no intention of reversing the classic Thomistic position
in this fundamental area, I do think that a concerted effort
is needed to explicitate the richness, the flexibility and the
relevance of this tradition of thought, and to see that in the
long run the reality we attempt to express is more important
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ANTHONY J. KELLY

than the words we use in that attempt. Further, I do not hope
to give final answers, but I do hope that it will not pass as
presumptuous to open some areas of our standard theology to
more close scrutiny for the sake of the continuance of a
balanced development.
It can be reasonably admitted that the Thomistic arrangement and presentation of the theology dealing with the Mystery
of God have not been easily understandable. 1 One soon gets
used to the predictable labels attached to the traditional " De
Unitate Dei- De Trinitate Dei" schema: it is said to be too
static, philosophical, too little in line with the basic patterns
of Salvation History, etc. To anyone understanding the basic
approach of St. Thomas, this causes little concern; he finds
many of the current questions on God hopelessly naive, e. g.,
the " Honest to God debate," and feels that at the same time
they can be speedily and neatly dealt with by an appeal to
the best of traditional Thomism. Recent suggestions in theories
of a " developing Deity " would be smartly dismissed as nonsense. But here we must be careful: it is possible to evade a
responsibility. Are the Thomistic answers really available to
modern thought? Are they too concealed within a system of
thought that can appear overly rigid and exclusive? Have we
spoken sufficiently with the proponents of the newer Theisms
in an effort tore-actualize the context of the Thomistic doctrine
dealing with man's affirmation of God? The answer to be given
must be carefully qualified in view of the excellent work that
has already been done. 2
Those outside the Thomistic tradition seem to have considerable difficulty in understanding precisely what Thomists (and
for that matter, all Catholic theology) are getting at when it
1 Cf. K. Rahner, "Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise 'De Trinitate,'"
Theological Investigations IV (London, 1966), 77-104; G. Martelet, " Theologie und
Heilsoeconomie in der Christologie der ' Tertia,' " Gott in Welt IT (Freiburg,
1964),
• Apart from the basic and well-known work of Rahner and Schillebeeckx, articles,
such as C. Kiesling," A Translation of Tillich's Idea of God," Journal of Ecumenical
Studiea 4 (Winter, 1967), 700-715, are of great value.

GOD:

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193

comes to discussing the reality of God's relationship with man.
Some recent developments in Catholic theology admit, implicitly at least, that we have fallen short in giving an adequate
account of the God-Man relationship, as we shall soon see.3
It seems that traditional Catholic theology, from the Middle
Ages on, has left the reality of God too " abstract," not
sufficiently involved as an actual, free Presence in human
affairs. Perhaps the very richness of the notion of being and
the utter existential fulness of the divine Reality as understood
in Thomism has given the impression that nothing more can
be said. One source of constant questioning is the degree in
which the whole Being of God is really engaged in man's
destiny and, consequently, the degree in which God's actions
really reveal what He actually is. This seems to have been in
Fr. Y. Cougar's mind when he wrote:
Sooner or later, speculative theology, drawing upon revelation
attested to in Scripture, will have to pose the problem which
occupies us in a much more personal way: if there is such a deep
bond between theology and economy, if God discloses the en-soi
of his Mystery in the pour-now; of the alliance, of grace and the
incarnation, all that has been and is done for us, including the
incarnation, has been required, has it not, in spite of his absolute
liberty, by what God is in himself? Is there not in the mystery of
his en-soi, a presence, a call for the pour-now;, including hominization? 4
In a recent work Schubert Ogden has given intelligent and

clear expression to a new theism, called " neo-classical," which
attempts essentially to establish the intrinsic relatedness of
the divine Reality to man and his world. 5 Ogden relies on the
basic work done by Whitehead and Hartshorne in this field.6
3 Cf. Magnus Loehrer, "Dogrnatische
Bemerkungen zur Frage der Eigenschaften
und Verhaltensweisen Gottes," Mysterium Salutis II (Einsiedeln-Ziirich-Kiiln,
1967)'
•" Christ in the Economy of Salvation and in our dogmatic Tracts," Ccmcilium
I (Jan., 1966), 4-15.
5 The Reality of God and other Essays (London:
SCM Press, 1967).
6 Cf. especially C. Hartshorne,
The Divine Relativity: A Social Conception of
God (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1948); Reality as Social Process (Glencoe,
TIL: The Free Press, 1953).

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ANTHONY J. KELLY

I will note the main points of this neo-classical approach, not
so much as an effort to identify the adversary as to have a
talking point for the furtherance of our announced intention to
explicitate the latent riches within the Thomistic tradition.
Ogden's preoccupation with giving us a new brand of theism
begins with his perception of the increasingly atheistic assumptions of our contemporaries. Much of the classic theism
seems contradictory to the modem mind (and to Ogden).
One point singled out is the impossibility of harmonizing the
free character of creation with the immutable essence of God
as Pure Act/ Whatever the case, the classic theism (and
Thomism is included explicitly in this) lacks existential allure
for men of our time. 8 God is just not sufficiently involved with
man and his world. The traditional idea of God as Pure Act,
static, impassive, immutable, must be supplanted by an idea
of the Divine Reality that is more viable for the modem mind.
Now one's conception of God must not only be logically consistent but also intelligible, if God is going to be accepted as
our ground of confidence in the ultimate worth of life. God
must be conceived of as genuinely related to the world and as
really affected by our actions. 9 A purely external relation of
1 The Reality of God, p. 17 f: "Theologians
usually tell us that God creates the
world freely, as the contingent and non-necessary world our experience discloses
it to be. This assertion is also made necessary because it offers the only really
credible construction of the account of creation in Holy Scripture. At the same
time, because of their fixed commitment to the assumptions of classical metaphysics,
theologians also tell us that God's act of creation is one with his own eternal
essence, which is in every respect necessary, exclusive of all contingency. Hence,
if we take them at their word, giving full weight to both of their assertions, we at
once find ourselves in the hopeless contradiction of a wholly necessary creation of
a wholly contingent world. . . . As Actus Purus, and thus a statically complete
perfection incapable in any respect of further self-realization, God can neither be
increased or diminished by what we do, and our action, like our suffering, must
be in the strictest sense wholly indifferent to him."
R Ibid., p. 18.
• Ibid., p. 47: " ... We have seen that the only God whose reality is implied by
a secular affirmation is the God who is the ground of confidence in the ultimate
worth or significance of our life in the world. Given this affirmation, God must be
so conceived that his being this ground of confidence is rendered as intelligible
as possible ... , God must be conceived as a reality which is genuinely related to
our life in the world, and to which, therefore, both we ourselves and our various
actions all make a difference as to its actual being."

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reason cannot be sufficient; God must be related to the world
with a real internal relatedness. 10
This relatedness that is referred to here is parallelled to the
relation of the human subject to an historical event which
profoundly affects him. 11 The distinction between" existence"
and "actuality" is introduced in this context. "Existence"
is the non-variable in God, the abstract constant, which strictly
speaking is not relative; " actuality " is the variable insofar as
the existent is verified in a variety of concrete ways. 12 Hence,
the way is open to a dipolar affirmation of God through which
God is said to be at once supremely absolute and supremely
relative. 13
Ogden sees this in favourable contrast to traditional theism's
monopolar affirmation of God who, in the doctrine of St.
Thomas, is related to the world in a purely nominal way. 14 He
attributes in this perspective a merely unqualified negation of
real relatedness to the world. The traditional interpretation of
the Scriptural names, "King," "Judge," etc., succeeds merely
in eliminating any real element of relatedness of God to the
10 Ibid.:
"God must enjoy real internal relations to all our actions, and so be
afl'ected by them in his own actual being."
11 Ibid.:
" A person or thing may properly said to ' exist,' provided the essential
characteristics by which he or it is defined are somehow actualized. Thus, I exist,
for example, so long as the complex of traits designated by my proper name as
all the stages of my life history is realized in some state or other of actual
relations with my fellow human beings and to the larger natural environment.
This is to say that my existence as such has to be distinguished from any of these
actual states, taken simply by itself. I exist as the person I essentially am,
whether as actually young or old, sick or well, in relation to these persons or those.
' Existence ' in short, properly functions as an abstract constant, always implying
' actuality ' as an abstract variable. Hence to say that anything ' exists ' requires
that the variable ' actuality ' have some specific value."
12 Ibid., see also pp. 58 ff.
13 Ibid., pp. 48 II'.
" Ibid., p. 48: " The whole character of traditional theism is defined by an
essential one-sidedness or monopolarity. As it conceives God, he is so far from
being the eminently relative One, that he is denied to be related to our life at all.
He is said to be a reality which is in every respect absolute and whose only
relations with the world are purely nominal, or external relations of the world
to him."

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ANTHONY J, KELLY

world. 15 So, in the traditional theism, God is literally not
related to the world at all.
There may be a hint of bipolarity in the ordinary account of
theism, but this is in fact deceptive. 16 Mystery is appealed to,
but this is less a sense of the Mystery of God than a maze of
inconsistencies and logical confusion." 7 Throughout all this
there remains the existential repugnance of a statically indifferent Deity.
In the process of offering this neo-classical alternative to the
traditional theism, Ogden introduces" the reformed subjectivist
principle" of Whitehead, which in this instance means that the
paradigmatic case of reality consists in the " self." 18 To exist,
as such, means to be related to one's body, one's society, one's
world. 19 The self develops through this interaction through
relatedness. The temporality of the human self displaces the
old ideas of substance and being, and replaces them with newer
concepts of creative becoming and of being in process. 20
In the light of this basic analogy God is seen as the supreme
instance of this creative becoming. 21 He is eminently social and
temporal, related to the world as the self is related to the body.
He is, in fact, absolute in this relativity. 22 God in this sense can
Ibid., p. 49.
Ibid., p. 50.
17 Ibid., p. 51:
" ... the so called 'mystery' has been unmasked as a logical
15

16

confusion, which makes supernaturalism all the more incredible as a reflective
account of our experience."
18 Ibid., p. 57:
" ... According to this principle we can give an adequate answer
to the metaphysical question of the meaning of ' reality ' only by imaginatively
generalizing ' elements disclosed in the analysis of the experience of subjects.' "
19

20

Ibid., p. 58.
Ibid.: " If we begin by taking the self as thus experienced as the paradigmatic

case for reality as such, the result is a complete revolution of classical metaphysics.
It thereupon becomes clear that real internal relations to others and intrinsic
temporality are not 'mixed perfections' peculiar to finite beings such as ourselves,
but ' simple perfections ' inherent in the meaning of ' reality ' in the most fundamental use of the word. In consequence, the chief category for finally interpreting
anything real can no longer be ' substance ' or ' being,' ... but must be process or
creative becoming, construed as that which is in principle social and temporal. ... "
21 Ibid., p. 59:
"This implies, naturally, that God is by analogy a living and
even growing God and that he is related to the universe of other beings somewhat as the human self is related to its body."
22

Ibid., p. 60.

GOD:

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197

never be without an actual world. 23 As so involved in the
worldly process, God appears as a worthy ground for our
confidence about the future, because our future is actually God's
future too. 24
Hence this newer dipolar approach to the affirmation of God
will appear as an acceptable form of theism that works through
accessible analogies and intelligible categories.
These rather skeletal indications of the neo-classical position
can be further fleshed out by reference to another article by
Ogden. 25 The starting point is a brief note in Heidegger's Sein
und Zeit which Ogden develops. 26 The basic question is, should
the eternity of God be interpreted more as a primal and infinite
temporality than as an eternal constant "Nunc Stans "? 27
Ogden attempts to get into the general swing of Heidegger's
thought as he analyses the instance of Dasein in the effort to
come to a general unveiling of Being. When God is recognized
as a Being, he must necessarily be understood as being-in-theworld through care.28 Further, since the present is seized only
in relation to the past realization and future possibility, so
God's present must be similarly conceived. 29 God's experience
•• ldid., p. 6fl.
•• Ibid., p. 64: " ... the only God . . . is the dipolar ground of the ultimate
significance of our life in the world. It is just such a God that the premises of
neoclassical metaphysics enable and even require us to conceive. . . . God . . .
must be thought of as the eminently relative One who makes possible ' a general
confidence about the future,' an assurance of the final worth of our life which will
not be disappointed."
25 "The Temporality
of God," The Reality of God, pp. 144-163.
26 Sein Und Zeit
(Halle, 19fl7), English trans., Being and Time (New York,
196fl), p. 4fl7, n. I (in original German); p. 499, n. xiii in English trans.: "It
requires no extensive discussion to show that the traditional concept of eternity, in
the sense of the ' stationary now' (nunc stans), is drawn from the vulgar understanding of time and is limited by an orientation to the idea of the ' constant'
presence-on-hand. If the eternity of God would admit of being ' construed '
philosophically, it could be understood only as a more primal and 'infinite'
temporality. Whether the via negationis et eminentiae could offer a possible way
to this goal would remain uncertain."
27 Ogden, op. cit., pp. 145 ff.
28 Ibid., p. 150.
20 Ibid., p. 15fl: " ... he (God) is an experiencing self who anticipates the future
and remembers the past and whose successive occasions of present experience are
themselves temporal occurences."

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ANTHONY J. KELLY

of himself is necessarily in a kind of divine temporality, in his
possession of himself in memory of the past, and as open to the
divine scope of future possibility. 30 In fact, God is absolute
temporality, because his relatedness to the world is total. He
is not restricted in this relatedness as man is. 31 The only norm
of God's relatedness to the world is himself.
Thus, Ogden, in instancing the primal and absolute temporality of God, considers that he has arrived at a theism that is
in favourable contrast with the classic tradition.
The above indications are not put forward as a complete
expression of a position that has been intelligently and roundly
worked out in the works referred to. My intention is merely
to rough out the general lines of this current approach for the
sake of the comment to follow.
Now the danger here for the doughty Scholastic is to weigh
in and thoroughly refute this theory point for point but, in so
doing, to overlook completely the acute theological and philosophical perception that is evinced throughout. In that way, one
could fail completely to see the openings that are provided for a
presentation of the classic and Thomistic theism more in
accordance with contemporary thought and values. This, of
course, would take more time and space than is at the moment
available, but it is worth our while to begin what others may
well complete in a more competent and comprehensive manner.
On the Catholic side there is considerable evidence of an
attempt to appreciate in a more vital manner the existential
relevance of the divine Reality to man. K. Rahner's bold
attempt to " economize " the Mystery of the Trinity is well
known. 32 Over and over again he states that the Trinity is a
Mystery of Salvation; that the immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity; that the salvific function reveals precisely the
immanent personality of the Divine Three. 33 Hence, it would
so
31
32

Ibid.
Ibid., up. 154 fl.
Cf. "Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise, 'de Trinitate,'"

IV, pp. 87-102.
•• Ibid., p. 87. See also his latest approach to Trinitarian

Theol. Investigations

theology in "Der
Dreifaltige Gott als Transzendenter Urgrund der Heilsgeschichte," Mysterium Salutis
II, pp. 317-398. For this point see especially pp. 381 fl.

GOD:

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199

be theologically unacceptable for him to conceive of the Father
or the Holy Spirit becoming man: only the Logos, the Word
of the Father, is the revealer. 34 No one can deny that this is
in general a laudable attempt, though Rahner's most recent
and profound elaboration of the theology of the Trinity needs
a thorough and critical examination. This, however, cannot
concern us here. 35
The problem, and the attempt to answer it, is better expressed in that section of theology usually called " de Deo
Uno." Partially through the influence of Rahner 36 a distinction
is being made between the "Attributes" (Eigenschaften Gottes) and the salvation-historical "Behavior" of God (Verhaltensweisen Gottes) .37 Dom Magnus Loehrer notes in his article
that, through the influence of the history of Apologetics, the
attributes of God have been rather philosophically set out and
construed, with a consequent loss of meaning when it comes to
interpreting the biblical metaphors. 38 Likewise, the Magisterium has elaborated its doctrine on the attributes of God only
as the occasion arose and usually in the context of correcting an
error: hence the reaction against the Gnostics, Dualists, Gilbert
Porrecta, and so on. 39 He goes on to suggest a much more positive approach in which the influence of Barth and Brunner is
felt. 40 The above distinction between the" attributes" and the
"behavior" of God is accepted as a way of affirming more completely the total Mystery of the Revealed God in his saving
Reality.
A philosophy of religion can realistically affirm the various
attributes of God; but when those attributes are transposed
Pp. 88, 91, Theol. Investig. IV; pp. 378 ff. of Mysterium Salutis II.
Op. cit., "Der Dreifalitige Gott .... " Ralmer's analysis and suggestions
concerning the meaning and the use of the idea of personality as applied to God
are very interesting.
•• Cf. K. Rahner, "Gott," LThK IV (1960), 1083-1086.
87 " Dogmatische Bemerkungen zur Frage der Eigenschaften und Verhaltensweisen
Gottes," Myste:rium Salutis II, pp.
•• Op. cit., pp.
fi.
39 Ibid., p. 300.
•• Ibid., pp. 807 fi.
3•

35

QOO

ANTHONY J. KELLY

onto the theological plane, they too often conceal the decisive
free actions of God in his saving design for the world. They can
obscure the fact that God takes a determined attitude toward
man. 41 The knowledge of God's free "attitudes" or "behavior," known only in Revelation, fills out, in a sense, the
knowledge we have of God through the attributes that are
basically affirmed of the Deity through creation. 42 These revealed Verhaltensweisen (ways of behavior) are not subject
to conceptual synthesis. We are left with a fruitful sense of
God's Mystery and the ineffable inner unity of the divine
Reality. 43 God's revealed behavior cannot be deduced from the
attributes, yet these are, in retrospect, presupposed as the
foundation of God's free action. 44
These ways of behavior through Salvation-History are not
disincarnate gestures on God's part. They are given definitive
expression in the event of Christ. 45 Here God is finally revealed
as Love in his free saving relations with man. 46 What may
have seemed anthropomorphisms in the Old Testament are
now given truly human expression in Christ. 47 Thus, God's
inner Self is really revealed in the " economia " of his salvific
activity. 48
" Ibid., p.
" Dies ist z. B. der Fall, wenn die Exodusassage ' lch bin da, der
ich bin ' (Ex. 3: 14) ohne weiteres als Aussage der goettlichen Aseitaet gedeutet
wird, oder wenn die biblischen Aussagen ueber Gottes Heiligkeit und Liebe
einfach als Aussagen ueber Gott als 'Esse Subsistens' bzw. als absolute Guete
gelesen werden. Wenn es wahr ist, dass Gottes freie Verhaltensweisen seine
Eigenschaften ... voraussetzen, dann braucht nicht bestritten zu werden, dass in
diesem Sinn auch die verschiedenen Shriftaussagen ueber das freie Verhalten
Gottes einen solchen letzten metaphysischen Hintergrund implizieren, wei dies im
klassischen Traktat " De Deo Uno " immer gesehen wurde."
'" Ibid., p. 303 f.
•• Ibid., p. 304.
44 Ibid., p. 304 f.
45 Ibid., pp. 305 ff.
•• Ibid., p. 306: " ... in Christus werde endgueltig offenbar, dass Gott Liebe ist
(I Jn. 4: 8). Diese Satz muss freilich richtig verstanden werden. Zunaechst ist zu
beachten, dass er nicht als Aussage ueber das metaphysiche Wesen Gottes gelesen
werden darf, sondern als Aussage ueber das letztefreie Verhalten Gottes zum
Menschen in der Heilsgeschichte zu verstehen ist,"
47 Ibid., p. 807.

'"Ibid,

GOD:

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Conversely, this demands of man that he regard God not
as a neutral, metaphysical Deity, but as the God of Redemption, one who merits his trust more than provokes his fear. 49
Thus the actual "behavior" of God calls forth a determined
attitude from man in the presence of God. There is implied the
reality of intersubjectivity, with all its free spontaneity, enabling God to be a real Presence in man's life. This is born out in
the various situations of Salvation History in that God communicates his N arne to man, not merely as a token to be
treasured but as a kind of symbol indicating the personal
character of God's Self Gift to man. 50 God reveals Himself as
eminently God-with-us and thus calls man to intimate communion with himself. 51 In this context the divine names are
not seen as mere confirmations of what has already been attributed to God through the processes of Nat ural Theology but
as a progressive revelation of the actual saving character of
God. 52
The Christian theologian, then, sees within the divine attributes, as it were, a free zone of God's actual activity made
known to us only through revelation, thereby giving us a deeper
knowledge of the divine Reality. 53
This interesting approach does not deny the traditional theological method of affirming the God of revelation, but it does
explicitate some valuable points in its alertness to the contributions made by Lutheran theology above all. Deep questions
nonetheless remain: what is really added? If one replies, the
concrete recognition of the saving freedom of God, the further
question arises: has it received its ultimate theological ex•• Ibid., p. 808.
60 Ibid., pp. 808 fl.
61 Ibid., p. 810.
•• Ibid.
63 Here
the examples of God's immutability and omnipresence are given. A
complete statement on the divine immutability is not possible unless it is realized
that God remains unchangeable in himself but actually becomes in the other ...
in the incarnation ( .. wirklich im andern wird) (emphasis original). Also, the
true character of the divine omnipresence is not revealed to us save in the fulfilment given by God's dwelling in Christ. Cf. p. 311 f.

.ANTHONY J. KELLY

pression? Does it resort all too easily to dialectic instead of
seeking a solution by deepening the categories already present
in the classic Thomistic scheme? In other words, is the above
approach, essentially, merely a more striking and appealing
statement of the problem rather than an attempt to give a
complete solution? For this, at least, we should be grateful. As
will be seen, my own approach will be developed more in the
direction of a deeper understanding of the available categories,
and, to that degree, I have no intention of passing final judgment on this theological development. I instance it for the
moment as a Catholic attempt to come to grips with a problem
more and more clearly perceived, and consequently I must
leave it at that for the time being, while I shall attempt to
develop some points in another direction.

*

*

*

*

*

It must be rather forthrightly stated as a first point that
Catholic theology, in the general tradition of St. Thomas, has
not felt the " remoteness " of God as much as its critics might
suppose. This is undoubtedly due in large part to the strong
account it gives of itself in the doctrine of the Missions. 54 In
the same breath, St. Thomas and his followers can state that
God is related to man only by a relationship of reason and that
the three Divine Persons are really communicated to the soul
in grace. 55 The "mission-schema" deeply affects the theology
of creation as wel1.56 As it lies there unexplained in the Summa,
St. Thomas's theology of the Trinity can indeed appear quite
•• Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 43. For profound commentaries on the whole doctrine,
see L. Chambat, Presence et Union. Les Missions des Personnes de la Sainte
Trinite selon St. Thomas d'Aquin (Abbaye Saint Wandrille, 1945); F. Cunningham,
The Indwelling of the Trinity. A Historico-doctrinal Study of the theory of St.
Thomas Aquinas (Dubuque, 1955).
55 Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 43, a. 2: " ... Unde missio et datio in divinis dicuntur
temporaliter tantum. Generatio et spiratio solum ab aeterno. Processio autem et
exitus dicuntur in divinis et aeternaliter et temporaliter: nam Filius ab aetemo
processit ut sit Deus; temporaliter autem ut etiam sit homo . . . vel ut sit
in homine secundum invisibilem missionem."
•• Ibid., q. 45, a. 5: " ... divinae personae secundum rationem suae processionis
habent causalitatem respectu creationis rerum."

GOD:

HOW NEAR A RELATION?

abstract and removed from the economia of Redemption. The
same goes for the" de Unitate Dei" which precedes the theology
of the Trinity. 57 Provided, however, that the schema is approached with synthetic intent and with a sympathy for what
Aquinas is actually getting at in his attempt to give an ordered
and intelligent introduction into the totality of revealed Truth,
it is not difficult to appreciate this classic approach as a
remarkable piece of constructive theology. Whatever the case,
it must be admitted that, even if the above remarks partially
explain the lack of sensitivity on the part of Thomists to the
theistic problems felt by the neo-classical approach, they do
not offer a solution. We might address ourselves more fundamentally to the problem by making the following points: I.
The problem of the different perspectives; II. The field of
analogy; III. The" relatio rationis ";IV. The Being of God.

I.

THE PRoBLEM OF THE DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES

It is worth stressing again that my intent is wholly positive:
I do not wish to attempt to directly refute the " neo-classical "
approach as Ogden has described it to us but only to accept
his implicit challenge to reactualize some of the true riches of
the classic and Thomistic affirmation of God. In a question of
this type different perspectives are to be expected. One point
of view can so impress itself on the objective account of a
particular theologian's affirmation of God that the result is at
best misunderstanding and at worst complete unacceptability.
This is brought out especially in the present case where Ogden
has above all in mind to establish some point of contact with
the contemporary mind through the use of the categories and
analogies that implicitly or explicitly it seemingly finds appealing. If this is a dominant motive with him, it could hardly be
expected that he is in a position to be struck with the full
depth and extent of the classic Thomistic approach. His
concern is not the immediate concern of the Thomist, with
•• See F. Bourassa, "Sur le Traite de Ia Trinite," GregOTianum 47 (1966),
!l85.

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ANTHONY J. KELLY

the latter's employment of the formal metaphysical categories
of substance, relation, etc. Does this mean, then, that the
confrontation of these two approaches devolves around only
semantic considerations? One instinctively feels that it is much
more, for, along with the motive affecting our style of presentation, there is the deep question of the whole personal stance
of each theologian approaching this question. This may not
find expression in his particular account of the divine Reality.
One must be alert to both a pre-understanding of what we
wish to give formal expression to and a pre-valuation of the
reality concerned. Let us consider briefly each of the components of the perspectives in which we approach this question of
God: 1) the motive that affects the theologian; 2) the preunderstanding that he enjoys of the divine Reality; 3) the
pre-valuation that axiologically orientates him one way or the
other.
1. The Motive.

The Thomistic approach has for its immediate motive understanding. The intellectual penetration of the divine Reality,
which is the " subiectum theologiae," 58 is the characteristic
action of the theologian. This radical intellectualism in theological procedure is based on the conviction that authentic
understanding is the surest road to affective progress and makes
for a ready and flexible expression of the object of theological
thought in accordance with the demands of a variety of circumstances. As it stands, however, the whole Thomistic system is
geared to intelligence, as act of the theologian in his contemplation of the revealed Mysteries, not to affective piety or
communication. 59 If it appears cold or abstract, and therefore
hyper-rational and inhuman, this is only because someone has
not yet realized that we must first affirm what really is the
58 Cf. R. Gagnebet, "Dieu, Sujet de la Theologie selon St. Thomas,"
Analecta
Gregoriana, 1954, pp. 41-55; also, M. D. Chenu, Toward Understanding St. Thomas

(Chicago, 1964), pp. 196; 301-!:110.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 2 (prologue); In I Sent., dist. 2, div. text.; In II Sent.,
prol.;

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case, what actually is, rather than express the divine Reality
in terms which happen to be the most compatible here and
now with our affective inclinations or most adapted to instant
communication. It refuses to allow the divine Reality to be
measured by the subjective capacity of our affections or our
capabilities in communication. This is not to say that the
Thomistic method has no time for nourishment of faith and
charity, with its icy intellectuality, or that it is not interested
in pastoral relevance. The reverse is true: because it wishes to
know the real God, to love the real Good, because it wishes
to have a real content in its communications, it adopts from the
beginning an intellectual standpoint which can certainly appear
overly detached and disinterested; but it suffers the danger of
giving such an impression out of respect for its motive, which is
to give an objective account of the divine Reality.
Is the object of the newer theism similar? There is undoubtedly a stress on intelligibility for the modem mind,
intelligible relevance, on presenting God as a credible ground
for hope, etc. It is too early to state, and certainly too rash
to suggest, that the neo-classical theory has sacrificed an ontic
statement for the sake of an affective and subjective stimulus
and easier communicability. Ogden most certainly does wish
to give a metaphysical account of what God is really like. 60
Nonetheless, perhaps a distracting element has entered into the
neo-classical position. Proponents of this theory wish to use
categories with which modern man is more familiar or that he
finds more appealing. This is, of course, laudable; but if a
rigorous critique has not been made on the objective grounds
of this topical appeal, confusion concerning the ultimately real
character of divine Reality must, seemingly, follow. Just because the contemporary mind is more at home with an existential account of reality interpreted in a broad evolutionary
and dynamic sweep, it does not necessarily follow that God is
actually like that. Because categories happen to be at this
moment more intelligible, it does not follow that they are more
•• Op. cit., especially pp. 44-70.

!l06

ANTHONY J. KELLY

apt. The only norm that governs our use of language and all
manner of conceptual tools for the affirmation of God must
surely be the divine Reality itself, what God really must be
like. Once we are on the road to affirming that, the language
of interpersonal involvement and symbol can be adapted for
affective expression and communication in our attempt to bring
out the personal relevance of such an objectively affirmed
Reality.
In brief, I suggest that, when the ontic stress of the Thomistic
method of affirming God is not fully appreciated, one cannot
expect that it is going to be credited with full marks. Further,
-though here I do wish to avoid too sweeping a statementbecause the neo-classical approach, as presented to us by
Ogden, tends to span the levels of ontic affirmation, affective
relevance, and intelligible communication, there is the appearance of a weakness built into this approach. These next two
points will partially clarify what has been said up till now.
2. Pre-understanding.

Obviously any hermeneutic of various systems of thought
must be at pains to come to grips with the pre-understanding
present in a given instance. This is especially important when
the issue in hand is one of considerable depth and complexity
and necessarily profoundly affects the subjectivity of those
involved. Often Thomism is analysed in its affirmation of God
merely on the merits of its objectively expressed concepts, e. g.,
when it happens that someone opens the Sumrrw. and naively
begins to expatiate on the contents without taking into account
the whole theological life that it comes from. New, the pre-understanding for the theologian of the classic Christian tradition
is surely that there is One God and that he is revealed to us in
Christ Jesus. At no juncture is God actually regarded as an
aloof Deity, even if the metaphysical moment in our affirmation
of the divine Reality does give rise to the employment of highly
abstract conceptual tools drawn from philosophical systems
that attempt to state the objectivity of the real. The concepts
that are used by the theologian in his effort to affirm correctly

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the Reality of God make no pretence of encapsulating the
Divinity. In the dynamism of our affirmation of God the mind
must yield to the darkness of the Res Divina, the One, Simple
Infinite Reality that God is.61 The very darkness and obscurity
into which the mind is drawn leads us to appreciate more fully
the concreteness of the historical facts in which God is revealed
to us: they stand before us in an historical originality and
spontaneity within the field of Absolute Ineffable Being that
has been affirmed of God through the formal metaphysical
categories. I have called this interplay of abstract and concrete
the formal and mysteric moments in our affirmation of the
Living God.62 This double moment arises from the special
pre-understanding we have of God as the Lord of Creation and
Salvation History. An influential Protestant theologian, W.
Pannenberg, stresses the concrete historical actuality of the
event of God's revelation of Himsel£.63 Though I cannot
endorse his position completely, I do feel that he exercises a
salutary influence in drawing attention to the event of Salvation
History that our conceptual knowledge must return to if it
is to attain to its most true affirmation of God. What we are
stressing here is, I feel, the noetic expression of what those
theologians already mentioned in more ontic terms with their
distinction between the "Eigenschaften Gottes" (Attributes)
and the " Verhaltensweisen Gottes" (Actual Behavior) .64
This being the case, I would think that the Thomistic approach is not given sufficient credit for its pre-understanding.
To sum up with regard to the second component of the perspective and, at the same time, acknowledging the danger of
oversimplification, it could be stated that the pre-understand61 Cf. De Div. Nom., c. Q, lect. 4; c. 7, lect. 4.
•• Cf. A. J. Kelly, "To know the Mystery: The Theologian in the Presence of
the Revealed God," The Thomist XXXII (1968), 40-47; 55-59.
•• Cf. Theology as History, ed. J. M. Robinson and J. B. Cobb (New York,
1967) . Special reference could be made to the opening essay by Robinson, " Revelation as Word and as History" (13-4Q), in which Pannenberg's approach is
sketched; and to Pannenberg's own essay. "The Revelation of God in Jesus of
Nazareth" (101-133).
•• Cf. M. Loehrer, op. cit., Mysterium Balutis II, pp. Q91-314.

ANTHONY J. KELLY

ing that should be taken for granted and accounted for is that
God is an Ineffable Personal Mystery. For the Christian theologian he is a Mystery of Love and, despite the absolute
intimacy of his communication, remains known as God, i. e.,
as the One who is accepted as being incomprehensible. No
word or concept will ever be adequate to express what God
truly is. The pre-understanding that is in operation behind the
structured affirmation of God in the classic and Thomistic
tradition teaches the theologian to regard God as an abiding
Mystery, dwelling in a darkness that is always beyond our
conceptual determinations. 65
This is a far cry from the neo-classical approach which sees
in human subjectivity, through the reformed subjectivist principle of Whitehead, 66 the paradigm case in the process of affirming the divine Reality. The Thomistic pre-understanding of
this whole problem would tilt the theologian in quite the
opposite direction: God is not immediately to be affirmed as
the image of man; rather, man must first assert the absolute
transcendance of God, and only then, with his eyes open to
the full scope of reality, is he in a position to qualify this basic
affirmation of the divine Transcendence by availing himself of
analogies, above all, those supplied by the being and life of
the human person. This point will be treated in a more detailed
fashion later. Suffice it to say that a conviction of the divine
Transcendence precedes the application of the various analogies; the reverse procedure, working through " self-contained "
analogies of the subjectivity of the human spirit, etc .., is in
danger of aprioristically constricting the absolute character of
the divine Reality within the imagined limits of the analogy
that is first employed. So much, for the moment, with regard
to the pre-understanding that can be assumed in the Thomistic
aproach to the affirmation of God.
65 Summa Theol., I, q. 12, a. 13, ad 1um:
"licet per revelationen gratiae in hac
vita non cognoscamus de Deo quid est, et sic ei quasi ignoto coniungamur. ... "
•• As cited and employed by Ogden, op. eit., p. 57.

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3. Pre-valuation.

This third component of the general perspective is possibly
the most important in our attempt briefly to indicate the
generally accepted Thomistic style of approach to this central
theological issue. It comes to this: my formal theological
approach to God does not demand of me an abdication of
my personal relationship with the divine Mystery, known and
lived through faith. On this level, God for me can only be
the Father revealing himself in Christ. This remains, in that
radical, transrational mysticism of faith, an experience that
axiologically conditions the whole conceptual structure of my
theological affirmation. The Living God, accepted in faith, is
a Presence for the Christian theologian which, obscurely experienced and unobjectifiable as it is, gives a non-conceptual
depth and dynamism to formal theological expression. Our
concepts live from this depth of personal presence. They have
an objective formal signification, but in the total meaning of
any theological statement a non-conceptual plus value must be
allowed for, arising from that personal communion that faith
brings about between God and the believing mind. A convenient way of saying this is to say that there is a personal
significance completing the formal signification of our theological statements and concepts. 67
Thus, my formal theological expression will presumably
indicate a drive toward objectivity in any assertions about the
divine Reality, a refusal to let God be measured by my own
subjective experience; but always present in such assertions
there is the consciousness (which I hesitate to call pre-theological) of the fact that God is personally related to me in the
community of believers in a way that engages the divine
Personal Freedom and elicits an authentic response from me as
an individual believer in the here and now of this instant of
the History of Salvation.

*

*

*

*

•• Cf. A. J. Kelly, op. cit., Part II, pp. 173-181.

*

ANTHONY J. KELLY

There, then, is a broad indication of what I consider the
general perspective of the Thomistic approach. To what extent
can I presume that this is shared by the neo-classical school?
With regard to the motive, some divergence has been noted:
regarding the pre-understanding, the primary conviction of the
utter transcendence of the divine Reality is not as strong, and
the pre-valuation may well be accepted as the same, depending
on one's theology of faith, and the place that that faith and
the life of grace plays in the processes of theological thought.
For the moment, however, it is sufficient to stress the perspective of the Thomistic approach, above all, to make theologians
of this tradition realize, on the one hand, the intellectuality of
the Thomistic approach, and on the other, the non-conceptual
depth that accompanies the thought of the Christian theologian.

II.

THE FIELD OF ANALOGY

I have no intention of giving here an exhaustive treatment
of the principles guiding the use of analogy. It will be of some
use at this juncture, however, to indicate the major features of
the dynamic field in which our analogies, as applied to God,
operate. I would suggest that the determining features of this
field can be reduced to two mutally conditioning points: 1)
God is anticipated as a personal subject by theological thought;
2) the divine Reality is anticipated as an absolute Reality.
I. When the mind seeks the ultimate explanation of the
universe in its total intelligibility, it is right for it to anticipate
that this ultimate intelligible ground of reality will be a subject.
This is so if only for the simple reason that in every act of
knowledge and willing we " come to ourselves " as a persistent,
unified consciousness implied in all our acts. It would hardly
make sense to such enquiring intelligences, enjoying such an
all-pervasive presence of self in all activities and related in
intersubjective communion with other such consciousnesses, if
the total intelligibility of reality could reside in anything else
but a transcendent subject, personal in its knowledge and love.
This intimate experience of self as an intelligent source of all

GOD:

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Ul

enquiry, experiencing, understanding, reflecting, and finally, of
committing oneself to reality through the act of judgment,
makes one anticipate a transcendent personal presence as the
deepest and most coherent source of the intelligibility of the
universe. One can put this another way in a more objective
idiom: the proofs for the existence of God, declaring the
presence of a transcending cause, necessarily include the recognition of the personal character of God because of the personal
"perfections" which the universe contains and which demand
explanation.
Such an anticipation of the Reality of the divine Subject is
more strikingly experienced by the theologian precisely in his
Christian capacity, for his whole theological thought has originated from the fruitful tension of his faith toward the God
who has revealed himself in Christ. God, as the object of faith
and as working that faith through the Spirit in the believer,
is, in a sense, experienced as the divine " Thou," a living,
Personal presence in one's life. Theology, springing from this
faith which alone puts the theologian in contact with the divine
revealed Reality, injects a vivid awareness of the Personhood
and subjectivity of the divine Reality which, in fact, may not
be objectivized until the very end of the theological process.
There are, nonetheless, clear grounds for seeing this anticipation
of the divine " relatedness" to us in the fact that theology is
" fides quaerens intellectum."
Hence God is anticipated as a uniquely personal Reality.
This anticipation gives shape and specification to our knowledge. Despite the abstract conceptualities that might necessarily be employed, and despite the ontic and even impersonal
character of some of the analogies that might be applied, our
theological thought and affirmations are polarized, in a very
definite way, by this anticipation of God as a Personal Reality.
Obviously, the neo-classical School has seen this very clearly. 68
2. The second feature of this dynamic noetic field in which
68 In its interpretation
of the divine Reality directly in terms of the existence
and actually of the human subject.

ANTHONY J. KELLY

our analogies operate is the anticipation of the divine Reality
as an absolute Reality. This demands from the beginning of
the theological process a consciousness of the surpassing
plenitude of the divine Reality necessarily eluding categorization within the limits of our experience. Our minds must necessarily be given over to the process of negation, of judging " This
is not God " where this means the conceptual construct that
is employed by the mind to affirm the transcendent Reality
of God. There results, indeed_, a darkness of thought before the
divine Reality, and a silence of word-there comes a point
when we can say no more about it. This is not necessarily some
profoundly mystical experience. It is rather a down-to-earth
recognition that we are truly endeavoring to affirm an absolute
Reality. While we speak of negation, darkness, silen<:e, etc.,
it must be noted that the whole direction of our thinking about
God, or better, our knowledge of him, remains wholly positive.
It is a directed darkness. It results in a great knowledge of
the Reality that God is.
Merely to call attention to this point is not enough. A
question arises in many forms as to why we should feel justified
in going beyond this or that attempt at conceptualizing the
Divinity. Basic reasons can be given: if God is absolute, then
the process of our knowledge must subject its performance to
this recognition. We might come to this theological conviction
by an ontic concentration on the proofs for the existence of
God, or through a transcendental analysis of our knowing and
willing which points to the implicit acceptance of an unlimited
absolute in our spirit-activity, and this remains to be adequately thematized. However we affirm the absolute character of the
divine Reality, we must take the word absolute literally: this
divine Reality is not limited in the manner of the realities
directly accessible to our experience. By definition, what is
absolute evades limitation and restriction and hence all adequate thematization by the human mind. This affirmation of
the absoluteness of the divine Reality is accompanied by the
experience of the self-transcending power of our knowing and
willing. These spirit-activities constantly surpass their own

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objective attainments. Thus, they are existentially indicating
a Reality which is beyond the present scope of our attainment
of reality. Though the Reality thus indicated is not attainable
in thematizable form at the present time and in the present
conditions of our spirit-activity, the presence of this fully:,-ufficient Reality is obscurely intimated to the mind through
the thematizations of finite reality that it has arrived at.
Hence, there is that Known-Unknown character of the Absolute
in its relationship to our minds. This springs from the affirmation of the necessary absoluteness of God coupled with the
experience of the self-transcendence of our spirit-activity in the
direction of the Absolute, which continually eludes objectification in terms of adequate conceptualization. The conjunction,
then, of the objective affirmation of the Absolute character of
the divine Reality and our subjective experience of self-transcendence towards it explains why the mind of the theologian
is necessarily restless in his knowledge and feels continually
compelled to go beyond the conceptualizations already arrived
at, however valid these might be. 69
In this way, what we have called the anticipation of the
absolute character of the divine Reality is borne out. We must
anticipate that God is not like this or that, not even like me
or it, since the absolute character of the divine Reality must
surpass the subjective-objective formulation we use in the
normal finite case. Rather, God is the supreme actualization of
all perfection, uniquely and concretely personalized in the
Being of God. He has everything that points in our experience
to the possibility of absolute concretization and nothing that
cannot be thus absolutely and unrestrictedly possessed.
Here is a sensitive point. On the one hand, we have God
anticipated as an eminent subject. On the other, we have this
anticipation of the absoluteness of the divine Reality. This
does not stop us from affirming consciousness of the divine
Reality as pertaining to the perfection of Being, but it does
prevent us from affirming that consciousness of God solely in
09 Cf. A. Kelly,

op. cit., pp.

50-55 and passim.

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ANTHONY J. KELLY

the tenns in which we experience it. We can objectively state
that God is the supreme Subject and as such is consciously
related to us. What we are not justified in doing is reading
into the divine Consciousness, in the sheer actuality of the
divine Existence, that subjective-objective polarity that characterizes our human experience of subjectivity. God is quite
simply above this distinction and contains, consequently, whatever of the actuality of existence we imply in making this
distinction. To turn the matter around the other way, we are
not justified in affirming the Reality of God merely in the tenns
of the subjectivity that we experience. Since we need both
polarizations to express our experience of reality, we need both
to express our affinnation of the fulness of the divine Reality.
We must avail ourselves of the whole scope of our knowledge of
reality if we are going to affinn God in the most real way.
Hence, I would feel that even such authors as Novak tend to
read too easily their own experience of subjectivity into the
divine Reality/ 0 even though he does valuable service to the
classic theistic approach in expressing it in such a relevant
and attractive manner. It is true that we experience the
totality of what is affinnable of God only within the polarities
of subject and object. Object in general tenns is a thematization of the universe of what really is, as "ob-jected," as up
against the knowing mind. The subject, the knower, let us say,
experiences an unrestricted openness to the whole scope and
span of what is, yet the attainment is necessarily so limited.
There _is not a complete correlation. It is as though the totality
of what is is broken by these two polarities. In the divine
Reality this is not the case. God simply is, not as subject and
object as we experience this division but in the one act of being
that includes what each member of this division has to include.
Since, however, we must talk of God in human tenns, we will
naturally avail ourselves of this division in the hope of bringing
out in the best possible way the fulness of the divine Actuality.
To sum up, the divine subjectivity is the specifically divine
7 ° Cf. M. Novak, Beliq and Unbelief.
A Philosophy of Self-Knowledge
1966), pp. 115-188 especially.

