Part 12 (2/2)

Thus, substance is conceived as the unique but hidden and unknowable basis of all the phenomena which const.i.tute the totality of human experience.

What is to be said of such a conception? There is just this much truth in it: that substance is _relatively_ stable or permanent, _i.e._ in comparison with accidents; the latter cannot survive the destruction or disappearance of the substance in which they inhere, while a substance can persist through incessant change of its accidents. But accidents are not _absolutely_ ephemeral, nor is substance _absolutely_ permanent: were an accident to exist for ever it would not cease to be an accident, nor would a substance be any less a substance were it created and then instantaneously annihilated. But in the latter case the human mind could not apprehend the substance; for since all human cognitive experience takes place _in time_, which involves _duration_, the mind can apprehend a substance only on condition that the latter has some permanence, some appreciable duration in existence. This fact, too, explains in some measure the error of conceiving permanence as essential to a substance.

But the error has another source also: Under the influence of subjective idealism philosophers have come to regard the individual's consciousness of his own self, the consciousness of the _Ego_, as the sole and unique source of our concept of substance. The pa.s.sage we have just quoted from Spencer is an ill.u.s.tration. And since the spiritual principle of our conscious acts is a permanent principle which abides throughout all of them, thus explaining the unity of the individual human consciousness, those who conceive substance in general after the model of the _Ego_, naturally conceive it as an essentially stable subject of incessant and evanescent processes.

But it is quite arbitrary thus to conceive the _Ego_ as the sole type of substance. Bodies are substances as well as spirits, matter as well as mind. And the permanence of corporeal substances is merely relative.

Nevertheless they are really substances. The relative stability of spirit which is immortal, and the relative instability of matter which is corruptible, have nothing to do with the substantiality of either. Both alike are substances, for both alike have that mode of being which consists in their existing in themselves, and not by inhering in other things as accidents do.

(_e_) Spencer's conception of substance as the permanent, unknowable ground of phenomena, implies that substance is one, not manifold, and thus suggests the view of reality known as _Monism_. There is yet another mistaken notion of substance, the notion in which the well known pantheistic philosophy of Spinoza has had its origin. Spinoza appears to have given the ambiguous definition of Descartes-”_Substantia est res quae ita exist.i.t, ut nulla alia re indigeat ad existendum_”-an interpretation which narrowed its application down to the Necessary Being; for he defined substance in the following terms: ”_Per substantiam intelligo id quod est in se et per se concipitur: hoc est, id cujus conceptus non indiget conceptu alterius rei a quo formari debeat_”. By the ambiguous phrase, that substance ”requires no other thing for existing,” Descartes certainly meant to convey what has always been understood by the scholastic expression that substance ”exists _in_ itself”. He certainly did not mean that substance is a reality which ”exists _of_ itself,” _i.e._ that it is what scholastics mean by _Ens a se_, the Being that has its actuality from its own essence, by virtue of its very nature, and in absolute independence of all other being; for such Being is One alone, the Necessary Being, G.o.d Himself, whereas Descartes clearly held and taught the real existence of finite, created substances.(245) Yet Spinoza's definition of substance is applicable only to such a being that our concept of this being shows forth the actual existence of the latter as absolutely explained and accounted for by reference to the essence of this being itself, and independently of any reference to other being. In other words, it applies only to the Necessary Being. This conception of substance is the starting-point of Spinoza's pantheistic philosophy.

Now, the scholastic definition of substance and Spinoza's definition embody two entirely distinct notions. Spinoza's definition conveys what scholastics mean by the Self-Existent Being, _Ens a se_; and this the scholastics distinguish from caused or created being, _ens ab alio_. Both phrases refer formally and primarily, not to the mode of a being's existence when it does exist, but to the origin of this existence in relation to the being's essence; and specifically it marks the distinction between the Essence that is self-explaining, self-existent, essentially actual (”_a_ se”), the Necessary Being, and essences that do not themselves explain or account for their own actual existence, essences that have not their actual existence from themselves or of themselves, essences that are in regard to their actual existence contingent or dependent, essences which, therefore, if they actually exist, can do so only dependently on some other being whence they have derived this existence (”_ab_ alio”) and on which they essentially depend for its continuance.

