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EXISTENCE AND CAUSALITY THE perennial philosophy is a philosophy of natural realism and common sense. Doubtless these are qualities which account for the fact that this philosophy outlives all fads and fallacies and survives all wounds inflicted even by its teachers and supporters. These same qualities appeal to the beginner in philosophy, and seem to promise that his effort to study and understand will not be in vain. However , they do not guarantee that the task will be an easy one. Beginners soon learn that the path of realism and common sense leads into many a thorny thicket, with no edible fruit in sight, or yet ripe for eating. A common source of difficulty is the fact that words and phrases, even of the great masters, are used in so many different senses, and are combined in so many paradoxical statements , that the thread of our understanding becomes snarled. Questions arise to which the student can see no consistent answers, and he may begin to wonder whether the last state of a philosopher is not worse than the first. Even though he keeps the indispensable faith of a philosopher and firmly believes that a little knowledge of higher things is more desirable than perfect knowledge of lesser things, still he krl.ows that a philosopher cannot live by faith alone, but must achieve a bit of understanding. In this paper we shall consider some of the difficulties which arise from classical statements concerning existence and causality. These topics are close to the heart of philosophy, because a philosopher is one who desires to know not only the facts but also the causes or reasons why they are so. We do not now inquire why something exists rather than nothing, or why these things exist rather than others. We acknowledge things as they are: God and his creatures, material ones and immaterial ones. By existence in a finite being we 76 EXISTENCE AND CAUSALITY 77 understand that by which it is or exists, by which it is distinct both from nothing and from its causes. Existence pertains primarily and properly to the -whole being, not to the parts.1 The whole is that which is, and which is created or generated, then moved or modified in this way or that. The fundamental parts, both matter and form, coexist in the whole by the existence of the whole, whereas the accidents inhere or exist in the whole, not simply in themselves. Existence in finite beings is not that which exists, or which is created or generated or made. When we speak of finite existence we mean something really distinct although not separated from something called essence or nature, which receives, supports and determines or specifies the existence.2 When we speak simply of the being we mean the whole as existing, distinguished only by reason from other determinations which specify the whole, whether it be man or beast. Thus there are two kinds of distinctions, which must be carefully maintained, particularly in logical and metaphysical matters. There are real distinctions and distinctions which are not real but rational, that is, introduced by reason itself. In ordinary life and thought, and even in the particular sciences such as physics and mathematics, we are concerned with the real distinctions which we find in things, and with their like1 " ••• to be created is to be made in a certain way. Furthermore, the being made is ordained to the being of the thing. Hence those things are properly made or created which have being. But being properly belongs to subsisting things, whether simple ones, as the separated substances, or composed ones, as material substances. For being properly belongs to that which has being, and this is something which subsists in its own being. But forms and accidents and the like are not called beings as if they themselves are, but because something is by them, as whiteness is called a being because by it a subject is white." Sum. Theol. I, Q. 45, Art. 4. • ". . . Although in an angel there is no composition of matter and form, nevertheless there is act and potency in him. This can be seen from the consideration of material things, in...

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