Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4

Fr. Thro's typed notes on Etienne Gilson's Lectures on Being and Existence during Spring 1946

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Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4
author_facet Thro, Linus J.
author_sort Thro, Linus J.
title Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4
title_short Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4
title_full Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4
title_fullStr Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4
title_full_unstemmed Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4
title_sort being and existence; plotinian influence on augustine’s idea of god, étienne gilson, part one, file 2 of 4
description Fr. Thro's typed notes on Etienne Gilson's Lectures on Being and Existence during Spring 1946
publisher Saint Louis University Libraries Digitization Center
publishDate 1946
url http://cdm17321.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/thro/id/0
_version_ 1797768530403262464
spelling sluoai_thro-0 Being and Existence; Plotinian Influence on Augustine’s idea of God, Étienne Gilson, Part One, file 2 of 4 Thro, Linus J. Lecture notes; Notebooks; Metaphysics; Philosophy, medieval; Plotnius; Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo; Gilson, Etienne, 1884-1978; Metaphysics; Theology Fr. Thro's typed notes on Etienne Gilson's Lectures on Being and Existence during Spring 1946 1946 2016-12-19 PDF 84.2.3.06b 02 Graduate School Materials 02 03 Toronto University, Toronto, Canada DOC MSS 0084 0002 0003 0006 http://archives.slu.edu/repositories/2/resources/203 Permission to reproduce or publish must be obtained from the Saint Louis University Archives. Saint Louis University Libraries Digitization Center Gilson, Etienne, 1884-1978 text ENG, LAT Saint Louis University Archives ENS is not a classical Latin word. Derived from sum, the partici_~e should be "B8Hs H, which 1s found only in the compounds abeens, praesens, etc. , The word ~ was created by the philosophers to translate ~v and Till. lWT"d.· Prist1an, Inst1tutio Rerum Grammatlcarum bk~ 18, no. 8.75: ~Graecl autem participio utuntur substantive. quo nos quoque secundum ana.l0 ,i~ pcssumUB nisi usus deficeret participl1 praesentis. Qu~-.,ls· C.aesar non lncongrue protullt ens a verbo sum, ~ ea." \lhgre did Caeser use the word "ensll ? No classlca~ text now Y~o~m hes it. Ser~ius Flavius used it in imitating the nreek, and Quintilian not0s the usage: De Institutlone Oratorla _8.33.~~: "I Iu1te. .ex Graeco formata ~. a Sersio Flavio ••• dura, exe~p11 gratia ens •.• eesentia. Why do we despise them, exoept that "Iff) are unfair .1urlges?,t The word w..s thus cr·eated be­fore the first ceptury A.D., yet was not us ed. Seneca: !~pist.olae .§8 Lucl111um: 58.6, 5; "sl scir-.s uns.m sy11abarn es· e, quam mutare possim. H 'ilhy ca.n' t 1:"(-1 tra.nsle.te to, 'on -- obviously it ca.n be translated ~y "quod est". "Sed 'ultum irteresse Video, sed ita. necesse est, poi~·.quod eat." Boethius, ciroa 475~525, used it in a philosophical sense, but there 1s no trace of it in his predecessors. In IsagG56n Porphyrii, prima comm., ok. 1, 24; Ed. Brandt, p. "74: "At <.lieat q'_~is, 8i haec decem genera Bunt ver~ subsistontln quoda~~odo entia vel dici posse (for Greek r;' ev"'· ). Flexus enim hie est ab eo quod est. eSRe" and coined because tuere viae no Latin '\'lord. -- "they can be called entia ll "Et ens hoc ipsum, ldest essE), 3enus fort·a.sse cli01 videbltur, sed falso, etc It Boeth1uB, Inea, 'oe;en. secunda, bk. 3, c. 7; Brandt, p. 221-222. Ens traotll.'11 est e.b eo quod dioimus est, omnia enlm sunt .•• ult1 tiL. omnium senus ens esse poauerunt, ab eo autem quod dicimus est participium flectentos: graeco sermone~ Latine ens. Note th~t in the theolo(ioal tractates of Doethius the word liens It is not used; 1nste:ld here appears "quod est 11 , et, llesse and q"od est ". 7hus, in I:1e~~10val Le.tln, there \'1111 be two words for tiv. ESSSNTU 3eneca.: :];pistclae ad Lucl11ium i .58.4.5 "Cnpio dicere ••. eL,sentl~ dicere posse. Sin minus, dicn!"" ot iratis , Ciceronem auctorem hu1u3 verbi habeo, puto locupl~t~m. 81 re­cent10rem quaerls 1 !r'ablanum .•. quomodo dicetur OU#I. res necessaria, naturam cont-lanes, funda..llontum omnium It 'there did Cicero say the word? never fO....u.Jd. ~~uint11ian·: De Inot. Orat. bk.2.14.2: Haec inter~retatio non l~inus dura que~ illa·Fla.vii entia at essentia (NB "entla" 'is hera a sinb-ular fe.,inine, as e.bstract of .~esse" meaning "being.")" Entia as a 1l0un failed; essentia sur­vived. ~uint:i..lian aUIJits that there 1s no ether word ~or oO(f"(" Arnobius uses it gI'p.ely. "essentic." may mea.n in ea.rly Latin the abstr~,ct for ~epse" or it may mean ne.ture. EXIS'rEFCE: t1 existentia" from "ex-sistare". In classicel Latin; it means to "come out of, to <lpp(;~.r." For exa;!lple, in " Cioero: "exsistunt in anlmls variotr"tes" : "t. ere occur, appear •••• The transition frOl "appear" ED cC:!l~.n6 out of its ca'...1se~ to t e sense of ",!:-o be" is very eD-Dy. st. :'"uf,?st, ne uans "exj.stere" in the classical sense, cnf. 7.11; 7.17; Lf-.14.21: "p.osten ictor mirabilis extitit" "he turned out, he showed himself to be •••• " Also other uses occur: for. exa.ple, Chalcidius' Ti ~us 52C 2 » ... ("'" loll' o~,., ~ , II r o t1(.~VT .. " at enini vere existentium rel~; 52D: OV11 ex­istens, etc. - In his comr.::l~ntary on 35A: Trr. DII I" Chalcidius says "Tria. existentia." .Candidiu8 Ari~n\ls, De Generntione Divina. I PL 8.1030: has a long list of neolo ,isms: e$. existentitas, eXistentia, exiatentialitas (4th century AD). Existentia is a property of that which ls. -- But the or15inal meanin. {lliS also lasted. I-ence in p' ilosc)~ical toxt "Xistcl'e" may nenn: Heel"e­thing which comes out of its ca-U$OS.II Alexander of :lIes: IInomen existe::,...tio.e sign.tf'icat essentiam (:B: absJ,ract for ossa) cUa'll oreane orlgir..is If surClib I, 31+9, ('uarro.c~hi. In oth0r cases, begins to me8.n. lito be.' bn Gobirol, Fons Vi tll.£.a.. often uses It eXistentio," to Tlob.n tl~e fact that s.orlething is. Gilos, cf ::::<0 ae, Theorernata de Esse at i].;E; ,·entia thoorom '13, P. 83 (Hocedez) quaellbet res, ost ens per'essen-ci&:l SUalri, tarr:en 'lula eS3entia rei creatae non dicit actum completum, sod Gst in potentia ad esse, ideo nOt'l 3 '1fflcH, Gs;;entia ad qoc qnod res b.otu oxistat, nlsi ei auperaQ~atur allQ~cd es-e, quod est eSGey~iae ~ctus et co lp1ernent\rn • 7:x:slstunt or c r 3. -.J~r esse su erac1ditum essentlae vel naturae. II "ExistoreII here n,ctually Jimans: ,03sentia plus esse. The English YiOr<130es boclc to Ch,r:.ucer. and Lydsate. As .•eaning being, goes to 1430, Lydgate. In F!"e:i1ch. tJ:L i'ford existence is not older than 1617. BEING AND THE ONB:: ~TITY Definins oet~phY81c8 as the science of belng ~s being. Aristotle has carefully D. 1.ded: nO'\;' this is rot the 6 0 as tho special sciences; they cut 0 f a part of being and inv0stiga.te that part. For exarlple, ,athematics ls concerned \'iith quail,tity; others are concerned wiJ.;,il mode:» of being, as l~fe, or of motion as under quantity. 'rh1s is the cha.rter of met,aphyslcs u.s a. science. This statement contains a clear intimation of what metaphyslcs should not do: cut off a art of being a ...d invest it viith the attributes of 1)e1118 itself. Any atte::npt to do this will fail, and the followers of such e philosopher will conclude that Dcaaphya1cs is a pseudo-science. ~his scepticism 1s a philosophical disease whose only cure 1s a return to metaphysics. Therefore, Dince being is the ~irst principle of human knowledge, it is also the first_r1ncilJ1e of metaphysics. It follows that failures in this field are to be bl~ned on failures in holding to the object of metaphysics. l'b9se conclusions, til0Ugh tru " aJ:' )E'.l"adoxical. If being 1e the first principle, it must be the very first object grasped by the huclan mind, 1::.00 if :30. how i8 it t~l.Ut.' so many have not c~asped it, or just l~t,it go; moreover, if it must accompany all our repre86ntu;i~ions, hOH can it be pY'esen"t to erery mind'and yet be so elusive. 3, // The only way of of this difficulty is to suppose that the fault does not lie only.with the nature of the mind; being itself might well be responsible in part. Something in being itself, &s if "fear of 'being wer'e the beginning of viisdom." Thus the fundamental ambi~lity of beiY~ appears: it !e either u beinE, sub­stanc ", nature, esse:rwe; or being itself as a progerty common to all that io. In the second acceptation, it is a :)articiple; it means the act wh :.'eb~ any 0iven rec-lity exi ets.: the "to be" as opposed to lta being. I, fl'he relation of !Ito bell to "being" is not reoiproco.l. An tlis 11 must belong to so.t:cthlng tl <>.t 1s or exists. But t.he r~verse is not true: belnG is cOl'lCeivable as non-existing -- the first distinct,ion in being is bet1'leen the ,real and the possltle. The possible is a bein3 ~nllch hC8 not yet, or has already lost, its "to be.". Actual t'lxistence is not thinkable apart from eing. Hence philosopher's \,111 naturally take being apart from exist,once as the first princinle. Further, being is ah"ays conceived apal'''t froI.l existence, for' 1)01ng is conceivable, but existence is not. "BeinG is not, a j,...eal predicate," s ys Kar.t. There 1s no difference between ~~e contents ~f a thing conceived o.s eXisting and the samG t.hinG not conc-ived as eXisting, If the "to be" could be conceived, it should be a :note 1.n the ,content of the thing; such a. note would r'='prcsent an existing thing; it ",ould be an "exis'tnetial i:i.1dex," as EUdinz__ton lIould say. But there 18 no Sl1Ch note. Anything ad<1au. to the concept makes ita different concept. _ctual exist ,.nce caroiot be represented by or ina concept. Conceptual knowled5e has existential neutrality. This fact has exercised a great influence on philosophy. '-­The fa.ut that exiqtence oannot be included in concepts ma.kes ph:.tlosophical speculation as conceptua.l t,c be ex.ist.entially neutral. .A. conceptual philosophy has t.he same relation to existence as the concept itself. Conceptual philosophy ca~~ot tell us the q,ctual exist""nca of -the rea:". philosopher takes being o.s his startin~ Qint. He is a\'1Ul~e of the importance of existende. But lito bell seems parren for philosophy -- it is in the class of ultimates. Philos'- phers, will naturally discou....~t existence from their own notions of being. ~i:'hey will' consider the nature ot existence in general; they will declare that exist~nce has ,to be taken for gpanted; they \'1ill consider being as Do noun. This does not seem to be aosurd, .for lito be" 1s inconceivable;" it may therefore be ontoloe;ically sterile. If "to be" reeans ' lito be thnee" it may well be disregarded. But beinG itself may not be ex~st0nti~lly neutral; existenoe m'y be an active force, an e.Lflcient cuunG. If such is the case, philcsophy based on existence-less being would court disaster and 'eventually meet it. Then philosophers \,(ould replace it "lith a sUTro_gfJ.to, and so mUltiply failuros. T.he th~ne of'these lectures: what happens to the notion of being \'/hen existence is removed from the uOi":fJ~"'ehe lsion of being. This will be an experiment in the history of ideas. The sligHest change in the oontent of an idea brings important consequences. Being is a partiCUlarly cuncial point in which this is true. 4: The Greeks hav~ carried out to its last consequences the existentially neutral "being." What is "reality" made of? This is a rundamenta~ question~ To know the naaure of reality, is for us to understand that everything is at bottt>m identical in nature with ~very other thing. The early Greeks tried to reduce nature to its components, water, fire, earth, air. Finally, one said: b~ing. This is a good answer; it is evident that in the last an~lysls, everything that is real, is. Each thing is a being; we conclude that being is the only property. shared in by all that is. Being is the fundamental attribute of reality. , In one step, Parmenides carried metaphysics to one of its limits, but also entangled it 1n a bi problem. Fire, water, and the like did not ne~d to be defined. But being must be defined. We cnow many beings, 'but what is being? Parmenides had to Bay what sort of reality being is. e raised the problem and gave an answer. Being is endowed with'all the attributes of identity. All that shares in being, is; all that whioh does not, is not. eing is botill unique and universal; ~t can have no cause, for to cause it, the cause would have to be; therefore, sinoe being would oause being, it cannot have any cause at all, nor can it be destroyed. It is eternal; it only is. Being hus no~history, for it i~ foreign to ohange. Change is becoming, i.e., beginning to be. ~elng has no structure, it is not SUbject to divisions. It is absolutely full. Picture it like ahe mass of a spher,s, ,\'1her,el,n being is everY\'lhere contiguous to being, immovable, neoessary, and so forth. Beins alone is. Any reality is eit~er bein' or it is not at all. Beyond the imaginative pioture, there are rational exi~enoies. Thcetetus l83E oalls ~armenldes a me~ to be res ectad and to be feared. He has carried metaphysios to one of its limits, and Plato himself could not set out. ~n t~s posit~on, we are up against a law of the mind. We fail to discover in reality anything else than ~eality. Reality' oan have no intermediate condit~on between existence and non-exist noe. "Being is" ., •• 17 fuat happens to reality 1'1hen "beine; is" is cousidered as a tautology? Only that which answers Parmertldes' desoription of being is •• this is quite a different ,answer. Th~ being should equal existence, ,this looks na.tural enough; if we grant this, we end up with Parmenides. If to be a being and to exist are the same, we must exclude who. tever oes not exhibit the characters of larmenidean being. -Being is one, and the world of sense is many; ~heelements are not only different, but opposite; yet, they seem to coeXist, and they have no ri6ht to. If the . world of sense is, being is'noither one nor simple nor homogeneous-­which is impossible from our hypothesis. Things, chan6e, appear, and so forth, and these cannot, be reconciled with the hypothesis. Consequently, the ",orld. of sense as awhole must be sai<l not to be. If reality equals that which is, then only being is real. Since we have no experience of Parmenidean being, then true reality ~s a pure object of the mind. We can talk about being, can say: "it is identical with itself, etc," w& must add that we have never seen it. Everything we see, inclUding ourselves, oannot be said to be; it is an appearance, an illusion. . 5 The position of Parmenides is a pure philosophical position, marking the absolute limit of Ii certain line. T~. Barta is in just the same line; he has the same definition of being, although he doesn't. say it's a sphere. If we call existence the mode of being as given in sensible experience, then to "exist" is "not to be" a.nd that which truly is does not exist. ~f being t~uly is, nothing should exist. Either it is sid.e by side with being and not in relation as in Parmenides; or existence will be a disease of being (Sarte) -~something that happened to being, nobbd~knows how or why. PLATO is the lnheritor .of P,__.rmenides. All that can be slid of being remains true in Parmenides' materialism and Plato's idealism. Qua beings, they ar~ 4he same:ov~w; 5v. This formula is rendered: the really real, and this is correct, but it loses a lot. T},te real is less bein6 itself than the thing - res - which is. lfuen reality is the practical equivalent for being. the meaning is clear: to point out amongs the objects ot knowledGe the only ones that trUly deserve the name of being. Plato himself seems at a loss to define "true being" -~ it¢' must be itself according to itself; being is selfhood. This restates the relation Which Parmenides had detented between identity and reality. To be . is first of all to be what it is. 