Not the least evil of Spinoza's definition is the confusion caused by gratuitously wresting an important philosophical term like _substance_ from its traditional sense and using it with quite a different meaning; and the same is true in its measure of the other mistaken notions of substance which we have been examining. By defining substance as an _ens in se_, or _per se stans_, scholastic philosophers mean simply that substance does not depend _intrinsically_ on any _subjective_ or _material_ cause in which its actuality would be supported; they do not mean to imply that it does not depend _extrinsically_ on an efficient cause from which it has its actuality and by which it is conserved in being. They a.s.sert that all _created_ substances, no less than all accidents, have their being ”_ab alio_” from G.o.d; that they exist only by the Divine creation and conservation, and act only by the Divine _concursus_ or concurrence; but while substances and accidents are both alike dependent on this extrinsic conserving and concurring influence of a Divine, Transcendent Being, substances are exempt from this other and distinct mode of dependence which characterizes accidents: intrinsic dependence on a subject in which they have their actuality.(246)

When we say that substance exists ”_in_ itself,” obviously we do not attach to the preposition ”_in_” any _local_ signification, as a part existing ”in” the whole. Nor do we mean that they exist ”in” themselves in the same sense as they have their being ”in”

G.o.d. In a certain true sense all creatures exist ”in” G.o.d: _In ipso enim vivimus, et movemur, et sumus_ (Acts xxii., 28), in the sense that they are kept in being by His omnipresent conserving power. But He does not sustain them as a subject in which they inhere, as substance sustains the accidents which determine it, thereby giving expression to its concrete actuality.(247) By saying that substance exists ”in itself” we mean to exclude the notion of its existing ”in another” thing, as an accident does.

And this we shall understand better by examining a little more closely this peculiar mode of being which characterizes accidents.

65. THE NATURE OF ACCIDENT. ITS RELATION TO SUBSTANCE. ITS CAUSES.-From all that has preceded we will have gathered the general notion of _accident_ as that mode of real being which is found to have its reality, not by existing in itself, but by affecting, determining, some substance in which it inheres as in a subject. What do we mean by saying that accidents _inhere in_ substances as their _subjects_? Here we must at once lay aside as erroneous the crude conception of something as located spatially within something else, as contained in container, as _e.g._ water in a vessel; and the equally crude conception of something being in something else as a part is in the whole, as _e.g._ an arm is in the body.

Such imaginations are wholly misleading.

The actually existing substance has its being or reality; it is an actual essence. Each real accident of it is likewise a reality, and has an essence, distinct from that of the substance, yet not wholly independent of the latter: it is a determination of the determinable being of the substance, affecting or modifying the latter in some way or other, and having no other _raison d'etre_ than this role of actualizing in some specific way some receptive potentiality of the concrete substance. And since its reality is thus dependent on that of the substance which it affects, we cannot ascribe to it actual essence or being in the same sense as we ascribe this to substance, but only a.n.a.logically(248) (2). Hence scholastics commonly teach that we ought to conceive an accident rather as an ”ent.i.ty _of an ent.i.ty_,” ”ens _entis_,” than as an ent.i.ty simply; rather as inhering, indwelling, affecting (_in_-esse) some subject, than simply as existing itself (_esse_); as something whose essence is rather the determination, affection, modification of an essence than itself an essence proper, the term ”essence” designating properly only a substance: _accidentis esse est inesse_.(249) This conception might, no doubt, if pressed too far, be inapplicable to absolute accidents, like quant.i.ty, which are something more than mere modifications of substance; but it rightly emphasizes the dependence of the reality of accident on that of substance, the non-substantial and ”diminished” character of the ”accident”-mode of being; it also helps to show that the ”inherence” of accident in substance is a relation-of determining to determinable being-which is _sui generis_; and finally it puts us on our guard against the errors that may be, and have been, committed by conceiving accidents in the abstract and reasoning about them apart from their substances, as if they themselves were substances.