(London,

GOD:

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act of conscious Being, transcending our limited, human experience of subjectivity. Spontaneous religious language (that
which often passes for " mere metaphor ") has a good deal
to teach the theologian. It exhausts the whole of reality,
delighting in inter-subjectivity of communion, yet speaking of
God in language which most properly applies in inanimate
objects on occasion. God is said to be a rock, etc. Of course,
this points to a special type of divine subjectivity exercised in
man's regard, but it also hints at an instinct in the human
spirit that senses the special character of the divine subjectivity, transcending all our finite experiences of it.
The peculiarities of the special noetic field in which our
various analogies operate are these two features: the anticipation of God as an eminent subject, and the anticipation of God
as the genuine absolute. They do not cancel one another out,
as might be thought, but rather complement one another in
a unique fashion: the anticipation and objectivization of the
divine subjectivity is corrected by the anticipation and eventual
thematization of the general terms of the absolute character of
the divine Reality, and the anticipation of the divine absoluteness is complemented by the anticipation of the divine subjectivity, so that the mind will not be lead into a state of
noetic atrophy, before an infinite void, but be directed through
the obscurity of this knowledge to the darkness where the living
God truly dwells: Deo quasi ignoto coniungamur. 71
I have no doubt that Ogden and the tendency that he so ably
represents will (perhaps unwittingly) do the traditional classic
approach good service in stressing the anticipation of the divine
Reality as a unique subject. I feel that he has not adequately
taken account of the full noetic field and recognized the determining feature of anticipation of the divine absoluteness. The
next two sections will make this more clear, since they will
take us closer to the heart of the matter. It might be remarked
in passing that even the contemporary mind might find within
itself the resources to affirm the divine Reality if contemporary
71

Summa Theol., I, q.

a. 18 ad 1um.

ANTHONY J. KELLY

theologians stressed more the necessity of really anticipating
the absolute character of God instead of anticipating for the
contemporary mind the kind of God it feels most comfortable
with.
III.

THE " RELATIO RATIONIS " BETWEEN

Gon AND MAN

We must now attempt to deepen more adequately the notion
of God's relatedness to man and his world in the context of the
relatio rationis which Ogden has taken exception to. Here,
above all, it is necessary to be alive to the values that classic
Thomistic tradition wishes to stress.
It cannot be denied that classic theism, and Thomism in
particular, sees no possibility at all in there being any other
relation between God and the world than that of reason alone.
The pith of the argument lies in the absolute Is-ness of God,
the sheerly existent One. God cannot be said to acquire a new
real relationship to anyone or anything without thereby denying the ontic absoluteness of the divinity. This would mean a
further increment of actuality or perfection. By the same
token, the Deity cannot be thought of as totally relative to
reality " outside " itself as though God were some form of
subsisting transcendental relation in regard to the world. This
would mean that God was intrinsically constituted as an absolute Being by an essential relation to what-is-not-God. 72 To
the Thomistic theologian this would be nonsense.
Before going on with the discussion, two points can be conveniently made: 1) In this classical approach, we can readily
concede an ontic, objective concentration which has hitherto
left much that is of interpersonal and existential value unsaid.
There are many reasons why this might have been the case, and
we cannot go into them here. Suffice it to state the fact of the
matter.
In this whole discussion the category of relation is
not so easy to pin down. 73 Admittedly St. Thomas and his
•• See this argument as summarized by W. Kern, "God-World Relationship,"
Sacramentum Mundi II (London-New York, 1968), pp. 403-406.
•• Cf. J. De Finance, Connaissance de L'Etre (Paris, 1966), pp. 464-475.

GOD:

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217

followers have used this category in a very objective sense,
describing it from the instances of the reference of one object
to another by reason of quantity or cause-effect proportion. 74
Clearly the antic consideration has been primary, as the basic
analogue was isolated for the understanding of this " tenuissima
entitas." Hence, even at this early stage it is worth asking the
question: have the real possibilities of this category been fully
exploited; is the nature of relation exactly the same when
existing between two things as when existing between two
persons? If not, then already there is room for seeing a different
complexion on the question of the relationship of God to man.
Straight away, the term relationship of reason seems to be open
to a more realistic interpretation in terms of intersubjectivity.
This is a point which must be looked into more closely since it
promises to open the way to a broader sympathy with the neoclassical approach.
Let us, then, examine more deeply the meaning of the
relationship of reason that God has in regard to man and the
world. We can begin by asking just what are the real elements
in it.
1. The Real Relationship of Man to God.

Although it is clear enough that God does not actually
change and cannot, there is another side to the question that is
equally clear: the creature does change, viz., in its coming
into existence, in the development of its potential in life, in
the vital unfolding of its natural capacities. There is a further
radical transformation in the creature when man, the intelligent
and free agent, receives the free Self-Communication of God,
so that man becomes a new being in Christ. Thus, there is that
radical relationship of the creature to God as the sustenance
of its being whereby the creature is related to God as the
proper source of existence. (In this context it is sufficient to
draw attention to the completeness of the relationship of the
"' This is not to deny the role that Trinitarian theology had in developing the
philosophy of the relation.

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ANTHONY J. KELLY

creature to the Creator, leaving aside the more technical
questions of just what kind of real relationship this is, predicamental or transcendental, etc.). Also, the created person as a
recipient of God's free grace is related to God in a new way.
Man's specifically human existence is elevated by the gracious
activity of God, so that man really does share in the infinite
eternal life of the Trinity, thus coming into the possession
of a unique, freely-given fulfilment of creaturely existence.
Through the transformation of his psychology, man can now
commune through faith and love with the divine Persons in
the knowledge that the present obscurity and limitation will
pass in an eschatological consummation when he shall see God
as he is, in vision full and immediate.
This much, then, is obviously real in God's relationship to
man: he is related to us as Creator and Redeemer. This
implies that we are really related to him as the created and the
redeemed. In this relationship God penetrated the whole fabric
of our human existence as the creative sustenance of our being;
he freely intervenes in man's history, personal and public, as
a Saving Presence. Yet he remains related to us only by a
relationship of reason. It must, however, be stressed that we
would not speak of the relatedness of God to man in this way
unless first we recognized that God had freely related man to
himself. The mind sees this relatedness because God has made
the first move. It is not a figment or equivocation. God really
brings about the creatures relatedness to himself, and this is
a real relationship. The difficulty of the whole matter resides
in this, that God remains God throughout the whole process of
his communications. If he changed in communicating himself,
it would simply not be God who was giving himself-or existence--to creatures.
The real element in this interrelatedness existing between
God and man finds conscious expression in man, especially
when he has received Grace. 75 Man so graced, conscious of
his communion with the divine Persons, does not regard God
•• See W. Kern, op. cit., p. 404.

GOD:

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as related to him in a purely figmentative way, externally or
non-literally. 76 God is a living Presence for man, a Mystery in
which his life and fulfilment are involved. This Presence of
God to man is included in man's presence to himself and an
intelligent and free consciousness. God is, in this sense, apprehended as man's Mystery, a Presence in man's life and action,
the goal and Master of man's destiny. God is" related" to man
as total love, a love which calls, exacts, redeems, consoles and
judges, in the depths of man's conscious self. Man sees God as
eminently his God.
It could be objected that this apprehension of God's relatedness to man, based on man's real relatedness to God, is nothing
more than a mystical flight, a projection onto God of the
spontaneity and conditions of our own freedom whereas, in
fact, traditional theism holds that God does not change and
is not "involved." In answer it can be admitted that anthropological utterance is used quite freely of God in the language
of myth and religious symbol. There is a basic reality that
must not be forgotten, however. This is the real freedom of
God. It is certain that there is no real relation of God to man;
it is sure that the only relation we can admit is that of reason
alone. Notwithstanding, there is in God Himself a real divine
liberty which will be seen as another real dimension to this
" relatio rationis."
2. The Divine Freedom.

Included in our affirmation of God as the absolute Unconditioned is his freedom. He would not be God if he were
determined by necessity. God could not be made God by any
reality outside himself. Anything that exists apart from God
need not have been; God caused it to be. Man need not have
•• We can say God is literally related to the world, even if this does not mean
in exactly the same way as we are related to it. God is related to the world in
the way it is proper for him alone to be related to the universe. Hence I must take
exception with Ogden's use of this word: " ... The fully justified assertion that
God is not literally related to the world (if by "literal" is meant in the same way
as we are related to it) proves on examination to mean that he is literally not
related to it." (p. 50)

220

ANTHONY J. KELLY

been redeemed and restored; God exercised a gracious and
compassionate freedom in thus re-creating man. Admittedly,
our recognition of the freedom of God must necessarily be
qualified by an equally strong assertion about his immutability
which follows necessarily from the absolute character of his
existence. We say: God does not change, yet he is free.
Logically we are led to say that God did not suddenly get a
new idea with regard to the creation or the redemption of
man; he must have eternally intended it. Yet, conversely, he
could have eternally not intended it.
Now this brings us to a striking and relevant aspect of
God's freedom. As a freedom actually exercised in this concrete
" economia," it is backed by the absolute immutability of God.
We might be tempted to jump in immediately and say," There,
you see, God is eternally unchangeable, he is not really involved
after all." There is another view to the matter. God has
eternally chosen to be our God. Implied in God's loving and
wise intention that we should exist and commune with him is
the recognition that he is the God of our world and our history,
of this economy, despite the infinite number of possibilities
that were open to him. This is a process of thinking back into
God the value of these " contingent " events of our creation
and redemption, only to find oneself in the presence of a divine
liberty that has truly eternally committed itself to man, to
these men, to us sinners. God has eternally chosen to be our
kind of God; he has qualified himself in this way. In this
perspective it is hardly a daring statement to say that God
is freely and totally related to man, even though the term
" relation of reason " remains valid on its own level.
3. God's Relatedness to Man.

The qualification that must be added here is at once a
restriction and an intensification of God's relatedness to his
creatures. It is a restriction, because God is not related in a
new, real way to anything outside himself, because of the sheer,
all-exhausting act of existence that properly belongs to him.
God can in no way acquire a new foundation of relatedness in

GOD:

HOW NEAR A RELATION?

221

himself nor be specified by a reality outside himself, as has
already been said. That would destroy the very notion of the
absolute. At the same time, our qualification of the way God
is related to man results in our seeing it as a more intense form
of relatedness. If God is not really related to things outside
himself, and if he has freely committed himself from eternity
to this temporal scheme of creation and grace, does it not
follow that his relatedness to the creature is present in the
very relatedness of his own divine consciousness to his own
divine Reality? In short, God is related to the creature because
he is " related " to himself. This does indeed sound like a
casuistic conundrum, but a small amount of reflection will
reveal the startling reality of the situation. Usually, we express
this divine knowledge and love of God for the creature as
being performed "through himself," "in the divine Essence,"
or other such phrases. Whatever be the words chosen to
mediate this Mystery, the message is constant: the creature
is present to the Creator in the Creator's own presence to himself. God is related to the creature in experiencing his own
relatedness to himself, in his act of Existence. Thus the bond
of God's relatedness to man, in his concrete personality, life
and development, is nothing less than the totality of the divine
Reality itsel£.77
Still, it is only a " relation of reason." This can be recognized
as the expression of the mind's activity when it attempts to
designate the close, communal relatedness of God to man, and
vice versa, at the same time allowing for the absolute character
77 This naturally
means that the universe has its full reality only " in God,"
a reality it can only fully possess in eschatological hope when its deepest and
definitive actuality will be attained . . . though even then, it would seem, the
universe (and man) will have its deepest reality only " in God." This is a
challenging problem for a truly Christian eschatology. W. Kern (op. cit., p. 404)
has some extremely concise remarks on the point of the God-world relationship.
If I understand him correctly, I find myself in agreement with his general point
stressing the special character of this relationship, but I am loath to follow him
in his suggestion that God could be in a sense really related to the world, but in
a way excluding the world being the foundation of that relationship, since the
whole propriety of our philosophical language in this context would be threatened.
His stress on the freedom of God seems to support the line that has been taken here.

ANTHONY J. KELLY

of God as a member in this interrelatedness. All this points
to a reality latent in this expression, signifying God's real
nearness to man. Perhaps our treatment of this special relationship has not been sufficiently theological. It might be that
theology has been too easily influenced by the original philosophical models in understanding the application of this category of relation, e. g., spatial or qualitative proportions, interactions, etc. Perhaps our consideration should swing more to
the properly theological model that dominates all theological
reflection, the Incarnation itself. God, the Eternal Word, is
" subjected " to human life and history. Though he remains
changeless and absolute" within" the divine Reality, he makes
his own a thoroughly human history, in time, "outside" of
God. 78 This unique case shows the palpable historical actualization of something that has eternally happened within the
divine Reality where one all-embracing and all-exhausting Act,
in which God claims and possesses all that is, has been and will
be in the universe.
Admittedly, the Incarnation, as that transformative claiming
of the sacred humanity by the Eternal Word, is the extreme
case. For all that, it seems to accord with the Pauline sweep
of theology to see it as the paradigm from which we can
understand the extent of God's relatedness to man. More than
anything else, it dramatically presents the theologian with the
deep reality of God's concern for man and his world. The
weak designation, relatio rationis, unable to convey the personal involvement of God in man's fate, must be used in its
right place as an accurate designation. But it must not be
78 Theologians, such as K. Raimer, W. Brugger, F. Malmberg, have been working
on this important question. To what extent God changes in the other, in being
subject to human history and the modes of operation of an individual humanity,
is surely one of the biggest Christological questions at the moment. The greater
or lesser reality that one sees in " God changing in the other " will influence the
whole of the present question. At present I must be content with stressing the
divine Actuality as inclusive of the reality of creation in the divine freedom to
such an extent that God is really indicating his actual reality when he " subjects "
himself to humanity in the Incarnation. The question of the degree of type of
change must be left open for the moment.

GOD!

HOW NEAR A RELATION?

allowed to weaken our grasp of the utterly total and personal
relationship that God enjoys with regard to man.
After attempting to give some indication of the real meaning
hidden in the weak and possible misleading term, " relation
of reason," we are now in a position to give a more positive
statement about the Reality of God as it is known by us.
IV.

THE BEING OF Gon

The impression that the traditional affirmation of God as
Esse Subsistens makes on much of the contemporary theological
and philosophical mind is easy enough to ascertain. So often it
is characterized as impersonal, abstract, and, of course, all too
static. It is hard enough, however, to counteract this impression, should one wish to do so. Naturally we would be expected
to say that it has been misunderstood, or that it must be
reinterpreted along more dynamic lines. One finds it difficult
to make any blanket assertion of how the theologians of a
past age actually interpreted, for themselves, this formula.
The existential depths of their language will, in the main,
probably have to be their own secret, since they were not
concerned to express the values that appeal to us of a later
age. It is, therefore, of greater importance for us to interrogate
ourselves on the meaning we see in this simple phrase, Esse
Subsistens. This in turn depends largely on what we mean by
is: Is it just a logical figment? An empirical recognition that
such and such is the case? Or does the word "is" indicate
what we understand by an intuition into the deepest actuality
of reality? These are big questions. Let us content ourselves
with just noting a few points in this vital area.
I. Following the indications of St. Thomas 79 we are lead to
see for ourselves that the "is-ness" of a being is the radical
actualization of all its reality. It is the fundamental en-actment
of all the formal components of the being in question. The
recognition of this leads us to see our activity of stating in
70 Summa Thool., I, q. 8, a. 1: "Esse est illud quod magis intimum cuilibet et
quod profundius omnibus inest, cum sit formale respectu omnium quae in re sunt."

ANTHONY J. KELLY

word and mind the existence of a being as staking out the
claim of this concrete existent in the universe of what really is.
In affirming that this is, we recognize the originality of the
existent as something which occupies a unique place in the
whole span of reality. This recognition of the existence of
something is an appreciation of the quite special character
of individual things as they are confronting us, uniquely themselves, possessing in themselves through their act of existence
a unique enactment of perfection. 80
When we affirm God as lpsum Esse, what, then, are we
doing? It appears that the theologian is affirming of God, in
a shorthand way, all the radical energy, originality, spontaneity
and charm that he has encountered in existence on the level
of creation. It is not as though we are assigning God to a
characterless void, for we look to a supremely perfect concretization of existence, the radical perfection that has been
grasped in reality. It is not as though an addition sum is
being done of all the perfections, in their various grades, and
then designating God as the possessor of the whole lot as we
have come to know them. What we are doing is more akin to
"allowing for," within the divine Reality, a transcendent
totalization of the perfection of existence as we have come to
know it. Further, this formal, metaphysical "making allowance for " a perfect totalization of existence is in the concrete,
because of the actuality of God known in the history of salvation, given an even more personal, free, and determined dimension. In other words, the ideas we might form of the positive
plenitude of the divine existence in its sheer actuality must be
completed by that specially concrete revealed knowledge we
have of God as the Trinity and of God as an eternal, free
Self-communicating Mystery. The theologian must allow for
all this in the ultimate act of existence that is God. Salvation
History, presenting us with the personal presence of God in our
midst, brings us ultimately to a more concrete, if more mysteri8 ° Cf. C. Fabro, La Notione metafisica de Partecipazione secondo S. Tommaso
d'Aquino (Milan, 1989), pp. 185-188.

GOD:

HOW NEAR A RELATION?

ous, affirmation of the divine Act. Thus, the divine Act of
existence is recognized as not merely the source and sustenance
of human and worldly existence but as the originating source of
salvation itself. There is no need, then, for this term, Ipsurn
Esse Subsistens, to be in any wise an untheological, abstract,
or static expression. There are still some considerations that
might make this more clear.
3. A remark on the terminology of rnixed and pure perfections might be helpful. It is very easy to isolate these two
types of perfections too much. Mixed perfections as applied to
God, e. g., God " hearing," experiencing some emotion, etc.,
are so designated in a convenient enough manner to indicate
a special effect in the range of the divine activity which, it is
assumed, can eventually be reduced to more objective and
dispassionate language. For instance, God " hearing " man's
plea for redemption is translated into the more objectively
theological language of God's election and foreknowledge implementing the design of salvation. Be that as it may, we should
not fail to notice that the attribution to the Divinity of these
mixed perfections, even though we might know that, in fact,
God does not possess them, is an expression of a richly symbolic
knowledge of the divine Reality. It indicates a non-conceptual
and concrete attainment of the meaning of the Divinity which
cannot be adequately objectivized. There is a splendor or
radiance about the divine Actuality as it comes into our knowledge which a purely conceptual designation cannot express. All
this goes to stress that it is rnan, not a detached mind, that is
grappling with the knowledge of God. There is a charm and
appeal about the divine Being that is too concrete for the
necessarily abstract, formal processes of objectivization. Hence,
the theologian must be ready to recognize a real, concrete
sense of God in the use of symbol and metaphor which are able
to bring home to man as a totality the reality of the absolute
Being of God in his concern for man.
In this context, a brief remark about the temporality of God
might be made. If the traditional theistic approach ever attributed temporality to God, it would be surely on the plea of

ANTHONY J, KELLY

its being a " mixed " perfection and, therefore, could fit into
metaphorical language about God in the sense of the above
paragraph. We certainly do speak of time in God in an anthropomorphic manner. The point at issue here is: is there any
sense in which temporality could be attributed to God absolutely, as something akin to the "pure perfections "? Every
orthodox theist must certainly fail to see how there can be
succession or development in the sheer actuality of the divine
Being. There is room for closer study on this point. If temporality can really be expressed in terms of pure perfection, as not
essentially implying limitation, progress, transition from not
having perfection to having it, then there is nothing to stop
anyone from attributing this kind of temporality to God. If
the existential concept of temporality, drawn from a reflection
on the actuality of human existence, is, as applied to God,
nothing but an attempt to point to the ever complete actuality
and the continuous self-originating and self-possession of the
divine existence in which God is always actually appropriating
his Being and his Selfhood, then it could be said that the
divine existence might fittingly enough be expressed in terms of
absolute or primal time. Eternity would meaningfully appear,
not so much as a static" Now" but as a divine time in which
God is ever actually possessing himself and all else in himself.
Human time would then appear as a weak sharing in the
abounding originality of the " divine " time.
On the other hand, if temporality means subjecting God in
his absolute actuality to some form of development in our
theological affirmations, I cannot see how real temporality
could be attributed to the divine Reality. So much for this
brief remark.
To return to the main point: the designation of God as
" lpsum Esse " can be understood to be a supremely vital and
complete affirmation. No one presumably is under the delusion
that he can express fully what God is but through this expression we say that God is the infinite Actuality, in a sense,
"situated" by man's experience of this actuality within the
limits of corporeal and historical existence. No one is saying

GOD:

HOW NEAR A RELATION?

that God is abstract because our concepts are abstract, but
it is affirmed that the realities that these concepts seek to
express are now actually in God. To appreciate this as fully
as possible, the mind must recollect itself in an experience of its
own actuality, in its attainment of being. In the experience of
this attainment, and of presence to self necessarily involved,
the human person comes to recognize that what is, being, is not
a vague abstraction but reality intuited in all its personal
warmth, with all its subtle colorations and textures, in the
special charm of spontaneity and in the singular originality of
existence. Such a " notion " of being, as the actualization of
" omnia quae in re sunt," 81 is used in our affirmation of God
as the all-perfect act of Being. In speaking of God in this way
we are not contracting the divine Reality to the limits of our
own attainment of reality, rather, we are pointing to the concretization of an infinite Actuality which remains merely situated for us by our experience of reality through our natural
and supernatural capacities. Revelation does not add new
thoughts to this kind of knowledge but gives us a deeper and
more concrete insight into the implications of our basic affirmation that God is, perfectly and infinitely.

*

*

*

*

*

SuMMARY:

In indicating these few points of just how concrete our
affirmation of the Being of God is, the question can be asked,
do we to a large extent transcend the problematic of the
God-world relationship? One is inclined to answer in the
affirmative. Since God is affirmed from "within " our existence,
the Reality of God is asserted from the fact that our existence
is " given "-by God in its concrete historical form. God so
affirmed is our God, freely though eternally committing himself. To realize the reality and the concreteness of our affirmation of God as lpsum Esse is to realize his complete relatedness
to us.
81

Summa Tkeol., loc. cit.

ANTHONY J. KELLY

We arrived at this point by taking up, first of all, two noetic
considerations: I. the Perspective, and II. the Field of Analogy.
In these two points we stressed the interrelatedness that was
assumed at the beginning of the theological quest, yet showed
how the anticipation of the divine subjectivity was necessarily
corrected by a correlative anticipation of the divine absoluteness. We then took up the reality implied in the relatio rationis,
the God-universe relationship, and the inspection of this led us
to make the final remarks on the actual Being of God. Indeed,
God as we know him, is for-us, though we have no need to
lessen his absoluteness nor his freedom in stating that.
CoNcLusioN:

I must admit that this has not been so much dialogue as
self-examination induced by the stimulating work of the neoclassical school as brought to my attention, above all, by
Schubert Ogden. Much remains to be said in the line of fruitful
dialogue since here our treatment is rather lopsided. My main
conclusion would be that the " relatio rationis " as applied to
God in his relationship with the universe is not as extrinsic or
existentially unappealing as it might seem. I have given my
reasons at some length, but they reduce to the real relatedness
that God brings about in the creature through the free but
eternal exercise of his freedom. By this he makes himself
eminently the God of our Universe, " our kind of God." For
this reason, the name " relatio rationis " might well be replaced
by the term "relationship of intersubjectivity" in certain contexts, once the basic metaphysical contours of the question are
established. (One might hazard, "relatio conscientiae personbring
alis ") . Whatever words one uses, one must attempt
out the reality that is implied here without destroying one term
of the relationship, namely God, in his absolute fulness of
Being.
Such are the general lines of the approach. There are many
points that need clarification. I am grateful ior the stimulus

GOD:

HOW NEAR A RELATION?

that the neo-classical theologians offer in their application of
"Process Theology'' to the Being of God; but in the end, I feel
we must
for no matter how intelligently this theocy
has been put forward, or how sensitive it is to the values of
contemporary theology, it remains an anthropomorphism, however finely drawn.
ANTHONY

St. Mary's Seminary
W endouree, Victoria
Australia

J. KELLY, c. ss. R.

THOMAS AQUINAS AND ANALOGY: A TEXTUAL
ANALYSIS

W

HATEVER PARTICULAR claims or assertions a
philosopher or philosophical tradition may wish to
make, what is unqualifiedly affirmed in the very
endeavor of philosophy is inward or mental experience; and
" spoken words are the symbols of mental experience." 1 Speech
and mental experience or understanding would seem to be
inseparable. The philosopher's inquiry into the whole invariably leads, then, to an inquiry into language.
By looking directly at whatever presents itself in our familiar world,
at things and their properties, at human affairs and actions, we
run the risk of being blinded, as do people who observe the sun
during an eclipse if they do not look at its image on some watery
surface .... To avoid being " blinded " Socrates thought he had to
" take refuge in spoken words " . . . in exchanging questions and
answers with himself and with others and in them search for the
truth of things. 2

Philosophers whose conceptions of human speech and understanding are as divergent as Heidegger's and Aristotle's still
concur in the centrality of language for man. Aristotle defines
man as a living being possessing speech, and Heidegger asserts
that:
To be a man is to speak . . . in his profound essence he is a
speaker, the speaker. That is his distinction and at the same time
his burden. It distinguishes him from stones, plants, animals, but
also from gods.3
1 Aristotle, On Interpretation, I. 16"8, tr. E. M. Edghill, in The Basic Works of
Aristotle, ed. Richard McKeon (New York: Random House, 1941).
• Jacob Klein, "Aristotle, An Introduction," in Ancients and Modems, ed. Joseph
Cropsey (New York: Basic Books, 1964), p. 56.
8 Martin Heidegger, An Introduction to Metaphysics, p. 69.

230

THOMAS AQUINAS AND ANALOGY:

A TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

For Aristotle and Aquinas, to " take refuge in spoken words "
is to take refuge in the power of human language to translate
the language of the things themselves and thus to symbolize
the mind's experience of the whole. This power of language is,
in part, the power of analogous signification. Analogy, briefly,
is the dilation of the focus of our meanings and words beyond
their original concrete matrix. Without analogy, names would
be but serial numbers stamped upon the objects of our experience and designating no more than the sequence in which we
encountered them. Embedded so deeply in the fabric of man,
analogy, it seems, is a" mystery" in the sense of an inexhaustible source of concrete problems. This is to say that analogy
itself is analogous, i. e., subject to a variety of formulations
all of which bear upon the mysterious issue involved, none of
which, however, fully embody it. Our discussion, then, in
focusing upon the Thomistic doctrine of analogy, necessarily
lays no claim to an explanation of analogy as such but rather
seeks only an accurate explication of but one traditional (i.e.,
the Thomistic) formulation of the problem, or " mystery " as
we have defined it, of analogy.
The Thomistic doctrine of analogy has been handed across
the centuries nestled for the most part in the largely unquestioned categories of Thomas's commentator, Cardinal
Cajetan, Thomas De Vio (1468-1584). Recently, however, the
accuracy and authority of Cajetan's interpretation of Thomas
on this point have been as widely disputed as they were once
accepted. Therefore it seems that we must initiate our discussion either by validating the position of Cajetan or by prying
the Thomistic doctrine free from a regrettable distortion of
long standing. In either case we must see what it is that
Cajetan maintains Thomas to be saying.
Cajetan constructs his interpretation of St. Thomas around
an early text in the Commentary· on the Sentences of Peter
Lombard (1254-56), which text reads as follows:
Something is predicated analogously in three ways. First, it may be
predicated according to intention alone and not according to its
being (secundum intentionem tantum, et non secundum esse).

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

This happens when one intention is referred to several things
according to a priority and posteriority, and yet this single intention
really exists only in one thing. Thus, the intention of health is
referred to animal, urine, and diet in different ways, according to
a priority and posteriority, but not according to a different being,
because health exists only in an animal. The second of these is
analogy according to being but not according to intention (secundum esse et non secundum intentionem) .
This occurs when several things are equally matched in the intention of some common note even though that note does not have
a being of one and the same sort (esse unius rationis) in each of
them. An instance of this is that all bodies are made equal in the
intention of "body." As a result the logician, who considers only
intentions, says that this term " body " is predicated univocally of
all bodies. In reality, however, this nature exists with a being of a
different sort in corruptible and incorruptible bodies. Thus, in the
eyes of a metaphysician or a philosopher of nature, who consider
things according to the being they have, neither body nor any other
term is predicated univocally of corruptible and of incorruptible
things, as is clear from words of the Philosopher and of the
Commentator in the fifth text of the tenth book of the Metaphysics. The third of these is analogy according to intention and
according to being (secundum intentionem et secundum esse).
And this is when they are equally matched neither in a common
intention nor in being. Thus being is predicated of substance and
of accident. Of such things the common nature will have some
being in each one of the things of which it is predicated, but it
will differ because they are of greater or lesser perfection. Similarly,
I maintain that truth and goodness and the like are predicated
analogically of God and of creatures. This means that according
to their being (esse) all these things exist in God and in creatures
according to their greater or lesser perfection. From this it follows
that, since they cannot exist according to the same being iii both,
they are diverse truths (diversae veritates) .4

Thomas's threefold division stated above (secundum intentionem tantum, et non secundum esse; secundum esse et non
secundum intentionem; secundum intentionem et secundum
esse) forms the structure of Cajetan's treatise D e nominum
analogia (1498) and these become Cajetan's analogy of attri1

Thomas Aquinas, I Sent., d. 19, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1.

THOMAS AQUINAS

AND ANALOGY;

A TEXTUAL

ANALYSIS

233

bution, analogy of inequality, and analogy of proportionality,
respectively.
'Cajetan's analogy of inequality, intended to parallel
Thomas's analogy secundum esse et non secundum intentionem,
finds the following definition in Cajetan's treatise:
Things are said to be analogous by analogy of inequality if they
have a common name, and the notion indicated by this name is
exactly the same but unequally participated in.5
According to Cajetan, analogy of inequality, the predication
of a generic (or specific) concept of its inferiors, is not analogy
at all, except by an abusive extension of that term.
Cajetan defines analogy of attribution, paralleling analogy
secundum intentionem tantum et non secundum esse, as
follows:
Analogous by attribution are those things which have a common
name, and the notion signified by this name is the same with
respect to the term but different as regards the relationship to
this term.6
While Cajetan recognizes the logical usage and validity of
analogy of attribution, he denies that it can have any metaphysical or religious application whatsoever. Consequently,
analogy of attribution is not analogy properly so-called; for
analogy, as Cajetan interprets it, is a metaphysical doctrine.
That is to say that what is common to or shared by the diverse
analogues is intrinsic to their existence. When formally considered, analogy of attribution is for Cajetan always extrinsic,
as is clear from the first of his four criteria of analogy of
attribution: " so that only the primary analogate realizes the
perfection formally, whereas the others have it only by extrinsic
denomination." 7 Cajetan rejects altogether intrinsic attribution; for it implies necessarily some intrinsic common formal
causes. 8 Thomas's bifurcation of analogy into analogia multor• Cajetan, DtJ nominum analogia, n. 4.
• Ibid., n. 8.
7 Ibid., n. 10.
8 Ibid., n. 11.

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

um ad unum and analogia unius ad alterum, to be found
throughout Thomas's writings, 9 appears in De nominum analogia as analogia duorum ad tertium and analogia unius ad
alterum, both subdivisions of analogy of attribution. 10
Finally, concerning analogy of proper proportionality, corresponding to analogy secundum intentionem et secundum esse.
Cajetan says:
We say that analogous by proportionality are called those things
which have a common name, and the notion expressed by this name
is proportionally the same. Or to say the same in a different way,
analogous by proportionality are called those things which have
a common name, and the notion expressed by this name is similar
according to a proportion.U

Cajetan identifies this third division of analogy, i.e .., secundum
intentionem et secundum esse, with the analogy of proportionality presented by Thomas in his De veritate (H256-59):
Consequently it must be said that knowledge is predicated neither
entirely univocally nor yet purely equivocally of God's knowledge
and ours. Instead, it is predicated analogously, or in other words
according to a proportion. Now an agreement according to proportion can be of two kinds. According to this, two kinds of community can be noted in analogy ... The first kind of agreement is
one of proportion; the second of proportionality .... 12

The example cited in both texts (i.e., I Sent., d. 19, q.
a.
ad 1 and De v'erit., q. a. 11) is that of "sight" said analogously of both corporeal and intellectual vision. " Proportionality " is chosen over and against " proportion " since the latter
entails a determinate relationship between the analogue, which
simply does not obtain outside of the category of quantity.
Further, in discerning between proper proportionality and improper proportionality (metaphor), Cajetan explains how
proper proportionality is had: " For instance, principle can be
predicated of the heart with respect to an animal and of a
• Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 5; De Pot., q. 7, a. 7; I Cont. Gent., c. 34.
°Cajetan, op. cit., n. 17.
11 Ibid., n. 23.
10 De Verit., q. 2, a. llc.
1

THOMAS AQUINAS AND ANALOGY:

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285

foundation with respect to a house." 13 Proper proportionality
entails a real perfection intrinsic to each analogue, whereas
improper proportionality or metaphor requires no such intrinsic
reality. Finally, Cajetan considers proper proportionality to
be the only valid form of analogy for metaphysical and religious
discourse. 14
(1) because it arises from the genus of inherent formal causality,
for it predicates perfections that are inherent to each analogate, 14 a
[and] (2) because only terms which are analogous by this type of
analogy are called analogous by the Greeks, from whom we have
borrowed the term. 15

So far as Cajetan is concerned, then, proportionality alone is
truly and properly analogy "as we have learned from the
Greeks," 16 and the movement from analogy of inequality to
analogy of attribution and finally to analogy of proper proportionality is a movement from the " less properly analogous to
those which are truly analogous." 17
Although the tri-partite division of analogy cited and discussed above is to be found but once in the entire corpus of
Thomas's writings, Cajetan and his numerous adherents attempt to correlate and reconcile every other analogy text with
it (i.e., I Sent., d. 19, q. '?l5, a. fl, ad 1). For example of how
Cajetan deals with other and seemingly discrepant texts, we
may cite one of the many texts in which Thomas divides
analogy two ways into multorum ad unum and unius ad

alterum:
Therefore it must be said that these names are said of God and
creatures in an analogous sense, that is, according to proportion.
Now names are so used in two ways: either according as many
things are proportionate to one, for example healthy is predicated
of medicine and urine in relation and in proportion to health of
Cajetan, op. cit., n. 26.
Ibid., n. 27.
14 • Ibid., n. 26.
15 Ibid., n. 28; cf. n. 2 and cf. Aristotle, Ethics, I, 7.
16 Cajetan, op. cit., n. 2.
18

14

17

Ibid.

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

a body, of which the former is the sign and the latter the cause:
or according as one thing is proportionate to another, thus healthy
is said of medicine and animal, since medicine is the cause of
health in the animal body. And in this way some things are said of
God and creatures analogically, and not in a purely equivocal nor
in a purely univocal sense. For we can name God only from
creatures, as was said above. Thus, whatever is said of God and
creatures, is said .according to the relation of a creature to God as
its principle and cause, wherein all perfections of things pre-exist
excellently .18
Cajetan reads this entire passage as an explication of his own
category of analogy of attribution, of which " multa . . . ad
unum " and " unum ... ad alterum " are subdivisions; 19 and
it is in this fashion that this passage has been read for centuries.
Further, in his commentary on the above passage, Cajetan
distinguishes names said of God and creatures from instances
of analogy of attribution:
But there is similarity in the fact that analogy belongs to either
thing by reason of an order obtaining between two things, although
differently in each case. For between God and the creature there
is a formal imitative similarity (similitudo formalis imitativa)
(which is touched upon in the text when creatures are said to be
ordered to God as to their cause, in which all perfections pre-exist):
between a healthy animal and urine, however, there is not similarity
but a relationship of signification (relatio significationis). Thus in
the former there is an analogical community according to formal
predication, while in the latter there is a community of attribution
to one thing according to whatever predication, either extrinsic or
intrinsic. 20
The distinction drawn between " similitudo formalis " and " relatio signi:ficationis " underscores the point made earlier-that
for Cajetan analogy is properly metaphysical rather than
semantic or logical. Cajetan finds the following article of the
same question congenial as well to his own insistence that all
analogates are to possess intrinsically and " formaliter" the
perfection predicated analogously of each.
Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 5c.
Cf. ibid., nn. 9, 18.
•• Cajetan, Commentaria in Summam theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 5, n. xiv.

18

19

THOMAS AQUINAS

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ANALYSIS

287

However, as was shown above, names of this sort are predicated
of God not only as cause but also properly. For when God is called
good or wise, this signifies not only that he is the cause of wisdom
and goodness but also that these perfections exist in him in a
higher way. In light of these considerations, then, it must be
maintained that, as far as the reality signified is concerned (ad rem
significatam), these predications are made antecedently of God
rather than of creatures because perfections of this sort flow from
God to creatures. As far as the imposition of the name is concerned
(ad impositionem nominis), however, creatures are named first,
because we know them first. Therefore they have a way of signifying which befits creatures as has been said above. 21

With respect to the above distinction between " ad rem significatam " and " ad impositionem nominis," the whole weight of
Cajetan's interpretation comes down upon the " res significata,"
the common or participated intrinsic perfection threading each
of the analogates to each other, rather than upon the "modus
significandi," a logical or semantic question.
Summarily, then, at the structural center of Cajetan's interpretation of Thomas on analogy is the tripartite division of
analogy in the Sentences, the third member of which is
identified with the analogy of proportionality treated in De
veritate, q. 2, a. 11. Central as well is the focus upon the
" res significata," i. e., the assumption that analogy is properly
metaphysical.
Cajetan's position has not been without its critics, notably
Sylvester of Ferrara and Francis Suarez; but until recently, his
adherents have easily out-numbered and out-published his
opponents. Although our full criticism of Cajetan's position
will take the form of a positive counter-proposal, several brief
points might well be raised and levelled against Cajetan here.
First, Cajetan's acceptance of the tri-partite division of
analogy in the Sentences as normative seems hardly tenable
textually. This division occurs only once in Thomas's writings 22 and can hardly be taken as a formal division of an:tlogy.
n Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 6.

•• Cf. Ralph Mcinerny, The Logiv of Analogy (The Hague, 1961), p. 96.

238

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

This is Mcinerny's conclusion in what is an impressively
thorough and careful analysis of Thomas's analogy texts. Concerning this tri-partite division, Mcinerny comments:
We are reading the present text as presenting, not a division of
the analogy of names, but as pointing out that the foundation of
analogous names is not always the same. In such .an example as
'healthy,' that from which the name is imposed has existence in
only one of the things named by it. Various references or propositions to that in which sanitas exists are the foundation for the
extension of the word sanum. In the second division we were
apprised of a remote and proper way of looking at things. These
different vantage points give rise to the univocity and analogy with
respect to the same name and the same thing named by it. In
the third division, we are told of analogous names which are so
founded that that from which the name is imposed exists in each
of the things named analogously but ' secundum rationem maioris
et minoris perfectionis.' 28
Second, Cajetan's reduction of all proper analogy to analogy
of proportionality as discussed in De veritate, q. 2, a. 11 has
been widely and variously criticized. Cajetan himself, as noted
earlier, points to Greek usage and to the possession of intrinsic
perfection " formaliter " in accounting for his position. Cajetan
fails to recognize that Thomas used the term " analogia "
differently than the Greeks used ava'Aoy£a and that thus no
one-to-one correspondence is possible between the two terms. 24
" St. Thomas makes the phrase ' secundum analogiam ' common
to every nonchance equivocation, something Aristotle does not
do with the phrase Kar' ava'Aoytav." 25 Also, while both Klubertanz and Montagnes conclude that proportionality as proposed
in the De veritate was for Thomas a temporary and isolated position to which he never again returned, 26 Mcinerny maintains
that there is no conflict between the proportion of the Summa
•• Ibid., pp. 122-3.
•• Cf. ibid., p. 35.
•• Ibid., p. 94.
•• Cf. George P. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy (Chicago, 1960),
pp. 86, 94, 97; and Bernard Montagnes, La Doctrine De L'Analogie De L'etre
D'ap1'es St. Thomas D' Aquin (Lorwain, 1963), pp. 65-66.

THOMAS AQUINAS

AND ANALOGY:

A TEXTUAL

ANALYSIS

9l89

theologiae and the proportionality of the De veritate. 27 In De
veritate, Thomas distinguishes between proportion and proportionality only after stating: " Consequently it must be said
that knowledge is predicated neither entirely univocally nor yet
purely equivocally of God's knowledge and ours. Instead, it
is predicated analogously, or in other words according to a
proportion." 28 This appears to be in perfect harmony with the
Summa where Thomas speaks of names common to God and
creatures in terms of a proportion of one to the other. 29 In
either instance God's knowledge is known and named from
ours. " Proportion " in the Summa, it seems, extends to both
determinate and indeterminate proportions, whereas the point
of the distinction drawn in the De veritate seems to be to
state explicitly that between some things named analogously
there is a determinate relation, while between others not; and
yet that in both cases the one is known and named from the
other. Thus, contrary to Cajetan's interpretation, the text of
the De veritate does not deny that there is a proportion
" unius ad alterum " in the names common to God and
creatures. In fact, the two-fold division (unius ad alterum /
multorum ad unum) is reiterated in the reply to the sixth
objection of the same article. Thus Mcinerny's conclusion
appears sound:
What St. Thomas is stressing in the De veritate is that this
proportion or relation is indeterminate; it is not determinate as if
by moving from our knowing we could know what God's knowledge is.30
What St. Thomas is after in the De veritate is the recognition that
such a proportion does not put us in possession of determinate
knowledge about God. 31

Regardless of whether one accepts the conclusion of Klubertanz
and Montagnes, or that of Mcinerny, Cajetan's position is
Cf. Mcinerny, op. cit., p. 85.
De Verit., q. a. llc.
29 Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 5c.
•• Mcinerny, op. cit., p. 88.
81 Ibid., p. 90.
27
28

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

rendered untenable. It seems rather clear that Cajetan's own
independent thought and writing intrudes itself between
exegete and text so that "Cajetan becomes, on the matter of
analogy, not so much a commentator who wants to understand
the text before him, as an author who sees the text in the
light of his own independent work." 32
Third, the cardinal presupposition of Cajetan-that the analogy of names is a metaphysical doctrine-is the most fundamental focus of recent criticism. While Cajetan clearly creates
the impression that possession of the analogous perfection
" formaliter " is constitutive of the analogy of names, Thomas
leaves no doubt that a name could be analogously common to
God and creature even if it were intended to signify only
"causaliter." 33 Cajetan's position seems irreconcilable with
what appears to be a formal statement of Thomas on analogy:
" when something is analogously predicated of many things,
that from which the others are named is found properly only
in one thing." 34 Thus it would seem that intrinsic versus
extrinsic denomination would be accidental to the analogy of
names as such. 35 In fact, to be named analogously would
always be an extrinsic denomination. Mcinerny concludes
that:
The phrase ' illud invenitur secundum propriam rationem in uno
eorum tantum ' has nothing to do with possessing the perfection
intrinsically. To say that among things called healthy, only animal
can be so denominated from a perfection intrinsic to it, is to
say more than is said when we are told that animal, urine and food
are called healthy analogically. Whether this ontological situation
holds or not, all the rules given for the analogy of names are valid
and unchanged. We cannot argue from the fact that things are
named analogically to one ontological situation or the other, for
what they have in common is to be named analogically-not to be
this way or that but to be named in this way. 36
•• Ibid., p. 13.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 13; Mcinerny, op. cit., p. 17.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 16, a. 6c.
•• Cf. Mcinerny, op. cit., pp. 91, 93.
•• Ibid., p. 98.

