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Objection 1: It would seem that consent is to be found in irrational
animals. For consent implies a determination of the appetite to one
thing. But the appetite of irrational animals is determinate to one
thing. Therefore consent is to be found in irrational animals.
Objection 2: Further, if you remove what is first, you remove what
follows. But consent precedes the accomplished act. If therefore
there were no consent in irrational animals, there would be no act
accomplished; which is clearly false.
Objection 3: Further, men are sometimes said to consent to do
something, through some passion; desire, for instance, or anger.
But irrational animals act through passion. Therefore they consent.
On the contrary, Damascene says (De Fide Orth. ii, 22) that
"after judging, man approves and embraces the judgment of his
counselling, and this is called the sentence," i.e. consent. But
counsel is not in irrational animals. Therefore neither is consent.
I answer that, Consent, properly speaking, is not in irrational
animals. The reason of this is that consent implies an application of
the appetitive movement to something as to be done. Now to apply the
appetitive movement to the doing of something, belongs to the subject
in whose power it is to move the appetite: thus to touch a stone is an
action suitable to a stick, but to apply the stick so that it touch the
stone, belongs to one who has the power of moving the stick. But
irrational animals have not the command of the appetitive movement; for
this is in them through natural instinct. Hence in the irrational
animal, there is indeed the movement of the appetite, but it does not
apply that movement to some particular thing. And hence it is that the
irrational animal is not properly said to consent: this is proper to
the rational nature, which has the command of the appetitive movement,
and is able to apply or not to apply it to this or that thing.
Reply to Objection 1: In irrational animals the determination of
the appetite to a particular thing is merely passive: whereas consent
implies a determination of the appetite, which is active rather than
merely passive.
Reply to Objection 2: If the first be removed, then what follows
is removed, provided that, properly speaking, it follow from that
only. But if something can follow from several things, it is not
removed by the fact that one of them is removed; thus if hardening is
the effect of heat and of cold (since bricks are hardened by the fire,
and frozen water is hardened by the cold), then by removing heat it
does not follow that there is no hardening. Now the accomplishment of
an act follows not only from consent, but also from the impulse of the
appetite, such as is found in irrational animals.
Reply to Objection 3: The man who acts through passion is able not
to follow the passion: whereas irrational animals have not that power.
Hence the comparison fails.
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