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Chapter 7

The Human Person

838. In the human being the intellective (rational) subject and person are therefore the same thing. The intellective principle, which does not differ from the volitive principle, is that which is supreme and most excellent in human nature.

In brute animals the feeling, instinctive principle constitutes the subject. There is nothing above this principle in brute animals, there is nothing on which it depends; it is truly a principle. The whole activity of the brute animal begins from this principle, and its subsistence is grounded in it. In the human being, however, the principle, which is the highest point of his existence, is properly speaking intellective rather than simply sensitive; feeling is added only as a kind of instrument, something which serves, a means to an end, the matter of knowledge.

We must now look more closely at the way everything in the human being adheres and is joined to the final principle, `human person', which constitutes the summit, as it were, of human nature. We have already touched upon the topic, but here we must reconsider human unity and its order.

839. The human being, whom Cicero rightly calls a multiple animal, is multiple in his actions, attitudes, external appearance, and the different forms of his nature. It is a source of unending wonder that the unity of this nature can offer such inequality, be almost infinite in its variations, and exhibit new aspects and characteristics in individuals, in societies at all times and places, in diverse races, climates, levels of development, qualities and events. This multiplicity of forms undoubtedly presupposes multiple powers which themselves manifest a multiplicity of actions, habits and conditions. However, all this multiplicity can be reduced to a few principles, and ultimately to a single principle, person, the pinnacle of human nature.

840. Earlier we listed the principles of action found in human nature. We said that, in addition to the material forces, they are five: life instinct, sensuous instinct, human instinct, will and freedom. We showed how the subordination of these principles, effected by a dynamic bond, enabled the feeling instinct to modify the life instinct, and the human instinct to modify the feeling, while the will controls the human instinct, and freedom inclines and bends the will to one of two possible contrary volitions. And because we can be conscious of all these subordinate activities, the principle of consciousness (which is consciousness of our person) informs us that they are all moved indirectly (not directly) by ourselves. Thus, when we act freely, the first activity emanating from us is free activity, which makes all the other activities obedient to it.

The fact that we cannot move our lower powers directly, and indeed are obliged to move and control them by means of their link with the neighbouring powers, reveals a related truth: the lower powers are not, properly speaking, ourselves (our person) although they are so closely bound with us that they form a single individual. We must therefore distinguish powers from principles of action.

841. All principles of action are powers, but not all powers are principles of action. We call principles of action those powers which govern a complete genus of activity and constitute the active principle of the genus. Different principles of action can be joined together in one individual, as in the case of the human being. But although joined together and subordinate to a supreme activity, they do not cease to have an activity of their own.

842. Consequently, the different principles of action united in one individual operate in two ways: of themselves, according to the laws of their own nature, or moved by the supreme principle. If they act of themselves without the intervention of the supreme principle, their acts are simply natural. But if they are moved by the supreme principle, their acts are called personal. Hence, in the human being, acts are natural and personal.

843. We should, however, bear in mind that person can intervene in two ways in the actions of the active principles below it: either by moving them to act or by permitting them to act with its consent. In both cases, there is personal action, but in the second case personal action is merely by consent, an act chosen by the will; in the first, personal action is one of force, an act of command, involving the practical force.

844. This physical or (if we prefer) dynamic superiority of person over the other active principles is natural, that is, intrinsic to its nature independently of its good or evil acts. Hence, when the human will gives in to the attractions and charms of the appetite, the will does not lose its nature, which is essentially superior to the appetite. Remorse, on the other hand, arises in the human being because he was aware of degrading and subordinating himself when he should have been in command.

We can support our argument by another observation. The instinct can never move the will by command or violence. Like one who invites and begs, it can only use bland persuasion, imposing no action forcibly. Consequently, if the will, by refusing to move, did not respond to the invitation, the instinct could not move it in any way whatsoever. On the other hand, if the will moves, the instinct cannot prevent the movement unless the will consents to immobility. In the case of the instinct, however, the direct opposite is true: the will commands it imperiously, forcibly and firmly opposing the instinct's first movements, which it suppresses. Hence, even when the animal instinct manages to influence the will, it does so only in a servile way, never as a master. The will, however, is the master of the instinct, and makes it obey forcefully, not by persuasion. Early authors expressed this double aspect of command by two words, with which we can terminate our discussion. The kind of control exercised by the animal appetite on the will was called diplomatic; the control exercised by the will, despotic. We see here the natural superiority of the will over instinct.

845. Let us now attempt to determine more exactly the proper seat of person in the human individual.
When the human being first exists, the five principles of action observable in him are not as distinct from one another as we have made them. They can in fact be reduced to two: the principle of subjective action and the principle of objective action. The three instincts, life, sensuous and human, are reduced to the first; will and freedom to the second. In fact, every action either begins spontaneously from the subject, or is aroused by the object. The fundamental feeling is the basis of the innate subjective principle; the intuition of being the basis of the innate objective principle.

In the case of all the other powers, Condillac's opinion that they are not innate can be accepted as true. These powers are not distinguished in the essence of the human being, but become distinct according to the different way in which the primitive, innate principles operate.

846. With the principles of human nature reduced to two, it is clear that person as innate can exist only in the second, that is, in the principle of objective action, and that person itself is susceptible of the same development and modifications as the principle of objective action.

847. So far we have discussed the bond between the lower, active principles and the human person, a bond that is real, powerful and physical. But there is also a moral bond, a bond which by right entails a superiority of person over all the other powers of human nature.

848. This moral excellence and superiority by right, which elevates the human person above the whole of nature, must have the same source as all morality and right. This source is the light of reason, the source of right and of moral good and evil.

The will, therefore, is more noble than the other powers because it acts in virtue of knowledge and follows the light of reason.

849. Freedom, or the power of inclining the will to one or other of two opposites, is, considered physically, the natural master of the will. It is also more excellent than the will when considered morally, that is, considered simply as a power, not yet issuing in acts of virtue. And because the will in this state is determined neither to good nor evil, freedom is able to determine it to good. If the will receives its degree of excellence from its being ordered to follow the light of reason, freedom receives its excellence from being ordered to move the will towards the fullness of the light of reason. Hence the moral dignity of freedom as a principle of moral good and merit.

850. Moreover, it is clear that the moral superiority of freedom is independent of freedom's good or evil acts, because the excellence we are discussing comes to freedom not from good acts but from the ability to do good acts, from being born to do them, as their cause.