THOMAS AQUINAS AND ANALOGY:

A TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

The point here is simply that the analogy of names is a logical
rather than a metaphysical question, a point which Cajetan
missed altogether; and "the division of analogy resulting from
such confusion can only be regarded as a gross identification of
the logical and real orders." 31

*

*

*

*

*

Prior to any attempt at presenting a clear and cohesive
doctrine of analogy in the writings of Aquinas, it is well to
note the bewildering variety of texts from which any such
doctrine must be gleaned. Nowhere in the writings of Thomas
is there to be fond a thematic, ex professo treatment of analogy;
rather, Thomas simply employs analogy, presupposing prior
instruction and familiarity. Analogy is one element in the
" philosophy " of Thomas; and " he does not expound this
philosophy systematically for its own sake but only partially
and for the solution of particular problems, usually theological
ones." 38 But this raises fundamental questions of methodology
to which we will later return briefly, the scope of which, however, lies beyond the reach of this study. The textual point to
be made here concerning analogy is simply that " the diversity
of problems and viewpoints rather than doctrinal development is the principal background for the variety of terminology." 39 Concerning chronological development in Thomas's
conception of analogy, Klubertanz concludes that the results
ofchronological investigations are meager, 40 and Mcinerny sees
no evidence of any evolution or significant shift in Thomas's
mind on these points. 41 Consequently, while no doubt at the
cost of some oversimplification, though hopefully without any
risk of significant distortion, we will in our treatment trace no
chronological development of the doctrine of analogy through
Thomas's writings.
Ibid., p. 35.
G. Klubertanz, op. cit., p. 22; cf. p. 105.
•• Ibid., p. 22. Klubertanz proposes six general areas of usage of analogy in the
writings of Thomas-d. ibid., pp. 106-107.
•• Cf. ibid., p. 104.
" Cf. Mcinerny, op. cit., p. vi.
37

88

242

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

Once what it means to be named analogically is pared from
one or other concrete application of analogous appellation, it
seems apparent that the analogy of names itself is a logical or
semantic question, belonging to the logic of signification and
quite distinct from the ontological doctrines of the analogy of
being, participation, and analogous causation. To be named
happens to things as they are known and is not intrinsic to
them as they exist " in rerum natura." 42 In Thomas, analogical
signification is nearly always compared with univocation and
equivocation; and in every such instance, things are said
(" dicuntur ") rather than are (" sunt ") analogues, univocals,
") . " Th e
.
" " eqmvoca
.
. als (" ana Ioga, " " umvoca,
or eqmvoc
dicuntur
as opposed to sunt, on ratio
emphasis is always on
as opposed to the mode of existence which things enjoy apart
from being known and named." 43
St. Thomas could not be clearer on the status of the analogy of
names: it is a logical doctrine to be discussed in terms of what is
formal to logical discussions and, above all, to be divided by
properly logical criteria. By attaching nearly every statement on
the analogy of names to equivocation, St. Thomas makes it difficult
for us to treat the analogy of names .as something other than a
logical intention. 44

By logical or second intentions are meant ideas about first
intentions, i. e., ideas derived from or verified in first intentions.
First intentions, in turn, are ideas about real things, i.e., ideas
derived from or verified in things in the real world. First
intentions, then, belong to things as they are in the real world,
i. e., to things as extramentally existent, whereas second, or
logical, intentions belong to things as they are in the intellect,
i.e., to things as intramentally known. Examples of first intentions would be: " bread," " white," " animal," " man," " rational," etc., while corresponding second intentions would be:
" substance," " accident," " genus," "species," "specific difference," etc. Logic, then, becomes the science of second
' 2 Cf. ibid., p. Hl5.
•• Ibid., p. 77.
" Ibid., p. 84.

THOMAS AQUINAS AND ANALOGY:

A TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

i48

intentions, whose task it is to explicate the properties of or
relations between things as known. Even though logic entails
knowledge of real entities which are themselves the remote
foundations of logical intentions, and even though logic aims
at ordering such knowledge of real entities, the logical and real
orders must nevertheless be held distinct.
Analogous, univocal, and equivocal signification are concerned with the relationship between word, concept, and
referent. 45 Words are conventional or arbitrary signs of concepts, which, in tum, are natural signs of things as known.
Given the situation that one word is applied to a plurality of
concrete referents, univocal, equivocal, and analogous signification refer to whether the concepts signified by the single
word are in the case of each concrete referent virtually identical, virtually diverse, or systematically ambiguous, respectively.
We will return to the relation between analogy, univocation,
and equivocation. The point to be made here is that analogy
is a second intention, a logical relation, obtaining between the
three constitutive elements in verbal signification: word, concept, thing. To demonstrate the logical or second-intentional
character of analogous, univocal, and equivocal signification,
we may note that the very same concrete referents may be
analogues, univocals or equivocals, depending upon the names
given them. For instance, a shrieking infant and an enthusiastic
student are analogues when they are said to be " concerned,"
univocals when said to be " alive," and equivocals when said to
be" trying." Although logical intentions are remotely grounded
in things as they really exist, their proximate foundations are
always things as known. Thus, " whatever be the foundation
in reality for their similarity-and it need not be cause/effectit is unimportant for the statement of what it means for things
to be named analogically." 46 We have focused already upon
what it means to be named in contrast with simply to be; now
we must focus upon what it means to be named analogously,
in contrast with to be named univocally or equivocally.
' 5 Cf. John A. Oesterle, Logic (Englewood Cliffs,
•• Mcinerny, op. cit., p. 188.

chapters I and 8.

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

Thomas frequently presents analogy as a kind of equivocation, as in the following text:
The term " animal " which is predicated of the living animal and
of the drawing of that animal is not used purely equivocally; for
the philosopher broadly speaking takes equivocal names in a broad
sense according to which they include analogous terms, because
being, which is an analogical term, is sometimes said to be equivocally predicated of different predicamentsY
With pure or chance equivocals the same name signifies totally
diverse concepts, whereas with analogues or equivocals by
design the same name signifies concepts which, while diverse,
are not totally divergent or unrelated but are instead " partim
diversae et partim non diversae," and " in aliquo uno convenientes ":
Something can be predicated of diverse things in multiple fashion.
First of all, when the concept is absolutely identical so that it
may be used of several things univocally, such as the term animal
of both a horse and a cow. Second, when the concepts are simply
diverse so that they are predicated of various things equivocally,
as the term dog of the stellar constellation and of an animal. Third,
when the concepts are partly diverse and partly not diverse (partim
sunt diversae et partim non diversae); they are diverse insofar as
they imply diverse relations; they are one, however, insofar as these
same diverse relations are referred to one single thing. Such things
are said to be predicated analogously, that is proportionately, insofar as each thing in relationship to its relation is referred to that
one thing. 48
Something can be predicated of several because of different concepts in two ways. The first way because of completely different
concepts which have no relation to one common thing. And these
are called accidentally equivocal terms because it happens,
as it were, by chance that one man gives a name to one thing
and another man gives the same name to another thing. As, for
example, happens most conspicuously in the case where two men
are called by the same name. The second way, one name is used
of several according to concepts which are not totally different but
which agree in some respect. (In a:liquo uno convenientes) ,49
•• Summa Thevl., I, q. IS, a. 10, ad. 4.
'"IV Metaphys., lect. I, n. 585.
•• I Ethic., lect. 7, nn. 95-96; cf. I Sent., d. 81, q. 2, a. 1, ad. 2.

THOMAS AQUINAS

AND ANALOGY:

A TEXTUAL

ANALYSIS

The examples following upon the latter citation above are quite
illustrative: " military " is said of sword, quirass, and horse in
that" they have reference to one principle"; "healthy" is said
of medicine, food., and wine in that "they have reference to
one end"; "being" is said of substance, quantity, and quality
" according to the different relationships to the same subject ";
" sight " is said of body and mind " according to a relationship
to different subjects"; "good" is said of many things" according to analogy, or the same proportion, inasmuch as all good
things depend upon one first principle of goodness or inasmuch
as they are ordered to one end." 50 What distinguishes these
examples from each other is not that some are with real
foundation and others without but rather the variety of foundations upon which they rest. The point may again be made
here that:
' To be named analogically ' is always an extrinsic denomination of
things, not something which belongs to them as they exist in
rerum natura. This is something which attaches to things as known,
and on this level, the reason is always the same: many things
receive a common name insofar as they are denominated from
what the name principally signifies. 51

There is, then, in analogous signification, an element of
community in the midst of diversity. "There is diversity
because the name signifies different proportions or relations or
references; there is unity because these proportions or relations
or references are to one and the same thing. . .. The analogous
name is one of multiple signification but· that multiplicity is
reduced to a certain unity because the name signifies many
relations to one and the same thing." 52
In like manner it should be known that that one thing to which
diverse relations are referred in analogous predication is one in
number and not only one in concept (ratio)' just as in the case
of that one thing designated by a univocal name. 53
•• Ibid.
61 Mcinerny,
op. cit., p. 125.
•• Ibid., p. 74.
•• IV Metaphys., lect. I, n. 535-6.

!46

ROBERT E.

In the case of all names which are predicated analogously of several
things, it is necessary that all be predicated with respect to one, and
therefore that that one be placed in the definition of all. Because
" the intelligibility which a name means is its definition," as is said
in the fourth book of the Metaphysics, a name must be antecedently predicated of that which is put in the definitions of the
others, and consequently of the others, according to the order in
which .they approach, more or less, that first analogate .... 54
Something is said to be predicated analogously which is predicated
of several things whose intelligibilities are different but which are
attributed to one and the same thing. 55

The " one " to which the various analogues have diverse proportions or relations or references, the " one " to which the diverse
" rationes " and definitions are attributed, is the " ratio propria " of the analogous name: " When something is said analogously of many things, that thing is found according to its
proper concept (ratio) in only one of those things from which
the others receive the name." 56 The "ratio propria" is saved
by only one of the analogues, while the others refer to it,
proportion themselves to it " per prius et posterius." For
example, " animal " alone saves the " ratio propria " of
"healthy" which is "id quod habet sanitatem "; and "substantia" alone saves the "ratio propria" of "ens" which is
"id quod habet esse."
This community of reference to or participation in the
"ratio propria" does not, however, cause analogy to shade
off into univocation.
Things named univocally participate equally in the common notion
signified by their common name. The notion signified by ' animal '
is' animate sensitive substance' and it is participated in equally by
man and horse. In things named analogically, on the other hand,
the common notion signified by the name is not shared equally
by all the things which receive the name; only one of the analogates
is signified perfectly by the name. The others are signified imper•• Summa Theol., I, q. 18, a. 6c.
•• De principiia naturae, c. 6, n. 866.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 16, a. 6c.

THOMAS .AQUINAS .AND .ANALOGY:

.A TEXTUAL .ANALYSIS

!l47

fectly and in a certain respect, that is, insofar as they refer in some
way to what is perfectly signified,57

Analogy, then, in Janus-like fashion, stands between and faces
both equivocation and univocation. Thus Thomas frequently
describes it as midway between them.
This type of community is midway between pure equivocation and
simple univocation. For in things which are predicated analogously
there is neither a single intelligibility (as in univocation) nor simply
different intelligibilities (as in equivocation). Rather, a name which
is predicated in several ways signifies different proportions to some
one thing .... 58

The distinction between analogy and equivocation and univocation may be brought out as well by considering the distinct
manner in which each of them is divided.
It should be said that equivocal, analogous, and univocal names are
distinguished differently. For equivocal names are distinguished
according to the things signified; univocal names are distinguished
according to diverse differences; but analogous names are distinguished according to diverse modes. 59

The division of analogy which Thomas intends to be formal and
exhaustive 60 is not the tri-partite division adopted by Cajetan 61
but rather the bifurcation of analogy into "multorum ad
unum " and " unius ad alterum."
Therefore it must be said that these names are said of God and
creatures in an analogous sense, that is, according to proportion.
This can happen in two ways: either according as many things
are proportioned to one (thus, for example, healthy is predicated
of medicine and urine in relation and in proportion to health of
body, of which the latter is the sign and the former the cause), or
according as one thing is proportioned to another (thus, healthy
57 Mcinerny,
op. cit., p. 76. In his more recent study of analogy, Studies m
Analogy (The Hague, 1968), Mcinerny focuses upon the problem of whether or not
there is a ratio communis in an analogous name and how it may differ from the
ratio communis of a univocal name.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 5c.
•• I Sent., d. ii!ii!, q. 1, a. 3, ad. ii!.
•• Cf. Mcinerny, op. cit., p. 82.
11 Cf. I Sent., d. 19, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1, and our discussion of this text.

248

ROBERT E. MEAGHER

is said of medicine and an animal, since medicine is the cause of
health in the animal body). And in this way some things are said
of God and creatures analogically, and not in a purely equivocal
nor in a purely univocal sense. For we can name God only from
creatures. Hence, whatever is said of God and creatures is said
according as there is some relation of the creature to God as to its
principle and cause, wherein all the perfections of things pre-exist
excellently. Now this mode of community is a mean between pure
equivocation and simple univocation. For in analogies the idea
is not, as it is in univocals, one and the same; yet it is not
totally diverse as in equivocals; but the name which is thus used
in a multiple sense signifies various proportions to some one thing:
e. g., healthy, applied to urine, signifies the sign of animal health;
but applied to medicine, it signifies the cause of the same health. 62
The mode of this predication is twofold. In the first way something
is predicated of two things by being referred to a third thing, as.
the term " being " of quality and quantity in respect to substance.
The other way is when something is predicated of two others referring one to the other, as the term being (ens) is of substance and
quantity. 63

It has already been pointed out at some length that a distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic attribution on ontological grounds is simply accidental to the analogy of names
formally as such, which is to say that: " the intrinsic possession
of the perfection is irrelevant to the intent of the phrase that
something said analogically of many is found in only one of
them with respect to its proper notion." 64 Every instance of
analogy involves extrinsic denomination, understood in logical
rather than ontological categories: " When something is said
analogically of many things, it is found according to its own
essence in only one of them, and the others are denominated
from it." 65 Summarily, things are said to be named analogically when they have a common name which signifies one of
them principally, "secundam rationem propriam," and the
other (s) secondarily, "secundum proportionem."
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 5c.
•• De Pot., q. 7, a. 7; cf. I Cont. Gent., c. 34.
"'Mcinerny,

op. cit., p. 93.

•• Summa Theol., I, q. 16, a. 6c.

'!'ROMAS

AQUINAS

AND ANALOGY:

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ANALYSIS

249

The final distinction we wish to draw is that between analogy
and metaphor. " What distinguishes the analogous name from
metaphor is this: those things which do not verify the proper
notion of the common name are nonetheless properly, if less
so, signified by it and consequently it can properly suppose for
them." 66 The discussion in II Sent. d. 13, q. 1, a. 2 under the
title "utrum lux proprie invenitur in spiritualibus? " may perhaps prove illustrative of the point to be made here. Ambrose
and Denis argue that "light " said of spiritual things is said
improperly and is but a metaphor. They recognize only the
" ratio propria " of " light " (i. e., principle of corporeal visibility), whereas Augustine recognizes a common notion, a
" ratio communis," (i.e., principle of manifestation) as well.
Consequently, it is Augustine's view that "light" is said
properly of spiritual things and even more properly thereof
than of corporeal things. The "more" pertains, however, to
an ontological judgment having to do with the "res significata " rather than the " modus significandi." Thomas concurs
with Augustine in concluding: " light exists more truly in
spiritual things than in corporeal things. Not so much by reason
of the proper concept of light but by reason of its manifestation." 67 What is immediately significant here for the purposes
of our discussion is the extension or radiation of meaning from
the " ratio propria " to form a " ratio communis," a community
of meaning. This is simply not the case with metaphor where
the name has only its " ratio propria " which is transferred to
an alien context and usage.
What distinguishes the analogy of names from metaphorical usage
is this: the former have been given an extended meaning and are
no longer univocal terms having only a 'ratio propria.' Thanks to
their 'ratio communis' they have become analogous. The metaphor, on the other hand, is a univocal term, used in a proposition to
suppose for something which does not fall under its signification.
Thus the term is used improperly ,68
•
•• Mcinerny, op. cit., p. 147.
67 II Sent., d. 13, q. 1, a.
08 Mcinerny,
op. cit., pp. 149-150. This question of the relationship of an;uogy
to metaphor in Thomas Aquinas is discussed thematically at some length in St"udies

in Analogy.

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ROBERT E. MEAGHER

Our attempt so far has been to point out and explicate the
logical character of the analogy of names. Within this schema
the question of divine names, i. e., names common to both God
and creatures, arises as a special instance or application rather
than as a subdivision of the analogy of names. 69 Such names
are clearly neither equivocal nor univocal but are rather either
analogous or metaphorical. Things are named as they are
known; thus a thing can be named precisely to the degree to
which and according as it is known. Formally, analogy presupposes concepts, presupposes knowledge of what is named,
presupposes an epistemological foundation. Consequently, the
problem of how we name God with creature-names leads to
the prior and more fundamental problem of how we know
God with creature-knowledge.
Yet, if we focus first upon the problem of naming God, it
is clear that God is named from creatures and that creatures
are " secundum modum significationis " or " secundum ordinem
nominis " the " per prius," the " id a quo " of such names. In
creatures alone is the "ratio propria" of such names saved.
Yet, " secundum rem significatam " or " secundum rem nominis " God is the " per prius," the " id a quo " of names
common to God and creatures.
We cannot give any names to God except those which we derive
from creatures. 70
The name of anything which is named by us can be taken in a
twofold way. It is either the expression or signification of an
intellectual concept ... and thus the name exists in creatures first
rather than in God; or insofar as it manifests the essence (quidditas) of the thing which is named and this time the name exists
first of all in God.71
Thus the perfections found among creatures which serve as the
matrix of names said of God now appear to be only quite
imperfectly found or verified in creatures. God is essentially
•• Cf. ibid., p. 158.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 18, a. 5c.
11 Ad Ephesioa, c. 8, lect., 4.

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251

each of the perfections which man in some sense and to some
degree has. God is pure act whereas man in some respects is,
to a degree, actualized.
Being is predicated essentially only of God, since the divine esse
is subsistent and absolute. Being is predicated of all creatures by
participation: no creature is its own existence, but rather is a
being which has existence. In the same way, God is essentially
good, because he is goodness itself; creatures are called good by
participation, because they have goodness. 72

Thomas describes the extrapolation involved in naming God
and creatures in terms of the three steps found in the writings
and tradition of pseudo-Dionysius: (1) affirmation; (2) negation; (3) supereminent affirmation. 73 For example, (1) God
is said to be 'good'- (2) not in the sense that creatures are
said to be' good'- (3) but with a supereminent goodness that
altogether transcends human goodness.
The underlying problem throughout this discussion, however,
is the epistemological one. A logical analysis such as the above
is simply descriptive and seemingly explains nothing. The
critical question seems to be: how does one attain the perspective or standpoint from which (1) creature-concepts become
applicable to God and (2) the ultimate ground of such creature-concepts shifts from created reality to uncreated reality?
Actually, these are but two aspects of a single insight-an
insight which is apparently without foundation. With respect
to our previous discussion, the problem is that of forming a
"ratio communis" that will include God and creature alike,
i.e., the problem of extending man's meanings and concepts
to infinite or transcendent proportions without their becoming
inapplicable to the finite and the concrete. Needless to say,
the scope of this question is immense and well beyond the focus
of this study. We will only hint at the lines which a thorough
analysis of this question might take.
•• Quodl., IT, q. 2, a. 1c.
Cf. Pseudo-Dionysius, The Divine Names, in Rolt, Dionyaius the Areopagite
(New York, 1920).
73

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ROBERT E. MEAGHER

It seems that, in names common to God and creature, the
underlying reference of effect to cause accounts for the common
name and grounds its ratio communis, without which such a
name would be said not properly but metaphorically of God.
Whatever is said of God and creatures is said by virtue of a certain
ordering of the creature to God, as its principle and cause, wherein
all the perfections of things pre-exist excellently. 74
Every agent is found to produce effects which resemble it. Hence if
the first goodness is the efficient cause of all good things, it must
imprint its likeness upon the things which it produces. Thus, each
thing is called good because of an intrinsic perfection, through a
likeness of the divine goodness impressed upon it, and yet is further
· denominated good because of the first goodness which is the
exemplar and efficient cause of all created goodness. 75

The analogy of divine names, then, is rooted in the analogous
causation of God as creator.
We find that there are three modes of agent causality. There is
an agent causality which acts equivocally ... and one that acts
univocally .... The mode of God's causality is neither of these
... not univocal ... not equivocal. . . . Thus the third mode of
agent causality is analogous causation. Hence it is clear that the
divine being (esse) produces creaturely being (esse) in its own but
imperfect likeness. Therefore, divine being is said to be in its own
but imperfect likeness. Therefore, divine being is said to be the
being of all things from which all created being flows as from its
efficient and exemplary cause. 76
Likeness of creatures to God is not affirmed because of communication in form according to the same concept of genus and species,
but solely according to analogy, viz., inasmuch as God is being by
virtue of his essence, things are being by virtue of participation. 77

*

*

*

*

*

Thomas's doctrine of the analogy of divine names is, like
nearly all of his teaching, a hybrid of theology or faith and
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 5c.
•• De Verit., q. 21, a. 4c.
•• II Sent., d. 8, q. I, a. 2c.
•• Summa Theol., I, q. 4, a. 3, ad. 3.

THOMAS AQUINAS AND ANALOGY:

A TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

philosophy or reason. That the world is created by God is a
datum of divine revelation alone, whereas the principle that
" omne agens agit sibi simile," as well as the notions of participation and exemplarity, are products of philosophical reasoning. Maritain has described the teaching of Thomas as an
immense movement of thought between two intuitions: the
intuition of Being and the intuition of God/ 8 The analogy of
divine names is an extremely significant expression of that
movement. Similarly, Josef Pieper likens Thomas's task of
reconciling revelation and reason to the bending of Achilles'
bow-the two tips of the bow representing the Bible and
Aristotelian philosophy/ 9 For Thomas, the reception of Aristotelianism was a theological act, the work of theology in full
possession of its faith, a theology not yet separated from the
world, its conditions, its perspectives, its procedures, its culture.80 For Thomas, theology exists only if revelation exists
and only if man accepts this revelation. 81 Thus it seems that
there is no fully satisfying solution in Thomas to our contemporary probings into the naming and knowledge of God; for
St. Thomas's point of departure, i.e., the acceptance of divine
revelation, represents for many modern men a destination
which hardly seems itself attainable. His philosophical categories as well may seem to be outflanked by our questions.
Yet it seems that philosophy takes different forms indigenous
to each age; and perhaps faith, too, may assume a modern
form hopefully giving rise to a " synthesis " that will allow us
to know, to interpret, and to name ourselves and our world in
terms of a relationship to what lies at the ground of our
existence.
RoBERT

E. MEAGHER

University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, Indiana

78

7
8

Cf. Jacques Maritain, St. Thomas Aquinas (New York, 1958), p. 100.

° Cf. Josef Pieper, Guide to Thomas Aquinas (New York, 1964), p. 107.

° Cf. ibid., p. 49.

81

Cf. ibid., p. 129.

KNOWLEDGE OF CAUSALITY IN HUME AND
AQUINAS

T

HERE ARE MANY reasons why a re-examination of
Hume's analysis of knowledge, especially insofar as
this analysis bears upon the causal relation, is important. First of all, Hume's influence on contemporary
thinkers, scientists as well as philosophers, is tremendous. His
thought, to large extent, arms the logical positivists with the
basic arguments which they employ to show that metaphysical
statements are meaningless. 1 His view, moreover, that all necessary propositions are nonexistential and that all existential
propositions are contingent and nondemonstrative-to which
his teaching on the causal bond is closely linked-is one of the
reasons why the analytic philosophers are prevented beforehand
from inquiring into inferences concerning God's existence. 2
1 On this point, cf. Julius R. Weinberg, An Examination
of Logical Positivism
(Paterson, N. J.: Littlefield, Adams and Co., 1960), p. 3. Hume's position on the
philosophical significance of the causal proposition is frequently reflected in contemporary philosophers, in particular, logical positivists and analysts. Moritz
Schlick, for instance, writes: "Necessity means nothing more than universal
validity: the sentence: 'A follows necessarily from B,' so far as content in
concerned, is completely identical with the sentence: ' In every case where the state
A occurs, the state B follows," and nothing more whatsoever" (The Philosophy
of Nature [New York: Philosophical Library, 1949], p. 89). Wittgenstein puts
it more succinctly: " A necessity for one thing to happen because another has
happened does not exist. There is only logical necessity" (Tractatus LogicoPhilosophicus [London: Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd., 1949], 6.37, p. 181). For
an example of Hume's pervasive influence on contemporary sciences, see 'Villiam
S. Beck, Modern Science and the Nature of Life (New York: Doubleday &
Company, Inc., 1961), passim, but especially pp. 174-175. An excellent survey of
Hume's influence on the elimination of causality as a philosophically valid notion
is provided by Gerald F. Kreyche in his article, " Some Causes of the Elimination
of Causality in Contemporary Science," The Thomist XXIX, No. 1 (1965), 60-78.
2 That Hume's criticism of the philosophical viability of the causal proposition
bas profoundly influenced both logical positivism and analytic philosophy on this

f254

KNOWLEDGE

OF CAUSALITY

IN HUME AND AQUINAS

255

Thus, to understand some of the major trends in contemporary
thought, an understanding of their Humean basis is essential.
For a realist, an even deeper reason motivates a study of
Hume. With Hume, the realist maintains that human knowledge is derived from experience, that it begins with the deliverances of the senses. Yet the realist, unlike Hume, holds that we
can, through experience, come to know things as they actually
are, that we can grasp at least some of the relations which
really exist among the sensible beings of experience. Obviously
" experience " leads Hume and the realist to opposing positions.
Thus it is incumbent upon the realist to examine Hume's
analysis of experience, to confront it with his own, and to show
why Hume's inquiry fails to account for some fundamental
data of experience.
The present study, which falls into two parts, takes the form
of a hypothetical meeting of the Edinburgh branch of the
Scottish Philosophical Association in December, 1774. There
David Hume, former Under-Secretary of State, presented a
paper summarizing the chief points of his speculative philosophy. Thomas Davingwood, professor of antiquities in the
University of Edinburgh, then replied to Mr. Hume's paper.
Professor Davingwood's studies of the ancients had led him to
examine the writings of some obscure medievalists, whose views,
he discovered, had been " grossly and grotesquely distorted."

*

*

*

*

*

It is a pleasant honor to be invited to summarize for you
question is abundantly clear from the literature. For instance, Diogenes Allen
observes: " Logical Positivism and Linguistic Analysis have greatly altered the
condition of the field of the philosophy of religion. Exponents of these philosophies
would, for the most part, endorse the criticisms of Hume. . . . The upshot of
Hume's criticism is that the grounds for the claim that there is a God are inadequate" (The Reasonableness of Faith [Washington: Corpus Books, 1968), pp. xv,
xiv. Cf. also the debate between Eugene Fontinell ("Faith and Metaphysics")
and Joseph Owens (" This Sublime Truth ") in Speaking of God, ed. Denis
Dirscherl (Milwaukee: The Bruce Publishing Company, 1967) and the colloquy
between J. N. Findlay and G. E. Hughes, "Can God's Existence Be Disproved?"
in Nmv Essays in Philosophical Theology, ed. A. Flew and A. Macintyre (London:
SCM Press, Ltd., 1955), pp. 47-67.

WILLIAM

E. MAY

the chief elements of my philosophy insofar as it bears on the
nature and scope of human understanding, particularly with
respect to the meaning of the causal relation. While I pretend
not to unlock the deepest mysteries of human knowing/ I am
confident that the principles disclosed by my analysis of experience and the conclusions to which these principles lead are of
the greatest significance in helping human kind attain to that
truth properly befitting it and in avoiding the fruitless and
disputatious reasonings so oft employed by those overvain and
quarrelsome spirits who are forever searching after occult
powers, forms, substances and accidents, and other abstruse
entities. For I believe that, by applying the experimental
method, whose value has been illumined so brilliantly by the
incomparable Newton and other luminaries in the realm of
mechanics, to questions bearing on man and human knowing,
we shall discover those truths conformable to man's nature and
lay bare the authority of that abstruse philosophy which in
times past has posed in the dress of wisdom, yet in truth
cloaked the most foolish superstition. 4
• Cf. Treatise of Hu7rULn Nature (henceforth cited as T) (Garden City, N. Y.:
Doubleday & Co., 1961), Introduction, p. xiv: "The essence of the mind being
equally unknown to us with that of external bodies, it must be equally impossible
to form any notion of its powers and qualities otherwise than from careful and
exact experiments. . . . And though we must endeavour to render all our principles
as universal as possible, by tracing up our experiments to the utmost, and
explaining all effects from the simplest and fewest causes, it is still certain we cannot
go beyond experience; and any hypothesis, that pretends to discover the ultimate
original qualities of human nature, ought at first to be rejected as presumptuous
and chimerical."
• Cf. Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (henceforth cited as E)
(Garden City:
Doubleday, n. d.), Sect. I, p. 312: "Here indeed lies the
justest and most plausible objection against a considerable part of metaphysics,
that they are not properly a science; but arise either from the fruitless
efforts of human vanity, which would penetrate into subjects utterly inaccessible to the understanding, or from the craft of popular superstitions, which,
being unable to defend themselves on fair ground, raise these entangling brambles
to cover and protect their weakness. . . . The only means of freeing learning, at
once, from these abstruse questions, is to inquire seriously into the nature of human
understanding, and show, from an exact analysis of its powers and capacity, that it
is by no means fitted for such remote and abstruse subjects."
On the truth conformable to man, cf. E., Sect. I, pp. 318-314: "It cannot be

KNOWLEDGE

OF CAUSALITY

IN HUME AND AQUINAS

In making this application of the experimental method to
human understanding I first direct attention to those appearances or phenomena disclosed to us in our immediate experience
of being conscious of something. Today I propose to analyze
this experience, applying the results of this analysis to the
relation between the event that we call cause and the event
that we call effect.
The generic term covering the immediate data of conscious
experience is perceptions. For it will be allowed that" nothing
is ever really present to the mind, besides its own perceptions," 5
and these are the only existent things of which we are certain,
being directly present to our minds, drawing from us our most
firm assent, and serving as the unshakeable basis for all our
conclusions. 6 Perceptions admit of two classes. Of these, the
first are what I term impressions, which, as it were, force their
entry into the mind; under these I include all our sensations,
passions, and emotions as they first appear in consciousness.
The second class of perceptions are called ideas, being less lively
and vigorous than the preceding, of which they are copies or
images. 7
Both impressions and ideas may, as more acute scrutiny of
doubted, that the mind is endowed with several powers and faculties, that these
powers are distinct from each other, that what is really distinct to the immediate
perception may be distinguished by reflection; and consequently, that there is a
truth and falsehood in all propositions on this subject, and a truth and falsehood,
which lie not beyond the compass of human understanding." Cf. Ibid., p. 815,
on rejection of abstruse metaphysics, as well as Ibid., Sect. XII, Part III, p. 480.
5 T., I. iv, II, p. 180.
6 T., I, iv, II, p. 193: "The only existences of which we are certain, are perceptions, which, being immediately present to us by consciousness, command our
strongest assent, and are the first foundation of all our conclusions." Cf. T., I,
ii, VI, p. 6Z; E., Sect. XII, I, pp. 4Z0-4Zl.
7 T., I, i, I, p. Z:
"All the perceptions of the human mind resolve themselves
into two distinct kinds, which I shall call impressions and ideas. The difference
betwixt these consists in the degrees of force and liveliness, with which they strike
upon the mind, and make their way into our thought or consciousness. Those
perceptions which enter with most force and violence, we may name impressions;
and, under this name, I comprehend all our sensations, passions, and emotions, as
they make their first appearance in the soul. By ideas, I mean the faint images of
these in thinking and reasoning." Cf. also E., Sect. II, pp. 816-317.

258

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E. MAY

experience shows, be either simple or complex. The former are
irreducible to more elemental constituents, admitting no distinction or separation, whereas the latter can be broken down
into composing parts, viz., into simple impressions and ideas. 8
Although complex ideas, owing to the freedom and arbitrariness
of our fancy, need not have any exact impressions corresponding to them, I make bold to declare " that all our simple ideas,
in their first appearance, are derived from simple impressions,
which are correspondent to them, and which they exactly represent." 9 As to our impressions, those resulting from our thinking or reflecting upon the ideas present to the mind are derived
from those ideas, which, in tum, are derived from antecedent
impressions. 10 Impressions of sensation or feeling, on the other
hand, are simply given to us in experience. Doubtlessly they
derive from things external to us, but as I believe that nothing
is of greater harm to genuine philosophy than an oversearching
into causes/ 1 it is sufficient to note that they arise from " unknown causes." 12
The maxim stated above with respect to the derivation of all
our simple ideas from antecedent impressions may appear of
little moment. Yet its discovery is most fortunate, indeed a
happy event for true philosophy. For by means of this principle
we have an infallible guide, a test that can be applied to any
idea, even the most abstruse, that occurs in human discourse.
Thus, whenever we suspect that an idea bandied about by
philosophers may be chimerical and, in truth, no genuine or
meaningful notion, we can quickly determine the issue by
8 T., I, i, I, p. 3:
"There is another division of our perceptions ... which
extends itself both to our impressions and ideas. This division is into simple and
complex. Simple perceptions, or impressions and ideas, are such as admit of no
distinction nor separation. The complex are the contrary to these, and may be
distinguished into parts."
• T., I, i, I, p. 4.
10 T., I, i, II, p. 7:
"Impressions may be divided into two kinds, those of
sensation, and those of reflection. The first kind arises in the soul originally, from
unknown causes. The second is derived, in a great measure, from our ideas."
11 Cf. T., I, i, IV, p. 7:
"Nothing is more requisite for a true philosopher, than
to restrain the intemperate desire of searching into causes."
10 T., I, i, II, p. 7, text cited in note 10.

KNOWLEDGE

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IN HUME AND AQUINAS

259

demanding from those who advance the idea in question that
impression whence it is derived. Should they be unable to
furnish us with this impression, we can at once conclude that
they have been arguing over a mere word to which no meaningful idea can be assigned. 13
Impressions once present to the mind reappear in it as ideas
after two different fashions, according as either the memory or
the imagination is the faculty at work. If the idea retains a
considerable part of that liveliness and vigor characteristic of
the impression, then it is the result of memory. If not, the
imagination or fancy is the faculty responsible. 14 Ideas of
memory also differ from those of imagination in that they preserve the original order of the impressions, at least to some
degree, whereas there is nothing freer and more arbitrary than
the fancy. Yet the latter difference, being not always observable, serves not to distinguish infallibly ideas of memory from
those of imagination, whence I conclude that the essential
feature allowing us to discern the ideas of memory from those
of imagination is the superior force and vivacity of the former. 15
13 E., Sect. II, pp. 319-320:
"All ideas, especially abstract ones, are naturally
faint and obscure; the mind has but a slender hold of them. . . . On the contrary,
all impressions, that is, all sensations, either outward or inward, are strong and
vivid. . . . When we entertain, therefore, any suspicion that a philosophical term
is employed without any meaning or idea . . . , we need but inquire, from what
impression is that supposed idea derived? And if it be impossible to assign any,
this will serve to confirm our suspicion. By bringing ideas into so clear a light we
may reasonably hope to remove all dispute, which may arise, concerning their nature
and reality." Cf. also T., I, ii, III, p. 31; E., Sect. VII, Pt. I, p. 351, Pt. II, p. 363.
"T., I, i, III, p. 8: "We find, by experience, that when any impression has
been present with the mind, it again makes its appearance there as an idea; and
this it may do after two different ways: either when, in its new appearance, it
retains a considerable degree of its first vivacity, and is somewhat intermediate
betwixt an impression and an idea; or when it entirely loses that vivacity, and is a
perfect idea. The faculty by which we repeat our impressions in the first manner.
is called the memory, and the other the iJrUigination."
15 T., I, i, III, p. 9:
"There is another difference betwixt these two kinds of
ideas, which is no less evident, namely, that though neither the ideas of the memory
nor imagination, neither the lively nor faint ideas, can make their appearance in the
mind, unless their correspondent impressions have gone before to prepare the way
for them, yet the imagination is not restrained to the same order and form with
the original impressions; 'while the memory is in a manner tied down in that respect,

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E. MAY

Because memory does, on most occasions and to large extent,
preserve the original order of impressions, there is a connection
among the ideas it provides. Yet there is nothing discernible
within any of our ideas inseparably and infallibly linking it to
any other. Basically this results from the derivation of our
ideas from impressions, since " there are not any two impressions which are perfectly inseparable," whence it naturally
follows that there are no two ideas perfectly inseparable. 16
Nor is there any separate idea of existence which the mind
needs to add to any of its conceptions to render it real. Whatever we conceive, we conceive as existent, or, what comes to
the same, nothing we imagine is absolutely impossible. 17 Thus
there is no essential connection among our various ideas flowing
from qualities observable in them. Yet, as experience also
shows, our ideas are definitely connected in the mind. Despite
the complete freedom of the imagination in disposing of those
without any power of variation." But compare this passage with T., I, iii, V, p. 77:
"When we search for the characteristic, which distinguishes the memory from the
imagination, we must immediately perceive, that ... these faculties are as little
distinguished from each other by the arrangement of their complex ideas. For,
though it be a peculiar property of the memory to preserve the original order and
position of its ideas, while the imagination transposes and changes them as it
pleases; yet this difference is not sufficient to distinguish them in their operaton,
or make us know the one from the other; it being impossible to recall the past
impressions, in order to compare them with our present ideas, and see whether
their arrangement be exactly similar. Since therefore the memory is known, neither
by the order of its complex ideas, nor the nature of its simple ones; it follows, that
the difference betwixt it and the imagination lies in its superior force and
vivacity."
16 T., I, i, III, p. 9.
17 T., I, ii, VI, p. 61:
"There is no impression nor idea of any kind, of which
we have any consciousness or memory, that is not conceived as existent. . . .
The idea of existence, then, is the very same with the idea of what we conceive
to be existent. . . . That idea, when conjoined with the idea of any object, makes
no addition to it. "\Vhatever we concei,·e, we conceive to be existent." Cf. also T.,
Appendix, pp. 554, 555, and esp. p. 558: "·whatever is distinct is distinguishable,
and whatever is distinguishable is separable by the thought or imagination. All
perceptions are distinct. They are, tl1erefore, distinguishable, and separable, and
may be conceived as separately existant, and may exist separately, without any
contradiction or absurdity." Cf. T., I, ii, II, p. 30: "Whatever the mind clearly
conceives includes the idea of possible existence, or, in other words ... nothing we
imagine is absolutely impossible."

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OF CAUSALITY

IN HUME AND AQUINAS

261

ideas which it fashions, it appears as though the imagination
is carried, as it were by Nature herself, from one idea to another. This proclivity to join ideas can scarce be the result of
chance, for we observe that certain ideas regularly unite with
others. There is, then, some uniting principle which, while not
providing an inseparable link between ideas, supplies a kind of
attraction in the mental universe comparable to the attraction
of gravity in the physical and forming, as it were, the cement
of the mind, binding idea to idea. 18 The ultimate causes of
this mental attraction I pretend not to explain, 19 but the more
proximate causes are qualities naturally leading the imagination
to pass from one idea to another. These qualities are those of
resemblance, contiguity in time and place, and cause and
effect. 20 The natural relations or principles of association imply
not, as already noted, any inseparable, necessary bond among
our ideas. They are, as it were, endowments of nature, providing men-and animals as well-for carrying on the affairs of
18 T., I, i, IV, p. 10:
"\Vere ideas entirely loose and unconnected, chance alone
would join them; and it is impossible the same simple ideas should fall regularly
into complex ones (as they commonly do), without some bond of union among
them, some associating quality, by which one idea naturally introduces another.
This uniting principle among ideas is not to be considered as an inseparable
connection; for that has been already excluded from the imagination . . . we are
only to regard it as a gentle force, which commonly prevails, and is the cause why,
among other things, languages so nearly correspond to each other; Nature, in a
manner, pointing out to every one those simple ideas, which are most proper to
be united into a complex one." Cf. E., Sect. III, p. 320.
19 T., I, i, IV, p. 12:
"Here is a kind of attraction, which in the mental world
will be found to have as extraordinary effects as in the natural, and to show itself
in as many and as various forms. Its effects are everywhere conspicuous; but, as
to its causes, they are mostly unknown, and must be resolved into original qualities
of human nature, which I pretend not to explain."
20 T., I, i, IV, p. 10:
" The qualities, from which this association arises, and by
which the mind is, after this manner, conveyed from one idea to another, are three,
viz., resemblance, contiguity in time or place, and cause and effect." Cf. E., Sect.
III, p. 321. An unusually good critique of Hume's approach to causation is given
by Matthew O'Donnell in " Hume's Approach to Causation " Philosophical Studies
X (1960), 64-99. Provocative essays on Hume's definitions of cause are provided
by J. A. Robinson and Thomas J. Richards in their articles, both given the same
title-" Hume's Two Definitions of Cause "-in Hume: A Collection of Critical
Essays, ed. V. C. Chappel (New York: Doubleday Anchor Books, 1966), pp.
129-161.

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life. This is evident above all in the relation of cause and effect,
which alone allows us to go beyond the evidence of memory and
sense, whenever we are dealing with matters of fact or existence. But neither animals nor children, nor the common run
of men, nor, for that matter, even philosophers in their daily
activities, are guided by reasoning in making those inferences
from cause to effect. An activity of such important consequences for life cannot be trusted to the uncertainty of reasoning. Thus Nature has given us a more ready principle, that,
namely, of cause and effect as an associative bond in the
imagination, at once available to all for ready use in meeting
the contingencies of life. 21
The relation of cause and effect may also be regarded as a
species of philosophical relation. The latter is any comparison
we may choose to make among ideas upon their arbitrary union
in the imagination. 22 The kinds of philosophical relation I
reduce to the following seven: resemblance, degrees of quality,
contrariety, quantity or number, identity, space and time, and
cause and effect. 23 Of these, the first four are what may be
termed invariable relations, depending exclusively on the ideas
related, whereas the final three may be changed without any
change in the ideas related. By this I mean that the relations of
21 E., Sect. IX, pp. 383-385:
"It seems evident, that animals as well as men
learn many things from experience, and infer, that the same events will always
follow from the same causes .... I But I It is impossible, that this inference of the
animal can be founded on any process of argument or reasoning. . . . Animals,
therefore, are not guided in these inferences by reasoning; neither are children;
neither are the generality of mankind, in their ordinary actions and conclusions;
neither are philosophers themselves, who, in all the active parts of life, are, in the
main, the same with the vulgar. . . . Nature must have provided some other
principle, of more ready, and more general use and application; nor can an operation
of such immense consequence in life, as that of inferring effects from causes, be
trusted to the uncertain process of reasoning and argumentation."
Cf. T., I, iii,
XVI, pp. 161-164.
22 T., I, i. V, p. 13:
"The word relation is commonly used in two senses
considerably different from each other. Either for that quality, by which two
ideas are connected together in the imagination, and the one naturally introduces
another . . . or for that particular circumstance, in which, even upon the
arbitrary union of two ideas in the fancy, we may think proper to compare them."
23 T., I, i, V, pp. 13-14; T., I, iii, I, p. 63.