'fhe ppposite 'lould mean that the I becomes another. which seems impossible; mete~bDphoais is conceivable as superficial alteration. To be 1s to be what it is. Loss of identity is loss of beinb. lhen self-identity is the mark of reality, being is.one, homo eneous, i~June to chang~. Tqe really real is free from otherness, because any other would be another be.L:Jg. If to be is to be the sc'lne, cMn e is impossible. This perman ncy in self identity is the chief mark of true being.' Ie agreed l:.h,<."1.t existence is not an attribute. Plato I s being is one, and clearly indifferent to existence. In Plato, being in 1taelf is not, but thin s are real because they have being. Things exist; but there is no self-Bubs1stont being in Plato (but Prof. Gilson does not wa~t to assert this dogmatically). This common property 1s the 0 I)~(:j." or essen"ce. This word points out the actual reality of what truly is. OV~~ points out the property o~ all that is. This property is Plato 1s cau~e4 by ~ self..,identity. Phaedo 78D "The very essence of being OV(J'ItJ. "011 7"'£ which we have accounted for •.• is it always in the same ma~~er and. in the same way? ••• each and eve:y :titself" (Which beil1, is) are the~ liable to change ••• or do they remain alwuys itself in itself.' In _lato's uwn writinGS, being may be called ideas or ~orms, but it is always for him, as real, the supremely intell­ig1ble. The more a thin- can beaaid to be, the more it 1s intell1gible. If being and intelligib1lity can be equated, it is because being has first been equated to self-1dentity: thus to' knovT and ·'1;.hat ,..,.hich is known are the same. Beyond the unity of the thing 1s the unity of the species; I reach the unity of the s"pec les in the }/i4"ti diversity of things. "The Principle of principles is tha correct use of ideas ••.• Look1ng deeper, one . I will find 1~ is not ing_lesB than to link 11 eas by axioms that are identical." Leibnil To define being thus is a permenent temptation. This is to make reality what it oUght to be to make it exhaustively . intelligible. In this sense, being and thOUght are one. The r.rinciple of identity is the principle o~onceptual thought. 'Being i.itself" is perfectly intelligible. The final ambition of thoa.e who account for something Is that "this" is really "that" -- that what seems to happen really does not hap en. In a world .of self-i~entity, which is the ideal of explanation, nothing happens. . Consequences: waat ~e we to do with otherness and the world of change? . If sameness ie, otherness is not. Timeus 27D "which is the being whioh 1s always being born and never is. 1t Phaedo 80B lithe world enjoylng always Its self-identity.1I , ~- We are justified in asking lato: what does it mean to say that an idea is? .tDo all the self-existent th1nge..exist?" Timeus in Jowett's translation is an unfair question. To s~y "beauty, or fire in itself,' etcH Is 1s unimagimable. Ideas are not sensible; how then are they. We may not Imagine ideas -­the question is wrong., "To be" is "to be the same" J"to exist iI is something else not relevant to the question. McTaggart, in The Nature of E>istence raises the question about the reality of fictional characters. these latter are self-identical, consistent, etc; they do not exist; but then many exlstents are 'tn<;m-entities"-­at least sea. people are. -- Thus appears the amblguity of being.­Plato ignored the meanlng: that it Is. Platonic idea is in the Sense that it Is what it is. Such a radioal decision might seem to simplIfy metaphysics, but it causes complications. Platonic being is always in history & variable qUantity. Plato accepts Parmenides; but he is interested in accounting for the fact that Certain things are, but not qUite; or perhaps we should 811-YS that certain things not quite are not -- non omnino non sunt of St. Augustine. The problem for Plato is the measure of realijy in appearance; no longer between what is and what is not, but between lito be" and "to be really real." His position is still indifferent to actual existence. In the order of actual existence, a thing either is or is not, and there is no mldd~e given. In Platon1sm, the degrees of reality correspond to degrees or selfhood. In Plato, sensibles are in that they share in the really real; they are not, in lacking self-hood. Signs of Platonism are (1) being and non-being are variable quantities; (2~ all relations of being and non-being are transposed into sameness and otherness. The Platonic participation ~n the Parmenldes is not how several individuals share in an idea, but but rather: how is an idea self-identical?how one and the same idea can share in its own unity -- if it is self-identical It is one; hence the idea is self-identical, is itself, and is one. Justice eg. is what it is to be just -~ but each idea 1s also one, hence each idea shares in ~ty. Unity in itself is to the Ideas as the ideas are to pa~ticulare. If the idea is because it Is one, being is because it 1s one. This one that is is a compound of being and one; and each of these 1s a compound, and so on-- thus there is a virtually infinlte mUltiplicity of parts i~ the unity or being. If being is one, then being is not one, and' one is not being. In Parmenides, we cannot conoeive being without it's b~ing ~; bet the relation of bein to the one is ino~nceivable ~- it must be and cannot be one. To b~. is and must. be something else than to be one. -- Let us turn to sameness ather the. unity. Beine; 1s sameness--if we acoept this \ 7 then being cannot be ascribed to any two different beings -­things either are not, or are not different. If on the other hand we say: no, OlUY that every being is itself; nevertheless sameness entai~s otherness (from others); then sameness equals being and otherness equals non-being; hehce, be1hg entails non-being. Jaoh peing is the same as itself only once, and other as many times aBthere are others. Hence any being is once, and is not inf~nitely. Hence sameness alone will not account for reali~y. Further, PInto oouidn't account for relations. §ensible things make up a world; ideas make up a t<(),.tJ~S vOlT#J, and all relations must be there. Each sensible thing shares in many ideas, and sometimes in opposites. A mixture of ideas ifi found in things; there is also a mixture of ideas among themselves. An idea shares in relations and .other ideas, and is yet itself. ItB~lf oannot be the reason of relations; and yet these relations constitute the ideas. Justioe truly is an equality, and thelike. Henoe no idea 1s solely what it is; to account for their identity we must have a prinoiple of identity and compatibility, Here to seomthing must be posited beyond being. Repuplio VI 509: even the really real is not supreme; above ~he . ou~,~ there 1s a prinoiple beyond reality: the good, which .sur­passes being in power and dignity. ~fuat is the Good? -- it isn't. In a doctrine where true being is self-identity being cannot account roor itself. The perfectly knowable depends on something un1~el11gible -- the ~arkness of a supreme non-being and non-intelligible. PLOTlNUS appears to us as an immediate suooessor of Plato, b.t there are seven cen~urie~ between them. The spiritual needs of their times were different. Plato, from time to time, goes beyond being, but seldom~ and never for long, because it is above in­telligibility. Plato opens a door to mysticism, but never enters it. Plotinus seems to be ~ather a theologian with philosophical insight. He thinks we should make the super-prinoiple the . starting-point. This prinoiple, though unnameable, is called One and Good. Good and One are one thine, with two reservations: they.are not things; they are two aspects, oomplementary, yet distinct, of the ineffable. ~t 1s not the good we know, and when we oall it one we think of the number one; but the One is not a number. It i~ a metaphysioal prinoiple higher than quantity, that in virtue of which everything that is one, 1s one. If in a philosophy der.iving from Plato, being is because it is one, then the One is tho ultimate cause of being. "The One is above being and so is the oause of being. The not-one is kept in existenoe by the One. So lo~g as.a certain thing is made of parts, it is not yet one, and we cannot say that it is. Enneads 5.3.15. In each of the composite beings, self-hood is a participated unity • . e One is different~ is qot unified, but is the origin and oause of all partioipated unity; it is an immensely powerful prinoiple able to beget everything. Under this aspeot it is called' the Good. I 8 We see here the systematio bharacter of Plotinus. Plato had hinted about going beyond being, and said once that that beyond-the-being is the Good. Platols formulas look like casual remarks. In Plotinus, the One is oeyond reality, yet more real, not a god, but better t~n a god. The One is the highest possible object of respect, aKcept that it is no obJeot because it is beyond' being. Being is no longer the first principle either in reality or in metaphysics. Being is the ' second principle., Because the One is not, it can be a cause. In order that being be, the One oannot be being. ~ead 5.2.1 Each pa,rticular being is only a particular unity. I the One were only a certain one, it vlould not be the One It...... is. Ennead 5.3.12 Hence there is no name for the One, for names indioate an It; but the One is no thing, le, nothing, because it is too good to be something. ToPe One is unthinkable, not only for us, but even in itself.' \lhere there is knowledge, tpere must be a knowing SUbject and a thing known, hence a oertain duality. But how can the One be two; hence the One will have no self-knowledge. Ennead, 5.3.3; 5.6.4. This does not mean the One is imperfect; the One does not lack anything by not knowing itself; the One is infinitely above self-knowledge as it is above being. The One is both unreal and unthinkable. The meaning of this whole dootrine hangs on the notion of . the One. Platinianism is not pantheism -- this is the illusion of perspeotive, due to the interplay of two doctrines of being: Plotl*us' and the historian's, eg., turning the One into God, and oomparing .,.. the Mm...' ...... emanation of the multiple from the One to creation. This is rather confusing ontology and monoloBY. The comparison is impossible; the positions have their respeotive consequences. ' In the metappysics of being, each lower grade of reality owes its reality to the faot that their cause ls. ' In the metaphysics of the One, lower grades of reality are sOIe~y because their first principle is not. In order to give something, a cause must be above what it gives. If the superior has what it causes, it oo~ld not be a cause: Enneads 6.7.17. If monism means that being is everywhere one and the same, then Plotinus is not 'a min1st, -beoause his first principle is not. Look at the origiij6f the world 1n Ennead 5.3.151 t1How did the One bestow what it itself had not? Because nothing is in the One is the reason that everything comes from it. In order that being be, it is necessary that the One he not, and beine; is it.s first-born,child." This is a radical devaluation of being. O~~~, essencefl reality, will not come first, but second. The cause transoendsl 'the maker of both real~ty and substance is neither" Ennead 5.3.l7~. When Augustine says, oonfess. 11.5.7: "Quid enim est, nisi quia Tu es?'! : he is speaking of the Christian God of Exodus. Had he been a Plotlnian, he \-10uld have s'id: "nisi quia Tu non es." These are t"ro mental universes. 9 We must try to grasp in its purity tne spirit of a tradition; the intrinsic ¢necessity of th~s metaphysics of the One. The implications are already in Plato; they blossom out in Plotinus. "The One 1s everything and yet is no thing" Enneads 5.2.1. There is a temptation to think the O~e is the beine of all things. True, it is owiD8 to the' One that things are, yet the One, has no being. Things are made of en emanation from the 011e. Others say: ens is derived 1"I'om "-'8se; Plotinian derivation 1s different·: Enneads 5.5.5: The sharing *n unity gives risa to quantity) ,Here (ie., in my doctrin~) the trace of the One gives rise~to O~~I·I Being is notlV-ng more than the trace of the One. If C\v.~ were derived from '"v, this would expresse the truth. -- Thls is a fancifUl etymology, but it expresi:es his philosophy. When ens comes from esse, the<.'-' a co~nun1ty of e8se~between beings ~nd their I principle entails mon1sm.fuere eJ.vai co:rnes rrom ~..., there can be no community of being and their first principle; besides, Plotinus himself makes his stand clear: the One ••• remain~ in itself "-'~~eads 5.5.5 . The Principle is not the whole of beings, but all come from it Enneads 3.8.9, \f.hy is it that being and knowing are one? '1'0 be end to know are one; or "to be and to be a.n object of thought are one? •••• What is a being: all answers contitute s~ many determinations of the x we call being; in the ciroumscription ¢t by definition of an intelligibl~rea, thOUght begets an object. l,ihatever I knm'l is. To be is to be thinkable. To be is to he.ve characteristics of being able to be understood. The essenoe of a being 1s the being taken in its intelligibility; Qc,d"{O' is the realne.ss of being. This position is not subjective idealism, but a system where intelligibles relations are the stuff things . are made 01'. In us, intellig1bi~:ity is Ct'&£:9I1entary; yet even we grasp a multiplicity of relations in a single intuition. Henoe, we can conceive all relations blended in a higher unity in some hiBher lnteliigenQa. This is the VOllS of Plotinus. Noue is what comes next after. the One. The One is no thing. In itself, ~he nous 1s the total i:.:lt.elllgibility of the One; yet it is not equal to the One; the Ope transoends all intell1gibility. The supreme intelligence is inferior to the One, yet it is perfect as an intelligenoe. Beings are identical with their intelligible essences. To explai~thlng, we use a multiplicity of ~ermsi these express intelligible relations, and SQ reality. This is illustrated by- , Leibniz: the world is made of intelliglbles. "These -olaJlngs are .ss~nces, beoause each has & limit; being oannot belong to what has no form or limit." -- This stabl. condition is their definition Enneads: 5.1.7: -- The last illusion to be dispelled: such int~lllgibleB are not known by the Supreme Intelligenoe,' they arii it. The supremem in'~lligenoe'is being itself, because it is al things Ennead 5.4.2: "'l'he intelligence is identical with being." Ii' the intelligence is knowlodge and nothing else, then being is thl9 intelligibles and nothing else. -- Being as existentially neutral cannot be the first prinoiple. In Plato, the Good 1s nQt God: at least this is neVer metnioned. In Pletlnus, some texts call the One the supreme god. Arnou says: in the Plotinus the One. is god sometime~. II vlhat fully deserves the name and title of God is the Intelligence. 10 In Froclus, .