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Objection 1: It would seem that the intelligible species abstracted
from the phantasm is related to our intellect as that which is
understood. For the understood in act is in the one who understands:
since the understood in act is the intellect itself in act. But
nothing of what is understood is in the intellect actually
understanding, save the abstracted intelligible species. Therefore
this species is what is actually understood.
Objection 2: Further, what is actually understood must be in
something; else it would be nothing. But it is not in something
outside the soul: for, since what is outside the soul is material,
nothing therein can be actually understood. Therefore what is actually
understood is in the intellect. Consequently it can be nothing else
than the aforesaid intelligible species.
Objection 3: Further, the Philosopher says (1 Peri Herm. i)
that "words are signs of the passions in the soul." But words
signify the things understood, for we express by word what we
understand. Therefore these passions of the soul---viz. the
intelligible species, are what is actually understood.
On the contrary, The intelligible species is to the intellect what
the sensible image is to the sense. But the sensible image is not what
is perceived, but rather that by which sense perceives. Therefore the
intelligible species is not what is actually understood, but that by
which the intellect understands.
I answer that, Some have asserted that our intellectual faculties
know only the impression made on them; as, for example, that sense is
cognizant only of the impression made on its own organ. According to
this theory, the intellect understands only its own impression,
namely, the intelligible species which it has received, so that this
species is what is understood.
This is, however, manifestly false for two reasons. First, because
the things we understand are the objects of science; therefore if what
we understand is merely the intelligible species in the soul, it would
follow that every science would not be concerned with objects outside
the soul, but only with the intelligible species within the soul;
thus, according to the teaching of the Platonists all science is about
ideas, which they held to be actually understood [Question 84,
Article 1]. Secondly, it is untrue, because it would lead to the
opinion of the ancients who maintained that "whatever seems, is true"
[Aristotle, Metaph. iii. 5], and that consequently
contradictories are true simultaneously. For if the faculty knows its
own impression only, it can judge of that only. Now a thing seems
according to the impression made on the cognitive faculty.
Consequently the cognitive faculty will always judge of its own
impression as such; and so every judgment will be true: for instance,
if taste perceived only its own impression, when anyone with a healthy
taste perceives that honey is sweet, he would judge truly; and if
anyone with a corrupt taste perceives that honey is bitter, this would
be equally true; for each would judge according to the impression on
his taste. Thus every opinion would be equally true; in fact, every
sort of apprehension.
Therefore it must be said that the intelligible species is related to
the intellect as that by which it understands: which is proved thus.
There is a twofold action (Metaph. ix, Did. viii, 8), one
which remains in the agent; for instance, to see and to understand;
and another which passes into an external object; for instance, to
heat and to cut; and each of these actions proceeds in virtue of some
form. And as the form from which proceeds an act tending to something
external is the likeness of the object of the action, as heat in the
heater is a likeness of the thing heated; so the form from which
proceeds an action remaining in the agent is the likeness of the
object. Hence that by which the sight sees is the likeness of the
visible thing; and the likeness of the thing understood, that is, the
intelligible species, is the form by which the intellect understands.
But since the intellect reflects upon itself, by such reflection it
understands both its own act of intelligence, and the species by which
it understands. Thus the intelligible species is that which is
understood secondarily; but that which is primarily understood is the
object, of which the species is the likeness. This also appears from
the opinion of the ancient philosophers, who said that "like is known
by like." For they said that the soul knows the earth outside
itself, by the earth within itself; and so of the rest. If,
therefore, we take the species of the earth instead of the earth,
according to Aristotle (De Anima iii, 8), who says "that a
stone is not in the soul, but only the likeness of the stone"; it
follows that the soul knows external things by means of its intelligible
species.
Reply to Objection 1: The thing understood is in the intellect by
its own likeness; and it is in this sense that we say that the thing
actually understood is the intellect in act, because the likeness of
the thing understood is the form of the intellect, as the likeness of a
sensible thing is the form of the sense in act. Hence it does not
follow that the intelligible species abstracted is what is actually
understood; but rather that it is the likeness thereof.
Reply to Objection 2: In these words "the thing actually
understood" there is a double implication---the thing which is
understood, and the fact that it is understood. In like manner the
words "abstract universal" imply two things, the nature of a thing
and its abstraction or universality. Therefore the nature itself to
which it occurs to be understood, abstracted or considered as universal
is only in individuals; but that it is understood, abstracted or
considered as universal is in the intellect. We see something similar
to this is in the senses. For the sight sees the color of the apple
apart from its smell. If therefore it be asked where is the color
which is seen apart from the smell, it is quite clear that the color
which is seen is only in the apple: but that it be perceived apart from
the smell, this is owing to the sight, forasmuch as the faculty of
sight receives the likeness of color and not of smell. In like manner
humanity understood is only in this or that man; but that humanity be
apprehended without conditions of individuality, that is, that it be
abstracted and consequently considered as universal, occurs to humanity
inasmuch as it is brought under the consideration of the intellect, in
which there is a likeness of the specific nature, but not of the
principles of individuality.
Reply to Objection 3: There are two operations in the sensitive
part. One, in regard of impression only, and thus the operation of
the senses takes place by the senses being impressed by the sensible.
The other is formation, inasmuch as the imagination forms for itself
an image of an absent thing, or even of something never seen. Both of
these operations are found in the intellect. For in the first place
there is the passion of the passive intellect as informed by the
intelligible species; and then the passive intellect thus informed
forms a definition, or a division, or a composition, expressed by a
word. Wherefore the concept conveyed by a word is its definition; and
a proposition conveys the intellect's division or composition. Words
do not therefore signify the intelligible species themselves; but that
which the intellect forms for itself for the purpose of judging of
external things.
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