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resemblance, degrees of quality, contrariety, quantity and number are discovered simply by inspecting and reflecting upon
the ideas they unite. Those of identity, space and time, and
cause and effect can never arise from the simple viewing of ideas
but require experience for their disclosure. 24
This excursus into the several species of philosophical relations may perchance appear an instance of abstruse metaphysic. Thus I hasten to show the relevance of these distinctions to true philosophy. For all the objects of human inquiry
may, I gather from the writings of philosophers and experience
in human discourse, be divided into two types, viz., relations of
ideas and matters of fact. 25 The truth of propositions involving
objects of the first species is intuitively evident or demonstratively certain, being discoverable merely by exercising
thought. And it is in investigating objects of this kind that the
invariable philosophical relations disclose to us their use. 26
Matters of fact or of existence, on the contrary, can never be
discovered by the manipulation of ideas. No proposition concerning existence or matters of fact can be the subject of demonstrative reasoning, inasmuch as the denial of any matter of fact
or of existence does not involve any contradiction or absurdity.27 The truth of propositions dealing with matters of fact,
"'T., I, iii, I, p. 63: "These relations may be divided into two classes; into
such as depend entirely on the ideas which we compare together, and such as may
be changed without any change in the ideas. . . . It appears therefore that of these
seven philosophical relations, there remain only four, which depending solely upon
ideas, can be the objects of knowledge and certainty. These four are resemblance,
contrariety, degrees in quality, and proportions in quantity and number. Three
of these relations are discoverable at first sight, and fall more properly under the
province of intuition than demonstration." On the need for experience to discover
the relations of identity, situations in time and place, and causation, cf. T., I, iii,
II, pp. 66-67, where the necessity for the sensible presence of at least one of the
objects related is stressed.
•• E., Sect. IV, Pt. I, p. 322: "All the objects of human reason or inquiry may
naturally be divided into two kinds, to wit, relations of ideas, and matters of fact."
26 T., I, iii, I, pp. 64-65; E., Sect. IV, Pt. I, p. 322:
" Of the first kind/i.e.,
relations of ideas / are the sciences of geometry, algebra, and arithmetic; and, in
short, every affirmation which is either intuitively or demonstratively certain."
27 E., Sect. IV, Pt. I, p. 322:
"Matters of fact ... are not ascertained in the
same manner; nor is our evidence of their truth, however great, of a like nature with

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as a consequence, can in no wise be determined by the invariable philosophical relations, which are valid whether any
objects corresponding to the ideas related exist or not. If we
tum to the three variable philosophical relations, we immediately note that two of these, those, namely, of identity and of
space and time, cannot advance us beyond our immediate
experience, inasmuch as they necessarily entail the immediate
presence of the objects related in idea to the mind. They are
rather perceptions than reasonings. 28 Thus, if any of the philosophical relations can assist us in going beyond present
experience to infer, from the existence of one object given in an
immediate perception to another object not given in such a
way, this can only be the relation of cause and effect. The
inference founded on this relation is unique. It does not deal
with ideal connections, as do the invariable relations, for it
bears upon actual existents and matters of fact. Yet this
relation, unlike those of identity and of space and time, does
not arise betwixt objects both of which are intuitively given
in an immediate impression. 29 This causal relation has already
been numbered among those natural principles of the imaginathe foregoing. The contrary of every matter of fact is still possible; hecause it
can never imply a contradiction." For a synthetic passage, cf. E., Sect. IV, Pt.
II, p. 330: " All reasonings may be divided into two kinds, namely demonstrative
reasoning, or that concerning relations of ideas, and moral reasoning, or that concerning matter of fact and existence."
28 T., I, iii, II, p. 67: "AU kinds of reasoning consist in nothing but a comparison,
and a discovery of those relations, either constant or inconstant, which two or
more objects bear to each other. This comparison we may make, either when both
the objects are present to the senses, or when neither of them is present, or when
only one. When both the objects are present to the senses along with the relation,
we call this perception rather than reasoning. . . . According to this way of
thinking, we ought not to receive as reasoning any of the observations we may
make concerning identity and the relations of time and place; since in none of them
the mind can go beyond what is immediately present to the senses."
29 T., I, iii, II, p. 67:
" It is only causation, which produces such a connection,
as to give us assurance from the existence or action of one object, that it was
followed or preceded by any other existence or action ... this conclusion beyond
the impressions of our senses can be founded only on the connection of cause and
effect." Cf. E., Sect. IV, Pt. I, p. 3f!3: "All reasonings concerning matter of fact
seem to be founded on the relation of cause and effect. By means of that relation
alone we can go beyond the evidence Qf QUr memory and senses."

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tion whereby it is led to find connecting links between the ideas
at its disposal. As such, it is a relation native to man and a
relation whose ultimate causes lie beyond discovery. What
remains is to investigate the nature of this relation as a principle of philosophical reasoning and to determine whether or
not it is founded on properties within things discoverable by
human understanding.
Various authors have attempted to show that the causal
relation can be determined exclusively on rational grounds.
They formulate this relation in propositions somewhat like the
following: " Whatever has a beginning has also a cause of
existence," and they then assert that this proposition is either
intuitively evident or demonstratively certain. It is, some
argue, intuitively evident by reason of the nature of the ideas
related, it being impossible for men to deny the truth of the
above proposition once they understand the terms involved. 30
Yet the idea of effect or of " whatever has a beginning " is
distinct from and thus separable from that of cause. There is
thus no contradiction in conceiving any object as first nonexistent and then existent without referring it to any distinct
idea of cause. 31 Still others argue that this relation is demonstrably certain, inasmuch as anyone who denies the necessity
3

° Cf. T., I, iii, III, pp. 71-72.

T., I, iii, III, p. 72: " But here is an argument, which proves at once that the
foregoing proposition is neither intuitively nor demonstrably certain. We can never
demonstrate the necessity of a cause to every new existence, or new modification of
existence, without showing at the same time the impossibility there is, that anything can ever begin to exist without some productive principle and where the
latter proposition cannot be proved, we must despair of ever being able to prove
the former. Now that the latter proposition is utterly incapable of a demonstrative
proof, we may satisfy ourselves by considering, that as all distinct ideas are
separable from each other, and as the ideas of cause and effect are evidently
distinct, it will be easy for us to conceive any object to be non-existent this moment,
and existent the next, without conjoining to it the distinct idea of a cause or
productive principle. The separation therefore of the idea of a cause from that of
a beginning of existence, is plainly possible for the imagination; and consequently
the actual separation of these objects is so far possible, that it implies no contradiction nor absurdity; and is therefore incapable of being refuted by any reasoning
from mere ideas, without which it is impossible to demonstrate the necessity of a
cause."
31

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of a cause for any contingent or produced being surreptitiously
reintroduces the very thing he denies, since he must then
attribute the existence of the object in question either to
nothing or to the object itself. If this is so, then how can we
regard "nothing" or the "object itself" if not as the very
cause in question? In replying to such specious reasonings, we
need but observe that, in excluding all causes, we really mean
just that, supposing neither nothing nor the object itself as the
cause of its existence. Naturally, if everything must have a
cause, then it is obvious that the object itself or nothing must
be accepted as the cause if all other causes are excluded. But
our point is just this, must everything have a cause? A need
of this kind cannot be taken for granted, for this would be
begging the question. 32 Nor can reason discover to us any such
necessity, since the ideas which it must employ in any endeavor
to do so are all of them, as has been shown already, distinct and
separable. Thus it follows that the causal relation can be
derived only from experience, to which we shall now turn. 33
What does experience disclose to us concerning any objects
said to be joined as cause and effect? It is obvious that it can
discover in the sensible qualities of objects no impression
sufficient to give rise to an idea of such magnitude, for no
matter what quality I seize, I soon find some object not having
it, yet falling under the name of cause or effect. 34 The idea,
then, of causation, must be derived from some relation among
objects. In determining these relations I observe that objects
regarded as being related as cause and effect are contiguous in
space and time, and that the object denominated cause has a
32 T., I, iii, III, p. 74:
"It is sufficient only to observe, that when we exclude
all causes we really do exclude them, and neither suppose nothing nor the object
itself to be the cause of the existence; and consequently can draw no argument
from the absurdity of these suppositions to prove the absurdity of that exclusion."
33 Cf. E., Sect. IV, Pt. I, pp. 324-325; T., I, iii, II, p. 68.
34 T., I, iii, II, p. 68:
"Let us therefore cast our eye on any two objects, which
we call cause and effect, and turn them on all sides, in order to find that impression,
which produces an idea of such prodigious consequence. At first sight I perceive,
that I must not search for it in any of the particular qualities of the objects; since,
whichever of these qualities I pitch on, I find some object that is not possessed of
it, and yet falls under the denomination of cause or effect."

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priority in time over the object denominated effect. 35 Yet
these relations are insufficient to convey to us the idea of
causation, for there are many objects so related which we yet
do not regard as instances of cause and effect. For example,
night regularly follows day, but for all that we do not regard
day as the cause of night. On the other hand, I observe that
heat follows from flame and I am led to infer that flame is the
cause of heat. 36 On each separate encounter with these two
objects in experience, all that is given is a distinct and separate
impression. Yet, when this experience is repeated several times,
it is no longer necessary for both of these objects to impress
themselves upon our senses or memory. On the presentation of
one of them in an impression of the senses or memory, our
understanding immediately arises to a consideration of the
other. Then, "without any further ceremony, we call the one
cause and the other effect," inferring from the existence of one
of these objects present to us in an impression the existence of
the other. Experience, it appears, has shown us a third relation
involved between cause and effect, that, namely, of constant or
frequent conjunction or connection. 37 Yet the addition of this
new relation to those of contiguity and temporary priority
serves not to explain sufficiently our idea of causation. For we
believe that the relation between cause and effect is necessary
and infallible. And from the bare fact that certain objects are
35 T., I, iii, II, pp. 68-69:
" The idea of causation must be derived from some
relation among objects. . . . I find in the first place, that whatever objects are
considered as causes or effects, are contiguous. . . . 'Ve may therefore consider
the relation of contiguity as essential to that of causation. . . . The second relation
I shall observe as essential to causes and effects ... is that of priority in time in
the cause before the effect." Cf. E., Sect. IV, Pt. I, pp. 324-325.
36 Cf. T., I, iii, II, p. 70:
"An object may be contiguous and prior to another,
without being considered as its cause."
37 T., I, iii, VI, pp. 80-81: "It is ... by experience only that we can infer the
existence of one object from that of another. The nature of experience is this.
We remember to have had frequent instances of the existence of one species of
objects; and also remember, that the individuals of another species of objects have
always attended them, and have existed in a regular order of contiguity and
succession with regard to them .... In advancing, we have insensibly discovered
a new relation betwixt cause and effect when we least expected it. . . . This
relation is their constant conjunction."

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constantly conjoined in time and space, we can discover no
compelling motive for affirming that such objects must necessarily be so united. All that experience shows us is that the
mind, after a frequent repetition of like objects similarly related
in space and time, is determined by custom to infer from the
existence of the one to the existence of the other. 38 Whence,
however, comes the idea of necessary connection, an element
regarded as essential to the causal relation?
As must all our ideas, so too that of necessary connection or
causal efficacy must be traced to some antecedent impression. 39
But there is no impression of sensation capable of giving rise
to an idea of such magnitude, since impressions of sensation
arise exclusively from externally observable qualities or phenomena, and these are incapable of giving us the key to unlock
the inner being or nature of the objects whence they derive. 40
•• Cf. T., I, iii, VI, pp. 80-81, 85-86; I, iii, XIV, pp. 142-143, 151; E., Sect. IV,
Pt. II, pp. 330-331; V, Pt. I, p. 336. For a synthetic statement, see, for instance,
E., Sect. VII, Pt. II, p. 363: "Every idea is copied from some preceding impression
or sentiment; and where we cannot find any impression, we may be certain that
there is no idea. In all single instances of the operation of bodies or minds, there
is nothing that produces any impression, nor consequently can suggest any idea of
power or necessary connection. But when many uniform instances appear, and the
same object is always followed by the same event, we then begin to entertain the
notion of cause and connection. ·we then feel a new sentiment or impression, to
wit, a customary connection in the thought or imagination between one object and
its usual attendant." Cf. An Abstract of a Treatise of Human Nature 1740, ed.
J. M. Keynes and P. Sraffa (Cambridge: at the University Press, 1938), p. 12:
"Here therefore is a third circumstance, viz., that of a constant conjunction betwixt the cause and effect. Every object like the cause, produces always some
object like the effect. Beyond these three circumstances of continguity, priority,
and constant conjunction, I can discover nothing in this case," and p. 22: " But,
beside these circumstances, 'tis commonly suppos'd, that there is a necessary connexion betwixt the cause and effect, and that the cause possesses something, which
we call a power, or force, or energy."
•• T., I, iii, XIV, p. 142: "As we have no idea that is not derived from an
impression, we must find some impression that gives rise to this idea of necessity,
if we assert we have really such an idea."
•• Cf. E., Sect. IV, II, pp. 328-329: "Nature has kept us at a great distance from
all her secrets, and has afforded us only the knowledge of a few superficial
qualities of objects; while she conceals from us those powers and principles on which
the influence of those objects entirely depends. Our senses inform us of the color,
weight, and consistence of bread. . . . It is allowed on all hands that there is no
known connection between the sensible qualities and the secret powers." Cf. Ibid.,
Sect. VII, Pt. I, pl. 351: Sect. Vlll, Pt. I, pp. 373-374.

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The idea of necessity, then, must stem from an impression of
reflection, whose nature can be explained as follows. The repeated observation of similar objects regularly united in spatial
continguity and temporal succession gives, it is true, no insight
into any new quality belonging to the objects so united. Yet
the act of observing these resembling instances does make a
new impression upon the mind, and it is this impression which
serves as the model for our idea of necessity or power or
efficacy, the element universally regarded as essential to the
relation betwixt cause and efl'ect.41
In sum, there is no necessary connection among objects
discoverable by human reason, even after repeated experience,
that can account for our idea of causation. The necessity implicated in this idea arises exclusively from a determination of
the mind by custom to infer like effects from like causes and
the observation of this determination by the mind. Necessity
is thus "something that exists in the mind, not in objects." 42
Why, then, do we universally attribute this necessity to things?
The reply to this question, it appears, can only be that our
mind is naturally inclined to " spread itself on external objects," leading us to presume that the necessity existing in the
mind actually resides in things. 43
While I deny that the idea of causation, as a philosophical
relation, can afford us any grounds for advancing beyond pre" T., I, iii, XIV, pp. 151-152: " There is ... nothing new either discovered or
produced in any objects by their constant conjunction, and by the uninterrupted
resemblance of their relations of succession and contiguity. But it is from this
resemblance that the ideas of necessity, of power, and of efficacy, are derived.
These ideas, therefore, represent not anything that does or can belong to the
objects which are constantly conjoined. . . . Though the several resembling
instances, which give rise to the idea of power, have no influence on each other, and
can never produce any new quality in the object, which can be the model of that
idea, yet the observation o£ this resemblance produces a new impression in the mind,
which is its real model. . . . This determination is the only effect of the
resemblance; and, therefore, must be the same with power or efficacy .... Necessity,
then, is the effect of this observation, and is nothing but an internal impression of
the mind, or a determination to carry our thoughts from one object to another."
Cf. also E., Sect. V, Pt. I, p. 336; VII, Pt. II, p. 363.
•• T., I, iii, XIV, p. 152.
'" T., I, iii, XIV, p. 153.

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sent experience and the testimony of senses and memory, I
mean not to deny the value of this idea as a natural relation or
principle of association. We are constrained, as it were by
Nature herself, to place a necessary bond between cause and
effect. We believe that events called by these names are actually joined, that the relation between them is infallible and
necessary. We believe that we can justly infer, from the
existence of an object present to our senses or memory, the
existence of another object with which the object whose impression we presently feel has been united in past experience.
Thus, in drawing to a close my account of causation, I must
now trace the nature of this belief and its place in human life.
As to belief itself, it is either some new idea, such as that of
reality or existence, which we add to the simple conception of
an object, or it is but a special feeling or sentiment of some
of our ideas, distinguishing them from the fictions of the
fancy. 44 That it is not a new idea is clear from what was said
previously respecting the idea of existence and also from the
fact that, were there a separate idea of existence, our fancy
could add that idea to any of its conceptions, thus rendering
the most fictitious as vivid and worthy of our assent as the
most real. We may thus conclude that belief is simply a certain
feeling or sentiment, characterizing certain of our ideas and
serving to distinguish them from fictions. This feeling makes us
take a firmer hold of our ideas, rendering them more lively and
thus more similar to our impressions. 45 It arises only when
there is present to the senses or memory some impression to
which we relate the idea in which we believe. 46 Because a
" T., Appendix, p. 554: " Either the belief is some new idea, such as that of
reality or existence, which we join to the simple conception of an object, or it is
merely a peculiar feeling or sentiment." Cf. E., Sect. V, Pt. II, pp. 840-841.
•• T., Appendix, p. 555: "We may ... conclude, that belief consists merely in a
certain feeling or sentiment; in something that depends not on the will, but must
arise from certain determinate causes and principles of which we are not masters
..• belief is nothing but a peculiar feeling, different from the simple conception."
Cf. E., Sect. V, Pt. IT, p. 841.
46 E., Sect. V, Pt. I, p. 889:
"All belief of matter of fact or real existence is
derived merely from some object, present to the memory or senses, and a customary
conjunction between that and some other object."

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present impression is associated with an idea, we have the
feeling or sentiment that this idea is real. Belief, therefore, is
"nothing but a more vivid, lively, forcible, firm, steady conception of an object," and is an act of the sensitive part of our
nature, involving not our cognitive or knowing powers. 47
Why is the nature of belief so important to the idea of cause?
The reason lies in the fact that all our arguments involving the
idea of cause consist both of an impression of the memory or
senses and of the idea of that object producing or produced by
the object of the impression. 48 This idea is, thus, related to
an impression actually present to the senses or memory. It
follows that this idea takes on the force and vivacity of that
impression, 49 so that we conceive it in a manner different from
that in which we conceive the fictitious ideas of the imagination. Nor does there enter into our belief in this relation any
so-called judgment, as many advance. For the distinction
betwixt judgment and the simple conception of an object is in
no wise one of nature but merely of the manner whereby the
same object is conceived. 50 In fine, "all belief of matter of fact
or real existence," a belief to which the idea of causation is
linked, " is derived merely from some object, present to the
memory or senses, and a customary conjunction between that
and some other object. . . . All these operations are a species
of natural instincts, which no reasoning or process of the
n E., Sect. V, Pt. II, p. 341 for quote cited in text. Cf. T., I, iii, VII, pp. 88-89
on belief as act of man's affective nature. A good study of Hume's use of the causal
inference as a psychological and not philosophical explanation of our belief in real
objects and real relations among objects is provided by John W. Lenz, "Hume's
Defense of Causal Inference," in llume: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. V. C.
Chappel (New York: Doubleday Anchor Books, 1966), pp. 169-186.
•• T., I, iii, V, pp. 76-77: "All our arguments concerning causes and effects
consist both of au impression of the memory or senses, and of the idea of that
existence, which produces the object of the impression, or is produced by it."
•• T., I, iii, VIII, p. 90: " When any impression becomes present to us, it not
only transpOTts the mind to such ideas as are related to it, but likewise communicates to them a share of its force and vivacity."
50 T., I, iii, VII, note 20, pp. 564-565:
" What we may in general affirm concerning these three acts of the understanding I conception, judgment, and reasoning I is, that taking them in a proper light, they all resolve themselves into the
first, and are nothing but particular ways of conceiving our objects."

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thought and understanding is able to produce or to prevent." 51
The necessity in our causal inferences is based on the inference
itself, not vice versa. 52 Thus I conclude that our belie£ in real
causes results not from the discovery o£ any necessary connection betwixt objects o£ our experience but exclusively and
solely from their customary conjunction in past experience and
from the liveliness and vigor imparted to our idea o£ one event
by another presently impressing itself either on our senses or on
our memory. 53

*

*

*

*

*

Truth, as Mr. Hume observes, is difficult to attain; and the
validity o£ his remark is perhaps nowhere more evident than
in the inquiry into human knowledge. Thus I am confident
that he, o£ all those present, will be especially receptive to the
comments I should like to make concerning human knowledge
and our understanding o£ the causal relation. Mr. Hume and
I have much in common. First, we agree in denying to man
a store o£ inborn ideas whereby he might be able to grasp the
nature o£ things anterior to his experience o£ them and in
affirming that all our ideas in some way derive from sensory
experience. 54 Again, we agree in holding that an abstract
analysis o£ ideas or concepts can never enable us to grasp,
through knowledge, those relationships objectively binding one
being to another. 55 Nevertheless, as shall be seen, our analyses
o£ experience lead us to quite different conclusions concerning
the nature and extent o£ human knowledge. Consequently, I
51

E., Sect. V, Pt. I, p. 339.

"" T., I, iii, VI, p. 81.
•• For this teaching cf. T., I, iii, VI, pp. 85-86; I, iii, XIV, pp. 142-143; E., Sect.
IV, Pt. II, pp. 328-329; Sect. V, Pt. I, p. 336; Sect. V, Pt. II, p. 342; Sect. VII,
Pt. II, pp. 360-361, 363.
5 ' Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 84, a. 3.
55 That an abstract
analysis of concepts cannot give us an understanding of
relationships actually existing among real existents is indicated in Summa Theol.,
I, q. 44, a. 2, ad 1: "Licet habitudo ad causam non intret definitionem entis quod
est causatum, tamen sequitur ad ea quae sunt de eius ratione. . . . Sed quia esse
causatum non est de ratione entis simpliciter, propter hoc invenitur aliquod ens non
causatum."

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turn to my task with the confidence that Mr. Hume will be
among my most attentive auditors, for it is a common desire to
secure the truth proportionate to human understanding that
motivates us both.
There are several areas wherein Mr. Hume's analysis is open
to criticism. I like, for example, the way he is able first to
claim that all we know are our own perceptions, be they impressions or ideas, and then to speak of "objects" present to
the senses or memory in an impression. 56 Obviously Mr. Hume
agrees with the maxim, " consistency is the hobgloblin of small
minds." We are not here, however, to quibble. Thus I shall
concentrate on what I believe to be the cardinal deficiencies in
Mr. Hume's philosophy. In brief, I intend to show that Mr.
Hume has failed to take into account or has misinterpreted
certain fundamental data of experience and that this failure or
misinterpretation is the root source of the erroneous conclusions to which his analysis leads. First, I shall briefly summarize his views on the nature of knowledge in general and
on the primary, direct object of human understanding. I shall
then turn to experience itself, to see whether or not a more careful scrutiny of it will disclose to us the evidence required for
allowing human knowing a greater scope than that granted to
it by Mr. Hume.
The notion of knowledge that emerges from Mr. Hume's
analysis is the following: Outside the knower are unknown
(and unknowable) "objects" or "things" or "realities."
These in some way or another act upon our senses, causing
affective states to arise within us and giving rise to vivid
images which are called impressions. These impression-images,
lively and vigorous in their initial impact upon the mind, can
56 For evidence of inconsistency in Hume on this matter, cf. the texts cited above
in notes 6, 10, £8, 46, 48. Other points of Hume's teaching that can be criticized
are: (I) his unhesitating acceptance of the rationalistic restriction of demonstrative arguments to those capable of resolution through the use of abstract principles
of thought, in particular the principle of contradiction, thus failing to allow for
the distinction between explanatory demonstrations (demonstratio propter quid)
and factual demonstrations (demonstratio quia); (£) his refusal to admit more than
a difference of degree between ideas and sense images.

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be reproduced m fainter images called ideas, and the latter
can be combined at will by the fancy. In short, knowledge
consists in the production within the knower of impressions by
external, unknown causes, and in the reproduction by the
imagination or memory of these impressions in fainter images
called ideas. 57 Knowledge is thus essentially a matter of mechanical action and production or reproduction of images. In
addition, these impressions (lively images) and ideas (faint
copies of lively images) are the immediate, direct objects of
human knowledge. Beyond them we cannot go, at least by
way of knowledge. 58 We can believe that there are "things"
corresponding to these impressions or ideas, " things " external
to us and existing independently of our consciousness, but we
can never know these "things." 59 This, in brief, is Mr. Hume's
position on the two chief points we intend to examine. Moreover, if Mr. Hume is right here, he is absolutely correct in
concluding that we can never attain through knowledge to an
understanding of the bond necessarily and objectively linking
cause to effect among the beings of the universe. How could we
know a relationship of this kind if, from the very start, we are
limited to a knowledge of our own subjective states of awareness, to our own perceptions, be they impressions or ideas?
Let us, then, inquire of experience to see if it discloses to us
any features that may have escaped the acute Mr. Hume in
his analysis.
Knowing or knowledge is itself an experience. Indeed it is
that experience whereby we have experience. This experience
of knowing discloses two fundamental poles, a knower and a
known; for knowledge is an act of someone we call a knower
concerning something we call a known. As an activity of a
knower, it is a vital, living act, perfecting the knower in one
way or another, proceeding from, taking place in, and terminating within him. Knowing can thus be called an immanent
activity in order to distinguish it from physical or transient
Cf. texts cited above, notes 7, 8, 10, 14.
Cf. above, notes 6, 10.
•• T., I, ii, VI, p. 62; I, iv, II, pp. 171-199.
57
58

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activity. The latter proceeds from an agent but advances
beyond that agent to another being in which it terminates and
which it perfects. In knowing flame, for example, I neither
change the flame nor do I become hot, whereas the activity
whereby a flame changes the temperature of a body proceeds
from the flame only to terminate in the body which it heats.
Knowing perfects the agent, in other words, whereas transient
activities perfect the patient. And knowing perfects the agent
because through knowledge the knower enlarges his horizons
and, as it were, completes his being. For while remaining himself, the knower becomes what is other than himself, namely,
the known, whose perfections the knower shares through knowledge. Knowers, consequently, differ from nonknowers in being
able to perfect themselves through an act immanent to themselves, an act through which they can draw into themselves
what is other than themselves, causing this other to exist in a
new way. This capacity argues to the existence within knowers
of a nature in some way freer, less limited than that of nonknowers. It means that a knower is less limited to the here
and now, less restricted in being than a nonknower. In brief,
this capacity means that knowers are in some way free from
matter and the conditions of matter; it means that knowledge
implies some level of immateriality in knowers. 60
It further follows that knowers differ among themselves
according to their level of immateriality. For there are, as
experience also shows, knowers and knowers. A worm knows
an apple from an acorn; a dog knows his master; the dog's
master, a man, knows his dog plus arithmetic, physics, himself.
The openness to what is other than self manifestly differs in
these three examples of knowers, thus arguing to a progressively
more immaterial principle within each to account for the diversity we discover in their knowledge acts. Reflection upon this
experience and the endeavor to account for it is the reason for
distinguishing two great divisions of knowledge, sense knowledge or sensation and intellectual knowledge or understanding.
60

Summa Theol., I, q. 14, a. I.

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Furthermore, experience also shows that both these divergent
types of knowledge are united in the one knowing agent,
man. 61
Thus far we have regarded knowledge from one of its poles,
the knower. But what of the other pole of knowledge, the
known or the other? How does this stand with regard to the
knower and to the types of knowing acts he exercises within
himself? Again looking to experience, the experience called
knowledge, we observe that it is an activity immanent indeed
to the knowing agent but controlled, governed, and determined
by the other, by the object known. This object measures
knowledge and is the final criterion whereby knowledge is
judged to be true or false. 62 It is obvious that "things,"
precisely insofar as they are realities or beings existing in
nature, " outside of knowledge," are not within the order either
of sense or intellectual existence. 63 Evidently, for a thing to be
known, it must somehow be in the knower, exist within him.
The knower, the agent, must be united to the known, to the
object toward which his act of knowing is directed. 64 The
notion of thing differs thus from the notion of object, for an
object is a thing-as-related-to-a-knower, whereas a thing, precisely as thing, is not thus related. But this does not mean that
"thing" and "object" are two different "things." Nothing
real is added to a thing when it is related to a knower; no
change is brought about in the thing. It is rather the knower
who receives an augment to his being, for in knowing he
becomes, is identified in some way or another with what is other
than himself, namely, the thing-object. 65 The object, in other
61 Cf. ibid.
Cf. also De V erit., q. l!, a. 2. On man as the knowing subject or
agent for all acts of human knowledge, cf., for instance, De Verit., q. 2, a. 6, ad 3:
"non enim, proprie loquendo, sensus aut intellectus cognoscunt, sed homo per
utrumque."
•• Cf. De Verit., q. 14, a. 8, ad 5; also q. 1, a. 2.
•• Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a. 7: "Sensus et scientia referuntur ad sensibile
et scibile, quae quidem, inquantum sunt res quaedam in esse naturali existentes,
sunt extra ordinem esse sensibilis et intelligibilis."
•• Cf., for instance, ibid., q. 78, a. 1.
•• In V Met., 1. 17, nn. 1003-1004, 1026-1029, esp. n. 1026: "Sed videre et

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words, is the thing as vicariously present to the knower. Moreover, the same individual thing can be related in various ways
both to various knowers and to the same knower. For instance,
a cat can be related to the knower we call man either as a
colored object, an emitter of meows, a furry, agile, slant-eyed
animal with sharp claws. In addition, a multitude of different
things can be related as one unique object to a knower, so
that an object can refer to many distinct individual things.
For instance, all cows can be related to a knower under the
aspect, that is, as object-things, of milk-producing animals.
We might term things as things the material object of knowledge, namely, that which is grasped in a knowing act, whereas
we might term the precise aspect under which they are ordered
to a knower as an object the formal object of knowledge or
that aspect or formality of things by which they are known. 66
But in any event, object means thing as ordered to related to
knower in some determinate way; object points to something
in things that is now in the knower making things present to
the knower. The object, in other words, is the thing, but the
thing as existing now not according to its own being in the
world of nature but according to the being of the knower in
the world of knowledge. If knowledge means anything, it
means that the knower, in the act of knowing, and the thing,
as object known, exist as one; there is a community of being
between knower and known. 67
For knowing to take place, then, the knower and the known
must be existentially united in the knower. Yet the existence
or superexistence of the known in the knower is not itself
knowledge. It is rather the necessary prerequisite for the act
of knowing, for in order to know the knower must first be
intelligere et hujusmodi actiones ... manent in agentibus, et non transeunt in res
passas; unde visibile et scibile non patitur aliquid, ex hoc quod intelligitur vel
videtur. Et propter hoc non ipsamet referuntur ad alia, sed alia ad ipsa." Cf.
Summa Theol., I, 13, 7; Quaestiones disputatae de Potentia Dei, q. 7, aa. 9-11.
•• Cf. De Verit., q. 22. a. 10. Cf. also Summa Theol., I, q. 77, a. 3 and ad 4;
q. 1, a. 3, ad 2.
07 Cf. text cited in note 64.

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united to the known. But as yet we have not seen how this
superexistence o£ things, as objects, in knowers takes place.
How explain a presence o£ this kind? Obviously what is
required is a medium or presentative form or intentional likeness existing within the knower making the known present to
it. The medium in question, moreover, must be by nature a
pure sign, a totally vicarious presence directly and immediately
linking knower and known. Its presence, indispensable to
account £or the knowing act, must be so unobstrusive that it
must not stand between the knower and the known, that is,
it must be o£ such a nature that it is itself not directly known
but is grasped only in an activity such as that in which we are
now engaged, namely, a reflective search and scrutiny o£ our
acts o£ knowing to discover what it is that makes knowledge
possible. Were it to get in the way, to stand between knower
and known, this medium would itself be the immediate, direct
object known, and I see not how we could ever go beyond an
analysis o£ our own subjective states to attain real objects.
Yet how is this medium brought into being? The explanation, i£ we hearken to experience, seems to be as follows. The
various bodies that make up the things o£ the universe we
experience through knowledge have two kinds o£ action. 68 One
follows £rom what is proper to them as bodies, being an action
through movement and proceeding £rom one body to another,
affecting the latter in some physical, material way. Thus one
billiard ball strikes another, imparting motion to it. Thus light
strikes our eye, causing certain physiological and neurological
changes within our sense organs and brain. Thus flame heats
our hand. Yet this can hardly explain knowledge, £or we can
know flame without becoming hot. Knowledge is possible only
i£ bodies have another type o£ action, one that is not £or the
purpose o£ changing or modifying matter but is directed to a
diffusion o£ a likeness, a likeness received £rom the thing in
the knower and existing in the latter according to his own
mode o£ being. In other words, the physical things or bodies
68

Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 78, a. 3.

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that constitute the universe of our immediate experience can
be known because they are meant to be known, because they
are orderable to knowers. But they could not be so ordered
did they not have, of themselves, the ability to communicate
themselves in some way to knowers. This ability is rooted
ultimately in their natures but proximately in the actions
whereby they disclose themselves to knowers. Actually sensible, relatable to sensory powers because of properties or
qualities dynamically issuing from :their inner wealth, the
physical things of the universe are proportioned to sensory
powers within knowers. 69
The proper, immediate object of any given sense is a determinate aspect of the sensible thing. And, in the case of our
outer, external senses, the act of sensing opens out upon the
thing itself precisely as that thing is, here and now, exercising
some action upon the sense organ involved. 70 Here there is
no need for an additional presentative or objectifying form or
likeness, produced this time by the knower, in which to grasp,
to know in act, the object. In the case of the knowing acts
a knower performs through his outer senses, the actual presence
of the thing to the sense through the thing's own proper
activity is sufficient. The sense act is thus immediately terminated in the thing-object as effectively present to it. Yet we
have sense knowledge of sensible things even when the things
in question are not present to our outer senses, as imaginative
and memoritive experiences testify. To explain knowledge of
this kind, the presence of the thing-object to the sense power
through a form or likeness whereby the known is made to exist
in the knower according to the knower's mode of being is not
alone sufficient. Here a further presentative form or likeness is
necessary, one which the knower, who has already become one
69 Cf. ibid., ad 1:
"Non omnia accidentia habent vim immutativam secundum
se; sed solae qualitates tertiae speciei, secundum quas contingit alteratio. Et ideo
solae huiusmodi qualitates sunt obiecta sensuum, quia, ut dicitur in VII Physic.,
secundum eadem alteratur sensus, secundum quae altemntur corpora inanimata."
Cf. also In 11 de An., I. 14, n. 425; De Verit., q. 8, a. 7, ad 2.
7 ° Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 17, a. 2, ad 1.

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with the object through a first form or likeness which the
ancients called an impressed species, expresses in order to
contemplate an object not physically present to him. 71 Yet in
every instance, the object known is not these presentative,
objectifying forms or likenesses or species but the thing-object
existing now within the knower through the medium of these
likenesses.
Even on the level of sensory knowledge, experience bears
witness, the knower grasps not only those sensible aspects of
the thing which form the proper objects of specialized outer
senses-colors, sounds, etc.-but their union in the one sensible
thing, a being sensed moreover as something affecting in some
way the life of the knower. A mouse, for instance, not only
sees grey and hears sounds coming from a cat but realizes
that the cat is the source of these sounds and this color and,
moreover, that the cat whose jaws open before it is certainly
not about to do it a favor. These sensible properties are the
proper objects of what are called the internal senses of common
sense and estimation, and these properties are seen to be
emanating from the thing which at this instant is actively
confronting the knower. And the total ensemble of these
sensible aspects of things is stored in the inner senses of
imagination and memory, which are the powers capable of
bringing into being the second kind of forms or likenesses of
which we spoke. These forms or likenesses are what the
ancients referred to as expressed species or phantasms. 72
We also claim to understand the sensible things of the
universe. We claim to know what they are; we claim to possess
some kind of knowledge of their essences or natures, the principles intrinsic to sensible things making them to be what they
are. We claim, in other words, that sensible things are also
intelligible, that they are ordered to a higher knowing power
within man, his intellect or understanding. But unlike the sensible aspect or object in things, the intelligible aspect does not,
71
70

Cf. ibid., q. 78, a. 4, entire article.
Ibid. Cf. also Quaestio disputata de Anima, 13.

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purely of itself, disclose itself to us. 73 For instance, no men whose
hearing is unimpaired will fail to hear a thunderclap if they
are properly situated. Yet they may differ markedly in their
explanations of what a thunderclap is, although all of them are
impelled, as it were by an inner necessity, to inquire into the
matter. This indicates that understanding or intellection requires something on the part of the knower not required for
sensation or sense knowledge. It indicates that there is a need
for the knower to discover, within the data delivered to him by
his senses, the intelligible source of those data. It means that
the human mind is impelled to find out why this particular
sensible thing actually affecting his sensory powers is what it
is, why it is characterized by such and such sensible qualities,
how it is related to other individual sensible things possessing
similar qualities. The reason for such qualities lies within the
things, for it is they that possess these qualities, and the latter
can even be regarded as signs or clues pointing to the dynamic,
intrinsic principle explanatory of them. It is to this principle
that the human mind or intellect or understanding is ordered.
Yet to know this principle, man must first render or make it
actually intelligible. That is, he must flood it with light, he
must extricate it from phenomenal, surface conditions in which
it is immersed. He must liberate it from conditions keeping
it from actually disclosing itself to the mind. This principle is
73 Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 84, aa. 2-4. Note that in these articles St. Thomas
stresses the nature of human intellectual knowledge as an act of an agent whose
being is composed of matter and spirit, body and soul. The principle governing
the thought expressed in all these articles is the following: Were intellectual
knowledge innate, were it derived from the nature of the human soul itself, were
it derived from " separated forms " flowing in some mysterious way into the soul,
then the concrete union of soul and body in man would be senseless. "Non enim
potest dici quod anima intellectiva corpori uniatur propter corpus; quia nee forma
est propter materiam, nee motor propter mobile, sed potius e converso. Maxime
autem videtur corpus esse necessarium animae intellectivae, ad eius propriam
operationem, quae est mtelligere, quia secundum esse suum a corpore non dependet.
Si autem anima species intelligibiles secundum suam naturam apta nata esset
recipere per influentiam aliquorum separatorum principiorum tantum, et non
acciperet eas ex sensibus, non indigeret corpore ad intelligendum: unde frustra
corpori uniretur " (art. 4, emphasis added) .

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present to man, for it lies at the heart of the phantasms or
forms or likenesses already present in the human knower as
explanatory principles of his sense knowledge. For these forms
derive their efficacy from the inner dynamism of the thingobject. What is necessary is for man's mind, his intelligence,
to make this principle actually intelligible, to render it alive
for himself. This is the work of what Aristotle called the agent
or active intellect, a power native to man that takes over the
deliverances of sense experience and disengages from them that
aspect of real things ultimately accountable for their properties
and sensible qualities, an aspect we term nature or essence. 74
Once disengaged by the agent intellect working on the
phantasms or expressed species of the memory and imagination,
this intrinsic principle of things becomes present to man's
mind as a new likeness or species or form of the thing. United
to this nature through this likeness, existing in him according
to his own intellectual mode of being, man can then grasp it
intelligibly through an act generative of ideas, that is, vicarious
forms of the natures of things, through which those natures are
themselves directly attained. The idea through which the
nature or essence of the thing is known is not itself the immediate object of intellect. For it, like the species or likenesses of
the sensible order which we have already examined, is a pure
means, an unobstrusive presence of the thing-object within the
knower, brought into being by him as a means in which to
contemplate the thing-object itself. The idea, in fact, is the
thing-object existing according to the mode of intellect, uniting
knower to known. As an entity of the psychical realm, the
idea is itself an object of knowledge, yet it is never known
directly, immediately, but only secondarily, through a reflection
on the very act whereby knowledge of things is achieved. 75
How does this analysis bear upon the causal relation? Remarkably enough, none of the ideas of our intellect, or rather,
the thing-objects known through these ideas, necessarily implies
•• Cf. ibid., q. 79, a. 8.
•• Ibid., q. 85, a. !ll.

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any other thing-object or idea. Here I agree with Mr. Hume's
analysis. In addition, the very first idea of the intellect, the
idea of being in the vague sense of something or whatever is or
can be, includes the notion of existence as an intelligible content.76 And since every genuine idea is necessarily that of
something either actual or possible, there is agreement between
Mr. Hume and me on the score that the idea of existence or
possible being is not a distinct idea added to other ideas. 77
Nevertheless, as noted previously, the notion of an object or of
a thing-as-related-to-a-knower means that things can be viewed
under various aspects, formalities, points of view. They can be
viewed in this way because all these different aspects actually
are rooted in the thing attained under the aspect in question.
This suggests, and experience confirms, that human knowledge
is piecemeal. We just do not enjoy an intuitive grasp of a
given being in its totality, in all its wealth. We first know it
in an indeterminate, vague way under the universal aspect of
" something." In addition, in conceiving things, in grasping
them through ideas, our knowing acts contain nothing that is
truly proper to the human knower himself. There is, to be
sure, a conformity or likeness between knower and known,
for the known exists in the human knower through a likeness
we call an idea. But no affirmation of this conformity has
been made. Thus I hold that knowledge requires completion
76 St. Thomas
frequently asserts that the first concept of the mind is that of
being or "that which is or can be" (cf. S. T., I, q. 5, a. 2; I-II, q. 94, a. 2; De
Verit., 1, 1; Contra Gentiles, c. 98; De ente et essentia, proeemium). For being
is the "first intelligible," in the light of which all else is intelligible. Yet it is
essential, in order to understand St. Thomas's teaching on this point, to distinguish
being as the first intelligible from being as the subject of the science of metaphysics.
The same materially, they differ formally, as thing-objects of intelligence. For the
being that is first known is known by all men, because all men are knowers,
whereas the being that is the subject of the science of metaphysics is known only
by metaphysicians, and it is obvious that not all men are metaphysicians. Moreover, the being that is first known is grasped in an act of simple conception or
apprehension (cf. Summa Theol., I-II, q. 94, a. 2), whereas the being that is the
subject of metaphysics is attained only through a judgment of separation (cf.
In Boet. de Trin., q. 5, a. 3).
77 For Hume's position here, consult notes 17, 44.

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through a further act, one distinct from the simple conception
or apprehension of a given aspect of real things. This act is
that of judging or judgment; it consists in affirming or denying
one concept, called predicate, of another concept, called subject.
In judging, the mind does not affirm that its concept or idea is
conformed to the thing (for this conformity is given in the act
of conceiving; the mind, through the idea, is like to, conformed
to the thing) . Rather, judgment affirms or denies that the
human knower, in the very act of giving judgment, knows that
he has the truth, that his intellect is actually conformed to
things. In other words, a judgment means that the human
knower affirms that he possesses within himself the likeness
of the thing known. 78 Moreover, what is judgment if not an
act by which the human knower asserts that a predicate and
a subject, which differ in notion or idea, are identical in the
thing? For in every true judgment the two terms that are
identified differ in notion. They are the same in the thing or the
subject of whom the predicate is affirmed, but they differ as
intelligible units of thought. 79 The proper function of judgment
consists in making the mind pass from the level of simple
essence or simple object signified to the level of thing or subject
possessing existence, a thing of which the object of thought
(predicate) and the subject of thought (subject) are intelligible aspects. 80 Mind puts together in judging what it has
torn apart or distinguished in conception; it synthesizes what
it has analyzed.
In addition, the notion of existence given in the vague
concept of being that is the first object-thing known through
an idea in the act of conceiving is a purely abstract, noetical
object, a unit of intelligibility; it is existence as signified. In
judgment, on the other hand, existence is reached as something
concrete, as an act exercised, lived in real things. In affirming,
through a judgment, that the sensible beings of our immediate
78 De Verit., q. 1, a. 3. Again, as we find in Summa Theol., I-ll, q. 173, a.
" Judicium est completivum cognitionis."
79 cr. Summa Theol., I, q. 13, a.
80 cr. In Boet. de Trin., q. 5, a. 3.