·.etaphysics turns from theology to Religion. "The One is God, and how could it be otherwise, since the Good and the One are one and the same thing, and God and the Good are one aWl the same thing." Proclus too;k a text from, the limeus this probable to.;Le. I' "The 'l'imeu8 ref'ers everythj.ng to the .Demiul"ge, while theParmenidos re~ers all to the One; there must then. be the followi. relation: what the B8m1urge is to the Universe, the One,is to all thirigs~ "If the world-maker of the Timeus is a god, then the One is God simpliciter." One first begets the supreme intel~igence, ~hich is also the first being. Being comes first among created ZBXBKmB things. It 1s a mere accident that Platonism met so early with Christianity. Plotinus and Proclus had taken'a chance in turning a doctrine of Being into a doctrine of God. Some neo-Platonists when converted, felt that they had changed religions. PlotinuB and Froclus had pract1ced bodily asoeticism and meditation. But suon a program c~ be gone through either through dialectic or through Grace. et conversion did not necessarily mean that a philosopher cC.LB.llsed e.ll his ideas •. One could think as a. Platonist and believe as a Christian. The text o'f Exodus 3.14: " I am He Who is, II "He vlho' is hath Bent me, It . need not induce metaphyai cal oonclusions. Yet if a oonclusion is drawn, it is that God is Being, and bein the first principle, it follaww that Being is First. Hence, no Ohristian philosopher can teaoh that there is anything above Bein~. In Liber de Cauais, leot. 4; prima rerum creatarum eat ess~ -- first of all is Being and nothing is created before it. The first principle is the One, and Being is the first creature. This is self-consistent, but not consistent with the Christian universe. Logically speaking one oannot thlnk as a neo,'Platonist 'and and as a Chrlstian~ Yet some thinkers have attempted to do it. • St. Augustine, who was deeply imbued with neo-Platonism, never devaluated being, not even to extol the One. He knew on_y Plotlnus, yet neVer mistook God for the One. He breaks f'rom Plotinus: nothi~ is above God, and God is Being. God 1s also Good and the One, but 1s these because He is first of all Being. St. Augustine on this f'undamental point is not a Neo-Platonist. Marius Viotorinus, whose works had peen read by Augustine, had become a Christ1an. After his oonversion, he composed some trea.tises on theological points. 12.2 Generatione Verb1 Dlvini, FLa. This text shows us what Augustine would have said if he had stayed a neo-Platonist. God is above all that 1s and that which is not. Since God is above Being,' 1t can be said of Him that he is not. If He 1s ~uperior to'Seing, He oan produce it. Since God is the cause of Belng,in this sense He is vere tv. Being is God as the effeo)j is in an eminent cause. God is a supremetz{ non-Being, the cause of Being. Victorinus believes in the Trinity; hence, when he says "God" he J+1eans "God the F ther." In Plotinus:. the One begets supr~e intelligence which 1s int lli~1bility which is' first and supr~me being. Similarly, God the F"ther begets . ·"existentiam et noun". In this first-porn of the"FAther, the 11, Christian I1lJ. roco ~1z the Verbum Dlvin • f tl e _eroon.. arc ece-'istontlalT-~.arlus Victorlnus \-[1' 't s the l\rla.ns -- it is hard to se~ t.r,at.,.lf cd e Pother is non... elng, and t 0 SO~ is 5~1n • . ..his 1s 6 nretty a88. ~. It .th "r 'i,ho 1e not, t.he 'lord is as oo()ott.en c. :2 ""L 8.1021. ItGod 1s the whole pre-b lng -- totu.>n P' con; ~,s to .Jesus, Ho 1s thnt \'thole baing itself' -- hoc tctU"Il on; but . B H. is the "thole bo 1 _ t.:l. ')3. enjoy1 existence ..If 111'e and lntelllgenoe, he is om!111..odis " telGlon on." -It ~s unfaj.r to ' ay thut thla is pure ""'lotln1an1sm; neverthele s 1t doesn't or.:r. lot,inu8 h d. ' ot heen p Jhr1stle.n.j •.•V. as a 'hrlst1an must ~,int~in tr£t thOl~h be otton .y the F\ ther, th' "on ~.e not in e '101"; the fi'nt,her, who 1:s. not-, ls in no way deprived of bo1n; c. J6, p. 102gB. In tnlc ~cnse God as besott, n is not inferior to the be ettl \Jod; r ther He is sui 1 slue c:'l.uea. ibid. 10280; c. 18, 10~O., - A 1"0 cnn do here 1~ to b~ 1..ndttl ant. - r. ,8,lao eL.ls it 'the text.of ~xooue, If a Cht't~tlan holds "11th Plot'inus tho.t Be!:!,:g 1s a fir t -born, then according to hlm \'1111 be e, 0 1s? lilt 1s J'esus ,2 rl t t for. he h1mself ~BS so.ld: 0 ~~ ; solt: e 11m. 111 on. s ..p9r on, "0 t/J est. tt c. 14; 1028-. It the fact t1 at neo-P le.tcnlnm akse bad theology dO$s "'let disl'lMD'e it ae philO::3o hy - yet: if ny b in .... eYer entailed t _ nC'tion of exist .ne , 1~ is Je~hw9: -- 0,. d hore we have a theolof , tan ~ 0 <10, 8 Dot t'l.nd. cannot understend .he IUlffiC of his God. D1cmys us t e ~o ...!l,gito T s certainly a Cl1rlt:rtlRn, y()t he _oaited ~ood even 'bye bo1 • One ~o~ the Chr1stia rod was the su~rQ e r-o -B,lng. God cannct be w at He 31~ s. in order thD.t (1 7'r,.y~lVo it: .....Q ,j.vinto. 0m1n1bu a 4.3. I If the f'! od 1s bove beL.:, "0 :tat 8{ Y tl at hAt its 1£ 5." vit ....o It :to n()1vas ;form. t B.t, f c h rcmr.ln.. in hi s 11' without es enco, is the aome of e8~enCe;8. J 1:faless. rO(l.:U.ty, e 1s supra e lifo ••• since any form d~ ~i3d. to t- e ,ood _,oints out its 1nt rrnin" ,m... r. II ibid.... As a Chri e la..'1. n'"or....>siu"" kno~72 thn.t G-od;! call'~~l Eiooclf b in • Yet he so ... :1 thls the ru known fro. rfec4·,s, ibid. 5.4 "Go ~_ . .s ~lf is not-b!?'in ,. i but is ten Of elngll -- thP..t on account of ~ .1 __ ~h being", ar~. ':.. ~ fo('A is th1s--ie. the cause. ublle VI; fno\'T/;~l)le ob.. · ete owe to t a ...1'00' their" no 1 . 111ty and also their roalit , thC1~h the oOd is not b,ing, 'bUt , f'ar aUl"p" G90S r ....~~ ity" ·':...:1a is t 10 • or1t1. of ' io:nyslus, nd fe"lt Christian tb.lnkors accepted 1t. . cotus ~1 ern doscribed t_.~ tL. .Verae of C_ is $o.n t ought; he \'iroto 0. co~. lete 803mo~ony, which 1s n COl' crote {. i 1 act_c. e world. of .J01':'u1 1s' ,10t exactly <? d8( \. ct1on~ but ~1 divis!on'rom ita prinei, Ie; ~md. tpC te'1:'. (,r th~ U1"11 ... to constitutes n: ture. "Nntu~elf is t ~ most ~ener£\l or all te s. lfU'-1;tu,'~::) 13 tho [Selleral' nama of all that in n'l. 1s ott' De -l'/isio1:lB Nl-'.turue: FL 122.441a '" oh naturo s a r; Q,'nt, of the 11.0.1 otio callod the Un1ve ·se. SOme t~rns ann' lndarE'.t oc1, ~n so are 001113s. .uu·~ o\,lner' te .13, thouch, ce s "Oily' os1 cd. oacl1,t G )ot.h understanr1ing ~'. t ei'ir.J.tlon by the1r' very nature; theIr £1,re lth a.bove 0 • below be! '; they are not. John ..1eedeq. 0. ,i1der n,lJ e tb realIty. The rirat 1')r1nc1ple is a non-bein , even tough 1 t is od. 1'1.8 O<.'1.US of lng, God ca.nnot be. ' ~' "see otm1um eat su.per esse d1vin1'tas lf D{ 1.AS 12­Beings come by way of division; once posit the first principle, the whole s~pies follows. The One is goodness, generosity. / . The world. is not deduced; it flows from the Goodness of the One according to intelligible laws. Is John a monist or pantheist?? This never was his position; he is a real Plotinian. The btnng , of creatures is not part of God, for God has no being. 'He who 1s not and things which are -- there is an unbridgeable gap. Noteworthy that John was condemned for teaching that the Beatific Vision is impossible. God cannot be seen, for He 1s no being. 1~e Beatifio Vision is a theoppany, and so only a manifestation of God., 'rhis is consist.ent with his principles. This is not an ontolOGical gap merely -- God ai~ creatures are so wholly distinct, that God is not even equivocally eing. 1he analogy of being would have seemed'to John to be pantheism. The easiest way to avoid this pitfall is to make God non-Being DDN 2; col. 523 haa an explicit statement about the difference between God and cre~ture. If John's first principle were being, he would be monist and·pantheist. He calls ~od the being or all beings -- beoause He Himself 1s not. The conct*mnations do not mean that his philosophy was inconsistent, but th&t it was wrong. If a Christian says: God. is the being of creatures because He is not -- this is wrong. Lhe bible shovs us that God is pure existence. John didn't see that the existentially neutral Platonism couldn t handle the God of Exodus. -- • 818 A crucial point is,the d6ctrine of Divine Ideas. The Divine Id.eas would seem to have to be God for a Christian; yet John denied this. If B,.ing is int:l1isibility, and. the Divine Ideas are the first intelligibles, then Boin~ is ideas. If ideas are beings, they are creatures. The Christian God, ~fuo is, is His own Ideas. Hence: ideas are created as ~lngs, and nevertheless are God. If they are Beings, they are Creatures; hence, there are creatures in God who yet are God. The are not creatures because no true oreature is eternal. No doubt that Divine Ideas are eternal. Yet they are creatures, because as beings they are eternally creat8i~ by Him Uho is above being •• "They are eternal, but not .coeternal with God." -- John is trying to Identity Divine Ideas with God as much as his philo&ophical ideas permit. And in this dilemma: that of Ideas whioh are in God yet are creQtures -- he gives us the key to many similar doctrines. Many tried to follow hlm for a while. -- In any doctrine where there is the slightest gap between God and the Divine Ideas, the breath of that gap is proportioned to the ontological dose of Platonism present. Meister Eckhardt, in the 14th Century, wrote Questiones Parislenses; ed. Geyer, Eonn, 1931. Here, he says that God is not primarily _sing, a.nd that He does not know because He is, but Ee is beoause He knows. Hia intellection is hhe root or his being. ?he Evangelist has not said: in the beginning was E ins; but: in the beginning was the lord; or, as the Lord Himself~says: 'I am the Truth'" p. 9. All things were made by Him, as the author of the L1ber de Cauais says: the first cr .sture is being. Deo convenit nee esse nee ens, sed est altius ente. In God, there is no esse nor ens; if a cue-se is trUly a cause, nothing of the effect should be formally in the cause. God is the cause fo all being; hence being ca~~ot be in God. If it pleases to call intellection bei , this is allrlght, p. 10-11. Since being belongs to creatures· •• 1n God there is no being, but puritas essendi-- le. purity from being. To Exodus is prefereed Deuteronomy 6.4: "The Lord is One.'W'"Deus est unus, and this is confirmed, because Proclus and the L1ber deCausis frequently call God Unity or the One. Existence appears inconceivable; being is sel~-hood; so metappysics turns into henology. Bein~ ls sUbJected to a 13 transcendent Cause above being, and this cause is unintelligible. So mysticism must come in; ;but in philosophy it is out of place, especially in a uhilosophywhich claims complete intelligibility as its goal. If you take the existence from being, it cannot be put back. Is it ce~tain that what Plato's being lacks is existence? It may· be somethine; beyond eelfhood 'without being exist -nee, so we must examine other surrogates. ARISTOTLE developed a metaphjrsics of substance. Plato had criticized his ewn doctrine: if there are ideas, we cannot know them, and ,they have notbing to do with things. "The real thlnc-:a heve nothing to do with ideas ••• the yonder. realities can do nothing nor suffer anything ••• the gods. may know ideas ••• ; the world of ideas remains unknowable.to us ••. and if such knowledge were possible, it would not help us at all. II Platonism might appear .as the phiJ.oso'9hy of a physico-mathematician. PIe,to , s world is the world of tho modern physical s*tences. The world of biolo6ists and physicians is different. Leibniz says that physicians are not metaphysicians. Locke called this method a plain ~~storicial method, that is, a descriptive method. The metaphysics of ~~istotle is the normal philosonhy of all who de~l,concretely with concrete reality. Aristotle is interested in OV~,~ -- reality; what he sees and what he can touch -- this thing -- a particular existent, a~ distinct ontoloe;ice.l unit, no} man-in-himself, but Peter or John. \~lat makes a thing to be an ou~~? There 1s a first class of things wh1chbelona to something, but are not somethin~; rather they are always in something, es. sensible qualities. Such characters have no being of their own; they have the being of the sUbjeot in which ~hey are. They are by being in, and are called accidents; they; are not beings~ but merely happen "to be in." 'rhey are not Q"Cf"J;~ -- reality. The .oecond class of thinc;s is , uncovered in pred1cation. One type of predication: the quality of whiteness is present: this thing is white; on the other hand, in a sentence like: this is a. man, manness is not a property "in," but a character ascribed to the sUbject itself; it has predicability. The third olass is tha.t of dlDtLnct ontological units, "Thich are neither abstract notions like manness, nor ~coidents, like color. This double notion is not a. concept; it turns into a trTOfold affirmation:;what is, is individual in it~ own right. "Being is in a subject" entails that being is a sUbject •. A .subject 1s that which haVing all that it needs to be, can support s.ccidents. As such, every actual Gubjpqt is a sUbstance, as supporting accidents. Categories 1.5 "Being - O.vet"lQ- - in the true primit1ve and strict sense is neither predicable of a subject nor in a. subject." Sensible qualities were thus rightly refUsed being by Plato; but this merely restates the problem: we know where reality is, but not wl1at it is. In our oxperienoe, a substance's presence is illOSt clearly indicated by operation and activity -- we detect substances by what they operate. ature is the intrinsic principle: of operationsl there fore all true substances are natures; therefor~ in·order to act, eaahmust first be an energy -- a concretely ; real and Wholly dynamic world. Being is energy and efficacy. . There is a two-fold meaning of act: first, the act which is a thing, or a thing which ie act~ actus primus; second, any I particular actiVity. Add together all the operations, you constitute 14: the thing. A thing is what it aoes. Being is exercising an act, of bei:ng, of being whi:te, etc. '!;.'hlteness ls not, but a man is white and so whiteness is as sharing in his being. Aristotle is here tclklng about existing things; for bim, reality is·a nucleus of energies, so its coret escapes the concept. In its innermost reality, substance is conceptually unknowable; we know that since they act, they are and are aots. Here Aristotle stol1s. He knew that "to be" is "to oe in aot" that is" "to be" is an act." -fuut 1s ·an act? Arlstotl'e just. pointed 'to.it, and pointed out.its c~ntrary, ie, potentiality; but it is much easier to understand" potential!ty thJm act. ,ft~'fe must not seok a. -defin1tion of everything -- this is all.rie~t; then he invites the read9r to see for himself -- "as waking to sleeping, as seeing to not­tt ' seeing, as formed to unformed this shows what Aristotle had in mind in saying that actue~lity-means the existence of a tr~ng. Examples help us to locate actual reality. Thoughsware of the glvenness of an'aqt as such, he nev-e!' thOUght of settinc it q,side. Something is the core of r ality and yet escapes definition.' That's the way reality is, if actuality is myoterious, it is at least a natural mystery, not a fictitious one. This very being, which reality is as being in act, what sort ~f beins is it? itA bel,ng is" -- what does it mee.n? i1rro be tt is to exist" -- probably his everyday notions hold that, just as in everyday ••••••••• life existence 1s t.emendously important. fr~t philosophers are liable to forget thls. 1that ~~istotle has in mind, is it exintence?nothlng authorizes us to say yes. ' Existence is not excluded, so little does he think of it. He tells us lito . be" is something elsG than eXistence, and then existence is over­looked. Among the mecnings of being in Z c.l; 1028a3 lithe f.irst is one 1'1!1ere it means that uhich it is and signifies the SUbstance. The "ls" is the what of a thing, not the fact that it exists. That ':{hich makes it to be e, substance mal~es ita bein<:. JDIHIf Not that he is not interested ln existence, but once evidenced y sense or :::\rov~d, exist nce is dismissed. Once we know that it is, we t~...lk about what it is. Existence is a mere prerequisite to being, whioh is substanGe. Aristotle's own words are clear. "'1'he question raised of old, and even now, and ahvays, and is always the subject of doubt: what baing ls, is just the question: what is substance -- some say it is one, others more than etC •••• . e must consider e.l. oat exclusively what that is in this sense." "'hat prln::.a.rily 1s ls a substance which is the whatness of a thing. This accoun~8 for Aristotle's metaphy-sical structure of things. Everything is ma~de up of several metaphysical layers. The most real in a substance is that Whereby it is in act. _-ow in corporeal things, this is not the matter. Netural forms are harder to detect than artificial ones; they are the intelligible core of reality. An animal is SUbstance, because it has an irmar principle, the form. The act is not the matter, but the form. If a being is priruarily or ah10st exclusively what is is, therefore each being 1s primarily and. almost exclusively 1ts ~1Brm. The distinct!ve character of an Ju~ietotelian metaphy8icB of being lies in the fact that it kno'fs of no act uuperlor to the form, not even existence. There is nothing above being, and in being,nothing is above form, A form ia an act which has no act. Ii'orm is a supreme act. If anyone has an act of a form, he is beyond Aristotle. -- This is coming back to Plato. Aristotle's forms are Plato's ideas brought do~m to earth. Form 1s called essence as knowable. Forms or essences remain the same in all the individuals of a species. If man-in-h~self does not exist, the same difficulty can be urged 15 .' against the l\rlstotellan essence. Aristotle has n ither room nor use for the Individua.lD. Plato had said this ope!lly: the idea is real, things are not. Al'istotle professes·to be interested only ,in individuals, and then proves that since the form is the same, their trun being docs not differ from one to another. He d.ecides that \'lhich is real in th~s man is -rlhD.t each man is. llhe "this" and the "what." -- how are they reconciled" . Individuals are such by matter, but matter of.itself has no being. The supremely real is such MXKK in virtue of what in it exhibits an ~~Q08t complete lack of reality. How are we to understan~ the individual to be real, which is individual because of matter. Species takes over reality from individuals in a philsophy of substance. The radical ambiguity o~ this position seen i~ its consequences. In the middle Ages, thinkers were divlded on the problem of universals: how can soecies be in individuals? This looks like a game, but at, bottom i8 the .