The "Real Distinction" in John Quidort

The "Real Distinction" in John Quidort F. A. CUNNINGHAM, sJ. "'WHEN CHOSSAT WROTE [in 1910] that the true founder of the composition of essence and existence was not Thomas Aquinas, but Giles of Rome, Grabmann [in 1924] crushed him under an avalanche of thirteenth-century masters who had an attributed this doctrine to Thomas Aquinas. Both were right, but. . . ." Thus, M. Gilson. 1 Ft. Chossat unfortunately never had a chance to dig himself ouL He died in 1926. Other scholars however have been digging away, and this snow job has been melting steadily over the years. Quantity is a poor substitute for quality. If Msgr. Grabmann had had one good reference, he would not have had to have recourse to many. Here is a bit of history which has grown up around one of the more impressive documents in that avalanche. Personally I believe that it is in its own way typical I. Trm ~ s ' r Msgr. Grabmann found this manuscript in the Vienna National Library, Cod. tat. 2165. It contained the Commentary of John Quidort on the Sentences. On the last page (folio 142") he came across thi.~ thesis: Esse non est proprietas fluens ab essentia, sed est ab extra sicut ealor in aqua et lux in acre. The very last sentence looked like a colophon: Nota quod pro praedieto articulo determinaverunt Parisiis anne Domini 1279 magister Joannes Praernonstratensis et frater Stephanus in sue duplici quolibet, scilicet quod esse non fluit ab essentia in aliquo genere sue.z Msgr. Grabmann interpreted this determinafio as the signature of a fragment from a disputation held in 1279 by a John the Premonstratensian and a Brother History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages, New York, N. Y.: Random House, 1955, p. 422. s "Doctrina S. Thomae De Distinctione Reali inter Essentiam et Esse ex documentis inedifis saeculi XIII illustrator," Acta Hebdomadae Thomisticae, Romae: Academiae S. Thomae Aquinatis, 1924, pp. 131-190, esp. p. 142. [9] 10 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY Stephen. He was mistaken here in three respects: the nature of the document; its author; and the date. In 1928 Abb~ Pierre Glorieux published a manuscript he found in the Mazarine Library, Cod /at. 3490 (fol. 157-158a). He called it "'Un m~moire justificatif de Bernard de Trilia," or that of some pseudo-BernarcL3 In 1930 Dr. Koch pointed out that this piece could not have been written by Bernard when he was a master. 4 Msgr. Glorieux agreed: "Concedo non totum, sed amplius." He had himself become convinced by this time that he was not dealing with any Bernard at all, but with John Quidort of Paris. 5 John had been delated to Rome for sixteen propositions in his Commentary on the Sentences. e His degree was held up. 7 This was the Apologeticum which he addressed to his Master General s After the war the Abb~ returned to this work. In 1951 he identified Msgr. Grabmann's document as the last article in that Apologeticum. 9 According to him, those names, John (of Weerde) the Premonstratensian and Brother Stephen (of Fermont) were not those of the authors; they were simply authorities which the author had reserved for his concluding punch line. :~ One of the references cited in this thesis was that of Giles of Rome in quaestionibus disputatis de esse et essentia. ~z In 1927 Fr. Hocedez had proven that Giles could not have written this disputation before 1285-1286. z2 In 1952 Dora Mtiller gave us a, critical text for the Grabmann document. ~s He extrapolated an extra line in the concluding sentence. And he told us that Msgr. Grabmann had admitted to him in 1947 that he had made a mistake in deciphering the date. Instead of 1279, now he thought that he should have read 1299. ~4 " Revue des sciences philosophiques et thdologiques (henceforth to be known in this article as RSPT), "I-Sa carri~re ~ l'Universit~ de Paris (1279-1287)," XVII (1928) 404-426; "II- Son Commentaire sur les Sentences," XVIII (1929), 23-58. 9 "Le m~moire justificalif de Bernard de Trilia," RSPT MIX (1930) 464-468, esp. 468. 6 "Notes: Bernard de Trilla? ou Jean de Paris?" RSPT XIX (1930) 469-475...