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experience exist, we grasp, in some degree, the act within things
ultimately responsible for all that they are, the root source,
intrinsic to them, of their natures and properties, the act
making the qualities we have perceived in a sensory way real. 81
The importance of judgment in human knowing can be seen
in the growth of human knowledge and plays an essential role
in grasping the necessary connection between cause and effect.
As noted previously, the first concept or idea, the first thingobject attained in intellectual knowledge, is that of being in
the vague sense of" something." Human knowledge progresses
by making more and more determinate the elements potentially
contained in the notion of something, in proceeding from
common, indeterminate knowledge of things in their most
general aspect as " something " to what is precise, determinate,
within them. 82 This vague knowledge becomes more distinct as
the intellect advances to an understanding of things in their
proper natures. This it does by grasping in things their characteristic or proper accidents or phenomenal appearances, viewed
as signs or indications of their inner natures or essences. 83
And because the proper, immediate object of human intellect
is the being of sensible things, which exist only as individuals,
81 The human intellect is primarily
ordered to know being as found in sensible
things (cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 84, a. 7). These are all concrete, composite
realities. Through simple apprehension, special formalities really existing within
these composites are grasped, but grasped in an abstract, universal way (cf. ibid.,
q. 85, a. 1). The role of judgment is to reunite these distinct intelligible aspects
of real things, to put them back together as they are in things (cf. text cited in
note 80). Moreover, the being or existential act (esse) within the things is the
source for all that they are: " esse est actualitas omnis forrnae vel naturae "
(ibid., q. 3, a. 3).
8 " Here texts of capital importance
are S. T., I, q. 85, a. 3 and In I Phys., I. I,
nn. 6-8. The latter reads: "innatum est nobis ut procedamus cognoscendo ab iis
quae sunt nobis magis nota, in ea quae sunt magis nota naturae; sed ea quae sunt
nobis magis nota, sunt confusa, qualia sunt universalia; ergo oportet nos ab universalibus ad singularia procedere ... non sunt eadem magis nota nobis et secundum
naturam; sed ilia quae sunt magis nota secundum naturam, sunt minus nota
secundum nos. Et quia iste est naturalis modus sive ordo addiscendi, nos debemus
devenire ex notioribus nobis ad notiora naturae ... nos procedimus intelligendo de
potentia in actum; et principium cognitionis nostrae est a sensibilibus, quae sunt
materialia, et intelligibilia in potentia. . • ."
88 Summa Theol., I, q. IS, a. 2. Cf. also De Verit., q. IO, a. I, ad 6.

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throughout this entire process of making our vague awareness
of things as " somethings " distinct, we must constantly refer
our intellectual grasp of things in their common aspects to the
phantasms or expressed species of imagination and memory
in order to see the univeral nature as it actually exists in the
individual, concrete being that is the thing-object known. 84
There is, in other words, a necessity for bringing judgments to
bear upon sensible existents actually experienced. 85 Through
judgments of this kind, we gradually come to see the bifurcation of being into substance and accidents; into the being
which exists in itself and being whose existence is an inexistence.86 This, in turn, discloses to us the dynamic character
of the beings of our environment, for we come to understand
that the accidental features of things, through which their
inner essence is disclosed, are in reality complements to that
essence, perfections or acts flowing from their inner being or
essence, perfecting it and giving it more "being." 87
We judge, in other words, that the beings of immediate experience, the sensible existents given to us in consciousness, can
in some way be regarded as hungering for more being, as
dynamic centers of existence reaching out for more, clamoring
Summa Theol., I, q. 84, a. 7.
Thus the need, in Thomistic metaphysics, for resolving all judgments in the
senses: "sensus sunt extremi sicut intellectus principiorum, extrema appelans ilia
in quae fit resolutio judicantis" (De Verit., q. 2, a. 3); "quia principium primum
cognitionis est sensus, oportet ad sensum quodamodo resolvere omnia de quibus
judicamus" (ibid., ad 2).
86 In V Met., I. 9, nn. 890 ff:
"oportet, quod ens contrahatur ad diversa genera
secundum diversum modum praedicandi, qui consequitur diversum modum essendi.
. . . Et propter hoc ea in quae dividitur ens primo, dicuntur esse praedicamenta,
quia distinguuntur secundum diversum modum praedicandi. Quia igitur eorum quae
praedicantur, quaedam significant quid, idest substantiam, quaedam quale, quaedam
quantum, et sic de aliis. . .. "
87 Summa Theol., I, q. 5, a. I, ad I:
"cum ens dicat aliquid proprie esse in actu;
actus autem proprie ordinem habeat ad potentiam; secundum hoc simpliciter
aliquid dicitur ens, secundum quod primo discemitur ab eo quod est in potentia
tantum. Hoc autem est esse substantiale rei uniuscuiusque; unde per suum esse
substantiale dicitur unumquodque ens simpliciter. Per actus autem superadditos,
dicitur aliquid esse secundum quid, sicut esse album significat esse secundum
quid .... "
84

85

KNOWLEDGE

OF CAUSALITY

t:N HUME AND AQUINAS

fl87

for fulfillment. We discover levels of being among the existents
delivered to us through
We find that they are more
or less good,, true, beautiful. But none of those sensible existents
given to us in our immediate experience is totally, perfectly
good, true, beautiful; none is totally being. This argues to a
lack in them, a lack which in final analysis is the reason why
they hunger for more being, for fulfillment, a lack or appetite
explanatory of the dynamism they disclose. All this is inexplicable, utterly absurd, unless we are willing to admit that all
of these sensible beings of immediate experience are of themselves incomplete beings. Since they are not being itself, they
cannot even explain of themselves the being we actually discover in them. They are, in other words, caused beings. 88 That
these beings are caused is a judgment forced upon the mind
by an appreciation of what they are, and this appreciation,
in turn, is the result of a long process of judgmental acts
bearing upon the sensible existents present to us in sense knowledge. Certainly the idea of cause is not a part of the idea of
any of these sensible existents as natures or essences of such or
such a kind. But, and here is the point which Mr. Hume has
failed to see, we cannot understand these sensible existents as
beings until we have judged that they are, in their being, nonself-explanatory, demanding an other from whom their being is
derived and from whom is derived the thirst or appetite they
display for more and more being. 89 In other words, through
judgments we grasp that the beings of our immediate experience
demand a cause for their being. Mr. Hume is right in holding
that the causal relation can never be discovered through an
abstract analysis of ideas. But by eradicating the judgment act
from human intelligence, he cut himself off from the only way
possible for attaining this relation in a knowledge act. For it
is precisely through judgments concerning the sensible beings
Cf. ibid., q. 2, a. 3, quarta via.
The dynamism, the movement characterizing the sensible beings of the world
of our experience is an indication of their unfulfillment, of their need to acquire
what is not theirs by nature, that is, more being. On this, cf. ibid., q. 44, a. 4,
88

89

and ad 1.

WILLIAM E. MAY

present to us in experience that we see that they are caused,
that they are effects, which would not even be were there not
a cause distinct from them responsible for their being.90
WILLIAM

E. MAY

0CYI'p1U lnatrumentorum
Washington, D. C.

•• One of the major values of Hume's critique of the causal proposition is,
perhaps, its value in showing that the causal proposition is not a first principle,
not a rationalistic apriori "given." On this cf. Joseph Owens, "The Causal
Proposition-Principle
or Conclusion? " The Modem Schoolman XXXII (1955),
159-171, 257-270, 3(t3-339, and "The Causal Proposition Revisited," Ibid., XLIV
(1967). 143-151.

THE SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE
REAL DISTINCTION:
AN ANALYTIC AND
COMPARATIVE STUDY

I

F IT IS TRUE, as St. Thomas says in his introduction
to the De Ente et Essentia, that being and essence are the
first things conceived in the intellect; and that everything
else is conceived under the " auspices," so to speak, of these
primary notions, might we not safely conclude that this first
and fundamental monocular to all knowledge would have very
far-reaching effects indeed? Just as a person facing the west
will necessarily have a different perspective of the lights and
shadows and all the passing parade of reality than one facing
the east, so also it might make a difference whether one takes
his fundamental intuition of being from the top or bottom,
or from somewhere on the circumference, to speak metaphorically.
In fact-to reduce the situation to extremes--the question
of whether one views being from the bedrock of essence or the
heights of existence might be the deciding factor in a myriad
of other orientations which characterize his life: the orientation
towards conservatism or progressivism; individualism or personalism; naturalism or mysticism; determinism or freedom;
self-expressionism or altruism; passivity or activity; provincialism or universalism; humanism, or covert or overt theocentricity; multiplicity or unity, etc.
On his voyage to China in
reflecting on the fundamental differences which emerged in his discussions with some
of the ship's passengers, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin concluded
that
In all thought there is . . . a fundamental option, a postulate
which is not demonstrable, but from which everything else is
deduced. If one admits that esse (l'etre) is better than its opposite,

289

HOWARD P. KAINZ

it is difficult to stop short of God. If one does not admit it, no
further discussion is possible.1
Both essentialists and orthodox Thomists hold that " esse
is better than its opposite." (If, as Suarez points out, essentialists sometimes hold that " essence is most perfect," this is
only because they conceive essence as substantially subsisting
in itself, which subsistence must presuppose existence, in
Suarez's estimation) .2 This is what allows them to be on
"speaking terms." However, since the essentialists hold that
esse is really identical with essence, we might expect they mean
something else by " esse " than the Thomists, who hold that
it is really distinct from essence. If their perspective is not
from the pole opposite to existence, it seems to be somewhere
along the line. One of the purposes of this study will be to
determine the locus of their metaphysical orientation with
some measure of accuracy.

I.

SoME

CHARACTERISTics

OF SuAREZ

In the construction of this study I concentrated especially
on Disputation XXXI, Sects. 1-14, in which Suarez considers
the nature of essence and existence, and the distinction between the two; Disp. XXVIII, Sect. 1, on the major divisions
of being; and Disp. XXX, Sects. 4 and 6, on God's essence. 8
In the reading of Suarez I have been struck especially by
three things, which I think may have a bearing on the texture
of his thought: namely, his conceptualism, polemic attitude,
and individualism.
1. Conceptualism: When one returns to St. Thomas after
1 Corte,
La vie et l'ame de Teilhard de Chardin (Paris: Librairie Artheme
Fayard, 1957), p. 58: "Je crois bien en fait, qu'il se place Ia, dans toute pensee,
un option fondamental, un postulat qui n'est pas demontrable, mais dont tout
derive. Si !'on admet que l'etre est mieux que son contraire, il est difficile de
s'arreter sans aller jusqu'a Dieu. Si on ne l'admet pas, il n'est plus possible, de
discuter.
• Disputationes Metaphysicae, Charles Burton, Ed. (Paris: Vives, 1961), t. 26
(this edition is used for all further references to the Disputations); Disp. XXXI,
Sect. 18, med.
· 8 Op. cit., pp. 1-20, p. 74 ff., p. 89 ff., and pp. 224-812.

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

fl91

reading Suarez for some time, St. Thomas appears to have an
almost " chatty " style in comparison. Suarez is the strict
logician, the rigid dialectician, all the way through. He rarely
resorts to examples or comparisons, rarely departs from an
unflinching argumentative mold. There can be no doubt that
he is concerned primarily with concepts and particularly with
the analysis and mutual comparison of these concepts. This is
not to say that he is unrealistic but only that he emphasizes the
conceptual, the essential.
fl. Polemicism: Suarez in the Disputations does not ordinarily declare himself at odds with St. Thomas on specific points.
It seems that he has too much respect for Divus Thomas to
openly differ with him. Quite frequently, however, he states
his diametrical opposition to impressive barrages of Thomists
and then adds that " they base their assertions on such-andsuch texts of St. Thomas."
One cannot help but notice in Suarez's disputations a kind
of zest for combat. After two or three pages of closely-knit
arguments he will conclude that his adversary's position is
ridiculosum. Not that he is swayed by passion or emotionalism,
rather just the opposite; he is the epitome of a cooly logical,
bilious metaphysician. But, whereas it was a notable thing in
the St. Thomas legend that he once brought his fist down on
the table and exclaimed " that takes care of the Manichaeans! ",
this type of behavior is rather a commonplace in Suarez.
3. Individualism: Unlike St. Thomas, who has the facility
for making his reader almost forget about the author and
attend wholly to the subject matter, Suarez reminds you
continually of his presence. " Ego " is a much-used pronoun
with Suarez. And he is continually giving " personal attention "
to those arguments which impugn " nostra sententia " or
" nostra positio." Suarez automatically gives the unmistakable
stamp of his own character to his writings.

II.

SuAREZ ON BEING AND THE DIVISIONs

oF BEING

The main criterion that Suarez uses to distinguish real beirig
from potential being and nothingness is the state of "standing

HOWAliD P. KAINZ

outside causes," of escaping, as it were, from indeterminacy and
nothingness.
The " being " which he seems to have in mind is that bare
minimal being which is common to both rocks and men, i. e.,
the lowest and most general type of existence. And it is this
bare, minimal being that is made into a genus containing in a
confused and indistinct way all the various categories of being
of which this one transcendental concept can be predicated
according to the analogy of intrinsic proportionality, in much
the same way that the genus of animality contains indefinitely
all the specific differences and can be predicated of all higher
species (univocally in this latter case, not analogously).
The main divisions in the category of being are, according to
Suarez, the divisions of infinite and finite being. These divisions, although not per se notae, gain their value from the fact
that they are most useful in the order of demonstration.
" Infinite," as applied to God, is not a privative notion,
(which would imply that he was ordered to some termination,
which he did not actually have) but rather a negative notion,
in that the notion of being, as applied to God, does not prescind
from any perfection of finite being. Any finite being, on the
other hand, is cut off from the perfections of others, intrinsicaUy
by the particular differences of its nature and extrinsically
by respect to those beings which contain its own perfection
eminently as well as from those beings whose perfections it
contains eminently itself.
The division of being into ens a se and ens ab alio can be
reduced to the previous division, says Suarez, since " aseity "
does not imply sui-causality but is merely another negative
notion implying that God is not subject to change or emanation
and hence is completely actual, perfect, infinite. And to thiS
latter division we can reduce the categories of necessary and
contingent being, uncreated and created being, actual and
potential being, and ens per essentiam and ens per pa'rticipa-

ticmem.

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

III.

293

THE BEING oF Goo

According to Suarez/ God's esse is not compounded with his
essence but is his essence in the most simple, complete, and
absolute manner. This is why, in God's appearance to Moses,
God, in answering Moses' question as to his identity, indicated
that in actual fact he was the only existent, so that, in a very
real sense, creatures may be said not to exist. And thus, in
God's essence, there can in no wise be any passive potentiality,
an'd in his existence there can be no receptivity or participation.
The main difference between the esse of God and that of
creatures is, says Suarez, 5 that God's esse is both really
identical with his essence and also of (or from) his essence:
· I aver unconditionally that to be "really identical with an
essence," and to be " of an essence," are not convertible predications: for, it suffices for the former that there be no distinction in
the thing, but, for the latter, it is necessary that the essence of
the thing should not be able to be totally constituted, in lieu of
that quality or property which is said to be "of the essence." 6

And so, this is the main distinction between the essence of
God and that of creatures, namely, that we cannot even
adequately think of God's essence, except as existing, whereas,
with created essences, we can make a precision of reason from
existence as the final actuality of a being.
And this leads us to the question of whether, besides this
distinction of reason which we can discern in created essences,
there is any more radical distinction.

IV. THE TYPE

OF DISTINCTION

WHICH

OBTAINS

BETWEEN

CREATED EssENCE AND CREATED ExiSTENCE

1. The Thornist Position.

Suarez himself expounds the Thomist position in Sect. 1 of
Disp. XXXI, where he states that they posit a distinction
in re for the following five reasons:
6 Disp. XXX, Sect. 6, p. 91.
• Disp. XXX, Sect. 4.
Fateor ... in universum non converti--esse in re idem cum essentia, et esse.
de essentia; nam ad illud prius sufficit quod in re non sit distinctio, ad hoc vero
posterius necesse est ut non possit rei essentia esse plene constituta, praeciso eo
quod dicitur esse de essentia.
: 6

HOWARD P. KAINZ

(i) It is an eternal truth that man is a rational animal; but
his actual existence is a contingent fact, depending entirely on
the action of some efficient cause, so that something real must
indeed be added to the essence.
(ii) Creatures do not have esse of their essence and hence
must receive it, which implies potency, or essence. in lieu of
which they would have to be unreceived act, i.e., God, pure
Act.
(iii) There must be some kind of real composition in
creatures; otherwise, they would have that simplicity which
is the prerogative of God alone.
(iv) Esse is either something distinct from the composite of
matter and form or the result of the union of partial existences.
If the latter obtains, then we have to face the problem of an
incomplete potency having an existence of itself. But this
seems impossible, because we know that the only incomplete
component principle that can exist separately is the human
soul.
(v) Theology affirms the distinction of Christ's human
nature., or essence, from the esse of the Divine Word. So, at
least here there must be a real distinction.
2. The Scotist Position.

The Scotist school proposes a " modal " distinction, which
it justifies in this way:
"Distinctions are not to be multiplied unnecessarily." There
certainly must be some type of distinction between created esse
and essence, for the reasons proposed by the Thomists. However, a modal distinction is sufficient adequately to describe the
composition in created beings. And so, why should we rush
into the innumerable difficulties that will arise if we try to
maintain a real distinction in each created being?
The nature of a " modal distinction is such that one extreme
is separable, by the divine power, from the other extreme,"
although this divine power could not extend to a mutual, or
convertible, separation, i. e., so that not only would created
1 Diat.

XXXI, Sect. I, #II, p. iiS.

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

295

essence be separable from its own proper esse (which is a
necessity for explaining the hyposatic union) , but also the
esse itself could be separable from the essence of a creature.
3. Suarez's Own Position.

Suarez prepares the way for his " distinction of reason " by
his doctrine on distinction itself:
Distinction, since it is just a negation, or a kind of relation, is
not a condition sine qua non for the existence of a thing, but,
rather, is a characteristic resulting from the existence of something
in such-and-such a way. 8

It is only through the determination of being that negations
and relationships are set up. In being itself, however, we can
find no a priori reason why there must be a real distinction of
esse from essence.
He therefore holds with Alexander of Hales, [Peter] Aureolus,
and others, in positing the complete sufficiency of a distinction
of reason for establishing the distance between finite and infinite being.
However, it must first be made clear, he says, that the
essence he is referring to is not the essence as purely potential,
for the essence as potential is nothing else but the objective
potency existing in the mind and jurisdiction of God, i.e., pure
nothingness. For, if such an essence had any reality of itself,
there would be something outside of God which did not depend
on him for existence.
The essence which is under consideration, is, therefore, the
actual essence which has received the esse essentiae and thus
becomes a subjective potency capable of receiving further
perfection.
Essences, according to Suarez, are concrete, finite existences.
There is no actuality which we could add to them which would
add anything to that which they already have. The quod est
is really a particular, determinate, fully constituted esse. If
• Ibid., Sect. 4, # 5, p. 286: Distinctio, cum sit negatio vel relatio quaedam, non
est conditio per se requisita ad esse rei, sed quid resultans ex tali esse rei.

.296

HOWARD P. KAINZ

we distinguish an actual existence realiter, then we must distinguish the esse of the actual essence from the esse of the
.actual existence, and so on ad infinitum, multiplying entities
without end. 9
4. Refutation of the Thomist and Scotist Reasonings.

(i) "Eternal" essential definitions are neither so eternal as
to require their production in re, ab aeterno, nor so necessary
as to prescind from divine liberty; and, in fact, the copula,
"is," by which, e. g., "rational animal" is predicated of" man,"
is itself implicitly hypothetical, i. e., conditioned by whether or
.not any man actually exists in rerum natura. 10
(ii) Essence as a potency is not an objective potency (i.e.,
nothingness) but a subjective potency actuated and capable of
further actuation, i.e., actuated of its very nature. Nothing
need be added to such a potency ab extra.
(iii) Composition in creatures is sufficiently accounted for
by the compositions of matter-form, substance-accident, naturesubsistence, etc., and in angels by a composition .of esse and
suppositum, in the following manner:
The esse of the nature [of an angel] is received in a supposite
distinct from this esse itself, and from this point of view is limited,
because it is united in a composition and is limited and determined
through such a mode of subsistence.U

The composition which Suarez speaks of here seems to differ
from the potency-act composition which St. Thomas discerns
In angels, mainly in that the receptacle, for Suarez, has some
• Dist. XXXI, Sect. 4, # 5, p. 236.
Ibid., Sect. 2; also, Sect. 12, ad fin.
11 Ibid., Sect. 6, init.
12 Ibid., Sect. 13, # 15, p. 303:
Esse naturae (angeli) recipitur in supposito ex
natura rei distincto ab ipsa, et ex hac parte limitatur quia in
trahitur, et per talem subsistendi modum limitatur ac determinatur.
Since, a few lines earlier, Suarez says: " dici potest illud esse receptum in
supposito ex natura rei distincto ab ipso esse essentiae," and since in this place he
seems to be making a reaffirmation of this same fundamental principle, it would
seem that " ipso " should be read instead of " ipsa." I have translated the
passage with this presupposition.
10

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING .AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

actuality (being the suppositum) whereas, for St. Thomas, the
receptacle, being pure potency, would not seem to have any
actl.lality of itself.
(iv) Partial existences present no metaphysical impossibility,. as the Thomist would lead us to believe. Rather, every
being, precisely insofar as it is composed, is replete with partial
existences. There is the partial existence of the matter, of the
form, of the accidents, of the subsistence, etc. And although
we must admit that prime matter is " prope nihil," still the very
fact that it is not absolutely nothing gives it something of
existence. 13
· (v) The distinction of Christ's human nature from the esse
ofthe Word.
The humanity of Christ truly has its own proper existence
(otherwise it could not be an actual essence) ; nor was it just
the esse essentiae that was subsumed by the Divine Word in
the Incarnation (which theory, indeed, would make it almost
impossible to comprehend how Mary could be the Mother of
God) but rather the esse existentiae, of the humanity, which
was united to the Word., in Mary's womb, so that the very
action of conception terminated in the production of the Godman (by which Mary truly became the Mother of God) . And
probably, says Suarez, this conception took place in such a
way that both body and soul, being united to each other, were
united in a " naturally prior " way (prius natura) to the.
Divine Word, making it Mary's privilege to bring about the
union which terminated in the actual suppositum of the Godman.14
There are, therefore, two natures and two existences in
Chirst formed into one composite person. And in this way,
Suarez declares, we escape many of the difficulties of the
Thomists, who are hard-pressed to explain just how a real
hypostatic union, rather than just a "fiction," [sic] takes place
in the Incarnation; why Christ's human nature is not eternal;
13
H

Ibid., Sect. 11, passim.
Ibid., Sect. 12, # 24, p. 290.

HOWARD P. KAINZ

how the esse of the Word can be proportioned to a finite and
merely objective essence, etc.
(vi) The modal distinction of the Scotists is just as unsatisfactory as the Thomists' distinction, because a mode is
only intelligible on the supposition that it is added to an
already existing entity.

v. THE CAUSE OF EXISTENCE
One of the most obvious advantages of maintaining a real
identity of essence and existence (and hence a lack of any
real composition in the order of being itself) , says Suarez, is
that it frees one from the necessity of recognizing any intrinsic
principles or causality in being, except for the natural compo- ·
sition of matter and form in material being.15
Strictly speaking, those who admit only a distinction of
reason within being can ascribe causality in the production of
a new "esse" only to extrinsic principles.16 That is, in the
sphere of transient " becoming," they recognize creatures themselves to be principal and proximate causes of existence. And
this for three reasons: 1) they truly effect a whole, existent
composition; 2) their action is a real action with a real terminus; and 3) the very eduction of the form is a reduction of
potency to act, i. e., to existence.
Thomists, quite congruently with the mind of St. Thomas,
usually relegate the action of creatures to the mere " preparation " of supposita to receive existence, i. e., by various " dispositive " actions in which they act as instrumental, or at least
secondary, causes in the transmission of existence. They say
that creatures produce the hoc esse, while it is God that
produces the esse. But, by these very "dispositions" which
creatures bring about are they not ipso facto causing a new
existence? Do not creatures, in producing the " hoc," also
produce the esse?
"Sicut res, ita et actiones, frustra multiplicentur." Why
should it be necessary to posit any separate action on the part
15

Ibid., Sect. 8, init.

10

Ibid., ad fin.

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

fl99·

of God to bring about an existence which is already sufficiently
accounted for? Creatures do not just dispose the matter and
educe the form but they actually bring about a finished product, standing " outside its causes," which is nothing else but
existence. Once a thing has been "reduced to act," we cannot
even imagine anything which is still needful and which only
God, working alone, could add.
The action of generation certainly must have some kind of
existence itself and thus terminate in some type of existence;
otherwise, we are left with an action terminating in real nothingness.
Indeed, if existence required a separate action on God's part,
then there would be need to posit not two but three substantial
actions, e. g., in the creation of man: the creation of the soul,
the disposition of the matter, and the union of the two, which
definitely seems to be a purposeless " multiplication of actions."
And so, says Suarez, we ought to conclude that creatures, in
producing the " hoc," also produce the esse and therefore the
essence too (since these principles are really identical) and that
they do this as principle and proximate causes. 17
What then, is the part of God in producing existence? God,
answers Suarez, is the First Cause of existence. It is only God
who specifically and per se primo brings about existence itself,
since it is only God who is able to create being from nothing;
to supply the very foundation of existence, which, in spiritual
creatures, is their substance (called by Cajetan their "necessity ") and, in material creatures, is prime matter; and to
produce, in the strictest sense, the totality of the particular and
determined existent thing. 18
VI. Gon As THE DETERMINER

OF EssE

The determination of esse must be ascribed to the action of
God: not that he actually intends the determinations or pro17

18

Ibid., Sect. 9, passim.
Suarez is willing to admit a quasi formal and material causality on the part

of form and matter respectively in the production of material things but observes
that these could not really be termed principles intrinsic to being itself.

300

HOWARD P. KAINZ

duces esse under the ratio of any certain detenninations but
rather that, as the key speaker in the assemblage of creation,
he communicates through the language in vogue in the realm
of contingency, which" language" happens to be detennination
and specification itself:
God confers esse, qua esse, per se primo; creatures, on the other
hand, effect only this or that esse. Which is not to say that God
does not bring about in every esse its entire specific determination,
or that a creature, in effecting some esse, does not at the same time
effect in this esse all that content of ens commune which is subject
to abstraction by us. . . . But God, in effecting these determinations, does so in that mode which is proper and adequated to his
infinite power, namely, through the production of esse itself, qua
esse, whereas the mode (ratio) which properly obtains on the part
of the creature is this or that particular esse.19

We must note,
that God's determination of esse is
not in the spheres of principal and proximate causality (since
this, in Suarez's mind, is the proper realm of creatures alone)
but rather in the sphere of first causality, which belongs to God
alone.

VII. PoTENCY:

PERHAPs THE CRux oF THE WHOLE PRoBLEM

One can scarcely fail to notice, in reading Suarez, that he
speaks of " subjective potency " in a different sense than that
which was applied to it by St. Thomas and is applied to it by
most Thomists.
Suarez refers to many different types of "esse's": the esse
essentiae, esse existentiae, esse materiae, etc. It is obvious that
he views the natural, subsistent composite as an accretion of
many different types of esse's. Even the most potential principles have some type of proportionate esse.
19 Dist. XXXI,
Sect. 9, # 21, p. 265: Deus per se primo oonfert esse, ut sic,
creatura vero solum facit hoc vel illud esse. Non quod vel Deus non efficiat in
omne esse omnem determinatam rationem ejus, vel quod, cum creatura efficit
aliquod esse, non efficiat in ilia omnem communem rationem essendi, quae a
nobis abstrahi potest . . . sed quod ratio, sub qua Deus attingit ilium effectum,
et adaequata virtuti ejus . . . , sit ipsum esse ut sic; respectu vero creaturae sit
tale vel tale esse.

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

301

The essence, seen by Suarez as having its own intrinsic esse;
seems to be something like the seed which contains in its own
actuality all the potentialities of the full flowering of existence,
which " flowering " is really just the logical conclusion of this
esse essentiae. This view of the actuated essential potency is
indeed a very valid and very natural view. For its esse exerts
a type of efficiency, causing the full actuation (the esse existentiae) through the becoming process and through the final
determinations given to accidents.
But note that the esse in this case imitates an active potency,
with quasi-efficient causality in the production of the fullness of
existence. It is not that passive potency which St. Thomas
speaks of as being one of the two correlative principles in the
constitution of finite being.
St. Thomas, in referring to the essence as potential to the
reception of esse, is not using " potency " in its first and most
common sense. Potency in the first meaning of the word, as
St. Thomas says in the first article of his De Potentia, is the
power which must be presupposed as the principle of operations.
And it is only in a derived sense that we apply the term to
the potential principle for the " first act," or form, of a composite being. Potency in this derived sense is applied properly
to prime matter, which is pure passive potency, and passive
for this reason, namely, that by its very definition it cannot
presuppose any act or actuation (since such an actuation
would render it incapable of receiving the very first act) .
Why does St. Thomas, in speaking of essence, often refer to
it as sicut potentia or quasi potentia? Does he mean by this
that it is not a real potency, just as existence is not really a
form but can be called a "quasi-form"? This is certainly not
his intention, for he states quite explicitly in the Summa Contra
Gentiles and other places that all creatures must be composed
from potency and act and that the potency is one thing
(aliud) and the act is another. 20 Unless we want to take
" aliud " here as synonymous with " idem," we are impelled tO
""ll Coot. Gent., 6!l.

302

HOWARD P. KAINZ

say that he is not calling essence a potency in an equivocal
sense.
The reference, then, to essence as a " quasi-" potency is
explained by the fact that it is one of the furthest extensions of
the meaning of potency from the primary meaning of the word.
But this extension is by no means invalid, any more than it is
invalid to extend the term " act " to form and ultimately to
existence, though in its first sense it refers to overt, accidental
operations. For this is merely an instance of the abstraction
process itself in which both universal and transcendental must
be derived from, and traced back to, their original sensuous
expressions.
Essence, then, is a real potency and is precisely that potency
which corresponds to existence itself, to the first and ultimate
act of the whole being, the " form of the form." And it is here
that Suarez is quick to point out what seems to be a glaring
difficulty: water is poured into a pre-existing container; accidents are received into a pre-existing substance; form is received
in " barely existing " matter; therefore existence must be received into an essence or potency which has at least some kind
of at least seminal existence, i.e., the esse essentiae. For, how
could it be received into the furthest extreme of potency, i.e.,
pure nothingness?
St. Thomas would no doubt answer that potency, qua
potency, cannot possess even the most seminal semblance of
act. To ascribe act to potency in this way would be like
ascribing whiteness to blackness, qua blackness, or up to down,
qua down. Besides the obvious and endless semantic difficulties
such liberties would bring on, there would be an inevitable
blunting of the precision which metaphysics, as a science,
should have.
But this is not to minimize the problem. For the problem
which Suarez is pointing out here is nothing else but the verj
problem, or better, the mystery of creation. For creation, just
as it took place at that very beginning of time which was in:
reality outside of time, cannot even now be relegated to any
point of time, or even be said to have ceased. Existence,. as an

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

808

immovable center of things, is in this sense removed from the
fringes of the gyrations and fluxations of temporal motion.
(And this is perhaps one meaning that can be inferred from St.
Thomas's statement that existence is " that which is most
intrinsic and formal" in a thing.) There is no presupposable
principle in the temporal movements of the processes of generation and corruption that could serve as a foundation, a
fulcrum, a
for existence itself. Rather, existence as the
truly first act is the foundation, the center, for all such progressions. We are faced here with the dilemma of choosing, as
the potential " substratum" of existence, either nothingness it.yelf or the very existence itself. Suarez chooses the latter alternative. For he makes this foundation for the " esse existentiae " to be nothing else than the existent essence; and since
this latter is really identical and synonymous with the existence itself, he is in reality making existence to be its own
foundation. St. Thomas, on the other hand, takes the other
course; for the potency which he allows as a recipient of esse
can have in itself not the least bit of act and must, for this
reason, be a type of nothingness.
The problem becomes most acute, and transparent, when
referred to the angels in whom, as St. Thomas says in the De
Ente et Essentia, 21 there is the most of act, and the least of
potency, among all creatures. Here we have a case where there
is no matter to serve as a receptacle for form and esse, and no
temporal progression of existential change, to account for a
gradual accretion of perfections. Rather, angels have complete
actuality and semper eodem modo se habent, as Dionysius
says. 22 Suarez posits as the " receptacle " for the angelic esse
the vecy suppositum of the angel itself. But we are led to
wonder whether such an answer is really a clarification of the
problem. For is not the suppositum the whole existent essence
without any precision being made? He seems to be stating, for
all practical purposes here, that the whole is being received
into the whole.
"'Ch. IV.
•• Quoted by St. Thomas, De Substantiis Separatis, Ch. XVII, 94, ad fin.

804

HOWARD P, KAINZ

It would seem that the more meaningful answer to the prot>:.
lem, especially as applied to the angels, is given by St. Thomas
in stating that their esse is received into a potency which of
itself has nothing o£ act but is rather a relative non-being. Nor
is" relative non-being" to be taken here as a kind of existence
(as Suarez takes it in the case o£ the relative non-being of
prime matter); rather, it is the result of the transcendental
ordering o£ existence to this or that specific determination.
Indeed, existence is the transcendental ordering itself, the
termination o£ which is the potency, which potency is much
like the point which must necessarily terminate the line
but which has no meaning itself except in reference to the
line. Only potency is more o£ a non-entity than even a point,
just as esse has more o£ being than a line.
But what is it that constitutes subjective potency as "relative" non-being? It could be nothing but the determination of
the esse to this or that mode of expressing, extending, exteriorizing, the divine essence in an intrinsic nothingness which
becomes relative; the particular act and the particular potency
have an irrevocable and irreducible relationship for one another
and neither the determined esse nor the determined essence
could have any intelligibility or reality except in terms of this
relationship: in much the same way that, if the end house in
a block of houses is removed, the house would be no longer the
end house, and the end of the block would no longer be the
locus o£ that end house.
As St. Thomas says in one place/ 3 nothingness in each particular thing is properly said to be prior by nature (but not by
duration) as that which arises solely from the creature itself
and not ab alia. This is that natural and ultimate " progression " which is found in every creature and is most fundamental
to it, so that potency, as relative non-being, is in this sense
naturally prior to act in any particular creature, for the very
reason that the potency " supplies " the only prerequisite
needed by God " before " he can create, which
23

In II Sent., I, I, 5, sed contra, ad i2um.

SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION

305

is pure nothingness. And the esse, in taking on the determinations of a specific essence, gives " form " and essential denomination to the potency, just as a globule of oil in falling on
water " forms " the surface of the water in the very act of
revising its own shape to fit the new environment.
In smnmary, we might observe that the essential position
of Suarez is very understandable: It is the only position by
which one can effectively avoid the use of "nothingness" as
a principle. But then again, we might ask, is nothingness
really that much of a threat to metaphysics? The answer to
this question will perhaps be indicative of a fundamental option
continually open to metaphysicians. 24
HowARD

P. KAINZ

Marquette University
Milwaukee, Wisconsin

•• Hegel, for example, in his own dialectical fashion, and in the epistemological
context supplied for him by his immediate philosophical predecessors (Kant,
Fichte, and Schelling), faces up to such an option in the beginning of his Lagic
(cf. "The Doctrine of Being" in the "minor Logic"): If we explore the meaning of "Being," we find that, in a very real sense, it is equivalent to, and paradoxically grounded in, Nothingness. Being is identical with Nothing, in the sphere of
our concepts. This "identity," however, must not be understood in the sense of
traditional formal logic but in the context of Hegel's dialectical logic. It is an
identity-in-distinction,
just as Hegel's "Reason" or Vernunft (which is often
misinterpreted in a Kantian or pre-Kantian sense) is the unity-in-distinction of
being and thought, ego and otherness. In other words, the fundamental " reality"
which " Reason " discerns in the beginning of the Logic is not Being but the
transcendental dialectical relationship between Being and Nothingness, that very
fundamental distinction which is at one and the same time a fundamental unity.
We might go one step further here to draw up a parallel between Hegel and St.
Tqomas: Just as the dialectical reciprocity between the two opposites, Being and
Nothing, leads immediately in Hegel's Logic to the synthetic comprehension of
"Becoming," so also a transcendental relationsip (=unity) between two distinct
principles, esse and pure potency (essence) leads in St. Thomas's formulation to
the comprehension of the ontological constitution of "contingent being."

EXISTENTIALISM:
GREEK ETHICS AND THE WAY
BACK TO THE FUTURE: A NOTE

F

OR ANY READER of Kierkegaard, it is a well-known
fact that existentialism considers Socrates as its model.
It is true that, in the Philosophical ragments, Kierkegaard goes " beyond Socrates " in developing a more radical
view of truth and of learning, but still it is Socrates who is
taken as the source of inspiration. We can observe this same
phenomenon of the return to Greek ethics in the use which
both Sartre and Camus make of classical tragedy. Again, their
existential rendering of the ancient tragedies makes each one
more radical than its earlier Greek version. Yet, the amazing
thing to note is the sympathy which the existentialists feel
for Greek ethical themes in spite of the intervening centuries
and all of their polemic against " historical understanding."
Existentialism is anti-evolutionary where man is concerned
and thus can feel itself immediately contemporary with classical
man. All men share the same human condition regardless of
time, although the Greeks seem to have caught the tragical
flavor better than many other eras of the past.
However, my interest now is neither to explore this relationship between Greek ethics and existentialism nor to comment
on the views of man which they share in common. Since
existentialism is future oriented and anti-historical in its outlook, it would be more true to its spirit to turn this brief
exploration toward the future and not the past. In any strict
sense, existentialism's interest in classical ethics was not historical; it was simply inspirational. That is, existentialism drew
from these ancient figures both its inspiration and the basis
upon which it could extend its own analysis. Thus, what we
want to ask now is how the combination of both existentialism

806

EXISTENTIALISM

807

arid Greek ethics might point out for us " the way to the
future." Existentialism, no less than ancient philosophy, now
belongs to another age, but both still can provide a ground for
the " way back to the future."
Specifically, what I want to try to do is to extend a very
brief parallel to an argument which I have developed more fully
in another connection. 1 That is, if existentialism can and has
provided a basis upon which metaphysics may be built, and if it
has done this by establishing the empirical foundation for
metaphysics which Kant demanded, what can existentialism
provide for the revival of a classical ethical perspective?
To suggest this may seem strange, since modem ethics is
perhaps most closely associated with " subjectivism" and " relativism," and these themes seem both opposed to classical
"objective" ethics and also actually to be what existentialism
endorses. Again, what I want to ask is not so much whether
existentialism was or is itself " subjective " but whether in fact
its explorations in psychology and literature can actually provide us with a ground for a return to something like a classical
ethical perspective. Do we once again have available a common
model for all men and a universal standard for judgment?
Perhaps the best way to approach this problem is to consider
the distinction which is often drawn and which is so fundamental to existentialism: that is, we do not have a universal
human nature given to us as an essence in advance, but we do
all exist as men in a common human condition. Classical ethics
would seem to depend for its objectivity on our ability to
discover a universally shared human nature. Therefore, to
deny this would put Athens ethically at a great distance from
Copenhagen and Paris and also doom existentialism to some
form of subjectivism in ethics. However, let us explore a little
what kind of common human condition existentialism thinks
we share and then see whether in fact this can enable us, not
to go back to Greek ethics but to move forward to revive a
1 See my The Exi:Jtentialist Prolegomena: To A Future Metaphyaic8, University
of Chicago Press. Chicago, 1969.

FREDEIUCK SONTAG

siillilar ethical perspective in the future. If our human cr:mdition is the same, although our essence develops differently and
oontingently, can this 3erve as the basis for an objective norm?
" Fate " is a common theme stressed in Greek ethics, and,
it is also characteristic of existentialism; If in .fact this notion
i:qvolves a
of essence in classical thought, on the;
other hand" fate" is strong in existentialism as the unyielding.
context of events which surround men and against which they
must act to define their essence and to achieve their freedom.
Men can be free, but not unless they can overcome their fate
and maintain their individual freedom. Sometimes, of course,
tliis freedom is more internally directed than concerned
with control over external everi.ts; but, nevertheless, there is
a common goal which all men are striving to attain and against
which they can be measured. Our freedom flows from ourselves;·
it is not connected with any specific form of external behavior.
Sartre's waiter can be as free as Aristotle's virtuous man. In
this sense, existentialism involves a little bit more democracy
than does classical ethics which tends toward aristocracy.
To say this, of course, does not mean that the existentialist
either ignores or would pull down all social and class distinctions. Far from it. He takes these for granted as the given
structure of society within which men live. Our actions will
be judged by this society according to the various sets of
objective norms which are in force at that time; however,
whether any given individual is " free " or not, this is an
evaluation which can only be made internally. Existentialism
W.ke,s man's setting in society for granted, just as Greek ethics
does. It. is far from revolutionary in its social theory; in fact,
the major problem for men does not lie on the external or on
the social level. Regardless of external events and our response
to. them, the crucial battle for freedom always is within, and.
achieving this has little to do with altering social arrangements.·
To place the oruy locus of the human battle externally is to:
falsify the problem. Man does what he can to improve social
but he must never confuse this with securing iri.dividuality and freedom for himself.