\ristotelian notion of being. Is it only individuals, as Ockham says, then the form of species is only a name. If the form is, because by it thinGs aro, then you are a realist. Is th~ form self-subsistent? you have a Platonic idea. If it is only a concept, how can it be the core of being? All these positions claimed to agree with Aristotle. In a way they QO, because Aristotle himself had ~lneled it. His mistake was· to use "to be " in a single sense, i;lhile it !las two: as meanin~ "to exist" then only individuals are; if it means "to be a whe.t then forms alone are, and individuals are not. Aristotle himself failed to make this distinction. Had Plato seen Aristotle's doctrine and criticlDD1 of ide"s, '\ofould he have l'l!'itten an .Aristoteles, to entaib.gle Aristotle in his own d!.fficulties: !'Are there forms of which individuals partake, and do they partake either of the whole essence or of a part? and since of the Whole, the essence is in 9ne and many? ,nd finally, kbw'can beinGS be by ~orms which are not?? If essencos exist, they ca~~ot be shared. If individuals are, they should be species." Essences are and individuals eXist, so tha,t erl c1+ eS:3ence exists through individUals and individuals are through forms. The world of A istotle consists of existents without exietence. They exist, be~ause they are there; but we can desoribe them as if they did not exist. There is a first Aristotle, ,\-(he wrote the Historic. AnimaliUIn, an observor of tr...1ngs. There is a s9cond. one, much nearer to Plato, \-!ho says: lithe individuals in eo speci~s ••• aro the real beings, but inasmuch as ,they possess one common speclficform, it will suffice to state the universal a.ttributes of the species .•• once for·e-II I1 .. , This dealt the death-blow to oqserv~ti0n. Men know the elements and the composites, because they knOi! \'ihat they a1:'0. 16 AVERRHOES& in the 12th Century, read the works' of Aristotle, and found him r1r;'b.t. He ''i'rote three series of commentaries ~o clear up obecurities and t.o show that whH,t the text says is true. 10 restate Aristotle 1s for him to state the truth. ~apGcially in­stl" uctive is the new turn religion had given to beine. Philosophy is not interested. in actue.l existence r reli€.5ion cannot affol"d to ignore exiotence. That's why Plato has the gods, to account for exi st "'nee: not an l';'ea , but the Demil,wge makes the world. The ideas only account for intelligibility. Two religions explicitly claimed to account for the world ~s it is: ch~istianity and islo.misro. ence it Ylaa necessary for e1ther group to tal~e into ac.~o·...tnt crea.tion. Avicenna did this; he could not overlook the fact. that the ,~orld might not have eXisted, and henoe said it '/as an accident. 'rhus Averl"hoes anc"'.lyzed the situa.tion, and haVing 'read Avice~~, he coul~verlook tho position; he denied it. The i~portD.nce .of being cannot be overlooked; but ~en who believe in creation say: an existing thing is not no-thing. So Avicenna had said: it happens to things to be. Averrhoes was surprised and indignant. He had learned that ~Jein3 is substance is aC.tual reality. "To be is to be real. 1I.l!~3n, existent man, and one ma.ll are "'Fo<J1'O..... II Averrhoes made no mistake about Avicenna' 8 doctrine; the dcctrinc is rcli310us in orisln; it is wrong in sayins that unity and being are superad.ded, a.nd this mistake is due to the fact thnt he mixes religion and philosophy. Averraoes did not mix them: religion is for the hoi polloi, and necessary for them. It teaches fundam9ntally ifhat philosophy teaches. But theologians should preach, and philosonhy teach, and must not mi:;: belief with proof. Creation is a handy way of showing men that God is thei~ master, since they Call110t understand KKHW Virtue, vice, the prime mover etc. Avicenna was \~one because he mixes relig10n with philosophy, Destructio Destructionum, dispute 8 . ...\rlstotle in Averrhoes met existence, and had to tell UEl where it fits, If existence is nothing more than essence, he had to tell us 80 f ..nd why. Thus this is a crucial case of pure sUb­stEllntiallsm. "who says tb.at real beings ~xist? Everybody. iow? in com~on 18~3Ua e (ie, Arabian) when they want to say it exists, they ss,id. it is to be found (se1n ist daseln) •••• .Lhis is eo crude and popular way of talklns •.. if taken seriously, existence will be said to happen to it. Hence Avicenna'a statement tha.t esse· ait .:.ccidens adveniens quiddi tati. II From this errors follo"r: each real being will be a compound of esaence and existence. T~en es~anca c~~~ot be conceived as bein3, escept when it receives esse. This becomes a disti~ction of two constituents of b~in3: ess~nce is bein3 only through receiVing esce; hence apart from it, essence is a bare pOG3ible. Hence it will have no reason for its existenoe nor necessity nor intelligibility. All this is a sop to theologiansa this about one necessary being who actualize possibles. An existi~ being is an actualized pos3i~lo.· If we consider one being, of itself it 1s a possible, but it now is 'in virtue of the', power of the First, and while it is it car~Dot not be. It ia, therefore it is necessa.ry while it is; while it 1" ats it cannot not be,· and when actua.l existence happens to It., it could not, not have happened, for what comes from the First, comes from intelligible nece~sity, end therefore in itself it is possible, but in relation to God, necessary. Possibile-ex-se, necessarlum­ax- alio. In Short, wbmething which while eXiatin3 is of itself possible 1s necessary while possible in relation to the First. This is meant by: esse est ccidens. But Averrhoes rejects all t.his aa a whole. I 17 "ifuat is existence and how are we to conceive it. Avicenna says: it is an accident •••• But it is none of the 9 c~tagories. If it happens to sUbstance, it cannot be substance and since'it is none of the 9 other categories it is nothing.~ To AverrhoQs the 10 categories cover the whole field; if existence answers none of these 10 quest1ons, it is unthinkablo, it is nothing. -- Might not riatotle have overlookad one category? -- Suppose existence to be an accident, it 1s yet a stran3e one; its properties are different fro~ a1lac.cidents. Take quantity and SUbstance: quantity gives it size and changes its appearancej Q.ue.lity, etc, all alter the substance by a distinct determination. ·ot so with exiatenoe. Ir esse were a category and an accident, it would apply tO,all the others and to all in the same way. ':lhen we say: a substance is .• 0r' quantity is ••• etc; the' sUi:posed accident blends with the terms and vanishes out of. sight. I Sub- . stance is \·rhitdl is intelliBible; lI substance is", if it means anythlTIo at all, maans "this is a subetanceil and the Bame applies to all the cateoories. If existence is an accident, quantity etc., cannot be accidents; "quantity is·1 means eithaI' IIquantit~T is qua.ntity" or ·nothing. And so there is no place for existence. Ho\y a.re H3 t.o acco'J.nt for this confusion. IIX i8 11 ••• ~Then a jUdgment 1s true, 1t says what is. Truth EI.SSerts reality. IIA man iSll means IIthere 1s a man" and. this is true because what 1s there is a man. llBeing is" ateans : "a being is therell , and "ls" expresses the intrinsic reality of it. ,-,xistence a.dds nothing -­Being is the noun derived from the verb "is." We 1i ht as well maintain the.t IIhuman1 tyll means something else tha.n \'(hut man i e • . Avicenno. has imagined that "is" me9.ning the reality of a being is something add.ed to being. -- "The world of Averrhoes is a world of SUbstance, naturally endo\'16<i with its unity and being. II Sub­stantia cuiuslibet uniua per quam est unum, est suum esse per quod est ens. 'I 11'1'0 posit substance, you posit both its unity and its bein(5. If -- Bl.lt a problem remains: the rela.tion of possible things to their actualized thinss. There are aotualized potenoies. Averrhoes sees this, but thinks it a pseudo-problem. In Avicenna, all this is t1ed up with the notion:. possible-se-se; if there . are ouch, thG problem arises. ~ut is this pure possible intelligible? The First 1s intl31ligible; also the fa.ct that everything outslde .the :?lrst is neces~.;ary through the First -- all this is flne a.nd true •. If a baing ls, and it is Yleoes:-3ary that it be, hmof then is it still possible? Avicenna sa.ys: in itself. But what is tl1io DOBsible? Its essence. An essence before existence LillS no eXls~ence. But as aotualized, it exists and has become necessary, aDd has no t.race of possibility. As possible it waan't; as ex­l~ ting it is necessary. To imagine it as still possible, we must include the possible unchanged still in the middle of the thing, and this is 8. trick of the lmaglna,tlon. The unrealized possible survives its actualization. Avarrhoes says: all this is absurd. I£ a thin is necessary, it is in no sense possible. - at is necessary is in no way possibility; ~here there is possibility, the being contains, beyond its own lli~ture, something possible from the point of view of another nature. i'he Heavens are neoessary-as ~egards their own being, the possibility of motion in spaoe remains'as an extrinsic possibility. Avicenna held the 18 wrong ioea of the heavenly bod~es, Dispute 5, loco cit. AV9rrhoes identified jvlcenn~ts ac~t~ine: the newness ascribed by rQlig10n to the orld is the sa~e kind of newness 8s0rlbed to tho world by Avicenna' doctrine. ~V~CO~llk~ wantsu philosopbical'surrogate for oreation. Averrb.oes had e;reat lnsieht. He sees a Ik~ philosophio~l surrogate for creation. Avlcenna's God has not even an essenoe, yet God does not create the world, It only flows from Him. But. Averrho13S finds GOrleth.ing like creation -- there is nei~ess 1n vieenna's world. The happenings are necessary, it 'is true, but there remains novelty, a,nd this is intolerable for • a. philo~01')hy of concepts.. ..otlan ha!:! no begilMing nor end, thou~~ Inotions may seem to begln and end, for menion implies a before and an after. All motions ofoelestial bodies alid all motions c~used by tbem, are a single motion whose sum total rmnains the same. "As movoments have nor boginning nor end, If 60 all events ho,va neither. ..\11 tha.t is is and nothing is ever chanced.. _othing 1s unpr'edicte..blc here; such a \<lOrld is proof a.gainst n ''I11eSS, just like ponoza' S \ororld. Some bei11Gs a.re nQ.turalljr eterna.l, an.Cl, they malta up the divine world. I'he others are subject to cha.nGe, but they don't count; they only pel'petu.e.te the species, r,hich is eternal, unche.ne;eable, etc. The world he.s al1,'aye been just '\'1'hat it is. F.,'-i6n knowledge has always been v;hD,t it is. The intellectual differences have no other causes a.nd no Qth r importance than the di:rfel"'e~B of bodies which reoeive the emanat~ons. ~Inen a philosopher cles, philosophy remains, both in the intelllo ence and in other philosophers •. r otr..1ng is lost: the divine mes3B.ge may be blurred at times, but it never will p8rmanently be lost. All truth, goodness, etc, are immortal, though man ~s wholly ffiprtal. Truth etc. are mo~e e8mnently in tho h1eher intelligences, and still more eminently in the Pure Act. The world is one solid block of tnt lligible necessity, hence it always ls. -- This is a perfect. example of an eXistentially neutral untverse. .. The j"!oslem divines the~selves ha.ted Averrhoes. Spinoza, \'Iho is a Cartesian v~rrho1st, sot into the same trOUble. In a relig1ouo world~ thereJ is ne~mess, there is creation and re-creation tl~ough grace. But a paradox: that men could believe as 01~istians and think as Averrhoists. This isa crucial 0x~erimento .. SIGm OF BRABANT was not only a Christian, but also, circa 1270, a !laster of Arts in the Univ01'sity of Par'is. .he Parisian J.aster of Arts had nott lng to do with th00logy; he \-Tag to teach ~\ristotle from the Logic to the Ethics. But 1270 is a late date. dence 3iger could not avoid taking into account history. He thought That Averrhoes was ristotle was Truth. But he lmew A·ricenna. Albort, and St. Thomas. This accounts for his decision about ~th !etaohysic§.: ie., being as being as object of metaphysics. His first questions is: whether in created things ens or esse belong to the ess~nce of creatures or if it is something added to essence. ObViously the question was widely disoussed; its be1ng in the flrst ~)laoe Shm-IB i ts vitality. Between 5iger and Averrhoes there iB Aquinas. 8iger cannot be satisfied to oppose 19 Avic~nna 'iith ttverrhoes, but he must, tny'n Averrhoes ugC1.lnst St. 'l'homas. S1ser S9.ys th~t there 1 s a certain a.mbign1ty in the question. Averrhoes vIS.S r1.e;ht in this, that :the notl.on of the 0.istinction is rellg1ou3 and tied up 'with the notion of cre~ti0n. If created, the world is new, and existence is distinct. A3 compared "lith ito idee. in God, ex;LstEH1Ce happens to the ,'rorl'.· Croatures do not ,exist ou.t of' themsel~ves; they mre 1t to God -­t: l1s 18 w1an1mous~.y held emd necessarily 80. 1'he only way to say this is: their o\·m heing is not something tha.t belongs to them per se,. but is glven to them from the only Being 'ler so -- God. Hence in ~ll 6hristian thought, no cre~ture is in its own riGht. Hence in all Christl~.n t.hout3ht there must 'bo .!!.2!!l.2 distinction between their aBsence and existence. If this be true: should not all haye taught the real distinction? Nor so; the.problom of the r~al distinction 13 ·dlffer,,:nt, it is philosophical: '\.'Thether in a creatsd be]_ne;, '!tln.!.le it. is. there is a distinct act of existence. On this point theologians do not agr~ee. !~any medieval theologl&ns had never thought of it. If as a philosopher, a particular thinker profeGses the distinction, as a theologian he will ~ee this as &. SUfficient and. 