This ”inherence” of accident in substance, this mode of being whereby it affects, determines or modifies the substance, differs from accident to accident; these, in fact, are cla.s.sified into _suprema genera_ by reason of their different ways of affecting substance (60). To this we shall return later. Here we may inquire, about this general relation of accident to substance, whether it is _essential_ to an accident _actually to inhere in_ a substance, if not immediately, then at least through the medium of some other accident. We suggest this latter alternative because as we shall see presently there are some accidents, such as colour, taste, shape, which immediately affect the _extension_ of a body, and only through this the substance of the body itself. Now the ordinary course of nature never presents us with accidents except as inhering, mediately or immediately, in a substance. Nor is it probable that the natural light of our reason would ever suggest to us the possibility of an exception to this general law. But the Christian philosopher knows, from Divine Revelation, that in the Blessed Eucharist the _quant.i.ty_ or _extension_ of bread and wine, together with the taste, colour, form, etc., which affect this extension, _remain in existence_ after their connatural substance of bread and wine has disappeared by transubstantiation. In the supernatural order of His providence G.o.d preserves these accidents in existence without a subject; but in this state, though they do not _actually inhere_ in any substance, they _retain their natural apt.i.tude and exigence_ for such inherence. The Christian philosopher, therefore, will not define accident as ”the mode of being which inheres in a subject,” but as ”the mode of being which _in the ordinary course of nature_ inheres in a subject,” or as ”the mode of being which has _a natural exigence_ to inhere in a subject”. It is not _actual inherence_, but the _natural exigence to inhere_, that is essential to an accident as such.(250)

Furthermore, an accident needs a substance not formally _qua_ substance, or as a mode of being naturally existing in itself; it needs a substance _as a subject_ in which to inhere, which it will in some way affect, determine, qualify; but the subject in which it immediately inheres need not always be a substance: it may be some other accident, in which case both of course will naturally require some substance as their ultimate basis.

Comparing now the concept of accident with that of substance, we find that the latter is presupposed by the former; that the latter is prior _in thought_ to the former; that we conceive accident as something over and above, something superadded to substance as subject. For instance, we can define matter and form without the prior concept of body, or animality and rationality without the prior concept of man; but we cannot define colour without the prior concept of body, or the faculty of speech without the prior concept of man.(251)

Substance, therefore, is prior _in thought_ to accident; but is the substance itself also prior _temporally_ (prior _tempore_) to its accidents? It is prior in time to some of them, no doubt; the individual human being is thus prior, for instance, to the knowledge he may acquire during life. But there is no reason for saying that a substance must be prior _in time_ to _all_ its accidents;(252) so far as we can discover, no created substance comes into existence devoid of all accidents: corporeal substance devoid of internal quant.i.ty, or spiritual substance devoid of intellect and will.

If prior in thought, though not necessarily in time, to its accidents, is a substance prior to its accidents _really_, _ontologically_ (prior _natura_)? Yes; it is the real or ontological principle of its accidents; it sustains them, and they depend on it. It is a pa.s.sive or material cause (using the term ”material” in the wide sense, as applicable even to spiritual substances), or a receptive subject, determined in some way by them as formal principles. It is at the same time an efficient and pa.s.sive cause of some of its own accidents: the soul is an efficient cause of its own immanent processes of thought and volition, and at the same time a pa.s.sive principle of them, undergoing real change by their occurrence. Of others it is merely a receptive, determinable subject, of those, namely, which have an adequate and necessary foundation in its own essence, and which are called _properties_ in the strict sense: without these it cannot exist, though they do not const.i.tute its essence, or enter into the concept of the latter; but it is not prior to them in time, nor is it the _efficient cause_ of them; it is, however, a real principle of them, an essence from the reality of which they necessarily result, and on which their own reality depends. Such, for instance, is the faculty of thought, or volition, or speech in regard to man.

The accident-mode of being is, therefore, a mode of being which determines a substance in some real way. Its _formal effect_ is to give the substance some real and definite determination: not _esse simpliciter_ but _esse tale_. With the substance it const.i.tutes a concrete real being which is _unum per accidens_, not _unum per se_.

The accident has no _formal cause_: it is itself a ”form” and its causality is that of a formal cause, which consists in its communicating itself to a subject, and, by its union therewith, const.i.tuting some new reality-in this case a concrete being endowed with ”accidental” unity.

Accidents have of course, a _material cause_; not, however, in the sense of a _materia ex qua_, a material from which they are const.i.tuted, inasmuch as they are simple ”forms”; but in the sense of a _subject_ in which they are received and in which they inhere; and this ”material cause” is, proximately or remotely, _substance_.

Substance also is the _final cause_, the _raison d'etre_, of the reality of the accidental mode of being. Accidents exist for the perfecting of substances: _accidentia sunt propter substantiam_. As we have seen already, and as will appear more clearly later on, the fundamental reason for the reality of an accidental mode of being, really distinct from the created or finite substance (for the Infinite Substance has no accidents), is that the created substance is imperfect, limited in its actual perfection, does not exist _tota simul_, but develops, through a process of change in time, from its first or _essential_ perfection, through _intermediate_ perfections, till it reaches the _final_ perfection (46) of its being.

