Appendix 12.

(511) [Reflection]

If by reflection we mean the aptitude possessed by the understanding for turning its attention toward the products of its own operations, universalisation has no need of reflection. On the one hand, we have sensation, a direct act of our spirit; on the other hand, the intuition of being, another direct act. Between the two lies the unity of the spirit which has simultaneously the sensation and the idea. The subject's awareness of feeling sensation while intuiting the idea is universalisation, as it were whole and complete. But if reflection were to mean an aptitude of the spirit for turning towards its own operations, there could be partial reflection in the primal synthesis, and in the universalisation it contains. The subject, joining the idea of being to its sensations through the unity of its feeling, turns towards its sensations, but by means of a very different kind of act which of itself is direct and straightforward. In this case, one could distinguish between reflection upon direct sensations and reflection upon ideas. Reflection upon sensations is a direct act relative to the understanding to which alone it belongs, but a reflective act relative to the spirit, to which it belongs in equal manner, and to the sensations towards which it turns. I note this in order to avoid all ambiguity. For the rest, I generally use the word reflection to indicate reflection carried out by the understanding, not by the spirit.

The Scholastics' 'reflection' must be understood in the second sense. For example, they say: 'The intellect knows individual things per quandam reflexionem [through a kind of reflection]' (cf. vol. 1, App., no. 19). The whole weakness in this form of expression is use of the word 'intellect' instead of 'human spirit' which perceives individual sensations (by means of sense) and universals (by means of the intellect) and, uniting these two elements, produces for itself a single perception. We say that in this perception the spirit knows individual things (sensations), by reflecting upon them, and universals, by means of the direct act by which it sees ens. St. Thomas points to this interpretation of the Scholastic dictum where he notes that we sometimes attribute incorrectly to the intellect what strictly speaking should be attributed to the spirit. Cf. De Verit., q. 10, art. 9, ad 3.