-
Question Five
- Franciscan Institute Publications
- Chapter
- Additional Information
QUESTION FIVE Text of Aristotle: “I say that matter, which in itself is nothing in particular, is neither quantity nor any of the other categories by which being is determined. For it is something of which each of these is predicated, whose being is different from that of each of the categorical predicates.” (Metaphysics VII, ch. 3, 1029a 19-22). Is matter a being? [Arguments Pro and Con] 1 [1] For the negative there is the text cited that it is neither something, etc. 2 Reply: 1 it is not such actually but it is such in potency.—To the contrary: either it is potentially matter or form or the composite. 3 Also, what is generated, does not exist according to Physics V. 2 This is understood of the subject of generation, because what is moved, exists. It is understood to be ‘in potency’, because what comes to it is actual existence; therefore, matter is not in potency. 4 Also, either it is pure act or a composite of act and potency, but it is neither of these. First because “it is scientifically knowable only by analogy;” 3 secondly, because then something less than it [matter] would be possible; nor is it the first [i.e., pure act], because “it is not differentiated as the basis of nature,” 4 and thus it is not form; neither is it the second [i.e. a composite] because it is a principle. 5 Likewise, in this way: the first act is without any potency; therefore there is also a first potency without any act. Likewise, act is in proportion to potency and thus would be unlimited just as potency is indefinite [infinite] 1 Thomas Aquinas, Quodl. III q. 1, a. 1, ed. Parma IX, 485b; Godfrey of Fontaines, Quodl. I q. 4, resp. (PhB II, 8-9). 2 Aristotle, Physica V, ch. 1, 225a 26-27. 3 Cf. Aristotle, Physica I, ch. 7, 191a 7-11. 4 Cf. Aristotle, Metaphysics I, ch. 8, 989b 6-7. 120 THE METAPHYSICS OF JOHN DUNS SCOTUS 6 [2] To the contrary: it [matter] is a per se principle, according to Physics I; 5 and a per se cause, from II. 6 [I.—BODY OF THE QUESTION] 7 Reply: “it is change that makes matter known”; 7 for all natural agents have something passive corresponding to them on which they act; therefore just as in accidental change, the agent of change changes something that remains from one term to the other (for whiteness does not become blackness, but what was at first white becomes black), so also in [substantial] generation, the generator changes something from one form to another form, and what is changed is called matter. This is Aristotle’s argument in Physics I, Bk. I About generation, 8 and Bk. II and XII of the Metaphysics, 9 and often elsewhere. 8 To this it is objected: that on which the agent acts must perish, but in the last instance the whole is changed into the whole, according to Bk. I On generation. 10 9 On the contrary: the first is not naturally corrupted before the thing generated comes to be; hence, if nothing of what perishes remains in that ‘now’ in which the generator generates, then it generates from nothing, neither does it act on something. 10 Reply: it is not from anything subjectively, but from something initially, as from a terminus “a quo,” God [however creates] from nothing in both senses. 11 To the contrary: an agent having in its causative power the whole effect, no less produces it, although another [agent] is not posited, which would debilitate more the power of the agent than fortify it. But, according to you, the generator has in its effective power the whole of the effect, because it presupposes nothing of it 5 Aristotle, Physica I, ch. 7, 190b 17-20. 6 Aristotle, Physica II, ch. 3, 194b 22-24. 7 Averroes, Metaphysica VIII, com. 12 (ed. Iuntina VIII, f. 103rb). 8 Aristotle, De gener. et corrup. I, ch. 4, 319b 6-320a 7. 9 Aristotle, Metaphysics II, ch. 2 and XII, ch. 2; 994a 25-b 7, 1069b 8-15. 10 Aristotle, De gener. et corrup. I, ch. 2, 317a 20-22. [3.238.79.169] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 21:33 GMT) BOOK VII QUESTION FIVE 121 [i.e. what was there before]. But through the action in a contrary that has to perish its active power is weakened, not strengthened. 12 This reason...