EXISTENTIALISM

809

All this having been said, it probably is over the meaning
and the place of" contingency" that Greek ethics and existentialism differ most, but perhaps it is also precisely this difference
which gives us a clue to the future. "Necessity" is the core of
Being upon which metaphysics has usually been based; now,
for the existentialists, metaphysics must center on contingency
and the accidental. Metaphysics is possible on an existential
base, but it turns out to be of a different kind. And so it is with
ethics. All men share the same norms, and they are to be
judged by them. The problem is that these are only accessible
to the individual if he adopts them as an internal condition, and
they rest on a contingent base. That is, no man is determined
to be free, although he may live in a context which condemns
him to face freedom. He can reject freedom, but at least it is
offered to every man. Of course, what determines this are not
his circumstances but only his response to them. "The way
to the future " lies in the recognition of our common circumstances, in the fact that our freedom does not depend on social
change (although nothing prevents this if conditions can really
be improved) , and that our own internal response will be
successful if it learns to accept contingency as an ultimate fact
of life and to act on that basis.
If we accept existentialism, we leave behind all evolutionary schemes where human ethics is concerned, and our moral
behavior will in no way depend on our historical understanding.
Existentialism also enables us to break away from the concept
of a necessary God whose fixed nature once controlled human
action even before the rise of evolutionary theories. God, too,
must be conceived of on a contingent basis, and this frees his
action just as it does man's. Our future is no different from the
Greeks; we all face contingency and the necessity to decide in
the face of uncertainty, no matter how different the facts are.
We both stand in the same place; all of us are future oriented,
although now we have discovered both the essential internal
locus of freedom and its basis in external contingency. A new
metaphysics of contingency vs. necessity, that is, one which is

810

FREDERICK SONTAG

made possible by an existentialist prolegomena, can open the
way to a common moral basis in the future. It will be one
based on freedom and contingency as universal human conditions, not on any demand for identity of principle between
all moral codes.
FREDERICK SONTAG

PCJ11Wfla Colleg6
Claremont, Califomia

BOOK REVIEWS
The Church in the Theology of Karl Barth. By CoLM O'GRADY. Washington-Cleveland: Corpus Books, 1969. Pp. 866. $10.00.
Any appreciation of this book by Colm O'Grady on the ecclesiology of
the late Karl Barth must take into consideration the express intention of
the author as presented in the Introduction. The book under consideration
is merely the first volume of a two-part study of Barth's ecclesiology. The
second volume, although announced for Spring, 1969, has not, to my
knowledge, appeared to date. In this first volume the author wishes to
present a faithful exposition of Barth's ecclesiology and thus make some
contribution towards the Catholic understanding of our separated brethren.
It is only in a second volume that he will present the reflections of a
Catholic in relation to Karl Barth's doctrine on the Church.
Colm O'Grady has remained faithful to his purpose. Except for a few
pages of interim reflections, the book consists of an exact presentation,
in a summary form, of the teaching of Karl Barth on the Church and
directly related matter. The latter includes almost the whole of dogmatics,
as a cursory glance at the table of contents will soon confirm: Section
One. "The Church of God: The Eternal Basis of the Church in God's
Election of Grace." Section Two. " The Church in the Son: The Objective
Realization of Reconciliation." Section Three. " The Church Through the
Holy Spirit: The Fundamental Form of the Subjective Realization of
Reconciliation." These three sections follow an analysis of Barth's teaching
on the Church as found in the first edition of his Commentary on the
Epistle to the Romans, the basic text where his Theology of Crisis, less
properly known as his Dialectical Theology, is to be found.
O'Grady is very careful to point out the development which took place
in the· theological thinking of Karl Barth. His treatment of the Theology
of Crisis is objective since he allows, for the most part, Barth to speak
for himself-a procedure which the author follows throughout this first
volume. O'Grady gives a brief outline of the genesis of the Theology of
Crisis, listing the names of those who influenced the thought of Barth
both positively and negatively, i.e., Plato, Kant, Hegel, Schleiermacher,
W. Herrmann, the two Blumhardts, Overbeck, Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky,
not to mention Luther and Calvin and St. Paul as read by the Reformers
and Barth himself. Plato and Kant Barth knew through his brother,
Heinrich, and Dostoevsky through his friend, E. Thurneysen. Barth's
attitude towards the representatives of neo-Protestantism was critical.
He was primarily an original theologian and exegete whose principle source

811

812

BOOK REVIEWS

was Paul. However, there is no denying the influence of Luther's "sola
gratia" interpreted according to an
"soli Deo gloria" on
Barth's basic and persistent affirmation of the absolute Sovereignty of God
and his gracious activity. Barth will eventually nuance his Theology of
Crisis, hut he will. remain faithful to his fundamental insight on, the
absolute Sovereignty of God and his separation from man or " diastasis."
. Karl Barth's evolution from a Theology of Crisis to a Theology of the
Word of God to that of the Word of God made Flesh, Jesus Christ, is. well
presented by O'Grady. The fundamental role of Jesus Christ in the·
election, justification and sanctification of man is a recurring theme·
throughout. All is realized and proclaimed in Jesus Christ. The Father
elects, justifies and sanctifies man in the Elect, the Just and the Holy
&e, and man participates in this gracious activity of God insofar as he is
a member of the Whole Christ. Jesus Christ is the concrete realization
of God's gracious activity while, at the same time, revealing the total·
Otherness of God. It is through the Spirit of the Lord that man is saved
in the Community, and yet man remains at once just and sinner. The
Word of God is found in the Scriptures alone, and yet the Scriptures, in
their materiality, are not Revelation, which remains basically the work
of the Holy Spirit. Man is called to become a member of the Community,
and yet the Community has no control whatsoever over the Spirit of the
Lord. The Sacraments are merely signs of God's gracious activity and in
no way instruments of justification, not even baptism and the eucharist.
There are " services " in the Community but no " officials." The Church
has authority but does not enjoy infallibility in her teaching. She is, at
one and the same time, the Communion of Saints and the Communion of
Sinners. The world was created good by God. It is primal pre-history
which already comes from grace and is related to the Church, since the
God who is active in creation is the same God who is later active in
reconciliation and in the Church. But, man, through his pride, is basically
sin.
These and other points of Barth's teaching are exposed at some length
by O'Grady with all the striking and paradoxical power of Karl Barth
himself. Their importance and interrelation in the teaching of Barth on.
the Church become more and more evident as we advance in the book:
This is hardly a novelty since any study which pretends to present a
oomplete picture of the nature and being of the Church must take into
oonsideration the whole of Revelation and especially Christology and
Soteriology. In the case of Karl Barth, his conception of God's absolute
Sovereignty and gracious activity realized and revealed in Jesus Christ
has profound repercussions on his nofion of justification and, consequently,
on his notion of the Church. O'Grady is fully justified .in dwelling at·
length on these points.
However, the purpose of Colm O'Grady's book is to help Catholics better

:BOOK REVIEWS

linderstand . the teaching of Xarl Barth. An objective presentation of
Barth's Dogmatics is, without doubt, essential in this respect. Yet, is it
sufficient? There are two parties in the dialogue which the author wishes to
foster: Karl Barth and Catholics. True, the second volume promises to
present the points of ecclesiological agreements and disagreements between
Barth and the Catholic Church as well as the basic theological reasons for
these agreements and disagreements. Nevertheless, and this even on the
level of an objective presentation of the teaching of Karl Barth, I do not
feel that we are given a sufficient introduction into the basic insights which
goveni or at least guide the thought of Barth. For a Catholic to "
stand " Barth, he would need a thorough grounding in the theology of the
:Reformers and in subsequent Protestant theology. This, of course, is no
simple task and can hardly be demanded of one man, and still less of One
book. O'Grady does furnish the basic outline of such a background, but
it should be completed, I feel, by further readings, many of which he
himself mentions in footnotes.
To be more specific, it is mentioned as a fact admitted by almost all
students of Karl Barth that Luther's " sola fide, sola gratia " and Calvin's
" soli Deo gloria, diastasis " had a lasting influence on the thought of Karl
Barth. Yet, we do not find a comprehensive view of the genesis, context,
and meaning of these key concepts. Then again, Barth's reaction against
liberal neo-Protestantism and the Historical School is affirmed and somewhat documented, but further readings are a must. In other words, the
genesis of Barth's thought, its immediate and mediate context, must be
filled in by the reader. All of which leads us to conclude that this book is
addressed more to the initiated than to the beginner. In which case it
rertainly can be considered as an important contribution to the ecumenical
.dialogue.
This dialogue would be further advanced if certain points were elaborated
in greater detail. There is, for instance, Barth's notion of the Whole
Christ. It is expounded at length by O'Grady, but no mention is made as
to its possible sources other than the Pauline epistles. Is it not possible
that Augustine had an influence on the actual interpretation of these texts
by Barth? And what role, if any, did Primaeval Man of the History of
Religions School have on Barth? His treatment of the preexistent Christ
would lead one to believe that there might have been some form . of
influence. Then again, there is the notion and the role of the Community
which have such a prominent place in ecclesiology today. It is evident that
much of what Barth has to say is merely a repetition of the doctrine of the
Reformers, but this doctrine itself would have to be elucidated especially as
concerns the Protestant fear of the Community " controlling " the Spirit;
their notion of the Community giving itself leaders; their teaching on the
primacy of the Word of God over the tradition of the Church in which
tradition; nevertheless, has a role to play; etc. In all fairness, it must be

814

BOOK REVIEWS

admitted that O'Grady treats of these subjects in some detail, but their
background does not seem to be fully developed.
A basic question which a Catholic cannot help but ask, and whose answer
would greatly help him to understand Karl Barth better, is: what is the
part of rhetoric and what is the part of actual dogmatics in the dialectical
aspect which is so characteristic of Barth's writings? True, this same
style is found in parts of the writings of Paul and Augustine. Admitting
that Revelation deals with the Mystery of God and of Jesus Christ, is
dialectics the only literary style suitable for a correct presentation and
interpretation of the Mystery? Is this Barth's way of expressing Luther's
rejection of the "Theology of Glory," i.e., ontological considerations? Is
this a declaration that Revelation deals merely with the " for me " and
not with the "in itself," with the " functional" and not with the " ontological "? If so, what are the religious and philosophical presuppositions
behind this position, and what is their value? Is it ordained to making
Theology ultimately "Pastoral"? What influence did Nominalism, and
subsequently Descartes and Kant, have on this way of thinking? When
it is question of God's relation to mankind in Jesus Christ and of man's
relation to his fellow man, is it purely and simply a matter of relations
implying that relation and reality are identical? Finally, when it is stated
that God's ways are not man's ways, does this mean that God's plan
transcends man's logic, or that it contradicts it in the strict sense of
the word?
O'Grady's book certainly helps us to understand better Karl Barth's
actualist thought-form which excludes all "staticism." Yet, I should think
that more consideration must be given to this matter. Catholic theology
and Protestant theology definitely present Christians with two different
thought-forms. The use of analogy of being by the former is, no doubt,
already a source of difference. But more basically, there is also the
question of the Theology of Creation and especially that of the transcendence and immanence of God.
It is all to the credit of Colm O'Grady that he has brought to the
attention of English-speaking Catholics the specific thought-form of Karl
Barth with all its dynamism and appeal, as well as all the questions which,
by its very existence, it puts to the Catholic theologian. We are forewarned. We are introduced into another manner of interpreting our
common heritage in faith. Even when we cannot agree with the conclusions
of Barth, we must take them into consideration. We are invited, in particular, to wonder at the gratuitousness of God's love for us revealed and
realized in the person, works and words of Jesus Christ and granted to us
in the Holy Spirit. From this admiration should flow praise, prayer and a
life in conformity with what has been revealed to us.
The second volume of Colm O'Grady's work will, no doubt, further our
understanding of Karl Barth, and, hopefully, bring with it at least some

BOOK REVIEWS

815

elements of a solution to the questions enumerated above. All the more
reason to look forward to its publication in the profound hope that our
dialogue with our brothers may progress towards that ultimate unity which
Christ desired for his Church, and for which the late Karl Barth devoted
his life.
THOMAS R. PoTviN, 0. P.
Dvminican Faculty of Theology
Ottawa, Canada

A History of Theology. By YvEs M.-J. CoNGAR, 0. P. Translated and
edited by Hunter Guthrie, S. J. Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday,
1968. Pp. 312. $5.95.
A new History of Theology by Father Yves Cougar, 0. P.! This would
indeed be welcomed by all theologians, students of theology, or people
interested in the deeper understanding of their faith. For nobody can
deny that there is a real need for a good History of Theology, especially
in English, and that Father Cougar is undoubtedly one of the very few
scholars who would be competent to write such a book.
Unfortunately, for several reasons to be explained below, this is not such
a book. And this is doubly said, for it could have become it: and thus
one constantly feels frustrated while reading it and realizing that it did not.
First of all, the book is really far from being new. It "substantially
reproduces "-as one reads (p. 7) with some surprise and disappointment
in the first lines of the "Preface" (signed by Fr. Cougar)-" the article
entitled 'Theologie' which appeared in the Dictionnaire de Theologie
Catholique published at Paris in 1938-39." 1 One may wonder whether
It is really worthwhile to translate and publish today, in the form of
a ·hardbound book, a thirty-year old article from a theological encyclopedia.
In order to answer this question, we must examine both the original article
(1) and the present book (2), the latter first in those points in which it
claims to surpass the original (a, b) and then as translation (c).
1. The original article in D. T.C.: its values and limits.

The original article, of which the present book is a translation, was
composed by Fr. Cougar in 1938-39 and is entitled " Theologie." Its
1 As a matter of fact, the article was composed in 1938-39 but published in 1943.
Cf. P. Quattrocchi, "Bibliographie generale du Pere Yves Congar," in J.-P. Jossua,
Le Pere Congar: La theologie au service du peuple de Dieu (Paris: Cerf, 1967, p.
item 150). An English translation of this book was published by the Priory
Press, Dubuque, Iowa.

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BOOK REVIEWS

aim is to explain the notion of Catholic theology, its nature and methods.
The article consists of three parts of unequal length. The first, cols.
841-46, gives a short but very valuable survey on the emergence and
meanings of the term " theology " (or rather theologia in Greek and Latin) ,
a survey which is not only of philological interest but already reveals a
great deal concerning the discipline itself. The second and longest part,
cols. 846-447, presents a rather detailed history of the notion and methods
of theology from the patristic beginnings to the
century. It is not,
and was not intended to be, a " History of Theology " in the sense of a
history of theological literature (as patrologies are for the patristic period,
or Grabmann's Geschichte der katholischen Theologie is for the medieval
and modem periods) nor a history of dogmas or Christian doctrines (as,
e. g., the classical Protestant works of Adolf von Harnack and Reinhold
Seeberg, or, more recently, of Alfred Adam). The third part, cols. 447-501,
entitled " La notion de theologie. Partie speculative," contains a systematic
description of the nature and method of theology.
This original article had, for its times, very great merits. It was really
the first full-sized treatise of such proportions and quality in Catholic
theological literature, encompassing both historically and speculatively the
nature and method of theology. It was carefully written, reliably and richly
documented, with numerous references to both the original sources and the
best available literature. Moreover, it was truly forward-looking and, as
did Fr. Cougar's work in general, in many points it anticipated and, as a
matter of fact, effected or strengthened that theological renewal which
prepared Vatican II.
Particular merits of Fr. Cougar's article include: a generally excellent
knowledge and sense of history; a much more positive evaluation of
patristic theology than what was customary at the time for Thomists,
who often considered real theology to be a creation of the Schoolmen.
The exposition of the theological methodology of the " Golden Age of
Scholasticism," and in particular that of St. Thomas Aquinas, was especially
outstanding; in the judgment of many it was in fact the best brief presentation available. Modem theology was viewed in a more positive light
than was usual in that epoch; there are even a few pages on Luther's
notion of theology.
The speculative part is, as a whole, an excellent piece, outstanding
especially in its acknowledgment of the full theological and scientific
status of positive theology (biblical, historical) , while not neglecting
theology's truly speculative functions. In fact, the insistence on the
intrinsic unity of theology, without suppressing the diversity and complexity
of its " integral " and " potential " parts, is perhaps the most valuable
characteristic of this section.
The article, however, has also, quite understandably and even fully
excusably for its circumstances, its definite limits. The modem period and

BOOK REVIEWS

817

its positive contributions are, from an objective point of view, relatively
neglected. Non-Catholic Christian theology is generally ignored, with the
above mentioned exception of Luther and a few passing remarks. NonScholastic medieval theology (" monastic theology ") is hardly mentioned,
its exegesis superficially presented and harshly criticized (cf. cols. 367-68).
In the speculative part, there seems to be no real awareness of what more
recent methods of thought (e. g., phenomenology, existentialism, transcendental analysis-all already operative during the thirties in German
Protestant and, to a lesser degree, Catholic theology) may contribute to
the intellectus fidei. The contribution of other sciences, besides history
(including philology) and philosophy, to the theological enterprise is
judged with skeptical reservations (cf. cols. 499-500).
In all fairness it should be said that these shortcomings are not
of Fr. Congar but rather of that epoch of Catholic theology, and Fr.
Congar is among those who have done the most to overcome them. In
this repect it is most instructive to compare Fr. Congar's much later work,
La foi et la theologie, 2 composed in 1958-59 3 and treating essentially the
same topics, with his article in D. T. C.; one can see there how he truly
assimilated and embodied many of the results of more recent investigations,
even though, naturally, that work also would be today in need of serious
updating.
2. The present book.

What are the implications of all this for the present book?
First of all, the title of the work, "A History of Theology," and the
description of its content both on its cover and in the table of contents
(p. 21) are misleading. As explained above, the work is really both more
and less than that: it is a study, both historical and systematic, of the
nature and method of theology. Strangely enough, the whole original third
part (65 cols. of the original article and pp. 198-288 of the Book) is
entirely suppressed in the table of contents, which gives the (wrong)
impression that all this is part of the last (6th) chapter, "From the
Seventeenth Century to the Present" (which thus includes almost half
of the book!) .
Second, the book, " substantially reproducing" an article of thirty years
ago, without any serious updating, reproduces not only its values but
also all its shortcomings. The values remain values, though much of what
was pioneering insight in those days is left behind today by the progress of
both historical and speculative research. The shortcomings however, understandable and excusable as they were thirty years ago, are much less so
today.
Tournai: Desclee et Co., 1962, in the series Le Mystere Chretien.
• Cf. op. cit., p. ill.

2

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The " Preface," anticipating, as it seems, these objections, affirms that
the present edition surpasses the original article in two respects: first,
it restores parts of the original manuscript suppressed by the editors of
D. T. C., and, second, it has been updated.
In the next two sections of my review I shall examine these two points.
a. Restoration of suppressed passages from the original manuscript.

A comparison with the original text in D. T. C. (the book itself gives
no indications!) has shown several passages in which the text of the
original manuscript seems to have been restored. As for quantity, even
allowing for some texts which may have escaped my attention, these
passages do not add up to more than 10-15 pages. 4 The additions I have.
found are generally good, although, since the translation is far from being
fully reliable and the original text is not available, one can use them only
with great caution.
There are, however, many cases of omissions from the original text
as found in D. T. C., a fact about which both the foreword and the preface
say nothing. The very rich documentation of the original article, one
of its great values, was systematically omitted or drastically curtailed
in the present edition." In some cases whole sections of the text itself
were dropped, again without any indication (cf., e. g., p. 176, where there
are only a few lines for col. 431, or p. 276 f., where one looks in vain
• Such passages seem to be relatively more frequent in the first chapters of the
book. Some examples I have found: on p. 26: a few lines in the section dealing
with Aristotle; p. 29: 4 lines on Origen; pp. 34-35: Cajetan and John of St. Thomas
on St. Thomas's terminology; on p. 37: quotations from Tertullian and Pontius;
p. 40: a quote from Adolf von Harnack; pp. 44-45: 14 lines which, however, were
inserted in a very confused manner (cf. below under c.); p. 52: a paragraph commenting on more positive aspects of medieval exegesis; pp. 67-68: a page on St.
Anselm; p. 71: 7 lines on Abelard; p. 75: 9 lines on monastic theology (this
passage may be a more recent addition; there are, however, no references to recent
studies on the subject); p. 76: two lines in the section on Peter Lombard. etc.
• Since examples of references and bibliographical indications omitted could be
adduced from practically every column of the D. T. C. article, I am going to give
only a few examples of substantial omissions of documentation: col. 342 on the term
theologia; cols. 347-49: about 15 lines of bib!. references on patristic theology before
St. Augustine; col. 350-51: from the extremely rich documentation on St. Augustine
and his influence (occupying, counted together, almost an entire column) the
translation retained only a few items (cf. pp. 45-46, notes); col. 358: 15 lines of
bibliography, listing mostly items which are still very valuable, are entirely omitted
in the English text (cf. pp. 57-58); col. 359: bib!. on the medieval
of
sciences omitted (cf. p. 59); col. 363-64: an entire column of bibliography on the
debate concerning the use of dialectics in theology and on St. Anselm, of which no
trace can be found in the English edition, and so forth throughout the entire wOTk!

BOOK REVIEWS

819

for the comparison of the different systematizations presented on cols.
49!l-95 of the original article) . Even if in some cases omissions of older
literature may have been justified, the reader should have been warned!
In most cases the original documentation, esp. bibliography, should have
been expanded and updated; in the next section we shall see that almost
nothing was done in this direction. Thus to claim without qualifications
that " the present text is more complete than that published in the
Dictionnaire " (Preface, p. 7) is misleading.
b. The updating.

In the Preface we are told that the present text "has, moreover,
another claim to relative perfection. I have tried to update the present
work, particularly in its historical section. Since 1939 there have been
many books devoted to the object and method of theology. On these
topics it was certainly my duty to provide a well-documented summary
for my readers. I acknowledge the fact that the result is somewhat short
of what I envisaged .... I have, however, introduced rectifications and
sufficient and necessary additions ... " (p. 7) .
To what extent has the work really been updated? Except for the
" Preface," very little indeed!
The "Preface" of the book (pp.
is entirely new and gives a brief
summary of the development of Catholic theology since 1939 to the
present. One cannot say that it is a "well-documented" summary, for
here, too, Fr. Congar's valuable bibliographical references were omitted or
drestically reduced. The translation, moreover, of the Preface is such that
this whole section becomes practically worthless (cf. below).
As for the rest of the book, a careful study revealed the following
efforts to update it:
P. 31, n. 9 contains some references not found in the original (it
contains, however, also several mistakes). On p. 43, inn. 8 some references
to more recent works on Origen's theology were added, though their content
was not worked into the text, which remained unchanged. On p. 189, in n. 9
two relatively new books (published respectively in 1950 and 1957) are
indicated on the conception of dogmatic development in the 19th century:
little compensation for omitting the much richer references of Fr. Congar
(col. 439) and for ignoring the numerous more recent studies on the
subject. On p. 197 four lines on the encyclical Humani generis (Pius XII)
were added; on p.
a couple of paragraphs on some interventions of
Pius XII and John XXIII; on p. 218 one paragraph on Vatican Il's Dei
Verbum; on p.
a quote from Schillebeeckx; on p. 274 another reference
to Humani generis. Finally, pp.
give a brief presentation and
criticism of the so-called "kerygmatic theology," and pp. 281-83 contain
some good comments on modern (phenomenological) philosophy of religion,
but in both cases without documentation or bibliographical references.

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Again, even if a few short passages escaped my attention, these would not
change the picture substantially.
To summarize: the historical section, contrary to what the Preface says,
remained almost entirely un-updated; all the important investigations since
1939 on the history of the notion and method of theology (with the very
few exceptions mentioned above) are ignored. 6 A comparison with La foi
et la theologie by the same Fr. Congar can show what this means for the
period between 1939-58-and the output of the last decade was not less
rich! 1
As for the systematic section, though it received somewhat more additions, it remained substantially in a pre-Vatican II stage. 8
In the light of all this it is almost cruel to quote the back flap of the
book: "This completely up-to-date study (emphasis mine) is an indispensable guide to the theological trends and insights, both past and
present."
c. The Translation.

In the case of a theological work of such high quality and preciSIOn
as Fr. Congar's original article in D. T. C., an accurate and precise translation is essential. Unfortunately, the present translation is such that no
one using it without a constant checking of the original French texts could
be sure of reading truly what Fr. Congar wrote.

The Preface.
The preface of the book (pp. 7-20), signed by Fr. Congar (p. 20), is an
addition in respect to the original article. Fr. Congar, however, published
its French text in the collection Situation et taches presentes de la theologie
• E. g., the latest work of Fr. Chenu referred to is from 1935 (p. 80, n. 18); the
name of J. Leclercq, the leading historian of medieval monastic theology, does not
even occur!
7 As for the " General Bibliography and Reading List " at the end of the book
it contains many good works on recent Catholic theology, selected,
(pp.
however, in an arbitrary fashion and mostly without any perceivable relationship
to the content and aims of the book.
8 I have found altogether four references to Vatican II (outside of the Preface):
five lines of a very general
p. 187: five lines of the "Translator's Note"; p.
the passage on Dei Verbum mentioned above; p.
two lines
content; p.
which I quote: "Vatican II says of faith that 'it instructs reason by multiple
knowledge.'" The reference given in the corresponding note (n. 80) is not to the
documents of Vatican II but to" Denz. 1799," which-according to the" Editor's
Note" on p.
the "Enchiridion Symbolorum ... , ed. DenzingerSchonmetzer.'' In Denzinger-Schonmetzer, however, n. 1799 is a text of the Council
of Trent on the sacrament of marriage! The quotation is really from n. 1799 of the
"old" Denzinger, and from Vatican I, not II!

BOOK REVIEWS
(Paris: Cerf, 1967), pp. 11-23: "La theologie depuis 1939." A comparison
of the translation with this French text leads to shocking results.
Thus, e. g., on p. 10, lines 2-12, one reads with surprise (in connection
with the so-called "nouvelle theologie" and the controversies it elicited):
The authors, and even more forcefully the Jesuit collaborators of Sources chretiennes
and Theologie, defended their position and explained it. They maintained that even
though their position was basically modernistic, it was not necessarily destructive
(emphasis mine). It centered (emphasis mine) on two key points: (1) a distinction which was really a disjunction between faith and belief, the latter being the
ideological structure in which faith finds expression; (Z) the conception of the
relation between dogmatic pronouncements and religious realities as a relation of
symbol to reality, not as an expression proper (however inadequate) to reality.

The French original, on the contrary, says (p. 13, line 17-p. 14, line 1):
Les auteurs pris a partie, exactement les collaborateurs jesuites de Sources chritiennes, et de Theologie se sont defendus et expliques.
Ces auteurs ne professaient pas la philosophie ruineuse qui caracterisait tJSsentiellement les positions modemistes et que l'on peut resumer (emphasis mine) en ces
deux points: 1° une distinction, voire une disjonction, entre joi et CT01Jance, celle-ci
etant Ia structure ideologique dans laquelle s'exprime celle-la;
Ia conception du
rapport entre les enonces dogmatiques et les realites religieuses comme un rapport
de symbole a realite, non d'expression propre (meme si elle demeurait inadequate)
a. reaiite.

Neglecting minor inaccuracies let me point out that where Fr. Congar
wrote (translation mine): "These authors did not profess the destructive
philosophy which essentially characterized the Modernistic positions and
which can be summarized in these two points: ... ," the translation
presents him saying that these authors acknowledged that their position
is basically Modernistic, and then attributes the key points of Modernistic
philosophy to them. Here the " translation " does not only simplify or
obscure the meaning of the original; it simply contradicts Fr. Congar, and
makes out of the Jesuits involved (i.e., Fr. de Lubac, Fr.-now CardinalDanielou, Fr. von Balthasar-at that time a Jesuit, etc.) • representatives
of an heretical position!
On pp. 13-14, speaking on the tasks of today's theologian, one finds
the strange sentence:
In the theology of the Incarnation of the Son, for example, he must find room for
the sacraments and eschatology, and even in the mystery of the Three Divine
Persons he must examine the questions about human beings and propose solutions.

The corresponding French text says (p. 17) :
• Cf. Y. Congar, Situation et taches presentes de la Theologie (Paris:
1967), p. 13, n. 6.

Cerf,

BOOK REVIEWS

ll faut developper dans Ia theologie, celle par example de !'Incarnation du Fils, des
sacrements, de l'eschatologie, mais meme celle du mystere des Trois Personnes, ce
qui, en elle, peut assumer les questions des hommes et leur apporter une reponse."

In English (my translation):
One has to develop in theology, e. g., in the theology of the Incarnation of the
Son, of the sacraments, of eschatology, even in that (i.e., theology) of the mystery
of the Three Persons, that which can take up the questions of men (scil. of today)
and furnish an answer to them.

On p. 15, lines 20-24, one reads (concerning recent trends and their
results):
Thirdly, the historicity of the human condition has finally been brought to light
in a new fashion, under the aspect of the condition of a being of the world and of
a being with the other characteristics of the human person.

The French (p. 18) has:
8° On a enfin mis en lumiere d'une facon nouvelle I'historicite de Ia condition
humaine, de I'etre au monde et de l'etre aux autres caracteristiques de Ia personne
humaine.

Besides giving" finally" (through its position in the sentence) a different
sense from what " enfin " had in the original, the above translation entirely
misses the meaning of the last two lines, where " to be to the world " and
" to be to others " are well-known technical expressions of contemporary
philosophy.
On p. 17 in the last paragraph one reads:
In short, today we find differing manners of theologizing. Scholasticism: conceptual,
argumentative, or deductive, exhausts the datum of tradition (emphasis mine), not
only of an intellectus fidei, rationally established, but of an application to different
times and cultures.

French (p. 20) :
Bref, nous rencontrons aujourd'hui plusieurs
de theologiser: Ia
conceptuelle, argumentative, deductive, issue de Ia basse-scolastique; Ia recherche, a
partir du donne de Ia Tradition, non seulment d'un intellectus fidei rationellement
elabore, mais d'une reponse aux questions du temps et des hommes. . . .

The English sentence, beginning with " Scholasticism ... ," amalgamates
into a nonsensical mess two distinct ways of theologizing, i.e. (translation
mine): "the conceptual, argumentative, deductive way, stemming from
late Scholasticism," and " the search, starting with the data of Tradition,
not only for an intellectus fidei but also for an answer to the questions of
(our) times and (contemporary) men.

BOOK REVIEWS

823

Further passages where the meaning of the original was altered or confused include: p. 9, lines 6-10 (cf. p. 12 of the French text), line 16
(cf. p. 12); p. 10, last 4 lines (cf. p. 14); p. 11, lines 1-5 (cf. p. 14), line 23
("as is very evident today" is not found in the French); line 27 (cf. p. 15:
the French, as the encyclical Humani generis, does not speak of "a failure
to return [emphasis mine] to scriptural and patristic sources " but of " un
abus dans le retour ... "; what was criticized by the encyclical was not at
all that these authors failed to return to the sources, but the way in which
they did!)'; p. 14, line 10 ("a fifth dimension probably" is a "funny"
remark, entirely out of place, and not found in the French: cf. p. 17);
p. 16, line 2 (cf. p. 19: "before" is a mistranslation of "devant" which is
not a preposition but the participle of "devoir"!); p. 18, lines 1-2 (cf. p.
21), line 13 (cf. p. 21: "un enrichissement grace au dialogue avec les
Autres" is simply" translated": "some embellishment"!), lines 16-17 (cf.
p. 21); p. 19, lines 15-17 (cf. p. 22), lines 22-26 (cf. p. 22) .-All this on the
first 14 pages of the translation!
The rest of the book.

Even though for the rest of the book the translation is not as bad as
for the preface, it still contains many mistakes. For the benefit of readers
I am going to point out some of the major errors.
On p. 25: the provisory definition of theology given in the first paragraph
simplifies Fr. Congar's careful definition (cf. col. 341) to the extent of a
mutilation.
On p. 26 Fr. Guthrie writes: "Plato was the first to use the term 8£oAoy{a,
to point out the profound educational value of mythology. For this reason
the Neoplatonists and some of the early Fathers of the Church classified
him as a theologian." Now, that Plato was the first to use the term 8w>..oyla
would be difficult to prove (even though it is true that the word is not
attested earlier in Greek texts of indubitable authenticity); 10 surely, what
the French said was that he used the term once (" une foi "-col. 342).
Nor is it true to say (and the French did not say it) that this was the
reason why he was considered later a theologian.
On p. 32, lines 7 ff., one reads with surprise concerning the Latin term
theologia: "Several Fathers apparently do not even know the term; v. g.,
Minucius Felix, St. Cyprian, St. Ambrose, Arnobius, Boethius, and St.
Gregory." What the French said (col. 345) was: "Plusieurs Peres ne le
connaitront meme pas: ... "where "le" referred to the specific ecclesiastical sense of the term.
Same p., n. 12 last line and its continuation on p. 33: where the French
had (col. 345) : ". . . est une monographie sur le dogme trinitaire ou
1 ° Cf.,
e. g., G. Ebeling, "Theologie," in Die Religion in Geschichte und
Gegenwart, Srd ed., vol. VI, col. 754.

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BOOK REVIEWS

theologia n'aurait que le sens admis par plusieurs Peres grecs " the English
translation reads: " ... is a monograph on the Trinity dogma in which
theologia would not have the only meaning admitted by several Greek
Fathers." This is just the opposite of what the original text said. As a
result Fr. Guthrie begins the next sentence with "For ... " whereas the
French has " par contre. . . ." (In the same note the name Langraf
became " Sandgraf ") .
The pages 44-45 present a real confusion. Lines 1-7 of p. 44 contain a
fairly good translation of the French text (col. 350) :
If the student studies this Epistola XXXVIII, just cited, he will be impressed by
the sureness and exactitude with which Basil distingushes the terms " essence "
and "hypostasis" ....

Then follow six lines comparing Basil with Athanasius, which are not found
in D. T. C., and are presumably restored from the original manuscript.
Then, however, we read again:
For example in Epistola XXXVIII of St. Basil, 11 note the firmness and subtlety
with which he distinguishes the notions of essence and hypostasis.

This is obviously but a slightly different version of the text given above
(lines 1-7) .
Now comes a passage which continues the translation of the French
(interrupted by the insertion) but contains several errors: thus " concordisme apologetique" becomes "apologetic concordat" (sic!)," au service
d'une perception et d'une expression plus precises du donne chretien" is
translated: "serviced by a most precise (emphasis mine) perception and
expression of the Christian data," i.e., the relationship has been inverted
and the comparative became superlative. What follows (lines
on
St. Jerome and his influence on the Latin Middle Ages is fairly faithful to
the French. But then (lines 30 ff. continued on p. 45) we have a cryptic
sentence not found in the French (and presumably taken from the original
manuscript) :
For Gregory N azianzen theology is a spiritual function reserved to the priests and
practically identical with the theory (sic!). This, of course, is not a pure theory
but it is sufficient to engage a total spiritual life and any spiritual experience.

Since the original French text is not available, one can only guess what
Fr. Congar may have written,l 2 but certainly he must have thought of
11 It may be noted
that, in the light of patristic research since 1939, this
"Epistola XXXVIII of St. Basil" is not considered authentic today but attributed
generally to Gregory of Nyssa; cf., e. g., A. Grillmeier, Christ in Christian Tradition (London: A. R. Mowbray and Co., 1965), p. 285, n. 3.
12 I would suspect,
in particular, that the affirmation:
. theology is a
spiritual function reserved to the priests," is the result of some misunderstanding.

BOOK REVIEWS

39l5

theoria, the Greek term for contemplation, which is then misleadingly
rendered by " theory " without sufficient explanation.
The English text then continues without interruption (p. 45, lines
" with regard to the previous text we need to cite only two typical references ... " (and there follow references to Abelard and St. Thomas). The
reader may wonder to what previous text he is referred to, since in the
preceding two sentences no particular text was mentioned. Only by looking
up the French (col. 350) can one see that, the passage on Gregory
Nazianzen being a later insertion, the "previous text" is St. Jerome's
letter to Magnus!
P. 46, lines 5-6: "That those steps were taken in nature (sic!) is
sufficient condemnation of any who thought that Augustine belittled
nature." The corresponding French sentence (col. 351): "St. Augustin
lui donne une grande importance et cela suffit a montrer le simplisme de
tout jugement attribuant a Augustin une meconnaissance de Ia nature; ... "
"probably from the stains of original sin,"
On the same page, line
is an addition to the French text. The "Translator's Note," however, is
only a slightly abbreviated version of a text found in D. T. C. col. 350-351.
On p. 48, lines
we read: "Of course, these analogies are not proofs.
They have value only for the intelligent ears of the believers." The French
has (col. 353): "Bien entendu, ces analogies ne sont pas des preuves, mais
des moyens de tendre a !'intelligence, qui ne valent que pour le croyant:
... " Thus the important reference to the Augustinian intellectus fidei is
lost through a flattening simplification. (On the same page, last line
" Church bells can ring over this decision " is one of the " funny " additions
to the French text).
On p. 57, lines 5-4 from the bottom: the French phrase "Ia patristique
"the
proprement dite" (col. 357) is very misleading "translated":
patristic Platonism (emphasis mine) properly so-called."
On p. 65 the quotation, beginning in line 16, contains several mistakes
Thus, e. g., in the Latin" humiliter
(cf. the Latin text in D. T. C. col.
quantum potest quaerere " depends on " debet " and thus the right translation would be: " he should humbly seek " and not, as the English text has,
"he may patiently seek" (emphasis mine). Also the rest of the text as
well as the subsequent quotation (" 0 Lord ... ") are " translated " so
freely that the precise meaning of Anselm's careful sentences is lost.
On p. 116, lines 13-14 we read the strange sentence, attributed to
Alexander of Hales (concerning theology as science): "For it is a science
which reaches intelligence only after it leaves faith" (emphasis mine).
The same expression (" Only after it leaves a living faith, ... ") is repeated
in the next line. In the French (col. 393) we have in both cases "a
partir de la foi ": i.e., theology does not "leave faith" but starts with
(and bases itself upon) faith!
On p.
lines 18 H., we find:

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Obviously, it will always be a temptation for Scholasticism to conceive the work
of speculative theology as an application to a special datum preserved by tht
philosophical categories.

The French has (col. 421):
. . . ce sera toujours nne tentation, pour cette scholastique, de ne concevoir le
travail de Ia theologie speculative que comme une application a un donne special,
tenu par ailleurs, de categories philosophiques.

Thus the meaning of the original, which spoke precisely of the application
of philosophical categories to a datum received from elsewhere (i.e., from
revelation and faith) is entirely lost; furthermore, where the French spoke
of " this Scholasticism," i.e., of that of the 16th and 17th centuries, the
English has Scholasticism in general; " ne ... que " is not translated.
Even though the systematic part, beginning with p. 199 (" The Speculative Notion of Theology"), seems to have been somewhat better translated,
there too one finds passages where the meaning of the original is altered.
Thus, e. g., on p. 246, line 6 from bottom, and ff., we read:
From the standpoint of objective content, it is faith which dominates theology from
one end to the other. It is uniquely to develop in a human intelligence according
to the mode connatural to that intelligence, that it annexes and subordinatesitself
to (emphasis mine) philosophical notions.

The French text which corresponds to the second sentence runs as follows
(col. 474): "C'est uniquement pour prendre son developpement dans
une intelligence humaine selon le mode connaturel a cette intelligence
qu'elle s'annexe et se subordonne des notions philosophiques." Thus,
according to Fr. Cougar, it is faith which associates and subordinates to
itself philosophical notions, whereas the translation reverses the relationship and makes faith subordinate itself to philosophical notions, which is
something quite different!
Time and space do not permit us to analyze here the whole translation
line by line-and it would be tedious reading. The examples adduced (and
many others could be added) have shown sufficiently, I am afraid, that
the translation is not reliable.
If Father Cougar had given us a new History of Theology, it would
have been a major event for the annals of theological publishing Even
if we had received a well translated and reasonably updated version of his
old article, it would have been a very valuable book, eminently worth
reading. I cannot help stating, however, that "A History of Theology"
-" translated and amicably edited " by Father Hunter Guthrie, S. J.is a disappointment.
DAVID L. BALA.s, 0. CisT.
University of Dallas, Tt'JXIUI
A nselmianum, Rome
10 "

Foreword," p. 5.

