The First Principle of Practical Reason: A Commentary on the. 1-2, q. A good part of Thomas's output, in effect, aims at doing these three things, and this obviously justifies its broad use of philosophical argumentation. The first principle, expressed here in the formula, To affirm and simultaneously to deny is excluded, is the one sometimes called the principle of contradiction and sometimes called the principle of noncontradiction: The same cannot both be and not be at the same time and in the same respect. We can be taught the joys of geometry, but that would be impossible if we did riot have natural curiosity that makes us appreciate the point of asking a question and getting an answer. They are underivable. Like other inclinations, this one is represented by a specific self-evident precept of the natural law, a kind of methodological norm of human action. of the natural law precepts, although he does not accept it as an account of natural law, which he considers to require an act of the divine will.) Hence it is understandable that the denial of the status of premise to the first practical principle should lead to the supposition that it is a pure forma denial to it of any status as an object of self-conscious knowledge. 5) It follows that the first principle of practical reason, is one founded on the intelligibility of goodthat is: Good is what each thing tends toward. All other precepts of natural law rest upon this. In order to equate the requirement of rationality with the first principle of practical reason one would have to equate the value of moral action with human good absolutely. Thus the status Aquinas attributes to the first principle of practical reason is not without significance. [These pertain uniquely to the rational faculty.] examines how Aquinas relates reason and freedom. But it can direct only toward that for which man can be brought to act, and that is either toward the objects of his natural inclinations or toward objectives that derive from these. Obligation is a strictly derivative concept, with its origin in ends and the requirements set by ends. My main purpose is not to contribute to the history of natural law, but to clarify Aquinass idea of it for current thinking. ODonoghue must read quae as if it refers to primum principium, whereas it can only refer to rationem boni. The, is identical with the first precept mentioned in the next line of text, while the, is not a principle of practical reason but a quasi definition of good, and as such a principle of understanding. The other misunderstanding is common to mathematically minded rationalists, who project the timelessness and changelessness of formal system onto reality, and to empiricists, who react to rationalism without criticizing its fundamental assumptions. Thus the modern reader is likely to wonder: Are Aquinass self-evident principles analytic or synthetic? Of course, there is no answer to this question in Aquinass terms. These remarks may have misleading connotations for us, for we have been conditioned by several centuries of philosophy in which analytic truths (truths of reason) are opposed to synthetic truths (truths of fact). 2, c; Super Libros Sententiarum Petri Lombardi, bk. The prescription Happiness should be pursued is presupposed by the acceptance of the antecedent If you wish to be happy, when this motive is proposed as a rational ground of moral action. To be practical is natural to human reason. In issuing this basic prescription, reason assumes its practical function; and by this assumption reason gains a point of view for dealing with experience, a point of view that leads all its further acts in the same line to be preceptive rather than merely speculative. 98103. 1-2, q. He also claims that mans knowledge of natural law is not conceptual and rational, but instead is by inclination, connaturality, or congeniality. Thus in experience we have a basis upon which reason can form patterns of action that will further or frustrate the inclinations we feel. The goodness of God is the absolutely ultimate final cause, just as the power of God is the absolutely ultimate efficient cause. The object of the practical intellect is not merely the actions men perform, but the. In the first paragraph Aquinas restates the analogy between precepts of natural law and first principles of theoretical reason. See also Van Overbeke, loc. 2 .Aquinas wrote that "good is to be done and pursued and evil avoided." Aquinas stated that reason reveals particular natural laws that are good for humans such as self-preservation, marriage and family, and the desire to know God. The first practical principle, as we have seen, requires only that what it directs have intentionality toward an intelligible purpose. However, one does not derive these principles from experience or from any previous understanding. The latter are principles of demonstration in systematic sciences such as geometry. The difference between the two formulations is only in the content considered, not at all in the mode of discourse. But does not Aquinas imagine the subject as if it were a container full of units of meaning, each unit a predicate? I have just said that oxide belongs to the intelligibility of rust. Hence the primary indemonstrable principle is: To affirm and simultaneously to deny is excluded. As I explained above, the primary principle is imposed by reason simply because as an active principle reason must direct according to the essential condition for any active principleit must direct toward an end. This is why I insisted so strongly that the first practical principle is not a theoretical truth. At any rate Nielsens implicit supposition that the natural law for Aquinas must be formally identical with the eternal law is in conflict with Aquinass notion of participation according to which the participation is. The theory of law is permanently in danger of falling into the illusion that practical knowledge is merely theoretical knowledge plus force of will. Later in the same work Aquinas explicitly formulates the notion of the law of nature for the first time in his writings. Thus the principles of the law of nature cannot be potential objects of knowledge, unknown but waiting in hiding, fully formed and ready for discovery. Reason is doing its own work when it prescribes just as when it affirms or denies. Aquinas thinks in terms of the end, and obligation is merely one result of the influence of an intelligible end on reasonable action. There is a constant tendency to reduce practical truth to the more familiar theoretical truth and to think of underivability as if it were simply a matter of conceptual identity. However, to deny the one status is not to suppose the other, for premises and a priori forms do not exhaust the modes of principles of rational knowledge. [24] Again, what is to be noticed in this response is that Aquinass whole understanding of law clearly depends on final causality. correct incorrect Maritain points out that Aquinas uses the word quasi in referring to the prescriptive conclusions derived from common practical principles. 