THE PRINCIPLES OF REAL BEING.
All knowledge which is truly scientific rests on demonstration, and all demonstration depends on principles or axiomatic truths. But, besides the principles of demonstration, there are other principles on which not only the knowledge, but the very existence of things, and their origin and constitution, essentially depend. These latter principles are nowadays less known than the former, as we may argue from the fact that they are scarcely ever alluded to in modern speculations; and yet they undoubtedly have the best claim to the attention of philosophical minds, for it is in such principles that the real germs of all true science are hidden. For this reason, we have determined to offer our readers a short but accurate summary of the philosophical doctrine on principles; which, if presented, as we shall try to do, with becoming perspicuity, will prove to be a kind of popular introduction to metaphysical studies.
I. NOTION OF PRINCIPLE.
By the name of principle philosophers designate that whence anything originally proceeds in any manner whatever: Id, unde aliquid quomodocumque procedit. This definition implies that there are many different manners of proceeding, and consequently many different kinds of principles. And so it is. Aristotle, however, shows that principles of all kinds can be reduced to three classes; that is, to those principles of which a thing consists, those through which or out of which a thing is made, and those by which a thing is known: Primum, unde aliquid est, aut fit, aut cognoscitur.[139]—Arist. Metaph. 5.
The first class comprises the principles through which a thing is, viz., by which the thing is intrinsically constituted. These principles are called constituent or intrinsic principles, and are always present by their own entity in the thing principiated; as the matter in the body, and the soul in the animal.
The second class contains the principles through which a thing is made. These principles serve to account for the origin of the thing, and are called extrinsic principles, because they are not present by their own entity in the thing principiated. Thus, the motive power of the sun is not, by its own entity, in the planets to which it imparts movement, but in the sun only; and the medical art is not in the person who has been cured through it, but in the doctor. There is, however, in the planets something proceeding from the motive power of the sun, and in the person cured something proceeding from the medical art, as every one will acknowledge. Whence it is obvious that the extrinsic principles by their very principiation must leave some mark or vestige of themselves in the thing principiated.
The third class consists of those principles through which any conclusion is made known. These principles are general truths, which are made to serve for the demonstration of some other truth, and are called principles of science.
Among the principles of this third class we do not reckon the principles from which the first apprehension and immediate intuition of things proceeds; to wit, either the power through which the object makes an impression on the cognoscitive faculty, or the faculty itself through which the object is apprehended. Our reason is that these principles, thus considered, do not form a class apart. The power of the object to make its impression on the subject is an extrinsic principle of knowledge, and ranks with the principles of the second class above mentioned; whilst the power of the subject to perceive through the intelligible species is an intrinsic principle of knowledge, as well as the species which it expresses within itself, and, therefore, is to be ranked among the principles of the first class. Accordingly, the third class is exclusively made up of those principles which serve for the scientific demonstration of truth; and this is what Aristotle himself insinuates, at least negatively, as he gives no instance of principles of this third class but the premises by which any conclusion is made known.
Before we advance further, we have to remark that, in metaphysics, the first principles of science are assumed, not as a subject of investigation, but as the fundamental base of scientific demonstration. Thus, the principles, Idem non potest simul esse et non esse,[140] Non datur effectus sine causa,[141] Quæ sunt eadem uni tertio sunt eadem inter se,[142] and such like, though usually styled "metaphysical" principles, are not the subject of metaphysical investigation, but are simply presupposed and admitted on the strength of their immediate and incontrovertible evidence. Such principles are perfectly known before all metaphysical disquisition, and need not be traced to other principles. On the other hand, metaphysics, which is the science of reality, deals only with the principles of real beings; whence it follows that the principles of demonstration, which, like the conclusion deduced therefrom, exist in the intellect alone (and therefore are beings of reason, and principiate nothing but other beings of reason), are not comprised in the object of metaphysical inquiry. Hence, the only principles which metaphysics is bound to investigate are those that belong to the first and second class above mentioned; that is, the intrinsic and the extrinsic principles of things: Primum unde aliquid est, and primum unde aliquid fit.[143]
Principles and causes are often confounded, although it is well known that they are not identical. Hence, our next question is: In what does a cause differ from a principle?