'lltim' te root of distinction 'bet"reen God and creature. But those who rio not ad.i'TI.it thl s dlstinction will f1.nd manJT other clistl.flctiona. Bence, if a theologian toa.ches ~.t, it is because he is convincsd of it as a l?hilosopher. Hence" 1t 1s not ilJlpoged by revelf:l.tion as SUCh. It is not sufficient if Ne find a man saying tru~t created being is received. -- In those doctrln3s rhich hold the c.istinction, it is ufled to dlfferentiute God and creature. ""'igE)!' cCl1clu.des: yOll hold the distinction to distinsuish God from cree,t.ure; I can do it ,~ther-~lis""; hcnee it 1s not necessary. Siger 13a.Js: "Gome sa.y a thing is in Virtue of somethins a&Jed, honce is not the thin ; therefore esse 18 added to essenGe. This is the opir~on of Albert, based ,on the Libel" de Causls, bee .use it is said that bein s owe thLir exi8tenc~ to God. If Albert r.ally tuugb.t this (Prof. -llson doe8n't think so)hs didn't do it fa!' thi/3 re!J.son. pra.ctica.lly £.111 theolo,';lans admi t a distinction of reason, but not in· the thinG; since "re can concsive the thing G,B non-existinG, hence l,le can separate essence frmp. existence. 1'hEl distinotion of rel.".son 1s founded on this possib!lity. -- The same confusion occurs at tre el1d of the quest.ion; Siger says: "ev'erything t .at is besidos the .trst is .corrmosed, 9.:0.d this has been the nain reason for Brc-ther ~ I . Thomas i,e., othervIise St. Tr..o"11a.s couldn t see hoi" creatures are-not God. Brother Thom.g,s concluded that. the oEly composition that i'laS available was t.hat of ·e13Gence a.nd existence, und so the distinction of Cod and c!'ea.tu!'a ':l:LS safe. 8i .Jer says we could also rea.son thus to ffiBtter ~nd fo~~, or we could admit in creatures a. ::ntxture of potency and act; henoe Brother Thoma£! h, s no reason to rasort to the real distinction. T~~e, the difference in simplicity must be explained. Fa.:1.thful to Aristotle and. verrhoes, cli er thinks that a.11 beings are necessary. ThE: difference cannot lie in ~ thin3s are, but in what they are. God is Pure Act, thin8s participate in aot. ~participation is always of dift'erent degrees. 'rhe essences of things npDroach more or less to Pure _ ct, just as numbers differ in their relation to unity. 20 . The lack of simplicity in all creatures is due to the amount of potency that sp~cifies their act. A purely spiritual substance 1s & s01f-sub~1stin3 act 'of thought, but 1s not fer th~t God. Cod is scli'-su slst n8 ·ho\.te;ht. But all othors - allud a _1"'1mo 1ntelllgit or speciem quod est allud ab ipso ~ 'fhe aetuallty of' subs nce is the actuality of be.lne-; 3.8 such. . l-lre fOrJ'l'G, or com_ osltea of' "'OrIn ana. u· t,ter -- in both C3."'CS su stances are in v:rtu9 of their fOr-ill j t~ ere is nothing f-~:oove' that act 't'lhi eh 1s f-:>!'m. Eence, :the \ihole being is account for b;'l the acti1ality of form. . Sie;or thlru~s t'ld.'t. Albert \..m.~ Y':l'c:ht in Baying that all creatu os are per aliud, but the ero~turc can atil1 be being per se, since qua subst!:l.i'lce, a bein ~ i E} a se, ex sa, ,~t per :::;e, that 'Thich it is. Albei't YlGuld say: it 1sn't the cC:.lee of its own being. ~lrue, says 113e1', but it i8 e.till :r;>er se. The cl"'eature, in t1:e order of .efficient causality, 1s per al1ud; but in tho order of forma.l causallty, ..,,,.hieh is 1,vlmt counts, sl_~bstanee 13 pC3r see .I\.lbort thus confused efficient and rornal ce,usality. But Bre'Ghar Thomas is "!oree.· 3ubst&nces OViG their be1nr; toanohher, and in 8u~stance itself there is room for existence. hom~s d09cm't v/ant exi st 'nee to be sUbsta.nce, but of a· 8ubsta,11.ee, ie, e. principle '!:Ihieh ,\-;,,':J.en pl~e8ent in a. E;ubstanco rna.kes it to be, ~h:ch 12 UlUlecessary. Thomas docs realize that vieenna was ul'ong in m..1::in- existence to be an accident; but if it 1s n~ither ace1 . ent or sUbstance,. then -.'That is 1t '? \11tho'llt whitene88 there is no conceptua.l intelligibility. _he very notion of a hi3her-thc.n-\'1hatness-principle vanishes: the peak of reality is r08.11ty, c.nd th.:;U6h c;. 1'"'ea11ty I is yet a.n wh~.t. .\ristotle' s God 1s e. what. 1here 1s r~oth1ng above 8ubstance; nothin:-; 3.bove· ~Thatness. However deeply and keenly one looks, ono cannot see beyond hls O\'1n position. S15er asks "what is existence?" r-lT'..d here s of CO'd.ree ca:rmot answer. Thomas had tried to '''oint 1tout, and. so hL1,d to usa words ....hich mean "aon.ething" a.n.o. "....'ho..tness. II So Thomas looks as if he were tryillg to deflne existence. As- a rnattG!' of fact he in9J:'ely poin·\is to it, but if the onlool::c!' sees th_s as a definiti9n, he sees a mess. Sigor signalizes a text which if it were a definition would be a beaut: ~uotin3 Thomas berna.t:m: !lesse is something superadded to the essence of a thing, thgt dcos not 'belong to essence, yet 1s not an cccldent, but eOL,ethir~G superad'- ad, quasi conatituitur per principia easenti9.c. tI Esse io n.ot a11qu1d, ana it is ~10t t:i:'ile to say ~ II non pertinens ad.. essentia!n Y t. '11homas ahould helve added "quao3sentiam. I' And if 1 t d.eesn' t belong, ho\'l is it qllasl-ccnst':ttutad by th'3 principles of the essen.ce, wl-..1ch ar'(~ matter) forM, and e.ccident. !3ut ThOlTJ"S dayz it is not an ~ccident; he can't say it 1s matter, because matte:r is pot,;;mey; a_~d ce.J:1't say it is form, because then it wouldn't be superadded --- Siger scores~ 'l'l1is is Itjonere qua:ptam ll2.turan in entlbus. f/ For an Averl"holst Aristotellan, this is too mUCh. Thom~s pretends to oe en Aristotelian, but talks about eO!l1etl~ing that isn't in A istotle. -- lcloreover, llquasi constitutitur Pter .'pr~nciplall -- if this'r"means "not really'l then nothlne; is said; J.f it means "really" then matter and forL1 are principles of aub­st~ nce, Rn there i8 no room for exist~nce. 'he constituent prlnclple8 of reality make up existence -- then existence is meaningless. \ 'fuat the principles constitute 1s tho-thing, and onoe it 1s constituted. ·why do we need an existence'? The existence of reality i8 -identical with reality. Ens des1grmtes what is; res designates the habitual possession of being. BeinB and th1n5 are 21 not synonymous, but signify the same thine:. 'rhing is being, and b::dng 18 t:r_in~. Av:1.cenna t\scribed a distinct '3soence to '.'1hut is but a modo of sig:nlflcet10n: essentia p!'iI.8, 'il;y- is the posEem-:1o:.1. of being or real1ty as' 1t actuall':i J.8; esse si31~ificat e8sentL?m :;:>er nodum r ctU8 j11ax1rrfl. Hencs Sigel::' is 8~111 Aristotelian, e.nd he turns do\om 'L'homas as a. vel'bal illusion. Christ1f'.n theol.ogies havo eX';)l"essed themselves a.nd their philosophi'9s in thA 1ancuo.ge of !rlstotlo, eB ~Giall:t qt. 'I'hor:V.l.8 11"'8 dORe this. J.'hi3 has dc~olv~d histori~ne into thi~~ine r~m and them to be Aristotelians, ~~tfirft.i.J!:i.a-r Iimli~ ~i11at 'allo"lred ct. r~.'ho!:.1a.s to ts.Jlc .....1th ;\"9y'rhoes and company 'l'fas thHt the~r 'lvere concerned vlith the SC\ltle reality I?n<1 the sa.me vi· ....olS a.bout it. BU.":'; the world .ltf .!\.r1stotle 1s wrl.C'll;:r innocent of exint.-:mce, a:1.d in it ,creation h~s no sense. Yet the author of it is still its prime mov0r, ~nd in this sense its prime makoE. Hence, the notion of craation is [l. key 'problem. If God ~-{e!'e on1.y a pri:"ne mover, he would not be a. metaphysical cause. God. is ce.u. e; He 18 cause of tho verJ being of things: they O~'Te God their beine;. ..An Aristotelian ou.:~ht not to pray, but he OUgl:-r0 to praiB8 (lad: there 1s an c.verr!:loistic piety ,.8 co:ntemplFtion of the self-subsiste!lt. ~til:l., this is not 0. created univerae; th'? nod of A!'lstotle c01lld.n I t give everything: Fie could g~.ve per,.•anencjT. Because He j.G 8ub,stantL.l e,ct, Hia actue.lity j.s seJ.f-cont.s,lned; ~ hat happens outside 11m is n.ot rlue to His love, but to tI10 love of other tih.in.-es for. HiLl. The other pure ;),cts love Eir..1; th"y Hre r"oved. by their (~esire, CI.ncl since this' (~slre eteT'll::tlly touches ffi3.tter, thii1ge eternally fa.ll into plaoe. B 10'.'" the gods aY'a the 111-.... t "'11ig1ble rea11ties which need. L.le,teria.l ::: l_pport; S~)eCL3t:. ~\.e forms, they are eternal, but theJ' run through a!1 lni'inite numoer of indlvidua1s. Speicles uses indlvid.ua.ls in or(ler to last; it is the true ree,lity. All here o·'reB c.l_ to the :P:!"lme r'!o·ver (;'.11 thE'.t which is in 80 fp',r- El.S it 18; the ,.,or-Id owes everything ~pt existence. This world has no history, becR.ufJ0 it he s no novolty. -- As late as the 17th c0ntury, the world of Averrhoas hl?s not ch.?nseo.; the AVel'T'no1sts could. only 60 on re~ oe.ting them­selves. This world h~_s resisted Christianity in asser.tine con­tin2':\ nce in t~/in~ and freedom in. man; Avel'rhoism has brancled Christianity us e, my~~h; 1t h!~9 even 0p90aed science •. • But -1e' have not yet exhausted the sv.rl'o(jD. tes of existence • A?ICB'.NNA: Aristotle had said: w~at truly is in a thlneis the substance and in it the rona. Actua_ reality is SUbstance; tne form ig that which is in what trUly is. To deny t. e matter-form co~position ia to turn Aristotle's world into SUbsisting Platonic ideas. But this can be avoided somewha.t. The truay real is form; hence we can say that'form is theobject of meta,hysics. Just rei~~orce the form with a small dose of Platonimn: this turns it into essence. In Aristotle himself, the form is o~~(~, which means reality or substance, but also the trUly real. Form is n~ture as the source of operations. Form~ is essence as the intelligible. Whether 01" not there be any thing unintelligible, we can only stUdy the intelligible. '''/hen Form is essence, then substances oan be hand.led as a rlatonlc world 1s he.ndled. iihen Pla.tonism 22 1s hybridized, it tends back to its original purity. This 1s what ha.o happened to Avicenna and his doctrine of essence. His influence goes very far. ' . Essences are either in things or in the intellect. For this reason they ha.ve 3 apsects: first, essence in itself, as unrelated to thi~ and intell~ct; second, essence in things; third, essence present to intollect where it receives such aaa1«ents as predication,. illlive~saLity, etc. Logica t, ch. 1. This is a queer division: epsences are either in things or in the mind, and then "also in themselves." If essences are only when in thingo or in a mind, then wher.9 are they lIin themselves"? The problem seems insoluble; essence is.a neutral reality, floatln8 between tllings and the mind, yet never losing their privilidged position 'as in themselves. Essence in themselves do not exist, this is Avicenna's fir&t point. But the3-stage business is something else; any essence has 2 modes of existence, yet it is the same from the vie1~oint of definition. If there are no things, things can still be conceived, B,t least :By God, as possible. Hence, an essence is unrelated to things or mind. AviceIlll8. turns a psychological doctrine into a philosophical one. After saying they are only in things or minds, he then considers what they . would be without either -- an illusion, but resting ultimately on Platonism. Essences are the ghosts of Platonic ideas; they are abstractly nesessary, irresistible, immutable, etc -- and b'ing is selfhqod. A curious type of being - esse essentiae, which is not a being of existence: esse existence, yet is still a beir~, the kind that belongs to essence as such, even when not actualized either in things or in mind. rf there are such things, esnences are themselves; each is exclusively that which it is. They cannot be composed viith each other.; eg., human intellect cannot be the substantial form of its body, because an essence must remain what it is. And not only essences, but properties are incommunicable. Each is an unbreakable block of intelligibility. Hence eBsenc~s must be neutral with respect to nll deter.minatio~s. Of itself, an essence is neither singular nor universal; but indifferent. As form of an indiVidual, it is sin§ular; in the mind, it can be universal, Logica III, folio 12r. Animal is in itself something, and that ii>remains the same, whether it is said of an animal in the world of sense, or as an object in the mind. Of itself, it is neither universal nor singular. If it were universal of itself, there could be no singular animals ••• If on the contrary, anioal were singUlar qua animal, there could be only one a:h1mal, and nothing else could be animal. Thus, in itself, animal is nothing more than this intellection in thOUght: animal: et secundum hoc non est nisi animal. But if it 1s conceived as univers~l or singular, we are thereby conceiving something accidental to animal." Therefore animality in itself is itself, ~nd everything else 1s accidental. In his Netaphysics tract 5, ch. 1, fol 86v he says: "The definition of equinitas lies outside the definition of universality, nor is universality in the definition of equinlty, for its definition does not need it. Undeipsa equinitas non est. aliquldnlsi equin1tas tantum. Of itself, it 19 neither many nor singular, nor does it ·exist either in things or in the SOUl, and not one of these determinations which it could be said to be is in its essence either in act or in potency. Because it is equinity only, onness i8 a property which when superadded makes it to be one. ~~d besides, equinity has many other properties. , Since many horses share its definition, equin1ty is common; as in singulars it is singular. Equin1tas ergo in sa est equin1tas tantum." This is a racIly neutral essence. This gives a world of things, which though necessary in its cause, was yet possible in itself ..en while it still exists. Qua eosence it is not existins, just as it is neither universal nor singular. ..~t happens to it oas not change it. Of themselves, essences are nor; and nothing in them calls for existence. The First alone is necessary; then He t uly is, and so is truth in virtue of necessity. But no essence h .... s either existence or truth _etaphysl cs tract 8, ch. 6. "The other essences (besides God) do not deserve to be. As in themselves, and apRrt from the Recessary, they deserve priv~tion. -- to Him alone they owe their certainty. In his 'sight alone thsy are (based on Koran 28, verse 8)'Everything is perishable except his face.{) Averrho8s caught the reference. The accidentality of oneness and existence. Onssess inseparably follows SUbstance, and can'ot exist apart from th,t of which it is predicated. Y t oneness does not enter any definition -- it 1s neither g~nus nor difference of any substance; hence it must be an aocident. A vt~ry special aooident. The substano~ is the substance as individual. An inseparable accident, but since it is an ad ition to the notion of substance, it remains an accident. This is complete replacement of being by concepts which are essences which are things; from this arise'the "forme.lities" of Scotus. The ssme holds for existnce. "Being" lito belt -- is neit:er genus nor differneee; "manit is a com. on essence, ,,'hi en happens to be in one or another. "Natura homlnia, ex hoc quod est homo, accidit ut habeat esse." Metaphysics t-r. 5, c11.. 2.' Avlcenna does not use the term accident, b~t says: accidit essenti~e. Not as being .an does man r..ave being; so being must be superad.ded to mRnness. Hence, the exteriority of beln with re~peot to essence. Ess~ence is the buildin3 material: add existence, O~'1.e8S, eto; te.ke them awa.y, it is still essence, Arguemtn of • verrhocs rests on ithe assumption that vicenna thinks for himself, and does not follow Aristotle. This is tnlej he was trying to say sonethins new and true. In an actualized possible, existence was inseparably united to It~ yet since actual being is primarilylts essence, it hE.s its its eXistence; it is not it. ~ere it its exist~nce, it would have no essence -­notionalism. Once existenoe is excluded, when reality is parcelled out among abstract notions, then an "ctual being does not really exist. An essence may have &xistence. 0 true is t.his"tha.t the Necessary Being, who is in virtue of His own necessity, is ~~s o~m existence, henoe he had no essence: "Primus i 6itur non habet qUidditatem" Metaph. 