Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas

Titel: Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas

Stichwort: Duplex actio; Unterschied zw. 'processio operati' und 'processio operationis'; Wirkursache benötigt keine materia; Unterschied zw. Der Wirkursache, die im Tätigen bleibt und jener, die von der From seinen Ausgang nimmt; operatio ist mehr als Form

Kurzinhalt: ... actio that remains in the agent does not involve efficient causality inasmuch as it proceeds from form, species, or informed potency; for that procession is not 'processio operati' but 'processio operationis' ...

Textausschnitt: 5. Duplex Actio

202 Frequently Aquinas distinguished two types of actio, one which remains in its subject, another which goes forth into external matter to effect its transformation. This distinction has led subsequent writers to make metaphysical ultimates of what they term immanent and transient action, and, as not rarely happens, such speculative constructions are a barrier rather than a help to a grasp of St Thomas's thought, for they give an air of finality and completeness to what, in point of fact, contained not a little of the incidental and was not complete. (128; Fs)

203 Aquinas alleges two different sources in Aristotle for his duplex actio. Contrasts between actio and factio, and so between agere and facere, activum and factivum, agibile and factibile stem from Aristotle's Ethics.1 In the relevant passage Aristotle was distinguishing art, science, prudence, wisdom, and intellect; three of these (science, wisdom, and intellect) regard the necessary; the other pair (art and prudence) regard the contingent; the distinction between them is set forth by a parallel distinction between production (poiesis) and moral conduct (praxis).2 Now in medieval Latin both poiesis and praxis might be rendered by actio, and in such cases Aquinas's distinction was between the actio of moral conduct, which is a perfection of the agent, and the actio, more properly factio, which transforms external matter. (128f; Fs)

204 A corollary may be noted. When Aquinas restricts actio to beings that have dominion over their acts, actio has at least an association with moral conduct. 'Bruta aguntur et non agunt,' because St John Damascene said so;3 but also because Aristotle remarked that sense is not a principle of moral conduct, since brutes have senses yet have no part in moral conduct.4 The 'non agunt' does not mean that brutes do not act in the sense of 'aliquam actionem exercere,' which may mean simply being in act;5 it does not even deny that brutes move themselves locally inasmuch as one part in act moves another part in potency. (129; Fs)

205 Evidently this source in the Ethics lacks generality.6 But the other source in the ninth book of the Metaphysics is so general that it deals not with action but with act. The problem under discussion is the essential priority of act over potency, because act is the end of potency, the end is a cause, and a cause is prior.7 The point was evident in cases in which only potency and act existed; but when besides potency and act there was also an ulterior product, the apparent difficulty was met by noting that then the act was in the thing produced and that it emerged simultaneously with the product.8 There followed the familiar corollary on the twofold subject of the act (energeia).9 (129; Fs)

206 The medieval translator laid no stress on actio: the energeia that is in the agent was translated by actio; the one that is in the product was translated by actus.10 The opposite usage may be found in the Prima pars.11 General Thomist usage is variable. In the Sentences and in the De veritate an attempt is made to reserve operatio for the act that remains and actio for the act that goes forth.12 In the Contra Gentiles, factio is proposed for the act that goes forth and operatio or even actio for the act that remains.13 (130; Fs)

207 In the Depotentia, the Contra Gentiles, and the Prima pars, the distinction is drawn with respect to a duplex operatio.14 However, it is duplex actio that is regular in the Prima pars.15 Still, in the De potentia mention was made of a duplex actus secundus16 and this viewpoint returns in the Prima secundae,17 where also one may find an identification of the act that goes forth with the actio in passo of the Physics.18 As a final observation, one may note that Aquinas did not keep his two sources distinct; in both the Contra Gentiles and the Prima secundae he refers to the ninth book of the Metaphysics and proceeds to speak of factio, a term that implicitly is present in the Metaphysics but explicitly only in the Ethics.19 (130; Fs)

208 This fluidity of terminology is not surprising unless one indulges in an anachronistic projection of present usage upon the past. On the other hand, the meaning of these passages and their significance are quite clear. There is an act that remains in the agent and is the perfection of the agent; there is another act that goes forth into external matter and effects a change of it. The pair spontaneously come together in thought - grammatically because both are expressed by transitive verbs in the active voice, and historically because both proceed from the 'principium actionis' that was Aquinas's initial definition of active potency. (130f; Fs)

209 Even though later Aquinas did manifest a preference for a different definition of potentia activa, there was a deeper root in Aristotle himself to keep the two types of act associated; for it is a form that is the principle both of the act remaining in the agent and of the act that goes forth. In the Physics it was pointed out that the mover possesses a form which is principle of movement; for it is a man in act that makes a man out of what is a man only in potency.20 In his Sentences Aquinas refers to this passage and applies it both to transient and to immanent acts: 'causa autem actionis est species, ut dicitur in III Phys.; quia unumquodque agit ratione formae alicuius quam habet [...] sicut ignis qui desiccat et calefacit per caliditatem et siccitatem, et homo audit et videt per auditum et visum.'21 (131; Fs)

210 Even in his latest works Aquinas will speak of active potency as pertaining to things because of their forms,22 and will explain differences of efficacy because of differences in the perfection of forms; thus, fire heats and illuminates; what is so heated or illuminated can do the same but only in a lesser degree, while merely intentional forms cannot have natural effects.23 But form is not only the ground of efficiency but also the principle of operation: 'propria forma uniuscuiusque faciens ipsum esse in actu, est principium propriae operationis ipsius.'24 Such operation is the end of the operator and more perfect than his form;25 it is what is last and most perfect in each thing, and so it is compared to form as act to potency, as second act to first act.26 (131; Fs)

211 But however germane to Aquinas's thought as it actually developed, duplex actio is not a capsule of metaphysical ultimates. The act that goes forth into external matter corresponds to the predicament of action as defined in the Sentences: 'actio secundum quod est praedicamentum dicit aliquid fluens ab agente et cum motu.'27 But later Aquinas wrote that there are two actions, one that involves movement (in the sense of incomplete act), and another that does not, as when God causes grace in the soul. On the latter he remarked, 'Quod quidem difficile est ad intelligendum non valentibus abstrahere considerationem suam ab actionibus quae sunt cum motu.'28 (131f; Fs)

212 This tart observation would seem to be relevant to the passage in the commentary on the Physics where, after explaining Aristotle's concept of action and passion,29 he goes on to give his own quite different and quite universal definitions of the predicament of action and passion.30 As causal efficiency does not require external matter and movement, so also it need not go forth: there is a 'processio operati' of the inner word within the intellect.31 On the other hand, actio that remains in the agent does not involve efficient causality inasmuch as it proceeds from form, species, or informed potency; for that procession is not 'processio operati' but 'processio operationis';32 as we have just seen, operation is more perfect than form, and only an instrument is less perfect than its effect. The idea that efficient causality occurs in this type of actio has, I fear, little more basis than a failure to distinguish between the two different ways in which Aquinas defined his potentia activa. (132f; Fs)