It is commonly admitted that all causes are principles, but not all principles causes; which evidently implies that a cause is something more than a principle. In fact, when we use the word "cause," we wish to designate a being in which we know that there is a principle of causation; whence it is evident that the common notion of cause implies the notion of principle, and something else besides—that is, the notion of a subject to which the principle belongs. Thus, we say that the moon causes the tides by its attractive power; the moon is the cause, and the attractive power is its principle of causation. In like manner, we say that an orator causes great popular emotion by his eloquence; the orator is the cause, and his eloquence is his principle of causation.
From these instances it would be easy to conclude that the difference between a cause and a principle lies in this, that the cause is a complete being, whilst the principle is only an appurtenance of the cause. But as we know from theology that there are principles which cannot be thus related to causes, we cannot consider the above as an adequate and final answer to the question proposed.
Some of the best modern scholastics account for the difference between cause and principle in the following manner: A principle, they say, is conceived to differ from a cause in two things: first, in this, that a cause always precedes its effect by priority of nature,[144] whereas a principle does not require such a priority; secondly, in this, that the cause does not communicate its own identical nature to its effect, whereas the principle can communicate its own identical nature to that which it principiates.[145] From these two differences a third one might be gathered, viz., that the effect has always a real dependence from[146] its cause, whilst the thing principiated does not always really depend from its principles.[147] These grounds of distinction between principles and causes have been thought of, with the avowed object of paving the way to explain how the Eternal Father can be the principle, without being the cause, of his Eternal Son, and how the Father and the Son can be the principle, without being the cause, of the Holy Ghost.
But we must observe that there are four genera of causes and of principles: the efficient, the material, the formal, and the final; and that the two differences alleged by these writers between principle and cause do not apply to principles and causes of the same genus, but are applicable only when some principle belonging to one genus is wrongly compared with some cause pertaining to another genus.
That there are four genera of causes we will take for granted, as it is the universal doctrine of philosophers. That there are also four genera of principles corresponding to the four genera of causes is evident; for every cause must contain within itself the principle of its causality; and, in fact, Aristotle himself clearly affirms that there are as many causes as principles, and that all causes are also principles,[148] in the sense which we have already explained. Lastly, that the two aforesaid differences between principle and cause do not apply to principles and causes of the same genus can be easily verified by a glance at each genus. Let the reader take notice of the following statements, and then judge for himself.
The efficient cause (the agent) and the efficient principle (its active power) are both, by priority of nature, prior to the thing produced or principiated, and both have a nature numerically distinct from that of the thing produced or principiated.
In the same manner the final cause (the object willed) and the finalizing principle (the known goodness and desirability of the object) both are, by priority of nature, prior to the act caused or principiated, and both have a nature numerically distinct from that of the act caused or principiated.
Thus, also, the material cause (actual matter) and the material principle (the passiveness of matter) are both, by priority of nature, prior to the thing effected or principiated, and both identify themselves with the thing effected or principiated.
Accordingly, with regard to these three kinds of causation and principiation, it is quite impossible to admit that the difference between a cause and a principle is to be accounted for by a recourse to the two aforementioned grounds of distinction, so long as the causes and principles, which are compared, belong to one and the same genus.
As to the formal cause and the formal principle, we shall presently see that they are not distinct things; but, even if we were disposed to consider them as distinct, such a distinction could not possibly rest on the two grounds of which we have been speaking; for the formal cause and the formal principle have no priority of nature[149] with respect to the thing caused or principiated, and both identify themselves with the same. We are, therefore, satisfied that the opinion which we have criticised has no foundation in truth.