5.4 It can't be both ways: if "lod is existence, he cannot have essencej if He ~~d an essenoe, the essence would have existence, then God would be a possible not entailiI13 exlstence. (Kant's argument against hhe ontological urgummnt is based on the ,same reasonine;.) :~ence, the absmute priority of essence in the created world. God is pure eXistence, but He keeps it to Eiroself. ~he distinotion of being and essence is so insuperable th tif God hasan ess~nca, He canlt be being. St. Thomas says that in Him, essenc and existence are identicalj hence, Av1cenna is a prefiguration of 'rhomisI!l in appearance only. -- The First is Pure Act of ~xistence. ach finite thing dces exist and is a compound of essence and existence; hence there is no devaluation of being. Yet, AVloenna's disciples tend to fight Thomism. Hence ~ we must asks in what sense is it true that Avicenna's God is I existence? The necessary being ca~~ot not be; it .is the cause of all else by iill. The first is fill, nd - Iso Thought, All the possibles a.re unity in Him. Only in the 'irst Intelligenoe do the ~ossibiles ,ultiplyj the essences coincide with pure possitl1ity. Esoences here are their lack of existence. °ere, is a First who is ·.Jill gIld Thought. , melted into ..1.xistence; e T is Absolute Hecessity. Each ex'stC'nce is but a moment of the necessity of t.he '--'irst. Possibility is not necessity, .for necessity is God. The God of Avioenna is Existonce in the Bense of necessity, He must be, He is bound to be, and so are all thinGS, beoause they merely share in His necessity. Essence is innocent of eXistence, and vice versa. This is a new situation, <: nd 1':e are still en"'ag'""'d in it. Essence h d meant the.t· which ~o be mea.ns. Essence he.d not broken from its root: being. ;But when we spea of an ~s ence, \"19 mean samet'.lne; '1hi~h c""uld as w'ell be as not. " _:ssentia ce.n nO'l.v meLn that '{rhlch can receive esse. The accidental in Avicenna. is not the contingent; hence ca~o the.notion of essence as a mere possible which was n ciessar,y in the mind of God. ~rom 1277 on, thiA notion was condemned. After thrt, Christians have tried to blow ~·~.rt the Greco- oman­Arabian necessity. Ockham freed God from neces~ity by denying all essences anYWhere; no essences in thinJ8, no ideas in God. ·If·there arees~enc-s,· then God isn't Hlmi-' ty, thouc;ht Ockham. Another m~n tried also to break up Greco- abian noces~ity, not by annihilating eS8snces, but by taking fullest adbantage of their ex! st ential neutrality. . The ~QOTIST definition of essence io like that of Avioenna. Yet from the beginning there is & difference in terminology, which indicates a metaphysical realism. that is, the tendency to use "nature" instead of "essence. II This na.ture is of itself indi.fferent to univorsality, . which it gets in intellect, as well as particularity, when it is in matter, and singularity, when it receives its "thisness. This 1s a more complex situation, but fundamenta.lly the same. Of itself, equin1ty is neither a horse' nor a concept; equin1ty is equinity only, Opus Oxoniense (0.0.) 2.3.1.7. Where is -this COl'!l.l on nature? T:lha.t kInd of being has it? At ita origin, it hus being as the object of the Divine !lnd. This nature does not subsist by itself; the Divine Ideas are God; but, as object of the Divine! ind, .they have the being of an object -- esse intellectu~ Such a baing is purely intelligible. All together they are present to the Divine ~ind. Let us watch one of them being turned into a creature. If God is to create it, it will be an affect of 4is infinitely free will. I'ecessity is broken down -- God is infinita qua Being, and ~{1s free '/ill is infinite. For God, His Ideas ~re just ideas; their existence in Him is His own existence; of themselves they are not even possible. His iill first selects among these ideas the ones that will be created -- these, then, are the creabilla." Creability makes an idea to p9come a possible, for an idea is not a possible. This choice of an idea for actualization is by God's Free Will. The possible is thu~ related to eventual creation. Qua essence, ideas are not possibles; hence SCOtU6 esoapes the chain of essential I 25 'I' necessity. This is what is meant by saying that God makes the possibles. Then the Will presents these creab~ilia, and these possibles have their bei~ as possibles. A possible is not nothing, because it 16 possible; hence it must have some being I~n abridged crraduced being, ens diminutum. This is the common ~ nature, indifferent to univeroality and singular~ty. Creation is the act by which this possible becomes actuul. Hence there is no distinction ot essence and exis~ce. , Being 1s univocal; being 1s alwa.ys determined by the actu.al state or condition of easence. Lychetus says: it is contradictory for an essence to have its being of possibl~, and not to have,the existence ot its beitlg of o6siblej in so far as it is, it exists. Just as essence c~nnot have its actual being of essence without haVing its actual existence. Existence is merely the modality of essence. Its existero is just datel'mined as is e5sence. ifuen 'an essence is in time, so is existence. Sssence in its actual being 1s the same as in its exist nee. An essence-in its real and actual beIng cannot be iistinct from its existence. The 6ssenne of man is prior to its existence, for a thing is 'prior to its intrinsic modG. Through the definition of a thin, its existence can be proven. Lychetus on 0.0., 2.3.1.7. Existence is the mode of being which belongs to an essence as being. The problem of individuation. 'Scotus attacks someone who says: material substances, are individuated by 'I'Jheir esse, their ultimate act which is esse' existentiae. But being is indeter :ined, hence the baing of 0xistenC"e cannot determine anything. The foroe' of the answer depends on the fact. that existence depends on essence. Hence, to order existences, this must mean that they are so ordered by essences. If God's existence is above others, it is because of essence, but we can order essences by themselves; hence the order of eSFences is indipendent -- from genus on tpp to most special species and the i div dual. This last implies eXistence, bl.!.!:- only because an essence completely deten ined thereby -t 1s, ~nd.: so exists. The relation beti'leen existence and its ­determinln conditions? There is a rare text: 0.0. 2.3.3.2: "'here remains a dis'tinction between essence andex1stence, quae est o.liquo modo accidentali s, licet non si t vel"e accidentalis. But: 0.0. 4.13.1.33: Fals~~ est: esse est aliud ab essential And in 00:-4:"43.1.7 "Scot.us says he can't unclerstand the real distinction •. God 0Y~£~~1!Les the n cessity of_the }2oss1bles, ~in~e J!~~ 11;1- is tho_~ause 9~ thei~ very possibility. EVen possibi;ity Is contingent. Yet Scotus has the same genoral notion o~ essence as Avicenna. Creation. St. Thomas, Sum, Theol, 1.45~6 ad ~ says that only God can create, because the effect is infinite, because esse is produced. cctus a~gues quite differ0ntly: God alone can Icr~ate, not because God alone can give esse. To be an ~ctually - existing thing is to be an actually complete essence. But such a completely actual essence is produced in all efficiency QQ. 4.l.1.~· To make somet_ ing is to give esse. \'ihat about the chaa.'Il between exlstGnce and nothingness, which St.• Thomas speaks of? scotus also believes that the distance between God and creatures is infinite, because God's essence is infinit.e and creatures are finite. t the distance between finlta being and nothing is not infinite, ~or the distance cannot be greater than the being is. But the dj,ste.nc¢ between essence and nothing is the distance between that "quantity tl of being and nothing, that is, finite. "Non plus deficit nihil ab ente quam ens illud ponit.' In,ScotuB, ths creation of a finite effect does not prove infinity of its cause. If to'be is to be its own essence, then the distance L), "1t, l/ between it and nothing is equal to what this essence is. xistence is an intrinsic modality of essence, or gradUs in the Commentator,s. In Avicenna, a possible is a being in its u~timate actualization. Existence is an "accident of essence, since it 1s an intrinsic mode of that essence. IIAccidemt ll means that 0xiste,nace is extraneum quid.ditati" Scotus-Di1ucidatus of Anthony of Brindisi, ..:Japles, 1607. he Existence of God. Anthony of Brindisi, loco cit. says: first, essence is.a ~ture in itself, while existence is a mode ha . ening to creat.ures. Second: since it i.s. n creatures a mode, it doee not belong ~o a nature and so makes no difference; it 40esn't alter nature. Third: bet~ecn. the real beinG of essence D.nd t,he real being of existence thGre is a priority of nature. fheUgh ~~tures ca~~ot be but in individuals, yet the being ot the common nature is prior to anI existi~ individual. Foux'th: ,bet\'leen ··ne real being of essence and the real oe~ng of existence there is an o!~er of perfection; the former is more perfect: qUia osse essentiae perfections •.. quod esse exlstentiae est quodda..rr. accident Ie nabtmae. l ' In 00••1.2.lJ.4, Scotus says;. Existence est de quidclitate assentIa'e dlvinae. If one knoHs the OS'Jence of Aod, ie, this here divine Essence, he \'1111 knO\'1 that He exists, qUia null! alii perfcctius convenit quam huie. vicenna's God had no eosence, so as not to ·become a possible. <jcotus' God is as enee, this essonce, 1:-ith all its determinr.tions, end so exists. But we have to prove this. \~'e must work through essence. -Hence, Scotus' demonstrations are apriori~ There is a first in all orders. 'rhe first in all orders tranocellds all limits. Hence ....inflnl~e ••••mp.BB~.iNWE."tim••, because of His primacy 8.nd transcend.ence. But the absolute iri.fl ty of bcin' must exist. God is a possible essence ( that is, first and infinite}, ane th~s possibility entails existonce, because the infirJ.ty of possibility exists. First, God is an cosence, then first, thon, infinite, thenco!!lpletcly determined. In.finity is to be understood as a mode of the entlty.befo~o we can realize "''''It its thisness. c..3ch essenc'3 has an existence prOlJOrtioned to r his Being. God ia an essence, first, infinite; therefore He Is Ithis; thel"cfore He exists. 1-od's ~i tence is for Hi!!l to be this com£letely determin~d thing. There is an act of form -- In st. Thorn s it is act, not form, . fit 1s esse; in Scotus, it is thinne enot a form. It ust ~akes ... a thl" fit to ex1.8t. Existence is the kind 0 being e. compIetoly . --* determined essence..has. FranQois de .myronnes: lithe mode of reEl.llty or existence" is third among the modalities of God's o3sonce; Quaest••uodlibet. . 3, a.7. uGod's infinity precedes His existence and actuality. God's infinity precedes his Thisness. The Divine Sin5ularity pr~cedes His ex1.ste;J.ce." a 14th Century commentator • .\ntoll.1o Trombeta., De Formalitatibus (16th C.) If Some say in God 6xist",nce is of the quiddity of His essenoe, cum quiiJUs non convop.1o. For t .ose lfho 88e God face to face, in one concept they see both existence and esse:lce; but ,,,rhi1eboth are grapped yet in God Eimself, His existence 1s modally distinct fron His quiddity ••• Infinlty itself in Scotus is a mode. Now, if infinity, vlhi ell is more interior to essence th.an e:{is'" ence, is i taclf a mode ••. the sS.mo holds true of somethinG more removed from the essence, as Scotus admits existence ls.1/ I 27,1 SUAREZ did not follow Avlcenna and cetus. After teaching for years, he \'Trot,e hl.s lectu:!'es. Ao 0. theolc51an he ru:"d been using philosophical principles without clearing them up. So he wrote the l)i8putati~:me8 deto:ohysicae. These occupy a peculiar place. As a.isputntlones, thoy are of the lddle .i~ees; like works of' that period, they relate, compare, Bnd criticize op~iona. But ,the' work resomb~es a modern work, not only, in be1n3 purely philosophical, but also because it breaks fro. the order of Aristotle, to discuss the res ipeae, j!..sP. 2, proem. Amon3 t,hoee t111ngs to be discussed, the first 1s being. Beins, ens,has been taken as a participle or as a noun. Ens te fro~ Sl~, as exlstens from existo. Sum is a verb \'Jhich always aigi1.if188 actual existence and all-rays includes its own present participle, as: quidnm ~st eans quidam est ens. Ihis is why, 1n ita priuu\ry acceptation, it seems to have reeant anything actual. Later, it ca.1e to point out pOBs.1bles. 2.43. In the second sense, ens becomes a noun; ~ich means a real essence. 'I'his is an lmporte.nt notton. By it, Suu.rou means to designate such essences as are not arbit.rary products of' thought, thLt is, not self-contradictory, not ,'eigned, but c8.~able of existence. 2.44; 2.48. Avicennan a,ivorce is no lorlger to be feared" 11' essences are real, as aptae ad ex18tend~~. ~ssence therefore regains its intrinsic relation to esse. There is nc reason to·worry about the twofold meaning of being: actu~l and psssiblej this does not make it eqlivocal. There are not two concepts of actual and possible, nor yet a common concept, blenulng them. It is a single' concept in t,'1O different degrees of precision. 2.48 "Indeed, if it 1s used as a noun, ens is wLat has a real eSQence, presc1ndlng from $,ctual existence, neither 9Ke.a.ud.ing nor denying >It. If So . the vlcennan easence is coming in. Essence does not deny existence, but merely leaves it ffilt of account, by precislva abstraotio, by pr0visory ~emoval. "But taken as Do participle, ens is a rea~ b9il~, havi real essenceand actual existence, and thus signifies being in a more contra.cted and restricted sense. If 'rhis means that actual being is a restricted are~ or being at large. This means both actual aId . osslble bein, ure th~ samebelng. Actuallty i6 ·,ooited as a particular case of possibility. The nature of real essence plays. a dec1sive part • .o.!.Jssence does not ccue first in t.hE? order of origin; not in essences dces actual being lie. But in the order of dignity ar~ primacy, essence comes first among the objects of the mind (cf •. c,cotus) because essence of e. thing is \lhat belongs to it in the first place 2.4.14. Essence makes a thinu a being and precisely thi s being. As aal~ing a thing to be what it is, aesence is quiddity; as confa:r:-ring actual' being, it assumes name. of essence. Real baing is an essencej actual being is an essence actualized by its cause. The essence from the point of view of operation is nature. 2.4.5 How are we to defin e the relation of essence to its existence in actuul things? In the Preface, Suarez presents himself as a theologian vlho wishes to analyze his philosophy. He seems to know the whole set-up, entirely. But he is too just, too l!1oderate j from his mo/deration he is usually right; but somotimes ho is content with a. near miss. -- In this problem , he finds mwwwwwiNe&w••M three solutions:: roeal, Ll0dal,' and ra.tional distinctions. SUr.rcz asserts that the ; "real d_ctinc'tion 1s com only assumed to have been the opinion of st • .1.DOm"S, nd most of the ancient 'rhomists hold it. ' 31.1.3 28 This last comment is almost tautolo~cal. This actual distinction Slt&rez desifIlates by t.he term "real. II; he d.oes not use the words of 84 •.Thor.w,s, but of \....iles of Home, "iibose terminblogy obscured 'I'homas. "i\. real distinction :weans that e;;cistence is a res, wholly and really distinct from the entitas of created essence tl 31.1.3. ithout pressing the matter unduly, one lllRy suspect that t!l1s formulation may have influenced his solution. A created essence, once it is posited in act out of its c~usos is no longer 'possible, as if t.here were two distinct thin3s: duo.e res seu duae entitates di~tinctas. 31.6.1. If this is the correct formula, Suarez can enly deny it. llristotle and Averrhoes had said: there 1s no difference bet11een being man and ma.n. In philosophy, Aristotle and Averrhees weigh more than 'vicenna and ~quinas. But Suarez had his own reasons also. The d.ispute looks like a logical game, ea.ch side trying to 'ShOl.y that tho' other malces a: logical blunder. In so far as 103io is concerned, one oan be faultlessly right 6.8 ·,lell· us faUltlessly wrong. ine eter!"