Ockham's Theory of Terms: Part I of the "Summa Logicae" (review)

106 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY us, from the latter it is right to require that they hold firmly to the pledge taken at their baptism" (Ep. 136, quoted, p. 40). Though Hopkins's discussions are by and large historical and exegetical, his chapter on Anselm's ontological argument must be regarded--the history of philosophy aside--as an important contribution to the ongoing analysis of this argument. He begins with the common practice of distinguishing the argument of Proslogion, chapter 2, from that of Proslogion, chapter 3. With respect to Anselm's first argument, it was the Fool, after all, who was shortchanged: "in the end, it is not the Fool who fails to comprehend what 'God' means but Anselm who fails to comprehend what the Fool means. The Fool may admit that God must be conceived of as existing; but he need not understand God to exist, i.e. he need not take it to be a fact that God, conceived of as having to exist, does exist" (p. 74). Anselm failed to see that both thinking and not thinking that God does not exist in reality involves no inconsistency since "the conception and the denial take place in different respects, on different levels" (pp. 72f.). And notwithstanding certain maneuvers concerning the difference between cogitare and intellegere, Anselm's failure in his reply to Gaunilo to return to and treat this issue "constitutes a major deficiency. For precisely at this turn his original argument was extremely frail. Indeed, his unclarity on this point initially prompted Gaunilo's objections.... The essential plausibility of his argument arises from his confusion over this particular distinction. To expect him to be clear in this regard is tantamount to expecting him to recognize the unsoundness of his entire proof" (p. 76). According to Hopkins, Anselm presented one fully developed proof in the Proslogion, that of chapter 2, and then went on in chapter 3 to provide a statement about how real God is. Not only can God not not-exist, he cannot even conceivably not-exist, though this latter statement taken together with Anselm's reply to Gaunilo actually opens up "an altogether new line of argument" (p. 72) and implies a second proof. Following an excursus on Anselm's Augustinian and non-Thomistic concept of "necessary being" (necessary existence characterizes only esse per se), Hopkins considers and critiques Malcolm's well-known analysis of Anselm's arguments. Whether Hopkins's several criticisms of Malcolm are entirely judicious is a good question, and doubts may be raised also concerning the subsequent discussion of St. Thomas's concept of necessary being. Philosophers may invest themselves in these particular discussions with great profit. On the other hand, the issues involved in faith, reason, and the ontological argument constitute only a piece of Anselm's total philosophy-theology. This total perspective is altogether too often neglected by philosophers who are concerned only for what in it relates to the current rage, or worse, who think that the more strictly theological aspects may be ignored without any loss. Anselm himself knew better, and so does Hopkins, who has given us a book about the whole philosophy-theology of Anselm. ED. L. MILLER University of Colorado Ockham's Theory of Terms: Part I of the "Summa Logicae. ""Translated and introduced by Michael J. Loux. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1974. Pp. xiii + 221. $14.95) The English translations of different parts of Ockham's Summa Logicae that appear in a number of modern anthologies derive from Stephen Tornay or Philotheus Boehner. In many ways Loux's translation is a major advance over the work of these two previous translators. First of all, Tornay and Boehner provided only small portions of this important work of Ockham . Loux has rendered into readable English the whole of the prima pars of Ockham's key logic work. (In the 1974 critical edition of the complete Summa Logicae the work comprises three parts and runs 849 pages; Loux's translation covers the first part--on terms--and offers BOOK REVIEWS 107 the English reader slightly less than thirty percent of the entire work). Loux, however, advances more than just the sheer quantity of...