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THE SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION: AN ANALYTIC AND COMPARATIVE STUDY IF IT IS TRUE, as St. Thomas says in his introduction to the De Ente et Essentia, that being and essence are the first things conceived in the intellect; and that everything else is conceived under the " auspices," so to speak, of these primary notions, might we not safely conclude that this first and fundamental monocular to all knowledge would have very far-reaching effects indeed? Just as a person facing the west will necessarily have a different perspective of the lights and shadows and all the passing parade of reality than one facing the east, so also it might make a difference whether one takes his fundamental intuition of being from the top or bottom, or from somewhere on the circumference, to speak metaphorically . In fact-to reduce the situation to extremes--the question of whether one views being from the bedrock of essence or the heights of existence might be the deciding factor in a myriad of other orientations which characterize his life: the orientation towards conservatism or progressivism; individualism or personalism ; naturalism or mysticism; determinism or freedom; self-expressionism or altruism; passivity or activity; provincialism or universalism; humanism, or covert or overt theocentricity ; multiplicity or unity, etc. On his voyage to China in 19~3, reflecting on the fundamental differences which emerged in his discussions with some of the ship's passengers, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin concluded that In all thought there is . . . a fundamental option, a postulate which is not demonstrable, but from which everything else is deduced. If one admits that esse (l'etre) is better than its opposite, 289 ~90 HOWARD P. KAINZ it is difficult to stop short of God. If one does not admit it, no further discussion is possible.1 Both essentialists and orthodox Thomists hold that " esse is better than its opposite." (If, as Suarez points out, essentialists sometimes hold that " essence is most perfect," this is only because they conceive essence as substantially subsisting in itself, which subsistence must presuppose existence, in Suarez's estimation) .2 This is what allows them to be on "speaking terms." However, since the essentialists hold that esse is really identical with essence, we might expect they mean something else by " esse " than the Thomists, who hold that it is really distinct from essence. If their perspective is not from the pole opposite to existence, it seems to be somewhere along the line. One of the purposes of this study will be to determine the locus of their metaphysical orientation with some measure of accuracy. I. SoME CHARACTERISTics OF SuAREZ In the construction of this study I concentrated especially on Disputation XXXI, Sects. 1-14, in which Suarez considers the nature of essence and existence, and the distinction between the two; Disp. XXVIII, Sect. 1, on the major divisions of being; and Disp. XXX, Sects. 4 and 6, on God's essence.8 In the reading of Suarez I have been struck especially by three things, which I think may have a bearing on the texture of his thought: namely, his conceptualism, polemic attitude, and individualism. 1. Conceptualism: When one returns to St. Thomas after 1 Corte, La vie et l'ame de Teilhard de Chardin (Paris: Librairie Artheme Fayard, 1957), p. 58: "Je crois bien en fait, qu'il se place Ia, dans toute pensee, un option fondamental, un postulat qui n'est pas demontrable, mais dont tout derive. Si !'on admet que l'etre est mieux que son contraire, il est difficile de s'arreter sans aller jusqu'a Dieu. Si on ne l'admet pas, il n'est plus possible, de discuter. • Disputationes Metaphysicae, Charles Burton, Ed. (Paris: Vives, 1961), t. 26 (this edition is used for all further references to the Disputations); Disp. XXXI, Sect. 18, med.· 8 Op. cit., pp. 1-20, p. 74 ff., p. 89 ff., and pp. 224-812. SUAREZIAN POSITION ON BEING AND THE REAL DISTINCTION fl91 reading Suarez for some time, St. Thomas appears to have an almost " chatty " style in comparison. Suarez is the strict logician, the rigid dialectician, all the way through. He rarely resorts to examples or...

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