..al debate is obscured by this. ero important is the notion of bein involved. If it is actual being, it ie that beine ~hlch, once a possible~ is now an actual being·through its cauzes. That being is now an actaalized essence -- the esse actualis essentiae (cf. cotus). Suarez asks: if in order actually to be, an actu2l es~enoe still needs the e~plement called existence? Cf course not. Let us poslt un essence, eg, ~an; since this is not contradictory, nor feigned by ir.laginatien, it ·1s possible. If it i6 only pos~ible,lt lacks actuality and so does net exist. But if it is an actu~lly realized esence, what doee it la.c,;: in order to exist? Esse_oe is either actual or .1:.08 ibIs; tlo ctunl Dxists, the possib,le does not. "hen an es senee 1s a. vel" Bctu ens, it OJdst:3. Being 1s thus identified with essenco. Hence, Suarez conceives all actual beings a.s actual1 zed. essencef:. Then he won ers i hat actual eXistence would add to 'lctunllJ:ed essence. And this is the more absurd, in that existe4ce if: a tlUng. Hence, Suarez naturally parted company wi th .. ~quinc~s. Puarcz reo.liz3s that i;that makes actual essence different f. 'om nerel,V' possible ones is existenoe; he teRches that no finite essence exists.of itself~ Existence is the supreme mark of reality. A9tual rec.litp is eXisting reality. But the question is: isexietence a <iistinct act? Fer b'1n, existence 1s a formal mark'of reality. Existence is t~~t \;here~y formally and 1n r ns caT y a thing exists; althouGh existence be not a formal oause strictly, -it is nevertheless a formal and intrinsic constituent. His very comparison is suspicious: existence is a formal constituent of actual essence, as. personality is the formal constituent of the person. But personality is no cause at all •. F~istence thus 1s a property of actual things. Existence seems to add so much to possibility, ~nd yet 18 nothing. If God oreate~ something, He creates¢ an essence. ~.~at Suarez fails to see is that when God creates an essence. He does 'not give it the actuality of essence but another actuality which 1s existence. An essence is eternal and eternally deter~incd in the Bind of Goo. Creation does not actualize the essentiality of the essence, but actualizeo it in another onder. In the phrase: esse actualls essentiae,. actualis 1s misleadins: it cannot be the actualization ~ of the essence qua eesence. This is what philosophioal essentialism: doesn't let Suare. see. Ens actu idem est quod. eXistens,3l.l.13 I .~t is ens? If ens is essence. then actual essence 1s existing essence. But with what kind of act? If this is essential actuality, the essence ab·te.ys hIld it. If the act is beyond essenoe,then you I 29 enter another order. Ie a be*ng in aot only its essence? In a thing an essence iean aot through its own existenoe; in a mind, through the existence of t,he mind. But Sua.roz asserts it 19 in act throueh the essence 31.1.13. He 60~8 beyond ~cotus; ~e seems to have been f~i~~tened away from modality; pe didn't like existence coning later than other modalities in .GOO. ,So fr jTou put essence first, you can't have distinction. But why not put existence first? -- Suarez cOWlta Gcotists as upholdeY.'8 of a real dIstinction, because existence for theo is a.n aype~'1da6e of essence. Essentia in actu 1s all tha.t is needed for him. Suarez askss what does it m~an to sayan essence is, unless that an es_,ence exists.' "F'xiat$:' must a.pply to the thing, not to existence itself; hence, it,must apply to the essence. This-·:rneans that the essence is now' actual. Hence, what more does it need? uarez says that this argument ~.s apriol"i. -- This notion of being ha.s ,no room. for existence; h~ sees no need for a.n net, because beine; is ess<nce. If essence is the thing which just needs to be pro­duced, .then no act of exi stence is needed. -- Secondly, the reasons for the distinctioL are invalid, since without it he oan solvG those problems. (1) l Tot needed to eave distinction between God and creature. True, Suarez' nactualized essences are creatures. But it is the metaphysloa~ structure of bein~ which 1s at stake. (2) He says: possible beinE; is not eternal, since it ltsQlf 1e nothing; but t:l:'wn what '/fill be tho actualization of not~ ing? If esse~ essentiae 1s nothing, then the actualization of it· 1s nothinG. ~8scnce as essence is alw&ys actualizdd. Finite existence, says S1iarGz' opponent, is contingent, therefor's the distinction • .;u-t: says v uarez : I don't need it; actuc.lized ass .nces are truly created. But the question~ is: which 1s true? not: which 1s theologically correct? . ~{hy didn't Suarez see all this? Because he identified being with escence. Suarez influenced mcderna very ~~ch, first, the 17th Centur'y thinlr:e:i."s; then tr.rou[)h ~anu.a16 of "Schole.stlc pr.J.losophy." Kleutgen, vol. 2,., p.89-92·; Deccoqs, Institutiones Metaphysico.e, vol. 1, p_. ICO-IOI. t1 lfuat ens rcalo rr.eans ie ons, not a.s present participle, but as ~, noun, aB cQmethlnG that is essence. The rcot and in"{~crmost bottom' of' the actualit:r of the thine, thnt which is moet excellont' in thin3s •••• It fol1.ovTs from this, that in the Scholastics, the re.... l is not confused '/15.-th the actua.l; nor opposed to the ,L).csaib1e, for the rea.l is both actual and L)OSil1hIe, for, a.S Su.arez nays, 1ihGn vfe conceive a being as real, I'le do not ex­clude eXisteLce, nor incluue it, but we leave .existence out of consideration. Thus and only thus can finite beings become objeots of ocience. n -- The possible is Just as real !s the ectual. The real is not _the existing, nor o.s merely 'OSc' ible, for then \ire should have to exclude existence, and that would. be to flEmtion it·. :::;cionc~ needs t'lngs purified of existence. -- And. 0.11 this is dUe to Avicenr-lU, and probably dUG .l...ore to reason itself. "Re<..\,son rU3.c only cne means to account for what does not come from ltself, ~nd. thl.l.t is to reduce it tQ nothinG!less. II i'~e~rerson, 1.;0, deduction rt01ativiste. a. 2, 218,. and essentie,liam has done this by red.ueing exiotenco to nothing. 30 MODERN PHILOSOPHY brings new •••••••0.. episodes in the metaphysical radventU!'9A of being. Scholastic phllo89Phy died when it B .,hiloso·9h~r of nature had heen mistaken fOl" a. science of nature. The rise of matBSmat1calphyalca did not necessarily militate against substantial forms. lodern Bcience thousht it needed ~ purely extended world. Modern philosophy thOUght that therefore the world was just extension. The diVidinG line of med1eval,irom modern philosophy is not tllrough Descartes and Spinoza, but by the ti e of Hume it was here. iva seventeenth century tried to save whet could be saved; they ,took a lot for granted. Descartescomplalned that the Scholastics explained too' much, rlncipia I, c. 10. Explanptions of existence don't help in explaininG ~xistin3 things. (rhat is "'hat 1.s meant by sayinG that intorest had turned t<? science. '\{hen Descartes came· to eXistence, he took it for o;re.ntod. Descartes kne"r 8unrez, and for 11 time seoms to have owned a copy of his ",orks; it IS' Suarez whom he critices. 'fuen facin~ the problem ai' existence, Desca.rtes flatly denied the d.istinction, in the 5th ·!editatlon, Adam-Tannery, vol. 5, p. 5672 the notion of God necessarily entails existence, while that of creat~re does not -- but this is \-That all Chr.i stie.ns ad.rni t • As for further questions, a.bout a. dis­tinct act of existence, he denies them. In the business of matter and form, the Scholastics saw dOUble; lil~ewise on substance and aCCident; but in general,' the donlt do this on essence and existence; the donlt hold a real distinction•. Latte'r, Aur';. 1631, vol. 3, p. 435. Actually, there 1s no distinction at all, Letter, 1634, vol. 4, p. 349-350. To conceive the essence of a thing apart from existence is different from it concelv0d with existence, but the thing once real is identical with its existence; there is only e. di stlnctiol1 of rea.son betwer.m essence and existence: eSEentiam et eX:1.ste:ntla.r:l nullo modo distin{;,ui. As many concepts, so ~aT'..y . things. But th'9re is no concept of existenc8, therefore existence is no thing. 8plnoza kept faith with DesQartes~ 00 ltata Letayhysic~, Sp'mo.~s. says: "bripfly to explain the more {if'flcult q,uestiorlS •.• concerning being and its propE:>rtlea, ('od and the mind." ut he does not deem it rwo€ssary to define 0.11 the notions he uses. Some c.re so clec.:.r they CE'.nJ.'1ot be cleared up, part I, ch.2; for example, essence and ey..istence. "The being of essence is the mode under "f.'1.1c11 cree.ted things are comprised under the attrlbutes of God. :F.'Alstence is the very essence of thinGS outside of God, and in ltself, ru;.ffi o lythc.t being '\'lhich 1s created. 11 ~ssence can be con~eived apart from exlot~nce; but there is no use to explain either essence or existence, since their refinitions include them; we can give exa.:;,p10s: the idea and the thing made like it; so, for a.ny tinite thin t the ca.use of e,-i stance 1s outside thE) essence. ~xistence thus deflnod is the essence of things: ipsa rerum essentia extra. Deum in se coru3id'0-Jr'ata. Of. Lee notions d' essence et d'exlstence dans In philosophie de Spinoza, p. 32. The beine of existence is the being of essonce considered 8.S ou't,side God. All agree on essence; not all agree on the definition of ~od. All however agree that God's existence is contained in the essence. Desce.:pt..es, 5th ~·Ieditatlon, se.YI3 thn.t the notion of God. necessarily entails the n.otion of His existence. Fenelon, On the .......~istence of God;· part II, says: god's essence ~ntal1s ita actual exlstonce. Leibniz, ,Ionadolo~, Ii 44 "in the necessary being, essence involves existence, so that it is enough for Him to be possible for Him to exist." He blamed Descartes for not proving Godls possibility, If 45. "The necessary being has its Olin reason for existence. It The God~Essence has everywhere been honored; the God Cuius essentia est esse -- -this God ha's been lost sight of;' and so philosophy EiB lost sight Df the existence of things. In the middle of the 17th Century, J. Clauberg, in his Prologomena to his Elementa ?h1losophiae sive Ontosonhiae, says: "Since the science of God calls itself theosophy or theology, we should call ontosophy or ontology the science not of particular beings, but of being in general. tI This would be a science \1hich sees belnB as bein', that is, -in as much as understood as haVing a certain common ~ture, in bodies and spirits, r~ and creature. Leibniz once usos the expression "ontology!t; Cout.urnt, Onuscu1es et frar;:nent s de LEIby 1~;I p e, 512. But in 1725,. the term comes into Its own wlth the Ontol03ia of CHRISTIAN 10LFFs Ontologle, methodo sclen~1eica tradita. Wolff has a complete course of his lectures. He is an honest peda8~e; he ls not a. grea.t man, but a great master. Ape.rt f»an 5plnoza, there is something amateurish in 17th and 18th oentury philosophersJ the men were not professional men. They write Benial philosophy, but not scientifically. On the contrary, Kant, Fichte, and Hegel wrlte technically perfect philosophy. There 1s a standard of philosophical thinking, and -'lolff ha.d ma.intained that standard, and this was beca.use Suarez had mnlntained it' before him. S.terious:~ ness is needed;, in as much as philosophy is serious, it must be scholastic. \volff says: '~Slnce thesucess of the Cartesian phil­osophy, phllosophia prima has fallen into disrepute •••• Slnce Descartes grew weary of metaphysics •••• " there has no longer been any metaphysics. olff was conscious of continuing the work of the great scholastics. He did not want to bring back a dead philosophy, but he claimed the right to retain scholastic term­inology; to build up cleare~ definitions Ontologia. #12. He sets about thls with the term "being. 7. "Being is what can exist:. quod existere poteat, cui existentia non repugnat." #134. QUod. posaibile est, ens est, #135, and thls is a common notion. Being, somethin6~ possible, a~l these are equivalent terms. Beings usually exist. 'He 'tTho understands that A is a being, -)ecause it exists, menas thBthe knows it Can eXist~ #139. if.hatever Is possible, before it eXists, or after, can exist because it i8 PQssib1e. The causes of possibility are the absence of Inner contradiction. Then, to this we ascribe-such notions, as are not only compatible, but are its primary constituents. Such are thos.e that are not determined from the outside or by another constituent element. These are' the laws according t'o which essences are possible. Such constituent elements are cl~ied the essentials of being. Hence, essence is what is conceived of . being in the first place, and without it being cannot be #l~. For example, the es~_nce of virtue is made of an habitus ot the will and of the conformity with natura.l law of' the actsfollowlng from it. If any conditions are altered, there will be no virtue. Hence, the Bssentialia dete~ine the essence. Those essentlals ental1 certain properties; these are called attributes. Modes are certain ulterior deteroinatlons, as are neither neces-ary nor contradictory; an examp!e of a mode is motion. The essentials are the core of being. Per es sentialia ens posslble est. Since essence is possibility, to acknOWledge the essentials ls' ta know the essence. But there is no accounting for their belonging together. ~ Essences account for the possibllity of modes, but not for the fact; the reason for the actual presenoe of modes 1s always outside. ternal beings are those which account for modes in something else. Essenoe accounts for its actual attrlbutes.l # 167. ttEssence is hat which ls conoeived of a being in the 32 first plaoe, and is the sufficient reason for the'actual presence or possibility. of the rest -- Escentia definiri poteat per id quod de ente primo concipitur, et ratio.est cur cetera vel aQtu lnsunt vel inesse possunt." 11168, appendix to Ch. 4'. This . notion of essence, #169,"thatt it is first conceived about being, and that it contains the. explanation of what is present and can be present, is in aGreement with the philosopher~t notions. Certainly, Francis Suarez, S.J., who among the S~holastics has pmndered most.deeply ,about this ••• says: eSJence is the first and innermost principle, etc, and though he proves, bU.~istotle and st. Thomas, tha~ essence is nature, neverthel ss adds, that essence is what i8 manifested by its definition, and so essence is what we first conceive •••• suarez" adds that a real essence is one which is not contradictory ••• nor feigned, etc. If you ,look more to the idea than to the words ••• you will see that anyone who sets out to conceive being,' must have a prim~ factor •••• Secondly, essence contains o~~y non-contradictory and primary elements ••• Thirdly, essence contains the expalantion of all tr~. can be present or is present ••• ~Consequently, the notion of essence of at. Thomas a.nd Suarez is the same which ,,,e have deduced. apriori, and have refined in preciso~. Descartes reta1n8d the notion••••derived from '~cholastic philosophy, and Clauberg says: ahere is one attribUte of being•.•• that )as~ prlmal:'y and root and foundation, and this is essence." The ge:au1ne meaning of St. Thomas' notion of being is forgotten by' 1729. Wolff sees Suarez and st. Thomas as th'9 same, and he sees his own notion as identical with Suarez's. The notion of being as the real eacence, at once the stuff of beins, and the source of operations, This is 1'lhat -:'lolff has in common. olff e,ckno\'rledges existence is more than possibility: definio per complementum possibilitatis, #174; this resembles the existential code of Scotism. xlstence oannot even be an attribute. The suffiqient reason of a finite thing is always outside that beinG, and so existence 1s excluded from ontology. The existence of G~d is treated in natural theology; of things, in cosmology, etc. Existence cames every here except in ontology, wh1dlh means that this 1s a metaphysics of beine without existence. To Kant, metaphy~ics was Wolff, and the whole­Critique rests upon the Rssumption that the bankruptcy of i{olffian ontology is the bankrup~cy of metaphysics. KAl.TT once wrote of tlthe celebrated Holff, the greatest of all the dogmatic philosophers. 