3)Now among those things which fall within the grasp of everyone there is a certain order of precedence. Rather, it is primarily a principle of actions. Moreover, the fact that the precepts of natural law are viewed as self-evident principles of practical reason excludes Maritains account of our knowledge of them. However, Aquinas does not present natural law as if it were an object known or to be known; rather, he considers the precepts of practical reason themselves to be natural law. The precepts are many because the different inclinations objects, viewed by reason as ends for rationally guided efforts, lead to distinct norms of action. cit. In the first paragraph Aquinas restates the analogy between precepts of natural law and first principles of theoretical reason. We can know what is good by investigating our natural (rational) inclinations. Solubility is true of the sugar. But these references should not be given too much weight, since they refer to the article previously cited in which the distinction is made explicitly. As we have seen, however, Aquinas maintains that there are many self-evident principles included in natural law. But it is central throughout the whole treatise. If some practical principle is hypothetical because there is an alternative to it, only a practical principle (and ultimately a nonhypothetical practical principle) can foreclose the rational alternative. 4, d. 33, q. J. Robert Oppenheimer. [74] The mere fact of decision, or the mere fact of feeling one of the sentiments invoked by Hume, is no more a basis for ought than is any other is. Hume misses his own pointthat ought cannot be derivedand Nielsen follows his master. Of course, so far as grammar alone is concerned, the gerundive form can be employed to express an imperative. For Aquinas, however, natural law includes counsels as well as precepts. [8], Aquinass solution to the question is that there are many precepts of the natural law, but that this multitude is not a disorganized aggregation but an orderly whole. The mistaken interpretation suggests that natural law is a set of imperatives whose form leaves no room to discriminate among degrees of force to be attached to various precepts. [6] Patrologia Latina (ed. supra note 3, at 6873. B. Schuster, S.J., . supra note 3. Lottin, for example, balances his notion that we first assent to the primary principle as to a theoretical truth with the notion that we finally assent to it with a consent of the will. 2, ad 2. 94, a. The difference between the two points of view is no mystery. Now if practical reason is the mind functioning as a principle of action, it is subject to all the conditions necessary for every active principle. [21] D. ODonoghue, The Thomist Conception of Natural Law, Irish Theological Quarterly 22, no. Second, there is in man an inclination to certain more restricted goods based on the aspect of his nature which he has in common with other animals. The principles of practical reason belong to a logical category quite different from that of theoretical statements: precepts do not inform us of requirements; they express requirements as directions for action. But the principle of contradiction can have its liberalizing effect on thought only if we do not mistakenly identify being with a certain kind of beingthe move which would establish the first principle as a deductive premise. [26] He remarks that the habit of these ends is synderesis, which is the habit of the principles of the natural law. However, Aquinas explicitly distinguishes between an imperative and a precept expressed in gerundive form. Moral and intellectual that the precept of charity is self-evident to human reason, either by nature or by faith, since a. knowledge of God sufficient to form the natural law precept of charity can come from either natural knowledge or divine revelation. Hedonism is _____. Opposition between the direction of reason and the response of will can arise only subsequent to the orientation toward end expressed in the first principle. But more important for our present purpose is that this distinction indicates that the good which is to be done and pursued should not be thought of as exclusively the good of moral action. Thus to insure this fundamental point, it will be useful to examine the rest of the treatise on law in which the present issue arises. One might translate, An intelligibility is all that would be included in the meaning of a word that is used correctly if the things referred to in that use were fully known in all ways relevant to the aspect then signified by the word in question. For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us; that we may delight in your will, and walk in your ways, to the glory of your Name. Only after practical reason thinks does the object of its thought begin to be a reality. Many useful points have been derived from each of these sources for the interpretation developed below. To the first argument, based on the premises that law itself is a precept and that natural law is one, Aquinas answers that the many precepts of the natural law are unified. An intelligibility includes the meaning and potential meaning of a word uttered by intelligence about a world whose reality, although naturally suited to our minds, is not in itself cut into piecesintelligibilities. It is noteworthy that in each of the three ranks he distinguishes among an aspect of nature, the inclination based upon it, and the precepts that are in accordance with it. But something is called self-evident in two senses: in one way, objectively; in the other way, relative to us. 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