New Essay Volume 3

Appendix 8. (1230)

[Individuality and multiplicity]

Although antiquity maintained that knowledge is concerned only with universals, it was also known that the individual being of a thing is not foreign to the understanding. What cannot be assimilated by the understanding, however, is the particular condition of all contingent, finite things. This condition entails that they are not knowable per se, but only by means of their participation in being. As a result it often happens that each contingent thing does not have such a relationship with being as to exclude the possibility of an infinite number of other, equal things. The notion of a contingent thing includes the possibility of infinite others equal or similar to this thing, or (and this is the same) a universal notion.

In the limited things of this world, only their proper subsistence is present which, in sensible things, is the matter of which each is composed. But the very definition of matter precludes the possibility of its being per se the object of the human intellect.

Matter is such in so far as the particular sense terminates in it, and every intellective principle is absent from it. In fact, if we were to think of matter, it would cease to be particular, and through our intellective act would no longer be matter, but the idea of matter (possible matter). Matter of its nature cannot reach out and present itself per se to our intellect. Hence St. Thomas' affirmation: Singulare non repugnat intelligenti in quantum est singulare, sed in quantum est materiale: quia nihil intelligitur nisi immaterialiter [The particular as particular is not repugnant to the one who understands, but it is repugnant as material, because things are understood only immaterially], that is, by means of an idea or light (S.T., I, q. 86, art. 1).

Even the subsistence of spiritual entia is not perceived by the intellect, nor is our own subsistence and individuality perceived by means of particular perception. We too are a feeling, although a simple feeling, and in order to perceive such a feeling we have to apply to it the predicate of being which remains universal in the application because it is not exhausted in the individual SELF* .

In the sensible perception of ourselves we perceive purely and simply our reality with feeling. In the intellective perception of OURSELVES* , however, this substantial feeling holds the place of the matter of knowledge while the form remains universal in such a way that the essence of human being is included in the intellective perception of ourselves. The essence, however, is repeated and renewed in all human beings, and could he repeated and renewed in many more. That which is knowable in its subsistence, of itself, is being alone which relative to itself is particular and individual, but relative to the things it makes known to us is universal and common. Of all the particular things we know through being, there is nothing which in itself exhausts it. That being which makes us know the individual thing makes us know at the same time and presents to us the possibility of infinite other things either equal to or different from that individual.

This accords, as far as I can see, with the mind of St. Thomas, provided he is correctly interpreted, although there are several passages which at first sight seem to mean the opposite. For instance, in some places he teaches that the intellect is knowable to itself (S.T., I, q. 86, art. 1). But I believe that to understand St. Thomas' mind in these passages we have to be conversant with his ways of speaking. He often uses the word 'intellect' to indicate the form of the human being as, for example, in this sentence: Intellectivum principium est forma hominis [The intellective principle is the form of the human being]. Here the intellective principle is the intellect itself: Intellectus est intellectualis operationis principium [The intellect is the principle of intellectual activity] (S.T., I, q. 86, art. 1). This way of speaking is partially justified by the etymology of the word 'intellect' which indicates something understood.

We could say the same about human common sense, which imposes names upon things. In calling the faculty of understanding 'intellect', common sense recognises the need for something already understood per se if the faculty of understanding is to exist. Moreover, St. Thomas sometimes applies the word intellect to being, the intellective form itself, because being and the one who understands together make a single thing by means of their very close and perfect union in which it can truly be said that they touch one another: Intellectus enim in actu quodammodo est intellectum in actu [The intellect in act is in some way what is understood in act] (S.T., I, q. 76, art.4). When St. Thomas' way of speaking has been well understood, my own words, it would seem, are simply an explanation of his: being alone is what can be understood in its individuality. But because being, in so far as it shines in our minds and is received in them, is only initial being, that is, being without its terms and limitations, it can (in so far as it is conceived by each human being) rightly be called each one's individual intellect, and more appropriately the intellectual principle.

For greater confirmation of this, and so that my opinion may he seen to have the support of the authority of the ancient sages, I would ask the reader to reflect rather deeply on the whole course of philosophy from Plato, the master of Aristotle, to Descartes. He will see that this entire philosophy took as its foundation the truth of which I am speaking. Aristotle, for example, asks: 'How does knowledge come about except through the one seen in the many?' (Metaph., 3). This explains his opinion that knowledge essentially possesses in itself something universal. Duns Scotus explains this passage of Aristotle in the following words: Omnis scientia est de universali, quod est unum in multis, quia de singularibus non est scientia [All knowledge is concerned with what is universal, that is, with one in many, because there is no knowledge of particular things] (Comm., in hoc loco). If this was the universal knowledge of antiquity, it certainly supposed the apprehension of what is one, and therefore of the individual. What is this one, this individual, perceived in the many? We can answer this question very clearly if we take the teaching of antiquity on the one in conjunction with the opinions of which we have spoken. This teaching affirmed that by one was understood only undivided ens. Being was that which constituted unity and consequently one was sometimes taken for ens and vice versa. 'One simply means undivided ENS. From this it is clear that one is interchangeable with ens' (S.T.,I, q. 11, art. 1). Ens, therefore, is that which is known of its nature individually because it is the same as one; ens, seen in things, one in many, is that which makes us know things. This relationship of one ens with many things (with its many terms) is what makes the knowledge of things necessarily universal. Universal knowledge supposes prior to itself some particular knowledge in which it is founded, that is, the knowledge of ens.