Chapter 3
Reason
511. We have defined the essential intellect as `that principle which
intuits indeterminate-ideal being'.
We have defined reason as `the faculty of applying indeterminate-ideal being to
feelings, and to real and ideal beings' (cf. 499).
According to these definitions, the essential intellect furnishes us with
`indeterminate-ideal-being'.
Reason applies this indeterminate and ideal being to illustrate and render
knowable things which of themselves are unknown to human beings.
512. Reason first applies the light of being to feelings. The first function of reason, intellective-perception, arises from this application.(215) By means of intellective perception we apprehend real beings. When felt, their action brings knowledge of an acting agent through the principle of substance.
513. When perceptions of real beings have been acquired, reason can apply ideal being in new ways. One of these applications enables it to pass from the contingency and limitation of real beings to acknowledgment of the existence of a necessary, unlimited, first Being. This second function of reason, integration, is carried out by means of what we may call the principle of absoluteness.(216) Through such a noble use of reason, we come into possession of new intellective riches formed by knowledge of the existence of God, which in some way completes our knowledge of real beings.
514. But we have to make further reflections on the real beings we perceive
and know. We can exercise our power of abstraction on them by producing mental
and ideal beings, new kinds of objects, for ourselves. Abstraction, a
third function of reason, creates the world of beings of pure reason, and
concepts.
Reason thus becomes master of new material, that is, ideal and rational beings,
to which it can unceasingly apply being in general. By applying it to ideal
beings, reason creates what we call pure, abstract sciences.
515. Again, by applying the pure sciences of ideal beings to the real beings it has discovered, reason can derive all the applied sciences which regard real beings and can be pursued through abstract, scientific method.
516. The principle functions of reason, that is, of the faculty which applies ideal being, are therefore five: 1. perception; 2. integration; 3. abstraction; 4. deduction of the pure sciences; 5. deduction of complete sciences. Reflection is present in the last three functions, reasoning is clearly manifest only in the last two.
517. The aim and benefit of these different functions of reason is to provide us continually with new cognitions which must, however, be distinguished from the operation by which they are formed. We have to posit in the human soul a principle which intuits such truths after they have been formed, and a principle which forms them. This last principle, which draws one cognition from another, is precisely our power of reason; the principle which intuits the cognitions after their formation is our power of intellect, already defined by us as `the faculty of intuiting more or less determined ideal beings'.(217) And St. Thomas seems to offer the same distinction between the powers of intellect and those of reason. He says: `Intellect and reason differ relative to the way in which they know. The intellect knows by means of simple intuition, reason by discourse and by passing from one thing to another. Nevertheless, reason comes to know through such discourse what the intellect knows without discourse.'(218)
518. Certainly, the principle which intuits truth is not properly and essentially different from that which discovers it, because the truth is discovered when it is intuited for the first time.(219) Nevertheless, the distinction we have made between these powers, although not radical, is well founded in their various ways of functioning, and should be preserved.
519. Critical philosophy, with the German school in its wake, made reason a power superior to intellect. Kant, led by what he saw of the Platonists' use of the word, considered reason as the power of the absolute and placed it above the intellect (the power of concepts). But the Platonists understood the word logw as the objective reason of things, not as a mere power of the soul (although they were not entirely consistent in giving it this meaning). And there is no doubt that reason, as understood by Plato, who took it as objective reason and a synonym of `idea', is infinitely superior to the intellect.
520. If, on the other hand, the discussion is about powers, and consequently
about subjective reason, Plato and Aristotle seem to agree on the position
assigned to reason. Marsiglio Ficino, who in his preamble to Plato's
Meno intended to distinguish the powers of the soul according to the
mind of his mentor and author, gave pride of place to mind, which
corresponds to intellect, and second place to reason.(220)
The two powers were consistently placed in this order by the whole of
antiquity. Plutarch, who did not adhere exclusively to any school, is an
impartial witness: `There are two altogether special assets possessed by human
nature: intellect and reason. The intellect commands, and reason follows it.'(221)
Even the etymology of the word intellect indicates something already grasped by the mind (intellectum [literally `read through', `understood']); reason (ratio) from an etymological point of view simply points to an act of investigation. In the same way, the Greek word logoV, which corresponds to the Latin ratio, has its origin in legw, `I gather'. In other words, it represents an unfinished act, a search for the elements with which to form some cognition. In Latin, mens is the word best fitted to the meaning we give to intellect; in Greek, it is menw, from which mens is certainly derived.
MenoV expresses impetus, or ardour of spirit, and is understood as a force with immediate direction, just as the intellect naturally flies straight to the truth standing before it.(222)
Notes
(215) All these different functions of reason are described more fully in works already published by me on the theory of knowledge.
(216) It would be impossible for us to know with certainty that a being is contingent and limited if we did not first have some knowledge of what is necessary and unlimited. Nevertheless, although we require such knowledge, that is, the idea of necessary and unlimited being, we do not require to know that unlimited being subsists. This subsistence is what we deduce in the principle of integration.
(217) The intellect is always related to ideal beings. Our only communication with real beings is by means of sense and of judgment.
(218) S.T., I, q. 79, art. 8, corp. These words would draw us to believe that St. Thomas intends here to speak rather of reflection, one of the more general functions of reason. Strictly speaking, reflection takes place when we consider what we already know [Rosmini provides a summary, rather than a translation of St. Thomas' words at this point].
(219) This is why St. Thomas maintains that intellect and reason are not two essentially distinct powers. Cf. S.T., I, q. 79, art. 8.
(220) `The first power of the soul is mind whose act is perpetual contemplation of truth. The second, reason, whose act is the investigation of truth' (Argum. in Menon).
(221) On the Education of Children.
(222) NouV comes from neo which properly speaking means necto, `I join', cogo, `I bring together' (from which cogito is derived). J. Lennep affirms: `nouV is derived from the perfect middle nenoa. It indicates that highest part of human nature which connects, as it were, ideas conceived by the spirit and in this way reasons.' The word nouV, therefore, although it may be translated by `mind', expresses in its initial meaning a power which discourses and reasons, not a power which intuits. Hence Giov. Aug. Ernesti acutely places it in contrast with menoV which, as he says, `is permanent and stable in a sentence or proposition'.