1I Nolfr was the greatest of all philosophers sim~llciter, since dogmatic philosophy was all the philosophy before him •. As Suarez was to - olff, so ,,,'olff was to Kant. Hence, all metaphysics for Kant in entologloal in its own right. When Kant wrote that Hume had roused his dogmatic slumber, . he meant 'lolffian sleep. For olff l'laS dogma.ti sm itself. Kant oritici~ed metaphysics, never thinking that there might be some­thing other than ontology. Rosenkranz, Geschichte der kantian Philosophie (Vol._ 12, of KantJs, yorks). "me~aphysics thus understood (ie, -folff t s) took hold of Kant •••. Kant himself to the time of his own maturity was deeply immersed in the childish 33 imma.turity of 'Y'lolff (concerning the categories." '101ft 'Was never rejected .by Kant, at least in so far as T'Jolff's essences became the categories. Hmne, as strai&1t e~piricism, was an ex~entiul reaction. There exist such eleulente as. cannot be dedueid, oxpecially efficient causes. That an 1~ea .hould lead to another idea -- this is all in the ideal order:, and is perfectly intelligible. That a thing m.akes a thing -- ""his is a problem. Abstr~ct causality is easy because it does not in­velve existence. Kant, Prologomena: I cannot ~ee why, because one thing eXists, e.not' er should exist, nor how the concept of. such n connection should be deduced." Kant say in Hume the givenness of causal reletions and of existence itself. Hume, Appendix to the Treatise: Il':..here are t"m princi,les which I cannot render consistent, nor can I renounce them either: 1. all distinct perceptions are distinct things; 2, that the mind neV6r perceives a.ny real com ection between tfi.istinct things." This charge of existential d.ynamite blew to pieces the ontological world; and revealed to Kant his problem: what are we to do with existence if all perceptions are existences and yet the mind never perceives co~~ectione.l1 (Finally, he answered: we never perceive them t we prescribe them; in the beginn1ng his reaction was different.) Kan~, ~ in the Treatise On Negative -uantities, accepts Hume's distinction: "we distlnBuieh bet'men the logical grounq, lying in ld.entity, and real ground. ":"hough such a relation belongs to my concepts, it carr..-'lo'b be reduced to any jUdgment. II • Kant had clearly not .yet discovered the synthetic apriori: flHo'\': can I understand that because 6omethine; is, something else l!Ihould be?" To solve the probl~n, Kant transposes it from epistemology to' . metaphysics. Leibniz and Wolff had looked for it in abstract essences. Dut: the "best LJosslble rTOrld" ma~~ be the reason for .• the choice of this world; but not of creation simpliciter. The ground for the e;ustence of the world oannot be an idea; it must be a real e;round, for exe.mple~ God's "Ttlill. Kant's idea is that maybe we oUght first to consider the relation of God'sessence and existence. For -.rolff, God was such a.n essence as is the reason for its existence: ttEns a se rationem suae existentiae in se habet..• " Theoloeia ~aturalls 1.31. In the lieht of Hume, this arb~ent was no good; no essence can entail its own existence, for if the eSEence already is, there is no problem, whereas if not~ you can never derive.its actual existence from its possible essence. Kant didn't know that there mi5ht be an existence which wa.s its own essence; °t. Thomas ,ms forgotten even by his fol:!..owers. Can God's existence be deduced from His essence? What is existenoe daseln? Answers by saying wha.t it is not: existence is net a predioate l that ls, no lo~ical determination of a subject. For example, any possible (and this is a Leibnizian possible) .u is an esoence with all' its future determinations. Any change at all ~nywhere in this will change the essence •. This poss1ble is com­pletely determined without existence. Hence, existence is not a predicate. To put existence outside of pred.icatlon puts it outside logical·relations, in which setup "is ll is abraya a copUla. Bence, where "is II expresses existence it does not express a relation. "Caesar is" adds nothing to his determinations; you merely posit the whole th1ng. The same 1s true of God. If I say "God is" I podt at once and absolutely with all its attributes. 34 Does then existence add anYtth:1.ng"to the essence, or the possible? What does it o~an to say: 'in existence there is more than pure possibility?'t tlOne should. cl1stinguish bet'l'Teen" what __ one posits and hOiT orie posits it. Hhat is posited 1s the same in both cases, fer example, God. Tho 0ssence iD not posited the same way qua essence, as wl1.en existing. ~rhen posited as essence, . we posit the detenninations; in the second \re posit the oubstance (subject) itself." "Existence posits the subject -- C-ood! But what is this? Ever~~h1r~ proceeds as i~ the relation"between _ essence and existenae were in our own mind. T e words are clear." But how do they solve the problem? They answer ~hat I do when I signify exist,enoP1 not : \-lhat is added to the possible to make it real. Hence, Kant concludes, by existence I add nothine. ~ihat is positedas existing is moro posited (mehr gesotzt). ote ~ow this answer shies at the obstacle raised oy Hume: no existence oan be deduced from essence. J s.nt says, e:-::intcnce ·adtis nothing; but how then is"it more poslted. ~"lhcre then is existence? Hume is lost. To acoount· for [SivennesC~1 by our ''lay of positins was to leave ... ume and returI1 to 1-!olff as far as possible. \'!olff had "said: existence is a comuloment. Kant anewered that th1G tells us nothing. 'rhen he looks at aUIr.g..~rten and Crus1us (t\'1O lrolffians-­and thi3 covers the field of metaphysics) the latter said that "sometime and somewhere lt were marks of existence; fine, nays, Kant, if the thing which is sometime and som"~ere exists. So he realizes thD.t they do not do existenoe justice. Hence, he "sees that ex1stenc~ oannot be inoluded in essence. He "Tlle to bracket it; it would always be there, and t~en he was to neutralize it, so that everything oe s e.s if it Werel'l t t there. The Ori t 1que of Pure Reason says: "there are two s~ijrces of human know10d c •••. By sense oiJjects are given to us, but/lofte reason, thOUght 1s given. II 17! Though this is a critical i~ealism, it remains a real.~ of tho sensible world. ~fter rev~alin5 the pure apri9ri elements, there still ramains sen~ible intuition. In this, sensibility 13 passive, pure p(1ssivlty. lence, his pole:nic against the "confused id~c.1t notlono~ sense. "I "las not concerned ,",ith the existonce of 1>hings •... it never occurred to me to doubt it lt , Prologomena, .flrst part, third rem~rk. This is a realism of existence, and indeed a naive real*qm. Kant rejects the idealism of Berkeley, and also the problomat~cal idealism of Descartes; for Kant, the existence of the world is not a problem. The reality of material phenomena is just as immediate under the form qf space, as theself under the form of time. 'fuat directly hits us is existence. F~istence is g1van to us under the, and belo", the, forms of apaoe a.nd time. Sensible intuition is just a shook -- existenoe is below anything that can be said about"it. But existenoe should bekent out of philosophy; it simply is to be, and nothing more. Things are; but what they are -- for this reason is responsible. Intelligibility is put into things by tho mind. Raw reality is not to interfere with philosophy. In the Prefaoe to the oritiqu3 of Pure' eason, seoond edition, II Reascn faces nature ••• with the view of obtaining information from it, not as a pu~il, but as a judge, who asks the questions reality is to answer. Such was the ~ethod of science, . and philosophy should make it i tW" own. II Since exist -nce 1s below the ideas of the reaeon. below the cate6orles, and even below the forma of intuition, \-fe oan af irm it, we cannot talk about it. ~xistence thus becomes a modality of jUdgment. A modality-of jUdgment is such that thou[3h it caanges the judgment, it does not alter the oontents of ,the thing posited: affirmation and negation; posoibllity, impossibility, neoessity. ~fuey we say 35 something is, we deoide that tho forma~ oonditions of experienoe are met by a se.naible intuition. If an experience har~onizes wl~.:.h our idea.s,' it eXists, Tr'anscendental AZk;.lyt1c .. 2.4. The posaiblo is that which can be experienced. The coheront with the ma.terial conditions of sensation is the real. That "Those oohe1"ence with the raal is deterI:1ined by univeroal conditiona is the necessary. The judgment of existence takes plG,cO when e. possible is met. ,'x1stence appaaro as one of tho ...·m.ys to posit things. 'That "[hich is given is an "x". As knmm, or- even as perceived, it is a ~henomenonl the appearance of the x in its apriori conditions. _til the properties which constitute the thing 'ielong to the a.pp~al"·a.nce; this does not suppress existence; but only suppresses ~ it 1.s. ' ~eality only cond.it10ns }'.::no\,11edge. Science has no use for existence; by consigninG it to the thing­in- 1tself, Kant has se.feguarde<lit, yet kept it out of philosophy. ~ant has maintained eXi~tenae without saying anythin~ about it. But if natur'e is ':ihat tne mind makes it, ...;hy shouldn t the mi::.1.d, also prescribe existence? ,ecause, Kant says, that 'liould be idealism. ut why not try ide&liim? -- The common root of both sensibility and unaer.atanG~ng should be brou~~t to light; it merely eXists, and 1s unJrnown. But when it ls dug out, thon existence is either dented or deduced. If you eliminate the thins-1n-itself, you have phenomenlsm; deduce it, showing that even reality can be justified, you have Flchte justifyin~ it from the ~go, and Hegel from the Idee. The dialectic of :;EG""L, in 1ta reL.tlon to belng, is :tntelligible only ,'rhen overything i8 understood, a.nd that exhaustive13T; h1s system cincludes Duen th:i.nGo as geography, 10."', h1atory, and philosophy, and thephilosophy~of the hlstcry of philosophy. ~~his exhaustive intellie;ibil1ty ~ "entails (1) that if everything can be accounted for, then tl]9 ratl0 al is the real; everything is rationally justifiable; (2) '\'lhiltp' ever~rth1n(5 10 whrt it oUght to be from its o\'m point of view, it is root so from other points of view. ?he affirmation of anythlnr; at all involves some denial of something else. This fact has kept philoeophy.fro~'beingade­quate, because of tho further fact that they admit only some one thing. Hegel is here thinkinG of '{olff, and in the Enc;,rclopadie der philo8ophischen Grundwis~enschaften, # 27, he criticizeB him, not for not beine; critica.l, butfor something qUite different. iolffianism, taken in its most carefu~ly determined and. most clearly exp eased form, is the philosophy of the past from the point of view of _istory of philosophy only; from its own point­of view it is the siillple lmderstanding of th~ object of reason -­a pure look1ng at essences. Hegel does not blame this e1ther; he holcle it for much su_perlor to the critical id.e,',lsih of Kant. mat ls 11ron' \>flth 'lolffiD.niEm, i.,a.S that to knOvl the absolute one ascribes redicates to 1t; that 1 twas pureJ.y loCical metaphJ~slcs; 4 it did not exaIT~ne the contents of the predicates. The Dogmatists were right in assumins that the absolute csn be knOlin; but they , were wrong 1n the~r way of hand11ng concepts. Wolff wa.s candid and na1ve, pot because he was not oritioal, but because he had a mere soience of 'ahetract concepts. \ihen a concept is just presented, it contains only the empty abstraction of a mere essenoe. 36 Th1s is the deadA product of theodern philoso hy of en i tenment. ?hlloso hers merely londered w . t sUbjects their predicates could be pred.icated of, 'md their on I y rule a.s non-cont.radictlon. 'rhis was ere logical Wln~, ani ha3 not reached rea~ity. In lie el, dogmatism reiuces metaphysical concopt3 to logical oneG. ainst t~ is, Hegel sets t~e r'aM empiricism of Hume. I-.U· C 1.:80 't re ch ~rue uenera :i.ty -- '''hleh for e 131 sans, n t 3 l't haa for Hu s, a large number uf sl:nilar ca es; -- nor necessity, :1lic_. for Hume eant r"3 1:::1.1"' ucce9s1on. (In fa t, wne deemed it. i i.J0ssible T to r.eich t~ua univero, 1 ~nu necessary :mowledge). Kant in not so different: he dnits a glv n, i~d this is onou to hinder him uith all the burdens of ~ll.i1:"icism: he ha.n a u1-ven ':1 lch co.nnot be kno\'m: tJ e t ing-1n-itnelf, \fhi ch, e ":01 say , is 'the to·t Ily . abstractIi the e.Jpty "rholo, vii thout any deter ine.tion except. t.he "beyond.' •ncyylopodie, no., l:J+. Kant had protested o.!35.in t beln' ca.lled an lde"liot; but Hegel Flays that Kantisra was a vul'? rand , commont .ida;, 110m, '" ere everytbln::> \'Tent as if t_ 0 i "iran i;iel"'6 not, just as lf \That erl:e>lev oa.ld \'.'erf> 1"i ht. This remark lends crediolllty to '01.11" m-m tlo: al-ilson'~] lnter retf.:l1cn of "ant, and gives us the key to He el. T ere iE'i too much exi' t~nce in ~15,ntJ becauso '(That is th·~re can't· be knm·m, and yet MWQ'MP not e..10ue;h, beoause it la~e8 no diffe~ence. Yet, e ,el himself trusted con­cepts to 1"9 ch reality. . ' n'J9 he 'he,d to r2form conca t9 and essences, that is, by the use of the "concrete unlverso.l," the concreteness of t e concel',)t. A c _'. crete es",ence 1s the totality of XlOi its 1nter~el ,to 1.. and .mutaally ddeterminin con.st1 t, .tive elements. Hegel's view of cant t s comments, on the "ontolo:3ical argu ent. II ant ha.d said: from no notlon can one deduce its exlstence. Hggel cowlters: God recisely ls that w.lch can be thou~.t of only as existing. his ls ~ classical formula, this has a new eaninv here. s a ainet 101ff, ~ere the concept of existence w s . re­dlcated of the concept of Tod, Kant was rl.!)1.t. ut: nt shou.ld have se~n th trod's ess nco 1s the most concrete essence, .nd the fullness of real~ty: ~od 1s Spirit ltself, t e totality of all dete-minations. Kant had wondered whether he should ~scrlbe ex­istence to ~od, as if God h~d ~la1ted for this in ord~r to be. Tho problem, for He,.lel, is not whether we can ascr1b'3 xistc:mce to od, but whether Te ca.n r fuse to ",dmi t that God eXist"s: 0 re :"ca.te existence 1s to -rAdlca-te being, and being 1s tha 900rest and most abstract of all notions, ~he mOEt overty-strlc~en of all concepts because of its abstractness. It has little to add to anythin else, and the 0111y poorer thtne; ls the external ana sensible ex­istence, whlch chould not even be mentloned, 1Q1Q., no. 44. Belng is what 113 left of :t.he concreteness of an essence, uh~n all has been re o-ved. But the eSR'''nce of God is the fullest of 3.11 essences, because it has an infinity of determin~tions. To say of the supreme ."I" that e ex1 ats ls to say the least poss1ble. This is essentia11sm pure and simple, even thou ~ a sophisticated varlety. But bain'" here 1s not tbe final attribute, rather it is the fi-rst. and shu lest arid most abstract of ~11 attributes. eing is flr t because the lowest; it is the ~i~st in the lino of 9ro­essive determln tions. Being 1s indeter inat1on; not only re­la. tively, but absolutely; it is tota.l 1ndeterilllna.tlon. 'lnce lt is abstract, ,1 t Ca.'1.tlot oe sensed; since it is void of aJ.l content, it: cannot be re!: resented or' intuited. Being 1s not even essence, becau~e essence contains deter inations. How ls it known? The only way left is that bein ls 1dentical w1th thought. eing is thou t when ~lOU t tak http://cdm17321.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/thro/id/0

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