BOOK REVIEWS

8!!7

Dogmenentwicklung a1s Problem der Geschichtlichkeit der W ahrheitserkenntnis: Eine Erkenntnistheoretisch-theologische Studie zum Problemkreis
der Dogmenentwicklung. By WINFRIED ScHULZ. Rome, Libreria Editrice dell'Universita Gregoriana, 1969. Analecta Gregoriana 173. Pp.
387.
Hardly any other question receives as much attention in theological
circles today as that concerning the relation between history and revealed
truth. Such is the contention of Winfried Schulz in his carefully researched
and perceptive study of dogmatic development as analyzed and theorized
by Roman Catholics of the past and present. He begins with acknowledgements of gratitude to Sisto Cartechini, Johannes Lotz, Karl Rahner, and
Bernard Lonergan. This gives the reader reason to hope that something
genuinely worthwhile is to be found in the rest of the book, and that
expectation is not disappointed.
The treatment is in terms of themes rather than a purely chronological
ordering of positions. The first of the book's three major sections involves
a consideration of dogmatic development in its possibility, origin, limits,
and relation to the historicity of human truth. This is followed by a survey
of certain attempts to deal with development against a horizon on which
the distinction between the formally and virtually revealed loomed large
(Schultes, Tuyaerts, and Marin Sola). Von Drey, Mohler, Kuhn, Newman,
and Blonde! are then introduced with their concern for historical tradition
as conducive to the clarification of dogmatic development. They are presented as a transition to contemporary theological attempts to come to
grips with the problem. The final section deals with cognitional theory and
historically mediated truth, the antinomies posed by dogmatic development
in this context, and finally the theological structure of revealed truth.
For one interested in a scholarly study of Catholic attempts to understand changes in faith experienced and reflected, this book should prove
quite valuable. Although another preceded it by some years (Herbert
Hammans, Die Neueren Katholischen Erkliirungen der Dogmenentwicklung,
Essen, 1965) , they do not cancel each other out. Hammans made only one
reference to the work of a theologian of the stature of Bernard Lonergan,
an omission Schulz has attempted to remedy, though some may wonder why
among the secondary sources no mention is made of the extremely useful
article written by the late Robert Richard in Continuum of 1964. What is
more, Schulz makes an effort to indicate where he agrees and disagrees
with Harnmans (e. g., on Newman, p. 160).
There are a number of sections in which a more detailed treatment
seemed to be desirable. One of the first has to do with the historical
studies of the usage of the words Faith and Heresy in western theological
literature and conciliar documents of the past. The names of Lang, Umberg,
Lennerz, Favre, Fransen, De Letter, Lawlor, Salaverri, and Garcia Martinez

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suggest themselves in the context of a discussion on the part of Catholic
scholars concerned with the meaning of anathema sit and fides in the
decrees of Trent. I have tried to show the importance of this research
for a renewal of the Sacrament of Penance in terms of some type of general
absolution without a preceding confession of serious sin in species and
number (cf. "Auricular Confession and the Council of Trent," in The
Jurist 28 [1968], 280-97; "Renewal of Penance and the Problem of God," in
Theological Studies 30 [1969], 489-97) . Schulz considers Lang but of the
latter's significant contributions in this area he seems to take less account
than they deserve. To be more specific, there may be a commonly accepted
opinion that a conciliar canon concluding with anathema sit rejects heresy
in the strict sense and implicitly proposes the contradictory as divinely
revealed truth. If that opinion does not stand the test of historical
investigation into conciliar hermeneutics, then a definite factor in the
development of dogma for many Catholics would involve unlearning mistaken interpretations of teaching from the past. Given Schulz's concern
with historicity, it is strange that more attention was not given to the
implications of this line of thought.
In an understandable effort to show that Newman distanced himself
from the Catholics who sought to find a paradigm for dogmatic development in the process of deductive reasoning, a false impression may have
been given. Newman listed logical sequence as one of the notes of authentic
development. He denied that development either ante or post factum was
necessarily reducible to the thought process expressed in an apodictical
syllogism. But for him quite clearly the guarantee that a subsequent
expression was not a falsification of the faith expressed in a prior one
involved the fulfilment of a condition; namely, if the rules of deduction
were not followed, those of logic in a broader sense were not violated either
(cf. An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, London 1888,
ed. 6, P. II, c. 5, 189 ss.).
An attempt is made to show that charges of biologism leveled against
Newman are not grounded. (p. 160) It might be noted that the search
for analogues that led Newman to living organisms deserves to be pondered
more today than at times it is. One often hears it said that the dogmatic
development that has taken place might not have or might have been
notably different. There is a truth in this, but unqualified it makes past
development look more than a little arbitrary. Here the analogy with the
growth of living organisms is limited as well but may prove helpful. In
particular, after a certain period a life process under way often seems
to preclude certain changes of direction that were antecedently possible.
A point of application might be that of church order in the New Testament.
A number of notably different types are to be seen there. It appears that
the growth of a gradually developing number of Christian communities is
in focus. But what was realized at one stage of development is not for

BOOK REVIEWS

829

that fact alone shown to be a viable form at a subsequent period of
development. The application of biological analogues may be useful here,
though, to be sure, it merely labels the problem of irreversibility rather
than solves it.
It would not be surprising if some criticize Schulz for not alluding
sufficiently to the importance Newman attributes to implicit faith, especially in his Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent. There is a problem on
the level of faith-reflective as distinct from faith-experienced. How is one to
determine which of all the articulations of Christian faith is normative
for the believer? Newman recurs in the case of Catholic and Protestant to
the fact that faith is a real rather than notional assent. As a result of
this, both are related in their believing itself to realities and not simply to
propositions; the Catholic to the word of revelation in the word of the
Church and the Protestant to the content of the Scriptures. Whatever
one may think of this position, it is significant in terms of Newman's
notion of dogmatic development.
What is more, it may well have implications for at least one problem
facing Christians today. Notwithstanding important ecclesial differences
acknowledged by Catholic ecumenists and their Protestant counterparts,
one sees signs of an emerging consensus on the part of many in both groups.
Intercommunion is coming to be viewed not merely as something factually
occurring but as a justifiable type of conduct in view of a common faith
in Christ, his presence in the Eucharist, and perhaps even the ministry
of those who preside at the rite. It is in this context that I think a
question inspired by Newman should be asked. What is the nature of the
believing that is celebrated in the Eucharist? Is it primarily the acceptance
of a formula of consensus uniting celebrants with Christ? Or is it a ritual
association of the individual with the living reality of faith on the part
of a concrete local church (preexistent or then realized) and so with Christ?
If the latter is the case, then Newman's notion of faith as real assent may
be applicable today to a problem in which carefully worded and elaborated
formulae have been constructed to express a common faith regarding
Eucharist and perhaps ministry. This reviewer is at present involved in
the process of formulating just such a consensus-statement but does not
think a common faith regarding Eucharist and ministry suffices of itself to
justify a common celebration of the Lord's Supper. Historically conditioned
but real ecclesial differences of the first order are found in communities
otherwise united in such belief. Now, what is professed when men gather
to recall the death and resurrection of Jesus? It is a faith that unites
even those who cannot articulate it adequately-a condition affecting all
in varying degrees. In this context its implicit character is most important.
The union is not above all in terms of agreed-on formulae (however
important) but by way of association with a concrete local church and its
leaders. If this is so, it seems to raise very serious questions about joint

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celebration by those whose communities are divided in their conviction
regarding God's will for the structuring of Christ's Church. In this context
Newman's notion of implicit faith as real assent should, I think, be
considered.
With good reason Schulz devotes considerable attention to the works oi
Karl Rahner. In this he has an advantage over Hammans in that he is
able to draw on ideas expressed in " Kerygma und Dogma." the section
Rahner and Lehmann did for the first volume of Mysterium Salutis. The
expertise Schulz has acquired puts him in a good position to do further
work on Rahner's more recent endeavors.
In August of 1969 the latter published a noteworthy essay containing
among other things a reply to a position expressed by Jean Cardinal
Danielou (cf. " Die Freiheit theologischer Forschung in der Kirche " in
Stimmen der Zeit 184 [1969). 73-82). In it a practical rationale is at least
implicitly proposed for future policy regarding differences that exist within
the Catholic Church. It is Rahner's contention that further determinations
of faith like those of the past are probably not going to be forthcoming at
least, one assumes, for some time. Such definitions seem unlikely because
their precondition is not realized, namely, a more unified theology. (p. 81)
This should not be overlooked when it comes to expressing Rahner's theory
regarding the development of dogmatic expressions of Christian faith.
But it does raise a question. Have dogmatic definitions been the result of
theological consensus? An affirmative answer without qualification would
seem strange coming from the one who wrote " Chalkedon-Ende oder
Anfang? " Or is theology rather to be furthered or at least stimulated by
dogmatic definitions? If the tension is real, the relation is probably
reciprocal. At any rate the latter deserves a great deal more attention
from systematic theologians. Schulz seems to be the very kind from whom
we could expect fruitful research in just this area.
CARL

J. PETER

The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

St. Augustine on Nature, Sex and Marriage. By JoHN J. HuGO. ChicagoDublin-London: Scepter, 1969. Pp. 249. $5.95.
In 1965 a voluminous work on the Catholic Church's attitude toward
contraception appeared. In a special way the Church's attitude toward
sexuality in general and toward sexual pleasure and love in marriage is
set forth. Not only the official teaching of the Church but also the varying
(and sometimes even contradictory) opinions of theologians and canonists

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881

down the centuries come in for detailed examination and discussion. The
author, Prof. John T. Noonan Jr., is attached to the Law Department of
Notre Dame University. The book he has produced is at one and the same
time an astounding display of compilatory erudition (and as such of
considerable utility to the serious theologian, above all to the moral
theologian) and a very clear case of special pleading, that is, of special
pleading for a loosening of the traditional Catholic teaching on the subjects
examined. An ever-recurring refrain in the book (taken up by innumerable
other writers) is this: the cause of the Church's harsh and negative and
even pessimistic attitude toward sexuality and sexual pleasure in general is
none other than St. Augustine who, it is maintained over and over again,
held that all sexual pleasure even in marriage is sinful! This augustinian
teaching, it is further asserted, influenced the whole of Western theological
thought for well over a thousand years. Even St. Thomas, who for a
moment seemed on the point of emancipating himself from it through the
sound teaching of Aristotle on the notion and structure of pleasure, fell
under its spell. Ever after, insists the author, this augustinian-scholastic
( = thomistic) approach dominated the theological field and very effectively
queered the pitch for any further truly realistic and objective thinking in
the matter. Under this baneful double influence Catholic theologians were
unable to adjust principle to human behavior, as Noonan pointedly asserts
in his criticism of the hidebound moral teaching of Billuart. In that bald
assertion one may be permitted to think that the author lets the cat out
of the moral theological bag! Referring to the encyclical Casti Connubii
of Pius XI, he concedes that, as a synthesis of past doctrinal statements,
the document is a masterpiece, but he maintains that it is completely devoid
of all historical sense. In point of fact, when the matter is examined
carefully, it will be seen that it is Prof. Noonan and not Pius XI who is
lacking in authentic historical sense. For instance, his exposition of St.
Thomas's (one of the knaves of the piece) teaching is on the one side most
inadequate and on the other, as far as it goes, a complete distortion of
Aquinas's thought in the question of pleasure in general, and in particular
in the question of sexual love and pleasure and their place in marriage.
This should perhaps not be altogether too surprising, for Prof. Noonan is
neither a trained medievalist nor a trained moral theologian. N e supra
crepidam sutor!
Now, Father John J. Hugo offers us in the present study a thorough
examination of the mind of Augustine (the second and perhaps prime
villain of the piece) on the same matters. Basing himself on a close
examination of texts and contexts (doctrinal and historical) , he is able
to show that the contention, repeated ad nauseam by modern theological
writers, that for Augustine all sexual pleasure, even within the limits of
marriage, is always sinful, is without foundation and amounts to a grave
maligning of the Bishop of Hippo. In a special way he brings out
Augustine's penetrating and most realistic conception of the interrelation

BOOK REVIEWS

between function, finality and pleasure (see pp. 86-88, 114-117, 216-217,
note 29) . This same teaching was taken up later by Aquinas, and it
constitutes the basis of his teaching on the morality of pleasure in general
(and in this, be it said, St. Thomas was anything but a pessimistic killjoy!}, and on the morality of sexual pleasure in particular. This teaching
has been either completely ignored or gravely distorted by modern theological writers. Were it fully grasped and applied, it could well supply the
key to many burning problems of the day.
The study of Hugo is by and large complete and satisfying, and in view
of the actuality of the subject treated it must be regarded as a most
timely and important contribution to modern theological discussion. The
work would have benefited very much had the author shown himself to
be aware of modern discussions on very important and closely connected
problems-on the origin of man, for instance, and on original sin. All
indication of pertinent literature on these matters is unfortunately lacking.
Moreover, the production of the book leaves very much to be desired.
This, however, cannot be laid at the door of the author. Why must the
notes (that are so important in a study of this kind) be all relegated to
the end of the book? And why, to make matters worse and much more
aggravating for the serious reader and student, must they be numbered
chapterwise and not consecutively? And why must they be printed in the
same size of typeface as the body of the study? All the important texts
(references for control purposes at back!) of Augustine are given in
extenso in the text itself, indented and italicized. What is the sense of
calling attention to the italicized phrases in a text adduced in italics?
(see, for instance, p. 178} . These are blemishes that could well have been
avoided. Had they been elimated the book would have gained considerably
in attractiveness and the price in reasonableness into the bargain. And that
would make itself felt on the Catholic book market!
CoRNELIUs WILLIAMS, 0. P.
895 KaufbtJUren
Germany

La Dimensione trinitaria del carattere sacramentale. By CRESCENZO
Rome: Lateran University, 1969. Pp. 176.

SEPE.

In this work the author intends to offer a complement to the contemporary theology of the sacramental character, which principally centers around
the christological, ecclesiological, and anthropological aspects of the character. The first part (pp. 11-78) is historical. Here the author examines
the trinitarian dimension of the sacramental character in Scripture, in the
writings of the Fathers, and in medieval and modern theology. The
larger portion (40 pp.) is devoted to medieval authors, such as Alexander

BOOK REVIEWS

sss

of Hales (21 pp.) and Albert the Great (12 pp.), although the modem
authors, M. J. Scheeben and H. Mlihlen, are treated.
The second part (pp. 79-112) is theological and discusses the mediate
relationship of the sacramental character to the Trinity. The author
attempts to highlight this relationship successively in the christological,
ecclesiological, and anthropological dimensions of the character. The third
part (pp. 113-169) is both theological and speculative. After showing
the essential relationship of the sacraments in general to the Trinity, the
author proceeds to expose the particularly intimate bond of the character.
The latter is shown to be a consecration of the soul whereby is realized a
real, supernatural, static, efficientiva and durativa presence of the Trinity,
a presence qualitatively different from that accompanying sanctifying grace.
Moreover, this presence is cultic-sacramental and personal; it has an
intimate connection with the presence of Christ in the Church.
This work, a doctoral dissertation from the Lateran University in Rome,
is well composed and much of the material skillfully arranged. The
mystery of the Trinity is the principal mystery of the faith, so that there
can be no theology at all without at least indirect reference to this
mystery. Thus we wish to congratulate the author for taking up a theme
which, to our knowledge, has not yet been so extensively treated. The
clear exposition of the sacramental character as an entitative habit of the
soul, caused by a special presence of the Trinity in the soul (real and
supernatural but qualitatively differing from the presence received in
sanctifying grace), is, in the present state of sacramental theology, still
quite valuable.
On the slightly negative side, the arguments of the author seem here
and there to be over-simplified. Granted that the efficient cause is also
the exemplary cause (omne agens agit sibi simile!), his argument for the
presence of the Trinity in the sacraments in general (to which he devotes
a whole chapter, pp. 117-123) is too facile. He says that the sacraments
are the activity of Christ and so of the Trinity ad extra, and he consequently assimilates the effect to the efficient cause. But what is expected
is a convincing argument for the special Trinitarian aspect of the sacraments
or the special sacramental aspect of the Trinitarian operatio ad extra.
Moreover, the absence of some fundamental questions concerning the
sacramental character should be noted, e. g., why do only three out of the
seven sacraments have this special Trintarian effect; whether these sacraments form a special group distinct from the others, and, if so, whether
this has some Trinitarian reason; why does such a Trinitarian reality as the
sacramental need exist in the present sacramental economy?
TosHIYUKI MrrAKAwA
Oura-tenshudo
Nagasaki, Japan

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Eucharist. By Loms BoUYER. Notre Dame:
Press, 1968. Pp. 496. $14.00.

University of Notre Dame

This book which bears the subtitle, Theology and Spirituality of The
Eucharistic Prayer, is really an historical study of the origin and development of the Canon from its Jewish cradle to the post-Vatican II liturgical
renewal and the return of Protestantism to traditional Eucharistic forms.
We have come to expect from Bouyer sound scholarship and brilliant,
original insights. This monumental study, the fruit of twenty years of
painstaking research, does not disappoint that expectation.
The Eucharistic Prayer is, Bouyer insists, original and profoundly
Christian; but it is not a creatio ex nihilo. Its roots lie deep in the liturgical
soil of Judaism. The first Christians, all converts from Judaism, regarded
themselves as the Israel of God, the people of the new and everlasting
covenant. Just as the Christologies of Paul and John are unintelligible without continual reference to the authors' Jewishness, so also the unique
Christian community act of worship, the Eucharist, cannot be understood
without immediate reference to the Jewish worship from which it sprang
and of which it is the fulfillment. Western theology would have been spared
the bizarre theories on the sacrificial aspect of the Eucharist which cluttered
the post- Tridentine manuals had the Jewish concept of " memorial " been
clearly grasped.
Bouyer sees the Eucharistic Prayer (the Canon) holding in primitive
Christian worship the place occupied by the Berakoth in the Synagogue
worship. The Eucharist, like the Berakoth, is the response of God's people
to the reading of his word. Gregory Dix (The Shape of the Liturgy)
pointed out the similarity of the dialogue which introduces the Canon
with the dialogue between the President and the members of the Chaburah
which preceeded the Berakah of their fraternal meal. J. P. Audet, 0. P.,
(Revue biblique, 65 [1958], 871-899) argued convincingly that the primitive
eucharistia, like the Berakah of synagogue worship, was essentially a
proclamation of the mirabilia Dei. C£. I Cor. 11:26. Bouyer agrees with
Audet, but he insists that the Berakah expresses the people's dedication
to the divine will as well as proclaiming the mirabilia Dei. The Berakah,
as the people's response to the word of God, replaced in the Synagogue
worship the sacrifice which could not be offered outside the Temple of
Jerusalem. The essential element of the sacrifice, the people's dedication
to God, is found in the Berakoth.
Scholars dispute the exact nature of the prayers of Chapters IX and X
of the Didache, but there is general agreement that they are Christian
adaptations of the Berakoth. Bouyer, like many others, regards them as
Eucharistic prayers. What is disputable in Bouyer's presentation is his
acceptance of the collection of prayers of Book Seven of the Apostolic
Constitutions as evidence that the primitive Eucharistic prayer was a

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christianization of the Berakoth, the Qedushah, and the Keter which are
found in the ninth-century collection Seder Amram Gaon. The parallels are
striking. The prayers of Book Seven of the Apostolic Constitutions are
unquestionably Jewish prayer formulas. But a problem still remains, and
Bouyer has not faced it squarely. Are the prayers of Book Seven of the
Apostolic Constitutions liturgical prayers used in the Christian Eucharist,
or, are they a collection of Jewish prayers made by a Christian convert from
Judaism? Some Patrologists of note, e. g., Quasten, regard these prayers
as "a very interesting collection of Jewish prayers." When we remember
that the author of the Didascalia which comprise the first six books of the
Apostolic Constitutions was, in all probablity, a convert from Judaism, the
suspicion is strong that the prayers of Book Seven were taken from a
Jewish prayer collection and not from a Christian Eucharistic liturgy.
This English translation of Bouyer's book contains a supplementary
chapter on the reform of the Roman Canon and the three new Canons
recently added to the Roman liturgy. The author remarks in his Foreword:
" this reform has fulfilled some of the most important desiderata of this
book, a fulfillment which could never have been hoped for at the time
that I undertook to write it." Indexes of biblical texts, rabbinical texts, of
the synagogue liturgy, of ancient Christian writers, of Christian liturgies,
and of modern authors round off what is one of the most important studies
on the history of the Eucharist produced by modern scholarship.
RICHARD KuGELMAN,

C. P.

St. John's
Jamaica, N. Y.

Incontro con Cristo. Credibilita della Religione Cristiana. By VLADIMm
BouBLIK. Rome: Lateran University, 1968. Pp. 802.

In the preface the author admits that to some his enterprise may seem
presumptuous today when fundamental theology is hedged around with
difficulties. But he is modest and does not propose to solve all these
difficulties but to present a modernized version of the old manuals on
De Revelatione, such as Father Garrigou-Lagrange published many years
ago. Regardless of the Western world, in the East one feels continuously
the need for clear ideas on basic things like revelation, the supernatural,
pain and death, the Risen Lord. The author is well acquainted with the
manuals, a list of which appears on p. ix. But at the end of each chapter
there is an ample bibliography of special treatises and articles. For the
ordinary student these lists are far too long. It would be better to give two
lists, one for specialists and one for seminarists.

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The whole book bears the stamp of thoroughness, and if the author
begins by saying that he cannot solve all the problems, the student will be
pleased with the way in which most difficulties are presented and answered.
One of the unfortunate side effects of ecumenism is the modem contempt
for apologetics. The faith is to be proposed but not defended. Yet the fact
is that today the faith has to be defended from the old errors that more or
less survive and from new ones that hide behind the assumed title of
theology.
In this book the author deals with modem errors. The chapters on
Revelation itself, his treatment of myth and demythologization are excellent.
He analyses the various exegetical positions of Bultmann. However, with
regard to Christ and his miracles, a confrontation with living, hostile forces
would have been more beneficial than a fresh charge versus Loisy, Von
Harnack and Renan. From the missionary point of view, a defence of
Christian mysticism, of the Church's power to make saints, of the excellence
of her worship, of the Church's right and duty to evangelize, would make
excellent appendices to some future edition of this book. Indeed, an
apologetic of the Christian priesthood is one of our pressing needs,
especially in the "tiers monde " where so many are losing awarenses of the
priest's supernatural role. The absence of this kind of apologetic is due,
I think, to following too closely the order of the old manuals. Nevertheless,
a professor's manual is limited by the time available for lectures and the
course, and that necessarily restricts the scope of his published work. In
these days, one should be grateful that the author has covered so much
ground and with such excellence.
JEROME TONER, 0. P.
St. Charles' Seminary
N agpur, India

The Crisis of Faith. By FREDERICK SoNTAG. Garden
Doubleday & Co., 1969. Pp. 285. $5.95.

City,

N. Y.:

" This Roman Catholic Church which was built on the assumption of
authority is in crisis today over where to locate and how to interpret
authority .... This is not because the pronouncements of the Councils do
not make it clear; they do. However, there are movements toward decentralization ... which give each person an increasing sense of individual
norms against which he feels the Church's teaching authority must be
measured. . . . More and more, it would appear, Roman Catholics are
developing standards that are external to the authority of the Church."
The author, a Protestant scholar on the philosophy faculty at Pomona
College, bases his observations on his experiences during a precedentsetting year of teaching philosophy at a Catholic seminary in Rome, the

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first non-Catholic (his term) to be invited to teach regular courses in a
Roman seminary. Dr. Sontag hails as the work of the Holy Spirit this
trend among Catholics to look less to papal authority for guidance and
more to Scripture and individual conscience. However, he is concerned lest
the trend continue into religious anarchy. "Strict unity has been abandoned
as a way proceeding in the Roman Church, but can this tendency toward
an indefinite multiplicity of authorities be halted now that the line is
broken?"
The purpose of his book is to contribute to halting that multiplication of
authorities at some " halfway house " between papal authority and religious
anarchy and thus to establish some stable position for the reconciliation of
divided brethren of all Christian denominations. As a partial answer he opts
for the " authority of Paul " in preference to the " authority of Peter."
" Some take the route via Peter and accept an ' authorized spokesman
and guardian' who preserves the tradition and hands it down. The other
route is to follow Paul, which means to search for the immediate presence
of God and, in that converting encounter, to let the transforming experience of the Divine be the definitive test for all claims to authority ....
All Christians who come later must somehow find exactly the same
authority that Paul did opposing Peter."
But how can the Christian have confidence that he is guided by " the
immediate presence of God " and not by his own ego? To the extent that
he departs from self-concern to concern himself with the needs of others,
Dr. Sontag suggests.
The author maintains that the search for a usable concept of authority
to resolve the conflicts of our day and effect reconciliation of divided
brethren demands new definitions of traditional religious concepts. Especially we must redefine the nature of God, of Jesus Christ and of the Holy
Spirit. " Surely the eternal God of St. Thomas appears inadequate to our
task." He does not offer new definitions but suggests that they be defined
in terms of selflessness and concern for others. He urges a third Vatican
Council for the implementation of new definitions.
The book is written with a brotherly spirit and no trace of rancor despite
its strong disagreement with traditional Catholic teaching. The traditional
Catholic, conservative Catholic-how does one come up with an equivalent
term that does not have pejorative connotations today?-will find this
book with its search for a new source of authority and new definitions
of God to be an exercise in futility. Avantgarde Catholics will find the
book congenial in intent but perhaps slightly quaint and outmoded by the
writings of militant Catholic reformers, who are certainly more daring in
their departure from tradition and harsher in their denunciation of it
than is the sweet-tempered Sontag.
RoBERT CAMPBELL,

De Paul
Chicago, IUinoia

0. P.

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Esegesi Tomistica. By P. CoRNELIO F ABRO, C. S. S. Rome: Libreria
Editrice della Pontificia Universita Lateranense, 1969. Pp. 478.
This most recent publication by a renowned Italian Thomist is the
first of two new volumes containing a collection of selected philosophical
essays authored by Father Fabro over the past thirty-four years. As the
author states in the forward, the collection of articles represented in this,
the first volume, both antedates and synthesizes the analysis made in
his now famous work, La nozione metafisica di partecipazione secondo S.
Tomaso, which first appeared in 1939 and whose third edition appeared in
1963. The second volume which, to this reviewer's knowledge, has yet to
appear, will consist of a further collection of previously published articles
which principally contrast the Thomistic with the Hegelian-Heideggerian
notions of Being and which, again according to the author, closely parallel
the content of his book, Participation et causalite, which first appeared
in 1960. The title chosen by the author, Esegesi Tomistica, is indeed apt,
since all of the essays deal with some aspect or other of St. Thomas's
philosophy.
While the essays are of varying length and range over a rather wide
spectrum of philosophical problems, the basic themes underlying these
studies come through with unmistakeable clarity. For Fabro, Aquinas's
distinction between essence and existence (esse), which permits him to
view esse as the act of acts and the form of forms, and his concomitant
teaching on analogy and participation by which the unconditioned
" nature " of esse is philosophically revealed, provide the unique and
essential core and methodology of Thomistic metaphysics.
Since there are fourteen separate essays comprising this first volume,
it will scarcely be feasible to attempt a detailed treatment of each one.
Instead, an effort will be made to point out several interesting claims
contained in the essays and then briefly to summarize the author's views
regarding the " nature " of esse and transcendental participation.
The first five chapters of the volume all appeared in various philosophical
periodicals before 1940. These essays treat of four separate problems:
(a) an analysis of how the principle of causality is known; (b) the
Thomistic notion of contingency; (c) the distinction between "quod est"
and" quo est"; (d) the path St. Thomas followed in developing his theory
of esse as the act of essence. The last of these articles appeared in the
Revue de Philosophie in 1938 and is the first of two essays appearing in
the volume which are in French. In it the author attempts to reconstruct
the path Aquinas followed in arriving at his conviction that the essence
of finite being is not its own actuality. It is Fabro's conclusion, and one
to which this reviewer is sympathetic, that Aquinas came to recognize the
need for a real composition within the very heart of contingent being
through the demands placed upon him by the otherwise insoluble problem

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of participation. Fabro sees Aquinas's solution to this problem as charting
a middle course between Platonism and Aristotelianism, A vicennianism and
Averroism. At the same time Fabro feels that the Thomist position
regarding essence and existence is in accord with the authentic spirit of
Aristotelianism.
The next two chapters, five and six, constitute one-third of the total
book and are highly polemical in nature. Written in 1939 and 1941 and
published in the Italian periodical, Divus Thomas, they present a detailed
and rather personal critique of the French Jesuit, Pere Descoqs' interpretation of Aquinas's metaphysics of being. These pages will perhaps interest
only those desirous of a first-hand account of one side of one of the
Thomist-Suarezian basic encounters which took place during this period.
Chapter VII consists of an article entitled " Logic and Metaphysics "
which appeared in the Acta Pont. Acad. S. Thomae Aquinatis in 1946.
Here the author attempts to clarify the important role logic plays in the
development of Thomistic metaphysics, while at the same time defending
Thomism from the charge of " exaggerated realism." The author contrasts
Thomas's understanding of logic with that of Hegel, whose views he feels
are firmly in line with those of Spinoza. For Fabro, authentic Thomism
does not conceive of logic as " an enclave where one might cultivate sterile
concepts which have no rapport with reality." (p. 95) Rather, he argues,
metaphysics and logic intimately compenetrate one another, and this
intimate relationship preserves for being both their dialectical character
and that tension of opposites which constitute the very foundation of
metaphysics as a human science. (p. 294) Fabro insists that the Augustinian, Scotist and Suarezian metaphysics are radically and irreducible
diverse from Thomistic metaphysics, (p. 94) and intimates that it is
this diversity which explains the different understanding each has of the
role logic and the dialectic of participation play in its development.
Chapter VII, which contains one of the shorter essays, makes an
interesting historical observation regarding the development of the Suarezian
notion of contingency and the concomitant Suarezian analogy of intrinsic
attribution. The author has sleuthed out the curious fact that the Alexander
of Hales, whom Suarez quotes in support of his own position on contingent
being, was not that celebrated personage at all but rather a one-hundredyear-later 14th century Italian Franciscan, one Alexander Bonini, hailing
from a small town in southern Piedmont, Alexandria della Paglia. Fabro
carefully documents his claim that this " unknown " Alexander of Alexandria anticipated in remarkable detail Suarez's teaching on contingency
and analogy and shows that Alexander's views were unquestionably an
indirect source of Suarez's own position. Fabro concludes: " If Suarez had
been familiar with the original texts, he would have been able to discover,
we think, that ' his ' Alexander of Hales had formulated ' expresse et
optime' not only his own solution regarding the distinction between essence

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and esse, but also his theory of act and potency, and its corollary of the
analogy of intrinsic attribution." (p. 310)
The last five chapters discuss the related themes of (a) the determination
of act by potency; (b) the foundation and (c) development of the fourth
way; (d) analogy and (e) the notion of participation. All of these articles
have appeared since 1960. They total 120 pages, comprising roughly one
quarter of the entire work, and constitute the sole portion of the book
written after the completion of Fabro's Participation et causalite which
appeared in 1958.
In his discussion of St. Thomas's fourth proof for the existence of God
the author makes the claim that: " of all the proofs for the existence of
God [it is] the one which is theoretically the most basic and the most
formal." (p. 382) In his opinion all other proofs ultimately rest on
Aquinas's doctrine of participation, which doctrine in turn constitutes the
very core of the fourth way. He views the common scholastic tendency to
identify the fundamental characteristic of limited being with the notion of
contingency to have been an outright import from Avicennianism and
Leibnizianism and to have been incubated in the Augustinian, Nominalist
and Suarezian schools, owing to the failure of their adherents to have
grasped and/or accepted what Fabro calls the "intensive Thomist
notion of esse." (pp. 370-1) It is Fabro's contention that Aquinas
himself came, in his maturer writings, to place more and more emphasis
on the notion of participation as the most efficacious means of demonstrating God's existence.
Fabro also sees an intimate connection between Aquinas's teaching on
the three related problems of participation, causality and analogy and
attempts in Chapter 13 to develop the rudiments of the latter in an article
written in French and originally published in Bulletin Thomiste (1964) . He
is strongly critical of the influence Cajetan has allegedly exercised with
regard to analogy among a long line of Thomists, and he locates Aquinas's
own doctrine as midway between Cajetan's analogy of proper proportionality and extrinsic attribution and Suarez' analogy of intrinsic attribution.
The concluding chapter is, fittingly for Fabro, on the subject of
participation, and appeared in Divinitll.Y in 1967. The author again underscores the theoretical inseparability of the teaching of Aquinas on essenceexistence and on participation. He also insists that the authentic Thomistic
notion of participation requires not only the distinguishing of esse as act
from the essence that is its potency but also from that existence which
is the fact of being and is consequently merely an effect and not a metaphysical principle. According to Fabro, it has been the failure by some
Thomists (he names Marechal, Lotz, Rahner) to note the distinction
between intensive and factual esse which has led them to attempt to
ground the experience of esse in mere judgment and hence to speak

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equivocally of a "Thomist existentialism." Finally, Fabro concludes his
study with an insistence that analogy has both a vertical (intrinsic attribution) and a horizontal (intrinsic proportionality) dimension, both of
which are essential to the authentic Thomistic notion of participated being.
However, he is very desirous of emphasizing that the Thomist notion of
intrinsic attribution is very different from that of Suarez, since it rests
firmly on the foundation of the distinction between esse and essence.
While the present reviewer is in full agreement with the fundamental
themes the author has developed in this his latest work, he does find it
difficult to give the book his unqualified recommendation. The reason for
his hesitation is simply that there is little in this new book of selected
articles which is not already contained in the author's major works alluded
to above, viz. La Nozione Metafisica di Partecipazione and Participation et
causalite. Thus the main value this reviewer sees in the publication of
this newest volume is that it serves as a useful source book for one
interested in pursuing the development of Aquinas's notion of existence
during the early and late Middle Ages and of tuning in on some of the
essence-existence disputes which occurred during the first half of this
century. However, unfortunate as it may be, even the professional scholar
will find himself hampered here by the total lack of any kind of name or
subject index. Such an omission seems inexcusable in a work at once so
diverse in subject matter and otherwise so distinguished for its scholarship.
A singular if unexpected bonus is rendered the reader, however, by the
inclusion of a bibliographical listing of all of Father Fabro's writings which
has been prepared by his students at the University of Perugia. The
list of his major works of philosophy alone totals nineteen volumes which
collectively comprise a massive 6000 pages plus. The list of philosophical
articles, covering a period of thirty-four years. is equally as impressive
containing 272 separate titles. This complete list of the published works
of Fr. Fabro should prove a great boon to future students who will wish
to delve into the thought of a philosopher who surely must be among the
most eminent and prolific of Thomist scholars in this century.
JAMES

Seattle University
Seattle, Washington

B. REICHMANN,

s. J.

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Issues zn Religion. A Book of Readings. By ALLIE M. FRAZIER. New
York: American Book Company, 1969. Pp. 373.
The Gospel of Irreligious Religion. Insights for Uprooted Man from Major
World Faiths. By LowELL D. STREIKER. New York: Sheed and Ward,
1969. Pp. 169. $4.95.
Issues in Religion is a successful presentation of readings on religious
philosophy which clearly illustrates the connection between critical and
speculative thought, and the basic structures of human existence in which
religious questions and responses originate. Beginning with selections from
literature (Dostoevsky, Nietzche, Tolstoy, and Rilke) concerning the
human condition, it proceeds to consider the origins of religious life with
texts from Freud, Feuerbach, Durkheim, Campbell, R. Otto, and Suzuki.
The last half of the book deals theologically and philosophically with the
modes of religious life and, finally, with the doctrine of God. Ample
introductions to the sections and the various selections given both a
scholarly and evocative context to the reading. This book views religious
thought a8 a religious phenomenon, and this is precisely what any academic
study of religion should accomplish. It would serve as an excellent text
in an introductory course for religious studies.
Professor Streiker's book picks up where Issues in Religion seems to
end. It is current, germane, and so clearly written that one immediately
grasps the vision of this new and interesting writer. Here is an exciting
essay emerging from the " irreligious " ferment within traditional religions
which is closely intertwined with the unprecedented encounter of the
world's religions and the secularists' rejection of all religion. He dramatically argues that " knowledge of one manifestation of the Spirit is knowledge
of none." (p. xvi) Issuing a call for the living religions of today to meet
on a truly dialogical level, he urges men to learn not necessarily from the
religions encountered but from the men who live by them. He sees the
meeting of the higher religions as an opportunity and a challenge for growth
in faith and in the mystical life of modern man. Possessing a sensitivity
to both the Indian traditions and the contemporary sub-culture, The
Gospel of Irreligious Religion grapples with the problems of structureless
religion and the need to recapture and reproduce living religious experience.
An outstanding chapter considers the religious " irreligion " of Rabindranath
Tagore, the Bengali poet spearheading the Indian renaissance of this
century, who saw that only " by transforming the mundane and habitual
can man participate in the divine creativity." (p. 153) Although Streiker's
essay is at times simplistic, it faces the most acute problems of religion
today and offers provocative and creative direction.
WILLIAM CENKNER, 0. P.
The Catholic University of America
W aahmgtcm, D. C.

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343

La Verita Dell' Uorrw. By LuiGI BoaLIOLO. Roma: Pontificia Universita
Lateranense, 1969. Pp. 316.
This " Truth about Man " represents the first volume of a " new course
of philosophy elaborated in accordance with Vatican Council II " to be
offered and published by the Lateran University in Rome. Prof. Bogliolo,
who was entrusted with the preparation of the new course, is introduced
by the Rector of the University as best qualified for his task, not
only because of his " generous attempts to meet the demands and the
mentality of young people " but especially because of his ability to combine
the treasures of tradition with the interesting and sound views of modem
times. (5 f.)
In his Introduction, the author finds the anthropological orientation of
modern philosophy as the most characteristic feature of the mentality of
our age. Even Vatican Council II made " the anthropological inspiration
of modem thought its own." (10) And since in a most courageous, yet
all too forgotten and obscured conception also St. Thomas has seen in
" man, in a certain sense, the totality of being," Prof. Bogliolo believes
himself justified in endorsing this modem trend, in attempting " the
centralization of all philosophy in man," and realizing a metamorphosis of
the entire ontology into anthropology in his textbook. (!'l!'l f.)
His " anthropological and personalistic ontology " constructed " in conformity with the modern mentality" (35) and characterized as a" study of
the human spirit " (45) is divided into seven sections. In the first section
entitled: "The Truth of His Being," (15 ff.) the author is concerned with
a " recovery of the integral human experience " and with a preliminary view
of " man as synthesis of ontology." He rightly recognizes that the
possibility of a realistic philosophy depends upon a possible cognitive
contact with reality as such. " The heterogeneity of thought and experience " maintained by Kant must and can be overcome; for " thought also
is an experience ... capable of serving as the foundation of the first, most
It is
radical and concrete of all human sciences," of metaphysics.
intellectual, not sensory experience that characterizes man, having as its
object the act of existence of sensible beings, and consequently of everything that is. Existence of being is the act of all acts, the perfection of all
perfections, "proper to every thing and common to all things." (!'l12)
" To experience the existence of any being means the experience of something which is in everything existing and real. It is impossible to experience
the existence of one existent without experiencing, in a certain sense, all
that exists." (28) In this authentic, integral intellectual experience of the
act of existence the philosophy or ontology centered in man has its solid
existential foundation. (45)
This intellectual perception or experience also explains the unique nature
and position of man in the universe as it is visualized in " man as synthesis

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of ontology." (35) Of course, man--or rather" the human form" or" the
human spirit" (44 f.)-is not seen as the combination of a science, as the
title seems to indicate, but as the transcendence and immanence of all
cosmic perfections, as the author wishes to interpret these traditional terms.
Because of his intuition of the act of existence, man or the human spirit
is the totality of being, the substantial culmination of the cosmos, the peak
of the interiority of cosmic life and structures; in one word, he is the
immanence, i.e., the intrinsic possession of all cosmic perfections and the
transcendence or the " existential-substantial superiority " of this possession. (37 ff.)
In the second section: "The Truth of His Knowledge," (49 ff.) the
author first attempts to determine the nature of human cognition. Knowledge is defined as an identifying and subjectifying activity. It demands
that "the subject . . . subjectifies the object, transforms it into itself,
giving it a new mode of being, i.e., its own mode of being," (53) so that
the object becomes the soul itself. (118) Intellectual knowledge is always
the seeing of the being of that which is, an intuition, an immediate contact.
(56) In the case of the human intellect, however, it is a conceptual
intuition, and man's primordial intellectual vision is identical with the
primordial concept of being. (57) "Human intelligence is abstracting
intuition or intuiting abstraction." (58) Abstract and universal knowledge
thus in no way involves an impoverishment of reality. According to St.
Thomas, abstraction signifies an identifying and spiritualizing activity,
" elevating things to the level of the knowing subject " and enlivening
and enriching their interior fulness. (54) As a result of this humanizing
operation, the abstract idea is the universal in the sense of the universality
of the nature and causality ascribed to " spiritual beings in relation to the
material existent." The universal means the whole or totality of all its
inferior perfections. Human intellectual vision is thus an operation transforming, elevating, intensifying, totalizing, and spiritualizing its objects.
(60 f.)
His understanding of human knowledge and of its object, then, offers
the author the solution of the traditional problems concerning the origin
of our ideas and concerning the value of the universals. " As identifying
activity, cognition effects that the same forms or ideas which are in things
and inform things are in the mind and inform our mind." (62) Combined
with this simple explanation of the origin of our ideas is the author's
"coherent doctrine about the universals." (64) The identifying operation
of cognition reveals that " every single substance has something of the
universal in itself"; relatively, "inasmuch as it is an existent and as such
has a relation with all the existents," and absolutely, inasmuch as "every
single substance is an universal insofar as, in itself and through itself, it
is a whole, a universe, a fulness, a totality." (65) The identification of the
universal with the ontic whole finally allows us to end the related

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philosophical debate by simply declaring that " everything real is universal,
and every universal is real." (67}
The determination of the nature of cognition is followed by a discussion
of its characteristics in " the components of human knowledge." (70 ff.)
Human knowledge is sensory-intellectual. " There is no intellectual knowledge whatever, which would not have its origin from the senses." (71)
However, the intellect enjoys the same primacy over the senses that the
soul enjoys over the body. Human knowledge is objective-subjective. This
" duality stands at the beginning of cognition, conditioning its formation
and origin " in order then to turn into an identity of object and subject in
actual knowing. (73} Human cognition is passive-active in a way that
" the intuitive and the abstractive activity represent two inseparable aspects
of human knowledge. Human intellectual intuition abstracts and, while
abstracting, intuits." (75) Intuition is served and completed by reasoning.
Human cognition is thus intellectual-discursive.
As intellectual experience, human knowledge is, then, characterized by the duality of apriorityaposteriority. Dependent upon the pre-existence of its object, human
cognition is " radically conditioned by the aposteriori," while " permeated
by being and its laws of absolute, necessary, and universal validity," the
spirit's identifying experience necessarily has its apriori. (77 f.)
In connection with his investigation of the apriori-aposteriori aspects of
knowledge, the author proposes " in a brief, but sufficiently clear way the
fundamental principles concerning possibility." (80) What he reveals is
usually explained as intrinsic and extrinsic possibility in ontology.
Epistemological problems are touched in " the essential attributes of
knowledge." (89 ff.) The objective validity of knowledge is seen to depend
upon the anthropological structure of cognition. Gnoseology finds its
answers in the ontology of man. (89) Human cognition is primarily "the
intellectual vision of the act of existence." (94} As an identifying
operation, it has truth, certitude, and evidence as " attributes that pertain
to it naturally and thus necessarily; without them there is no knowledge at
all." (89} The problem of error and doubt does not represent an objection
against this clear and distinct idea of human knowledge. Errors are simply
" partial truth," (92} and a doubt is merely an imperfect certitude, " a
parasite of certitude." (97} With regard to the critical problem of knowledge and of philosophy as a whole, the author sees no reason to share the
interiority complex that " many followers of the classical philosophy "
experience in the face of modern and contemporary philosophy. As " the
immediate vision of the existence of the existents." (105) human cognition
is always critical, since it is always accompanied by a judgment of
existence. (100) The solution of the problem of knowledge has its foundation in this intellectus entis et primorum principiorum. (102)
These epistemological convictions serve as a basis for the refutation of
skepticism, relativism, phenomenalism, positivism, idealism, existentialism,

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and of Cardinal Mercier's mediatism. (107 ff.) " Before one questions
whether the subject is able to know the object, one ought to ask what 'to
know ' does mean. If the investigation reveals that cognition is essentially
an identification of subject and object, the problem of mediatism becomes
senseless." (114)
In a further section of this ontology of man " The Truth of His Spirit,"
(115 ff.) i.e., " an ontological doctrine of the structure of the human
spirit," is to be developed. First, origin, nature, and characteristics of
the will are studied. " The will has its birth in knowledge," the author
believes. The identity of subject and object of cognition is genuine, but
it presupposes this duality. " The soul having become the thing known
feels itself divided from itself to the extent to which the known object
remains separated and divided from it. Knowledge thus creates an intrinsic
split in the soul which suffers, in a certain way, a painful laceration in its
being. Hence a tension to recover the entire being of the thing known
originates. . . . The merely intentional possession necessarily is followed by
the interior tension directed to the full possession of the known object.
The origin of this interior tension . . . signifies the birth of the will, . . .
of the appetite for the total and exhaustive possession of the object."
(118) Born out of the all-comprehensive cognition of the act of being, the
will by nature is omnidetermination, a tendency to the total good.
As faculty of the totality of good, it is free in the face of a particular good.
The structure of the spirit is thus revealed as necessarily intellectual,
willing, free, and personal, its personality proceeding from its liberty. (131)
Aquinas's assertion that the intellectual soul is known by way of its
understanding serves as the principle of a philosophical view of the nature
of the human soul.
The denial of man's transcendence over the
world, as defended by materialism, sensism, and certain forms of existentialism, does not demand an explicit refutation; such philosophies are not held
"worthy of a consideration."
The knowledge of the substantiality,
the independent and subsistent being of the human soul becomes manifest
in an investigation of the nature of the intellect, will, and freedom. "All
the characteristics and attributes of intellectual cognition imply the independence of the knowing soul." For instance, " intellectual knowledge is by
definition cognition of the existent as such. Existence is the perfection,
upon which all the perfections depend and which itself does not depend
upon any .... The cognition of such perfection is the knowledge of all
knowledge; from it all other knowledge originates and it does not depend
upon any other knowledge. The independence of the cognitive activity
demands the independence of the knower. Hence the knowing soul is
independent." (134)
The idea of the independence of the soul immediately " raises the
question concerning the soul's dependence upon the body." It cannot be
denied that the body conditions the operation of the human intellect; but

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"it is clear that the soul can exist when separated from the body, because
its acting is totally independent of the limitations of the body and of
the senses. . . . The soul transcends corporality not by way of an antagonism or opposition, but because it offers being to the body and contains the
ontological perfections in a superior, non-corporeal way." It immanently
contains and transcends corporality, "without allowing itself to be blocked
by its limits." (135) " It is a superior substance which assumes the body
into itself . . . elevating it and communicating its spiritual and personal
dignity to it." (136)
From a consideration of the properties of the perception of existence,
which has "evident characteristics of spirituality," and of the intellectual
knowledge in general, we arrive at a knowledge of the supermaterial
simplicity and spirituality of the soul. And an accurate analysis of our
first experience of existence also allows us " in an irrefutable way to
conclude to the immortality of the soul. . . . By way of the perception of
being we know, in a confused and imperfect way, all things at once
(omnia simul) . It is thus a primary characteristic of this perception to be
tota simul: in one stroke to know the totality of known things, without
any before or after; it is the intrinsic simultaneous and total fulness of
cognitive possession." This fulness of the intellectual activity has its correspondence in the interior total and simultaneous fulness of the soul's being,
which existential fulness represents immortality in its positive aspect.
For immortality is not just a denial of mortality but essentially a participation of God's eternity. (141 f.)
After his demonstration of the soul's substantiality, spirituality, and
immortality, the author considers "the attributes of the human spirit."
(144 ff.) Besides being intelligent, willing, free, and personal, the human
spirit is described as possessing all the cosmic, i.e., spatial, temporal,
dynamic attributes in a non-cosmic way. The inferior grade of material
reality finds itself more truly in the superior grade of the spirit than in
itself, and it is only this conception of the transcendence of the spirit which
is able to overcome " once and for all the incredibly widespread dualistic
mentality." (154)
The following fourth section of the book is dedicated to a consideration
of certain logical doctrines concerning " the correctness of human discourse
and the validity of the method." (157 ff.) Porphyry's tree is to be improved by the addition of the act of existence. " The hierarchy of things and
the corresponding hierarchy of the ideas " thus has its peak in " being:
radical perfection and notion," and its primary disjunction in" being by
essence: God, and being by participation: the created existent." (162)
The distinction of the predicaments and of the predicables is explained and
extended to include the more general modes of the realization of existence
just mentioned.
These remarks about the concept are followed by some ideas about