Have all accidents _efficient causes_? Those which are called common accidents as distinct from _proper_ accidents or _properties_ (66) have undoubtedly efficient causes: the various agencies which produce real but accidental changes in the individual substances of the universe. _Proper_ accidents, however, inasmuch as they of necessity exist simultaneously with the substances to which they belong, and flow from these substances by a necessity of the very essence of these latter, cannot be said to have any efficient causes other than those which contribute by their efficiency to the _substantial changes_ by which these substances are brought into actual existence; nor can they be said to be _caused efficiently_ by these substances themselves, but only to ”flow” or ”result” necessarily from the latter, inasmuch as they come into existence simultaneously with, but dependently on, these substances. Hence, while substances are universally regarded as _real principles_ of their properties-as, for instance, the soul in regard to intellect and will, or corporeal substance in regard to quant.i.ty-they are not really efficient causes of their properties, _i.e._ they do not _produce_ these properties by _action_. For these properties are antecedent to all _action_ of the substance; nor can a created substance _act_ by its _essence_, but only through active powers, or faculties, or forces, which meditate between the essence of a created substance and its actions, and which are the proximate principles of these actions, while the substance or nature is their remote principle. Hence the ”properties” which necessarily result from a substance or nature, have as their efficient causes the agencies productive of the substance itself.(253)

66. MAIN DIVISIONS OF ACCIDENTS.-These considerations will help us to understand the significance of a few important divisions of accidents: into proper and common, inseparable and separable. We shall then be in a position to examine the nature of the distinction between accidents and substance, and to establish the existence of accidents really distinct from substance.

(_a_) The attributes which we affirm of substance, other than the notes const.i.tutive of its essence, are divided into _proper_ accidents, or _properties_ in the strict sense (?d???, _proprium_), and _common_ accidents, or accidents in the more ordinary sense (s?e????, _ac-cidens_). A property is an accident which belongs exclusively to a certain cla.s.s or kind of substance, and is found _always_ in _all_ members of that cla.s.s, inasmuch as it has an adequate foundation in the nature of that substance and a necessary connexion therewith. Such, for instance, are the faculties of intellect and will in all spiritual beings; the faculties of speaking, laughing, weeping in man; the temporal and spatial mode of being which characterizes all created substances.(254) When regarded from the logical point of view, as attributes predicable of their substances considered as logical subjects, they are distinguished on the one hand from what const.i.tutes the essence of this subject (as _genus_, _differentia_, _species_), but also on the other hand from those attributes which cannot be seen to have any absolutely necessary connexion with this subject. The latter attributes alone are called _logical accidents_, the test being the absence of a necessary connexion in thought with the logical subject.(255) But the former cla.s.s, which are distinguished from ”logical” accidents and called _logical properties_ (”_propria_”) are none the less _real accidents_ when considered from the ontological standpoint; for they do not const.i.tute the essence of the substance; they are outside the concept of the latter, and super-added-though necessarily-to it. Whether, however, all or any of these ”properties,” which philosophers thus cla.s.sify as real or ontological accidents, ”proper” accidents, of certain substances, are _really_ distinct from the concrete, individual substances to which they belong, or are only aspects of the latter, ”substantial modes,” only _virtually_ distinct in each case from the individual substance itself,-is another and more difficult question (69). Such a property is certainly not really separable from its substance; we cannot conceive either to exist really without the other; though we can by abstraction think, and reason, and speak, about either apart from the other.(256) Real inseparability is, however, regarded by scholastic philosophers as quite compatible with what they understand by a real distinction (38).

A _common_ accident is one which has no such absolutely necessary connexion with its substance as a ”property” has; one which, therefore, can be conceived as absent from the substance without thereby entailing the destruction of the latter's essence, or of anything bound up by a necessity of thought with this essence. And such common accidents are of two kinds.

They may be such that in the ordinary course of nature, and so far as its forces and laws are concerned, they are never found to be absent from their connatural substances-_inseparable_ accidents. Thus the colour of the Ethiopian is an inseparable accident of his human nature as an Ethiopian; he is naturally black; but if born of Ethiopian parents he would still be an Ethiopian even if he happened to grow up white instead of black. We could not, however, conceive an Ethiopian, or any other human being, existing without the faculties (not the use) of intellect and will, or the faculty (not the organs, or the actual exercise of the faculty) of human speech.

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