Aquinas on Being and Essence: A Translation and Interpretation (review)

208 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY half or toward the end of the fourth century.... " (55) as a Pythagorean manifesto representing only a segment of ancient medical opinion. It is only at the end of antiquity that a decided change took place, and men began to look upon the oath as a nucleus for medical practice. As Temkin observes, Edelstein's view "ran counter to the widespread view of the Hippocratic physician as a scientist-philosopher, trying to live up to the lofty principles of the Hippocratic Oath" (xii). I might also mention that Edelstein views Eryximachus in the Symposium (contra Gildersleeve et al.) as an historically accurate portrait of a medical practitioner at that time; methodist medicine as a transposition of Aenesidemian skepticism; dogmatic and empiricist medicine as representations of dogmatic and academic philosophy; classical (Hippocratic) empiricism as medicine's own creation and an original contribution to Greek thought; and differences between ancient and modern naturalism as striking. Certainly required reading should be his "Recent Trends in the Interpretation of Ancient Science" 0952). In the past few years several important works of Edelstein have appeared posthumously . Plato's Seventh Letter (in which he denies its authenticity, and rightly, I believe), The Idea of Progress in Classical Antiquity, and the Meaning of Stoicism are of primary importance for historians of ancient philosophy. Ancient Medicine shows the philosophical word a different Edelstein, the historian of ancient medicine, the role that he chose for his lifelong occupation. His views are subtle and complex and cannot be characterized briefly and well. Philosophers will be amply rewarded by a careful study of these essays. EDWARD W. WARREN San Diego State College Aquinas on Being and Essence: A Trar~lation and Interpretation. By Joseph Bobik. (Univ. of Notre Dame Press, 1965) Joseph Bobik has undertaken in this book a philosophical task which has become quite rare in medieval philosophy but is extremely admirable. Explicitly refusing to discuss the vast accumulation of interpretative and critical material which has centered on Aquinas' treatise, he attempts to provide a sympathetic and intelligible interpretation avoiding as much as possible the jargon peculiar to medieval scholars. The book is composed of the translation of On Being and Essence, which Bobik tries to render in "as ordinary English as possible," and a running commentary on the translation . The translation itself seems little different from that by Father Maurer (Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1949), except that Bobik attempts to purge the translation of some expressions used by the so-called "existentialist" school of Thomism. For example, esse is rendered simply as "existence" or "existing," rather than as "act of existing." Bobik's commentary is very useful in explaining notions that could mislead many readers of On Being and Essence. He repeatedly draws attention to the meaning of the important distinction between first and second intentions, the differing uses of the term "matter," and the Thomistic conception of metaphysics. On the whole, Bobik has a critical and open approach to the text and a strong appreciation of the need for clarity and precision. His commentary should prove illuminating to most students and teachers of Aquinas. However, there are three important difficulties to which I shall briefly call attention. First, the student who first reads On Being and Essence might think that the BOOK REVIEWS 209 distinction St. Thomas is attempting to draw between essence and existence, between what a thing is and that it is, corresponds to the distinction between the possible and the actual. In other words, it is one thing to think of the possibility of some sort of thing existing and another thing for it actually to exist Such entities as unicorns and phoenixes might be regarded as essences to which no existing thing corresponds or as essences which do not "have" existence. This interpretation would be supported by the following quotation from On Being and Essence: Now, every essence or quiddity can be understood without anything being understood about its existence. For I can understand what a man is, or what a phoenix is, and yet not know whether they have existence in the real world. (159-160) Bobik is probably correct in implying that the student's initial interpretation...