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judgment, definition, and reasoning. Notions of logic concerned with these
operations of the mind are to be grounded in the ontology of the intellect.
The first and basic act of human cognition is " the intellectual vision of the
act of being " and thus the comprehension of everything that exists. Hence
judgment and reason are totally at the service of intellectual intuition.
(173 f.) The traditional doctrine which denies truth and falsity of the
first operation of the mind, reserving it only for the judgment, does
obviously not hold true of the apprehension of existence; " for this comprises, in a superior way, every truth, every apprehension, and every
judgment." (176) All other cognitive operations are only processes of
development of this primary intuition of being, " in virtue of which all
is already present and immanent in our mind from the beginning in the
same way as the entire future of the animal or of the plant is present in
the tiny germ." (185) The logical theories of concept and judgment are
to take account of this basic truth, and consequently of the ideas concerning
" being and the transcendental judgments, the first judgments and the
principles of being." (179)
In his treatment of the nature and figures of the syllogism the author
finds that inductive reasoning, proceeding "from the particular to the
universal " (188) is of no less probative force than deduction. As examples
of such induction he lists the argumentation from finite effects to the
Absolute and from the nature of intelligence to the nature of the soul.
The foundation of the incontestable validity of this inductive reasoning is
said to be the relation between part and whole. (190)
All the preceding insights of this new modem anthropological ontology
are repeated and summarized in a eulogy of St. Thomas's philosophical
method and thought as " a typical example of a realistic method."
(194 fi.) The required renewal of teaching and studying philosophy can
find its model in the dialectical force of Aquinas's philosophizing. "His
Christian thought endowed with the strongest realistic, open, profound, and
dialectically proceeding sense can fill young men with enthusiasm also
today." (194)
Man "thomistically understood as the totality of being (totum ens)"
(250) is presented as the basis of subjective and objective morality in
"the correctness of his individual and social behavior." (247 fi.) As norm
of human existence, human nature has to be seen in all its dimensions and
in its relations to the hierarchical order of immutable, absolute, and
necessary values. " To act according to this order of things and of values
means to act in a human way, i.e., morally." (251)
" A perfect parallelism " between the speculative and practical reason is
discovered in the correspondence of the intuition of the first theoretical and
practical principles. However, the superiority of the human soul, so
enthusiastically exalted in the ontology of the human spirit, seems
suddenly to give way to " the weakness and frailty of the human mind "

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(256) in this abridgment of the traditional course of ethics. Indeed, the
condition of our mind and will is found to be so miserable that it is said
to render the revelation of God a moral necessity. (256)
As a social being, the human person naturally stands in interpersonal
relationships which "always constitute an enhancement of the ontological
space of the person." Social life has Christian charity as its dynamic
principle and is always to serve as an instrument for the ends of the person.
An imposition of social structures and political positions from above
against the free will of all is repugnant to man's personal dignity. "The
society of human persons can be conceived only as a democratic society."
(259)
In "The Truth of His History," (265 ff.) the author offers some ideas
about the philosophy of history which is explained as having the concept
of man as its constitutive principle (268) and as finding its meaning and
fulfillment only as historia salutis. (270)
And "Aesthetic Truth" (273 ff.) finally gives a short "introduction to
the philosophy of art." As merely transfigurative and transformative
activity, human creativity is distinguished from God's creativity which is
productio ex nihilo sui et subjecti. It has its foundation in the human
spirit and manifests itself as creativity of intellectual cognition, creative
imagination, and of the will.
A bibliography, an index of authors, and a table of contents conclude the
work.
The preceding short characterization of the main ideas of this first volume
of the new course of philosophy according to the norms of Vatican IT
certainly proves beyond any doubt that Prof. Bogliolo's " Truth about
Man " does not fulfill the expectations one ought to set for a modem
treatise of the philosophy of man. His thought is as post-conciliar as his
exclusive authority, St. Thomas, and his anthropological ontology is as
up-to-date as the selections from the traditional scholastic courses of
ontology, epistemology, logic, psychology, ethics and aesthetics, which
represent the constitutive parts of his ontology of the spirit. A realistic and
critical confrontation with modem scientific and philosophical questions
about human existence and nature is not offered, either because such
problems do not seem to be " worthy of consideration," or because their
solution is simply considered to be " clear."
This general evaluation of the present philosophical production, however,
is not intended to deny its originality and its reflection of certain trends
of modem thought. The author is obviously fascinated by " recent studies "
(17) of certain nco-scholastics who, under the influence of Marechal and
Heidegger, have finally " discovered " the authentic meaning of the thomanic
esse, understood to be the totality of all perfection and the flood of being
out of which all essences emerge. While fully endorsing this platonic interpretation of the esse in St. Thomas's writings, as it is defended in neo-

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thomistic esse-ism, the author preserves his independence with regard to
the understanding of the cognition of this act of existence and with
regard to the use he makes of this idea in his presentation of traditional
doctrines. He keeps himself free of every influence of the so-called transcendental thomism and refuses to see the esse as the horizon of every
question or its cognition as a positing of the judgment or as the result
of an intensive abstraction. Intending to propose a realistic philosophy, he
is aware of the need of a certain cognitive contact with reality, and seeing
such a contact only in experience, he declares thought to be an experience
also, and he identifies the primordial and basic act of thought with the
perception of being, conceived as the existence of all existents and as the
idea of all ideas. This experience of being is then used as the basis not
only of his ontology of the human spirit but also of his conception of
traditional scholastic doctrines. However, this so-called intuition of being
represents a rather questionable foundation for philosophical explanations
and its one-sided use seems to be greatly responsible for the shortcomings
of this philosophy of man.
It simply is not true that the primary and basic intellectual act is the
experience or perception of this act of existence and that human knowledge
is the natural and necessary development of this primordial intuition.
The mere fact that the esse-istic understanding of St. Thomas's esse was,
according to its modem discoverers, unknown for 700 years, should be
sufficient proof that this intuition does not represent a common human
experience. A critical examination of one's adult consciousness, not to speak
of the development of human cognition, should convince every esse-ist
that his notion of being is as empty or as complete as that of any other
normal human being, that is, that his so-called intuition of being, as the
perfection of all actual and possible perfections, in no way surpasses the
possibilities corresponding to his actual experience and knowledge of
existing reality. It will further reveal that the presentation of the entire
human knowledge and of all cognitive operations as a necessary development of this vision of existence is no less a merely dogmatic statement
than the belief that Ciceronian Latin is the natural development of the
understanding of the noun mensa to be memorized by a beginner student of
Latin. Human learning is an ad-discere, as the author rightly mentions in
another context, not a biological development of a " radically synthetic and
simultaneous perception of all that exists." {191) However, even granted
its psychological realization, the alleged intuition could not serve the
epistemological purpose for which it primarily was introduced. It cannot
offer the desired contact with reality, since being as act of all acts, common
to all possible finite being and especially as comprehending both God and
creature, as the author conceives it, is obviously a mere ens rationis and
not an existent's real component, the experience of which would be identical
with a grasp of reality. The critical problem of human knowledge is thus

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not abolished by an appeal to the vision of existence nor by lhe author's
identification of intellectual knowledge with this intuition. He does not
overcome the traditional dualism of thought and experience, as he hopes to
do, but merely replaces it by one of his own, opposing perception of
existence and experience of the sensible existent without being able to
bridge their difference. And by his psychological interpretation of intellectual cognition be renders the solution of the epistemological problem
simply impossible. If knowledge means an actual identification of the
object with the subject in a way that the object known becomes the soul
itself, a differentiation of various objects and of the soul from the object,
and thus knowledge itself becomes inconceivable.
The questionable character of the author's understanding of the intuition
of being, then, affects also the value of its use in philosophical psychology.
It is true that an elaboration of the nature of this notion of esse could
be as useful for the demonstration of the spirituality of the human
intellect as that of any other act of abstract knowledge. However, the
mere recognition of the alleged independence of this act of existence from
other perfections does not by itself prove the independence of the cognition
and of the soul. The independence of an object of knowledge from another
object does not as such establish the independence of the cognitive act of
perception and of the subject, in whatever sense this ambiguous term
" independence of cognition " may be understood. The author seems to
relate it to the substantiality as well as to the subsistence of the soul.
Since he identifies the " truth about man " with an ontology of the spirit
and completely disregards the vegetative and sensitive life of man, the
difference of the soul as the substantial principle of life from the body
does not find its logically consistent explanation, and " the independent
being " of the soul is thus expected to be seen as a result of the experience
of the independent act of existence.
Equally unsatisfactory is the relationship established between the notion
of the intuition of being and the immortality of the soul. Since we do not
possess the tota simul et perfecta visio of all that is, the author's conclusion to our total and simultaneous possession of our being as a participation of God's eternity cannot be valid either. Moreover, experience constantly reminds us that we do not possess our being wholly and simultaneously; as incarnate spirits we are subject to the laws of psycho-somatic
life and thus open to growth, development, and personal maturation.
However, insistence upon experience, so important for a realistic philosophical study of man, is there reserved for the alleged intellectual perception
of the act of existence. The unrealistic spiritualistic view of human nature,
which results from this neglect of a critical evaluation of human existence,
could be easily corrected by an occasional look at reality, especially in a
hospital or in a mental institution.
The hook's frequent merely metaphorical expressions and question-

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able statements, for instance, ascribing ontological personality to the
soul and its origin to freedom, seeking the foundation of the author's
inductive reasoning from the existence of the creature to the existence of
God in the relationship of part and whole, confusing operation and power
while unsuccessfully attempting to see the origin of the will in cognition,
etc., seem to deserve a rethinking and more precise formulations.
The young people, to whose demands and mentality this " Truth about
Man " is said to be so well adapted, must certainly enjoy a life well
protected from the influence of modern civilization. Our students are not
so unexperienced and unproblematic that they could be satisfied with the
philosophical answers of this ontology of the human spirit.
MARIUS

ScHNEIDER,

0. F. M.

The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

Del Principia di Crcazione o del Signifieato. By Au.ESSANDRO
Padova: Liviana Editrice, 1967. Pp. 168.
Whether systematization of the presumed points of confluence between
philosophy and theology is at all efficacious remains an issue that readily
invites and engenders controversy. Alessandro Cortese's Del Principia di
Creazione o Del Significato is best appraised as a work which evidences the
fact that &uch issues are perhaps more plaguing among Italian and
European philosophers than certain members of either constituency care to
admit. Thus, it is important to understand how such systematization
accommodates a new kind of philosophy, and that the endeavor to
elucidate this philosophy is an explicitly proclaimed objective of Cortese.
Concerned to emancipate philosophy from its apparent restricted dependency on the contingent empirical world, Cortese attends with some
care to the formal dieresis between the conception of " experience "
( = becoming) and the conception of " logos " ( = immutability) . Reminiscent of Hegel, Cortese explicates this new philosophy in terms of a
traditional account of the relation between experience and logos, a
synthesis which obliges one to read logos in terms of experience and experience in terms of logos. Entailed in the notion of synthesis, and in fact
apparently indistinguishable from synthesis itself, is what Cortese calls
'' The Principle of Creation."
The Principle of Creation seems to be what might be called " a pregnant
concept," that is, there are certain outward visible signs that something
is going on inside, but a description of internal affairs is rather speculative
and cannot be teased out as one might like, at least until birth, assuming

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birth is really a possibility for such concepts. Nevertheless, Cortese
speculates at great length concerning the Principle, and it is difficult to
deny that his speculation is theologically interesting. In his attempt
to structure the Principle of Creation as an Absolute Principle Cortese
claims that relativity is untenable since it commits one to a position of
ultimate non-determinability which prima-facie makes the epistemological
enterprise incoherent and nugatory. It is not enough, however, to claim
or even to demonstrate that the implications of a relativistic conceptual
scheme are devastating for epistemology, and thus Cortese introduces the
notion of " Protologia " as the absolutizing force of the Principle of
Creation.
Endeavoring to unpack the sense of Protologia, the formal dieresis
between immutability and mutability is carefully given an account by
appealing to a particular usage of " Christianity " and " future." Christianity presents itself as a mode of " absolute-act " in the sense that it
proclaims that God has become man in Christ and affirms his Death and
Resurrection. Future presents itself as pure potential which has significance
only insofar as it is, in the Aristotelian sense, actualized and become " fact "
and therefore manifested as on the spacial-temporal designation, " present."
There is a constant turning over, Cortese claims, a movement or process in
which the sense of future becomes fact and out of this fact derives the
sense of a new future, a new potential, the feasibility of a new fact. Yet,
the formulation itself appears to commit one to certain intractable problems
of stability. That is to say, the characteristic instability of the future
throws one back unmistakably to the instability of the present whose
relation to the past exemplifies the philosophically tenuous nature of the
historical process itself. Attempting to make the reader feel the force of
this argument, Cortese presents the notion of Protologia which turns out
to be a concept theologically grounded in and in some sense identical with
the concetto of God. Thus, Cortese argues, there is a point at which the
underlying structure of temporality is rooted in the absolute concept of
God. More explicitly, Cortese argues that the Principle of Creation is the
philosophical dimension through which such a concept, absolute by virtue
of logical necessity, can be reasonably expressed and is itself a requisite
for further reasonable discourse. The Principle of Creation is ultimately
independent of the philosophical spacial-temporal categories, yet everything,
particularly such philosophical categories, are only meaningful insofar as
they are rooted in the Principle of Creation.
With the exorcism, so to speak, of the duplicitous superficial structure
of temporality, the stage is set for a new kind of philosophy. In the
Principle of Creation future emerges with authentic content, and thus,
philosophy itself becomes maximally relevant as the Emergent. Yet,
precisely at the moment of its inception, authentic future is again absorbed
into the Principle of Creation, and it is here that ethics, an emergent
philosophy, is seen by Cortese as the central category of temporality.

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The Principle is an absolute, and in its synthesis of mutability and
immutability, not-being and being, finitude and eternality, it is the incontrovertible condition, the context in which all possibilities become possible
and all fact becomes fact. Philosophy, which concerns itself with either
ontology or logic, is spurious, since it neglects the fundamental absolute
condition in which both endeavors derive significance. Outside of the
Principle of Creation, there is no significance, and thus philosophy is
obliged, if its goal entails significance, to treat the foundation of all
epistemic considerations, the Principle of Creation. Philosophy becomes
for Cortese sacred philosophy, that is, Dio filosofico, and its search is for
the absolute ground of the formal dieresis made articulate in theology.
Philosophy accomplishes its task only by appeal to the Principle of
Creation which synthesizes experience (which Cortese refines by reference
to recent developments in phenomenology) and reason (which draws on
what Cortese calls analysis of language structure and common sense). A
prerequisite for significant epistemology is knowledge of the Principle of
Creation, and historical knowledge thus presupposes that condition of
process in which the events or moments of history converge with the
absolute Principle which undergirds the feasibility of such events.
This is not the place to attempt a definitive philosophical assessment of
Cortese's work or even to sketch the major outlines of its difficulties.
However, a brief excursus of such topics is surely not imprudent and in
fact may be of more than heuristic interest to the reader. For, despite
Cortese's generally rather tidy arguments, his analysis accommodates
several deficiencies, one of which is essential to the logical structure of
his exposition and therefore should be treated.
Attempts at grounding the philosophical enterprise in what Cortese
calls the " Absolute " are indeed attractive, and there is little doubt that
many philosophers have countenanced such views of one sort or another.
However attractive such a position may be, one must be philosophically
circumspect about certain inherent difficulties in the language itself which
militate against entertaining the position without palpable absurdity.
Language, Wittgenstein opined, is " a form of life," and thus it is a
human reality or construct which inherits many of the same logical limitations possessed by the human entities that use it. To hold that language
about God, that is, the Principle of Creation, the Absolute, can itself be
Absolute, clearly obfuscates the possibility of philosophy as a human
linguistic mode. It is more frequently than not an excessive burden for
the philosopher and theologian alike to be cognizant of the fact that
"God-talk" is by its very nature never anything more than man's talk
about God and thus not itself Absolute. Language is, by its very nature as
a human reality, incapable of expressing the Absolute. That is to say,
how can one expect the language to express absolutely that which, as
Cortese holds, is the source and most fundamental condition of language
itself?

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855

Perhaps one might respond that Cortese intends that philosophy is not
just language about the Absolute but language derived from and undergirded by the Absolute. Thus it follows that language transcends its normal
limitations as a human reality and itself becomes divine, Dio filosofico.
What sense one might make of this claim, however, is perhaps a conundrum
best left for the perceptive reader.
RoNALD S. LAURA
Harvard Divinity School
Cambridge, Mass.

The Idea of God. Philosophical Perspectives. Edited by EDWARD H.
MADDEN, RoLLO HANDY, MARVIN FARBER. Springfield, Ill.: Charles

C. Thomas, 1968. Pp. 182. $8.50.
This is a handsome volume, and the title promises a central matter of
general philosophical interest. Apart from the first essay by Fr. Clarke,
S. J., however, there is not a great deal in this book to recommend it. It
is edited from the offerings of a symposium on the Idea of God held at the
State University of New York for two days in October, 1967. Essentially,
the book is made up of four lectures, on each of which two comments are
made. The announcement on the dustcover runs as follows: "The aim of
this symposium is to consider in detail and from a variety of viewpoints,
the fundamental problems and potentialities of contemporary religious
thought." Between the aim and the achievement there lies a great gulf:
the rather free-wheeling style of many of the contributors, personal references that might be charming in their place, and, presumably, "off the
cuff" observations on a number of things, do not seem to assist the purpose
of a technical and serious publication. The "detail" that is promised
is hardly in evidence; the circle of reference is very limited and even quite
insular, though, be it noted, amongst the lists of metaphysical celebrities
in the Index are to found the names of A. A. Milne, Cassius Clay and God!
The variety of viewpoints is there; the most unified group seem to be the
atheists brought together by a certain amount of mutual adulation and
a fine triumphalism in expression. The " Theists " are rather timid and
seem to be the " odd men out " in the symposium. Perhaps the increasing
popularity of a " finite God " does tend to undermine one's religious
assurance. Admittedly, some of the " fundamental problems " are touched
upon, but there is little effort at interrelation. The general tone of the
treatment does not say a great deal for " the potentialities of contemporary
religious thought," though it does say a lot for its " fundamental problems."
The single bright spot is the opening lecture by Fr. W. Norris Clarke,

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S. J. He presents us with a clear, highly polished and scholarly little essay
which shows deference to the large and delicate question " How the
Philosopher can give Meaning to Language about God." (pp.
He
shows alertness to the exigencies of trends in current linguistic analysis and
clears the ground rather deftly by pointing to the special character of the
problem: there can be no meaning-analysis of the term "God," unless one
is prepared to go through the process of discovery which relates to the
finding of the significance of the term. He faces all the big issues well, the
role of the principle of intelligibility, the meaning of "casuality," the total
personal nature of our knowledge of God with its inherent limitations.
Perhaps the best point is when he shows that the animating element in
our affirmation of God is a fundamental option to respect the exigence of
intelligibility. Lonergan, of course, has made this point before, but Fr.
Clarke makes it again for his purposes and makes it well. (pp. 7-11) A lot
more could be said about this lecture, but we cannot delay. The worst thing
that can be said is that it more or less ruins the rest of the book. Would
that the subsequent lectures had faced even some of the points that were
raised so early. Perhaps it was all discussed, and the best part of the
symposium was not printed. (There are the two brief comments, and they
elicit an unfortunately brief comment in reply from Fr. Clarke).
The other essays are as follows: "Difficulties in the Idea of God," by
Paul Edwards. (pp. 43-77) This author's convinced atheism seems passionately off the mark: it is wearisome to hear a repeat, especially in overconfident tones, of difficulties that have already been answered. If space
allowed it would an interesting exercise to work quietly through Mr.
Edward's lecture and show him that believers understood him better than
he is inclined to think. Meanwhile, those whose intelligence and faith have
taken them into the presence of God will, in nice irony, be praying for
Mr. Edwards as he greatly "welcomes the disintegration of Christianity .
. . ." (p. 74) John Cobb Jr. in" The Possibility of Theism Today" shows
control over his subject. (pp.
He well indicates the cultural shift
that makes the theologian's reasons of other days lack a conclusive power
in the present. (pp. 106-111) Possibly in his care not to overstate his
case, Cobb appears overly timid and hesitant in his own conclusions. He
follows Whitehead's doctrine of the finite evolving kind of God. Perhaps
that is the reason. The last essay," God and the Philosophers," by Joseph
Blau, is a great effort in irenicism. (pp. 139-163) Does he have his tongue
in his cheek when he tries to reconcile everyone, theists and atheists alike,
behind God as the one symbol of the future? Will he please anyone? He
does not seem to understand very clearly the standard positions with regard
to the relationship between faith and reason nor the point of the traditional
proofs for God's existence. (pp. 145 ff.) Philosophers and believers are not
that silly, as Fr. Clarke's essay shows.
No doubt dialogue on this level is in its infancy. It is true, too, that

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Christians, and especially Catholics, have a duty to enter into it. From the
published results of a symposium like this we can learn at least one thing:
it is no time to lose one's nerve in the face of more general atheistic
positions. It will be a long time before the present modern phase of thought
will even begin to approach, in rigor and depth, the most ordinary and
common positions of the great Scholastics. There is something to start
from, and a lot we owe to the future to preserve.

A. J. KELLY, c. ss. R.
St. Mary's Monastery
W endouree, Vic.

Australia

Reflective Naturalism: An Introduction to Moral Philosophy. By VINCENT
PuNzo. New York: The Macmillan Co.: London: Collier-Macmillan Ltd., 1969. Pp. 387. $7.50.
Vincent Punzo, a member of the philosophy department of St. Louis
University, has made a commendable effort to provide a better textbook.
His work deserves consideration by anyone who teaches a required college or
seminary course in the subject. The ethics presented in the book is essentially a personally rethought and reformulated version of thomistic theory,
but Punzo does not present his textbook as a thomistic manual. Instead,
the problems of ethical theory are extricated from contemporary philosophical debate, and the more or less thomistic solutions are reached by criticism
of some alternative positions. Punzo refers to his method as "expositorycritical "; it is an application of Aristotelian dialectical method.
The book is divided into two parts, almost equal in length. The first
part deals with a number of central issues of ethical theory, while the
second part takes up a few moral problems. The book might be considered
for use in a one-semester course. If an instructor feels there is too much
material for such a course, either half of the book could be used by itself.
The arguments developed in the treatment of moral problems in the latter
half of the book do not depend on the theory outlined in the earlier
chapters.
In the first chapter, Punzo argues against forms of metaethics-particularly emotivism-which
would render normative ethics impossible.
Chapter two defends freedom of self-determination against various arguments drawn from recent British and American philosophy. Chapter three
argues against reductionistic naturalism and also against rationalistic
theories, such as Kant's formalism, and in favor of a version of natural
law theory (although Punzo avoids the expression "natural law").

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According to Punzo, practical reason discerns moral value by comparing the
possibilities of human satisfaction and frustration-which
belong to the
objective facts of nature-with an ideal conception of human community.
Possibilities that can be realized by human action and that are suitable to
the human community are morally good; those unsuited to it are morally
evil.
Chapter four clarifies the theory proposed in chapter three, particularly
in regard to the ideal of human community involved in the definition of
morality. Punzo uses Kant's ideal of human community, the kingdom of
ends, to limit utilitarian consequentialism, and he simultaneously uses
Mill's concrete humanism to limit Kant's formalistic conception of duty.
The resulting position is plausible, but not completely clear; the limitations
of Punzo's theory as a useful normative criterion appear clearly enough in
the second half of the book, which treats moral problems with dialectical
arguments for the most part independent of the theoretical part of the
book.
Chapter five treats the cardinal virtues. Punzo does not tightly integrate
this treatment with the moral theory outlined in the previous chapters.
The treatment is mainly traditional, the presentation less dialectical than
most of the chapters. An analysis and critique of Joseph Fletcher's position
is provided in connection with the treatise on practical wisdom.
Chapter six, the first chapter of the second part of the book, deals with
premarital intercourse and abortion under the title: ":Morality and Human
Sexuality." Chapter seven argues against Hayek's classical liberalism for a
welfare conception of social-economic justice. Chapter eight deals with
some problems of the political order, including capital punishment and
warfare. Chapter nine, arguing against Dewey's "closed naturalism," offers
the alternative of an " open naturalism "-that is, one compatible with a
religious commitment to a personal and transcendent God.
Most of Punzo's conclusions are compatible with the views of most
thomists, and most of Punzo's arguments are plausible. Yet the position as
a whole is not profoundly thought out; the argumentation is not theoretically cogent; the critiques of alternative positions include few brilliant
insights. Judged as an essay in creative philosophy, therefore, this work
is poor.
But judgment by such standards is not altogether fair, since Punzo's
declared intent was to provide a useful introduction for students of ethics.
If the students are not particularly interested in philosophy but are somewhat interested in the subject matter of ethics, the dialectical argumentation of this volume might be considerably more effective than a logically
tighter treatise would be. At the present time, when each class of students
seems less able and less willing than the previous one to follow any sort
of argument, perhaps argumentation like Punzo's is the most philosophical
approach to ethics worth attempting in an undergraduate or seminary
course.

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S59

However, one considering this book as a text should notice the range
and limitations of the materials Punzo uses. John Dewey is dealt with
explicitly more fully than any other philosopher. Punzo's dialectic also
makes extensive use of Kant, Mill, Moore, and Whitehead. Aquinas and
Aristotle are mentioned less often; they shape Punzo's line of argument
rather than providing material for his dialectical mill.
Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, and the existentialists are practically omitted;
Scheler, von Hildebrand, and Hartmann are not mentioned. The contemporary form of British analytic ethics is not strongly represented; figures
such as Hare and Toulmin do not appear. The forms of psychological and
sociological naturalistic reduction that are strongest today are not treated;
Freud and Levi-Strauss do not appear in the index, and Fromm is only
mentioned once in the book. Apart from Joseph Fletcher, recent Christian
ethics is hardly treated; Brunner, Barth, and Tillich are unmentioned, and
Catholic moral theology is studiously avoided.
There is no need, of course, for a systematic treatise to make a comprehensive survey of contemporary positions in ethical theory. Indeed, to
make such a survey ;vould lead to a history of ethics rather than to an
introduction to its problems. However, in view of the fact that Punzo has
chosen to use a dialectical method to present his position, his choice of
materials becomes very important. If students come to the ethics course
ignorant of the authors Punzo uses and having read much in the indicated
areas which he omits, the book might not be very useful. On the other
hand, if previous courses in the curriculum have provided an introduction
to Dewey, Mill, and Kant the book might work quite well.
Punzo's treatment of moral problems in the second half of the book is
generally sound and well informed. However, I would not wish to use this
part of the book as a text for a number of reasons.
In the first place, one can hardly do justice to a single complex problemsuch as abortion-in less than two hundred pages. Punzo treats abortion
in twenty-four pages; the entire problems section of the book is less than
two hundred. Hence there is inevitable superficiality. Many objections are
ignored that would occur to anyone who is intelligent, interested in the
problem, and not sympathetic to the conclusions reached. The conclusions
would therefore remain unconvincing to many students. In matters of
morals as in matters of faith, no argument is perhaps better than an
inadequate one.
In the second place, the list of problems treated includes warfare but
does not include the nuclear deterrent already in being; it includes abortion
but does not include the popubtion problem; it includes social-economic
justice but does not include poverty and colonialism. Of course, a book like
this must stop somewhere, but many students may feel that Punzo has
abstracted aspects of problems that are more easily treated and ignored the
wider and thornier issues.

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In the third place, the treatments of problems are not linked by reference
to common, underlying principles. Abortion is treated in a chapter with
premarital intercourse, as if abortion had something to do with sexual
morality. Capital punishment and warfare are treated in a different
chapter. The principles of organization are material, not formal; therefore,
the close relationship between problems of justice bearing on the dignity
of life in the abortion issue and in the problems of capital punishment and
warfare is concealed.
The bibliographies provided for the problem areas are not ample; many
important items are omitted. For example, the bibliography on abortion
includes some useful material-more favorable to abortion than against itbut omits Eugene Quay's Justifiable Abortion, Russell Shaw's Abortion on
Trial, David Granfield's The Abortion Decision, Glanville Williams' Sanctity
of Life and the Criminal Law (an important pro-abortion work), and the
useful paperback based on the 1967 Harvard-Kennedy Conference: The
Terrible Clwice.
The book has a rather brief index. It does not have study guides,
suggested assignments, or other teaching aids. Those not familiar with
Aristotle and Aquinas often will have difficulty locating the sources of
Punzo's positions in the classic texts. But Punzo generally writes clearly.
As usual, Macmillan has done a good job of editing and production, and,
considering the present inflation, the price of the volume is not excessive.
GERMAIN G. GrusEZ

GeorgefJown University
Washington, D. C.

La philosophie dans la cite technique (Essai sur la philosophie bergsonienne
des techniques). By RoGER EBACHER. Quebec: Les Presses de l'Universite Laval, 1968. Pp. 242. $5.25.
In his Introduction to Roger Ebacher's work Pierre Colin sounds the
basic theme of this volume: "Has philosophy a role in technological society
(la cite technique) , and if so, what? " Much of Bergson's very limited
consideration of technology revolves about mecanique, the hardware of
the paleotechnic and mestotechnic era in which he lived. He posits a
contrast between mystique and mecanique, and M. Ebacher conceives of
the latter under Bergson's formula" supplement d'ame." He quotes Albert
Thibaudet's comment of 1923: "Bergson's philosophy of intelligence is a
philosophy of technique and the intelligence of lwmo faber defines itself
as a means of operating upon matter through manmade instruments."
M. Ebacher's analysis begins with the precise meaning of techniques as a

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861

transmittable assembly of methods oriented toward activities judged useful
or practical. In his view man possesses an inherent technological bent and
social evolution moves toward a technological civilization, that is, toward
ever increasing rationality and control of the environment. The author
continues: " The philosophy of Bergson is essentially a philosophy of life,
of the evolution of life, of man inserted in this evolution."
Having thus defined the linkage between Bergson's thought and technology, M. Ebacher devotes the remainder of the volume to an analysis
in depth of four aspects of his subject: (I) Bergson's contacts with
technology, (2) a doctrinal analysis of the last chapter of the Deux sources
where the subject is most specifically touched upon, (3) locating the
doctrine in the context of Bergson's overall thought, and (4) showing the
role of philosophy in the technological society, employing a parallel between
Bergson and Marx.
M. Ebacher :finds that the key likeness through which Bergson interprets
the situation of a technicized world is that of spirit and body; that the
mal du siecle had its source in the constructive intelligence that had
fabricated a social body whose animating principle had not grown along
with it. Bergson's solution would be an enlargement of the " soul of
humanity," an expansion of the ideal of fraternity and respect for the
person, an enhanced subtlety of intelligence. Philosophy would have an
educative role as regards the citizen and a prophetic role as regards a
technological civilization "seeking its profound sources of energy."
In his analysis of the Deux sources H. Ebacher points out that philosophies of automatic progress are obsolete. While the Bergson of L'Evolution creatrice optimistically tends to associate human progress with technical
progress, toward the end of his life he affirms that, even among the most
confident, hope and optimism are but a violence done to anguish. For
Bergson, the middle way between his early optimism and a facile pessimism
lay in revealing the evils of technical civilization and seeking remedies.
Technology as a whole (techniques) can only be understood in the context of the general march of evolution in the world. In some sense every
new machine and method is a new organ of mankind. Bergson objected
to the use of the machine to satisfy the egoism of a privileged class and
asked a return to a more simple life in which the machine is placed at the
service of all mankind's fundamental needs. He conceived the role of
philosophy as directing the use of the machine in terms of value preferences; the conquest of darkness and fear, the movement toward a more
open society, enlightenment and greater self-awareness (conscience).
If technique belongs to the material side of mankind, M. Ebacher maintains that in Bergson's thought it must be informed by spirit (l'ame)conceived on the model of artistic grace, eternal mobility, lightness, vitality
on the move, dynamism on the alert-and hence as creative, spirit (l'ame)
seen through the logic of imagination as life, duration (la duree), spirit
(l'esprit) •

aOOK REVIEWS

Technique may be the instrument of barbarism and mediocrity. In 1914
Bergson could view Germany, militarized by Prussia, as a mechanism
carried to the extreme of materialization, without the ennobling and
spiritualizing ideals of France's 18th century: the inviolability of law, the
eminent dignity of the person, the obligation of peoples to respect one
another. For Bergson, the true mission of man lies in introducing into the
world the greatest possible charge of freedom. The object of human life is
not the fabrication of tools but the "creation of himself by himself"and technique is but an instrument of freedom.
In comparing Marx and Bergson, J\1. Ebacher finds them in accord that
inherent in man is a " will to power imposing itself on nature making it
enter into human plans. Both recognize that the primary role of technique
is to transform nature into an object for man and place it under his
dominion." (p. 213) He adds that while "for Marx Man-as- Technician is
a result, for Bergson he is a point of departure for the superhuman (surhumain) -the conversion of technique into the philosophical and mystical." It belongs to technology to create a " new form of existence; open,
personalized, creative, in a word, divine. The technician goes beyond
himself toward that intuition where praxis and contemplation, action and
being fuse together."
Bergson remarked in another place: "In the great work of creation
which is at the origin [of things] and which carries itself out under our eyes
we feel that we, ourselves participate, creators of ourselves." :rhus men
put themselves to service in creating humanity, planetary man, as" masters
associated with a greater J\iaster." This secular gnostic vision of a process
tmiverse divinizing itself in man has a particular appeal to the contemporary mind. Herman Kahn and Anthony J. Wiener in The Year 2000,
for example, foresee an era in which man makes his own nature, a hybris
dominated future.
Certainly a major reason for continuing interest in Bergson lies in his
influence on the thought of more recent thinkers like Pierre Teilhard de
Chardin whose vision of evolution and of the eschaton certainly owes much
to this master. Chardin, at the end of L' A venir de l' lwmme, foresees the
formation of a noi:isphere and the eventual separation of mankind into two
realms. One of these, true to nature, transcends nature by participating
in a gratuitously bestowed divine grace that opens man to God and the
universe. Another part of mankind self-divinized, moves itself and
is moved to an endless process of disgregation and dissolution. Some
of the notions inspired by Bergson may be leading, fruitful, and amenable to inclusion in a synthesis that complements and expands fides
quaerens intellectum. The role of technology is a case at point, for technology is reason applied to making and doing things-not " right " reason
necessarily, for technology is notoriously blind to both means and ends.
Norbert Wiener in one of his last books, God and Golem Inc., recalls the

BOOK REVillWS

363

Golem myth to point up the fearsome potential of blind technology.
Technology is the vehicle by which men's goals, men's loves, are realizedand " Two loves built two cities." The secular city is a conceivable product
of technology. Yet to one living in the latter third of the 20th century, it
might appear that "man making himself " tends to botch the job. The
philosophic base and values of the technical society in its secular version
seem infirm, and the anguish that Bergson once suggested seems not
unjustified. Only a technology informed by right reason, art, and prudence,
bears promise for the future.
M. Ebacher does not raise these latter issues but seeks to understand and
elucidate his subject on its own terms. His work is scholarly, clear and
firm in its conclusions. It seems somewhat overwritten in the sense that
a great weight of analysis is often directed at minor points. It is often
redundant as the same matter is brought out at successive stages of the
author's development. Perhaps the essential argument could have been
treated almost as well in a substantial article.
Nevertheless, this book is of considerable value in clarifying a specific
aspect of the thought of Bergson and illuminating the conceptual origins,
the metaphysical, psychological, and value premises of much contemporary
evolutionary thought.
CHARLES R. DECHERT
The Catholic Univi!Tsity of America
Washington, D. C.

Philosophy and Contemporary Man, 1968, and Current Issues in Modern
Philosophy, 1969. Edited by GEoRGE F. McLEAN, 0. M. I. Washington,
D. C.: The Catholic University of America Press. Pp. 193 each.
$7.95 each.
Studies in Philosophy and the History of Philosophy, Vol. 4. 1969. Edited
by JoHN K. RYAN. Washington, D. C.: The Catholic University of
America Press, 1969. Pp. 232. $7.50.
The workshops in philosophy held at Catholic University early each
summer have come to serve as a barometer for the changing atmosphere of
the profession among one segment of Americans practicing this art. There
may be a tendency to identify this group as Catholic by religious persuasion
and therefore scholastic in orientation. The reasoning here would be true
on the whole, yet there have always been notable violators of the pact:
one thinks of Brownson and W. M. Urban. The volumes under review
harbinger an opening to thought structures and approaches which bring to
mind men such as these two.

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BOOK REVIEWS

The two volumes of papers issuing from the 1966 Workshop are not
reduced in relevance by the passage of time alone; the philosophical world
lives with a lower pulse rate than do other areas of knowledge. Indeed,
if there is a pervasive spirit in these Proceedings, it is precisely that such
a gap exists, and that there is considerable wherewithal within the writers'
tradition to bridge it, if it can be but utilized.
Philosophy and Contemporary Man divides its attention between the
problems of relating philosophy, located primarily within the liberal arts
curriculum, with the ever-evolving methodologies of the " hard " and
" soft " sciences. Five papers range over the physical and social sciences,
culture, art, and psychoanalysis. Taken together, these presentations offer
considerable material for explicating the current clash between scientific and
" philosophic " methods, on the one hand, and the person-oriented stress
on the intuitive which is seen developing today in counterpoint to
technology.
Another section of this study offers four papers on specifically Christian
thought and its ramifications, or lack of such, on the contemporary mind.
Here we are suplied with reportata from an incisive panel discussion of the
interaction of person and society from historical, epistemological and
metaphysical perspectives. Still another section of this volume takes up
the question of theism in American culture. Three essays are given over to
the pragmatists' view of religion and the originality of this native product.
Consequences are seen in the recent " death of God " furor which will
affect the future of American religious thought in directions yet undetermined.
The second volume produced from the 1966 Workshop attempts to
relate the changing philosophical temper in this country with the education
of the Catholic clergy. The Current Issues in Modern Philosophy, then,
is to be understood in this framework. Today's seminarian will encounter
a society vastly different from that of the recent past, and effort must
be employed to realign his education in accomodation. It may be said
that this volume in its commentaries and analyses of Church discipline and
the current condition of philosophy compares well with the best of
European speculation. Especially praiseworthy are the several contributions
of William T. Magee.
In addition to this series of Workshop Proceedings, and those resulting
from ACP A conventions, the Catholic University Press irregularly issues a
series entitled Studies in Philosophy and the History of Philosophy, under
the editorship of John K. Ryan. We are now presented with Volume 4
of this series, featuring papers of some length by faculty and alumni of
the Graduate School. The articles range over a variety interests, from an
analysis of the logic found in the Confucian dialogues by A. S. Cua, to
the implications of Ortega y Gasset's "radical reality," or the object of
first philosophy. Dr. Caroline Putnam examines the profile of the philo-

365

BOOK REVIEWS

sopher-monk presented in the writings of Denis, Pseudo-Areopagite, while
Dr. Jude Dougherty critizes the once-current view that medieval philosophy and theology proved an obstacle to the advent of modem scientific
methodology. Although now laid to rest, it is not yet clear exactly why
this interpretation of the period between ancient and modem thought did
not act as a preventative to modem methodology, however clear the fact
itself may be.
Problems indigenous to the scholastic field are represented in the contributions of John Quinn and Bernardino Bonansea who discuss time in Augustine and Scotus's interpretation of Anselm, respectively. An intriguing view
of the doctrine on universals which is possible to extract from Aquinas forms
the basis of Ryosuke lnagaki's survey of this subject. The author stresses
that knowledge of being is intrinsic to an appreciation of Aquinas's position
on the nature of universal concepts. It is being which gives reality to the
universal, and only in relation to being can it be understood. Standing in
the way of this realization by Thomistic commentators, says lnagaki, has
been an attitude limiting knowledge to that of nature and a demand that
the analogy of being first be reduced to univocity. Paradoxically, the
univocity of the so-called universal concept is conjectured by the author
to require being's equivocity as its first context. On the whole, this latest
volume in the series commands respect and reflects the cosmopolitan
interests of scholars operating within the Christian ambit of Western
thought, but by no means therefore parochial in vision.
JOHN

The Pennsylvania State University
University Park, Pa.

B. DAVIS, 0. P.

BOOKS RECEIVED
Alba House: Theology: Science of Salvation, by Rene Latourelle, S. J.
(Pp.
$5.95).
Archie J. Bahm: Directory of American Philosophers V 1970-1971 (Pp.
436, $14.95).
Beauchesne et Ses Fils: L'Activite Artistique, by M.-D. Philippe (Tome
I, pp. 448, F 45,00).
Bruce Publishing Co.: Contemporary Protestant Thought, by C. J. Curtis
(Pp.
$6.95); New Morality or No Morality, ed. by Robert
Campbell (Pp.
$6.95); Contemporary Pastoral Counseling, ed.
by Eugene J. Weitzel (Pp.
Catholic University of America Press: Tommaso Campanella. Renaissance
Pioneer of Modem Thought, by Bernardino M. Bonansea (Pp.
$14.50).
Congregation of the Marian Fathers: Lord Have Mercy on Us (Pp. 79;
Domine, Miserere Nobis (Pp. 86).
Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Scientificas: Bartolome de las Casas.
De Regia Potestate o Derecho de Autodeterminacion, critical biligual edition by Luciano Perefia, J. M. Perez, Prendes Vidal Abril,
Joaquin Azcarraga (Pp. 473, 450 pesetas).
East-West Center Press: Advaita V cdanta: A Philosophical Reconstruction, by Eliot Deutsch ( Pp. 119, $6.00).
Fides Publishers, Inc.: The Making of the Christian Church, by Richard
Zehnle (Pp. 180, $2.50); Theology Today Series (95¢ each) : No. 4
The Theology of the Trinity, by Laurence Cantwell, S. J. (Pp. 94);
No. 5 The Theology of Creation, by Robert Butterworth, S. J. ( Pp.
91); No. 7 The Theology of History, by Osmund Lewry, 0. P. (Pp.
96); No. 8 The Theology of the Church, by Peter Hebblethwaite,
S. J. (Pp. 93); No. 9 Theology of Ecumenism, by Michael Hurley,
S.J.
B. Herder Book Co.: The Continuous Flame: Teilhard in the Great
Traditions, ed. by Harry J. Cargas (Pp. 138, $1.85).
Holt, Rinehart & Winston: The Time of Our Lives: The Ethics of Common
Sense, by Mortimer Adler (Pp. 374, $7.95); The God of Space and
Time, by Bernard J. Cooke (Pp. 217, $4.95); Between Earth and
Heaven. Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, and the Meaning of Christian
Tragedy, by Roger L. Cox (Pp. 271, $5.95); The Seminarian. A
Novel, by Michel Del Castillo (Pp. 135, $4.96).

366

BOOKS RECEIVED

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Humanities Press, Inc.: Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science.
Proceedings of the Boston Colloquium for the Philosophy of Science
1966/1968, ed by Robert S. Cohen & Marx W. Wartofsky (vol. IV:
pp. 555, $20.00; vol. V: pp. 490, $16.75); Evolution, Marxism and
Christianity, by Claude Cuenot (Pp. llO, $3.00); Science and Faith
in Teilhard de Chardin, by Claude Cuenot (Pp. 109, $3.00).
Martinus Nijhoff, Publisher: Language and Illumination, by S. Morris
Engel (Pp. 150, 19.80 guilders).
Oxford University Press: A Short History of Western Liturgy, by Theodor
Klauser (Pp. 244, $8.00); The New English Bible with the Apocrypha, (Pp. 1815, $9.95).
Philosophical Library: Spinoza: A Life of Reason, by Abraham Wolfson
(Pp. 363, $6.00); Book of Onias, by R. C. Crossfield (Pp. 69,
$3.50); Jesus Alias Christ. A Theological Detection, by Simon S.
Levin (Pp. 136, $5.50); In God's Image, by Jacob Rosin (Pp. 81,
$4.00); The Beginning Spring, by Robert Louis Nathan (Pp. 138,
$4.95).
Random House: The Visages of Adam. Readings Philosophical on the
Nature of Man, by H. A. Nielsen (Pp. 385, $3.75).
Charles Scribner's Sons: Religion in Ancient History. Studies in Ideas,
Men and Events, by S. G. F. Brandon (Pp. 426, $12.50).
Sheed & Ward: Dissent In and For the Church. Theologians and Humanae
Vitae, by Charles E. Curran, Robert E. Hunt, and the " Subject
Professors " (Pp. 249, $3.93) ; The Responsibility of Dissent: The
Church and Academic Freedom, by John F. Hunt and Terrence
Connolly (Pp. 240, $3.95) .
Tulane University:
Tulane Studies in Philosophy. Epistemology II Vol.
XVIII/1969 (Pp. 130, $2.50).
University of Notre Dame Press: The Spirit and Power of Christian
Secularity, ed. by Albert L. Schlitzer, C. S.C. (Pp. 230, $10.00).