The Writings of Charles De Koninck: Volume 1

The Philosophical Point of View

t wo The Philosophical Point of View 1. Preliminary Notions a. Becoming By the term ‘nature,’ taken in a general sense, we mean the coordinated ensemble of spatio-temporal things which surround us and of which we are a part.Becoming is the common and specific character of each thing in this ensemble . The universality of becoming is most obvious in temporal duration. The natural being which seems not to change or be changed in any other way can only continue its existence on condition that it be constantly renewed. Existence is received by it only in a successive and continuous manner. Successive and continuous duration is the definition of time. If this successive duration were not continuous the natural being could only exist by always becoming other. In this regard the whole of nature is in a state of constant flow. Natural being changes in many other respects. But the other changes, whatever they be, always involve time. Moreover, these other ways of changing are not particular or special cases of temporal duration. It cannot therefore be time which expresses this general mobility of the natural being, a mobility of which time is only a particular case, for even though it is implicated in the other cases, it is distinct from them. Let us say then that a natural being is a mobile being. And that nature is an ensemble of fluxibilia. Manifestly we are dupes of a verbal trick when we say that a mobile being is a natural being. ‘Natural’ is after all a vague term. And to take ‘nature’ in a strict sense, as we will see in what follows, we must define it in terms of mobility. It is mobile being, not as being, but under the precise angle of mobility, ens mobile in quantum mobile, mobile being precisely as mobile, that is the formal object of the Philosophy of Nature. Note that we have not yet mentioned ‘matter’ and ‘body.’ 257 b. Generation and Corruption Mobile being only becomes by receiving existence successively. The plant grows, the animal learns, the man becomes ill. Beings are enriched and impoverished . Perfections are incessantly engendered and corrupted. The cow is nourished by grass. She is enriched. But the grass in becoming cow is decomposed. The capital of nature is limited. When one being is enriched, another is impoverished. So, too, a corruption accompanies every generation. There are not only accidental generations and corruptions in nature, like the accidental generation in the cow that feeds: this generation entailed the corruption of the grass.And the cow engenders a calf: substantial generation. c. Natural Species The ensemble of beings constituting nature is divided into four species: men, animals, plants, and the inorganic. One can know without understanding: animal; live without knowing: plant; be without living: inorganic. These four species are the only ones philosophically definable.The canine species is not a species in the philosophical sense. Natural species thus constitute a hierarchy. The plant is manifestly more perfect than the rock or a nebula (abstracting from the life it may contain), being at once corporeal and vegetative. The animal is at once sensitive, vegetative , and corporeal; to which man adds rationality. We say that these species are essentially different. One lives or one does not, one can know or one cannot. There is no intermediary. However,despite the essential difference between the four species,they always have something in common.Man and the dog are truly animals,and like the plant they are truly vegetative, and like the inorganic they are truly corporeal . They have a common genus. With respect to man, the genus animal is called the proximate genus (genus proximum), whereas the vegetative genus is only a remote genus (genus remotum).The definition of a being should include both the proximate genus and the specific difference. We define man as rational animal. The inorganic species has only a negative definition: non-living being. The fact that the animal is sensitive, vegetative, and corporeal does not mean that it is composed of four superimposed beings constituting an ensemble we call animal. It must be one: its essence must be one. The essence 258 | Charles De Koninck makes a being what it is. It is the same essence that is at once animal, vegetative , and corporeal. Thus we say that between the different degrees constitutive of...