Let us, then, resume our previous explanation, and see how the difficulty above proposed against its completeness can be solved. We have shown that the notion of cause implies the notion of principle, together with that of a subject to which the principle belongs. We must, therefore, admit that a principle differs from a cause of the same genus, as an incomplete or metaphysical entity differs from a complete or physical being; or, in other terms, that a real cause, rigorously speaking, is a complete being, which gives origin to an effect; whilst a real principle, properly speaking, is only that through which the cause gives origin to its effect. The cause is id quod causat;[150] the principle is id quo causa causat.[151]
The formal principle, however, is an exception to this general doctrine, as formal principles do not differ from formal causes. The form, in fact, not only has within itself something through which it is fit to cause its effect, but also is itself that very something, and through itself brings its effect into existence. Thus the soul, which is the form of the body, through itself, and not through any of its faculties, actuates the body and vivifies it. On this account, then, any form might be indifferently called either a formal cause or a formal principle. But we must further consider that a form, as such, is an incomplete entity, since no formal act can exist apart from its essential term;[152] and on this ground we maintain that the name of principle suits it better than the name of cause.
And this conclusion will be approved even by those philosophers whose opinion concerning the distinction between cause and principle we have just refuted; for the two differences which they allege as characteristic of cause in opposition to principle have no room in formal causation or principiation, since we have seen that the formal act has no priority of nature with respect to its essential term, and identifies itself with the thing of which it is the act. Consequently, the form, even in the opinion of said philosophers, is not a cause, but a principle.
We hope to give a fuller explanation of this point on a later occasion; but what we have just said suffices to show what we at present intend, viz., that the doctrine which considers principles as appurtenances of causes admits of a remarkable exception in the case of formal principles, and by such an exception is competent to account for the existence of other principles importing real principiation without real causation. Now, this is exactly what the theological doctrine on divine processions requires. The fact, therefore, that the procession of one of the divine Persons from another involves no causation, but only principiation, can be accounted for by a simple reference to the nature of formal principiation. The Eternal Father is certainly not the efficient, but the formal, principle of His Eternal Son; and this already suffices to explain how the being of the Son is not a new being made by the Father, but is the very same being of the Father communicated identically to the Son. Thus, also, the Holy Ghost not efficiently, but formally, proceeds from the Father and the Son, through their conspiration into a simple actuality of love; and this suffices to explain how the Holy Ghost is not made by the Father and the Son, but is the very actuality of the one in the other.
To sum up: Formal principiation is not causation; hence, that which immediately proceeds from a formal principle is not caused by it, but only principiated; it is not its effect, but its connatural term; it has not a distinct nature, but the very nature of its formal principle identically communicated; lastly, it has no real dependence from its formal principle, but only real relative opposition; for real dependence has no place where there is identity of nature. This is eminently true of God, and, by imitation, of every primitive contingent being, which is strictly one in its entity, and consequently also of all the ultimate elements into which a physical compound can be resolved; for the ultimate elements of things cannot but be primitive beings.
The preceding remarks regard those formal acts which enter in the essential constitution of being as such, and which are called strictly substantial acts. Of accidental forms we have nothing to say in particular, as it is too evident to need explanation that they are not causes, but mere principles. It is, therefore, to be concluded that the distinction between cause and principle applies only to efficient, material, and final causality and principiativity. Thus, as we have said, the sun is the efficient cause of certain movements, and its attractive power is the efficient principle of those movements; the object is the final cause that moves the will, and the goodness, through which the object moves the will, is the finalizing principle of the volition: the steel is the material cause of the sword, but the material principle of the sword is the passive potency of the steel, which allows it to receive the form of a sword or any other form.
We must not forget, however, that the words cause and principle have been, and are, very frequently used without discrimination by philosophical writers, even of the highest merit. It is by no means uncommon to find, for instance, the premises described as the cause of the conclusion, the rules of the art as the cause of an artificial work, the exemplar as the cause of that in which it is reproduced or imitated. In these examples, the word cause stands for principle. The old Greek theologians even said that God the Father is the cause of his Eternal Son; the word cause being undoubtedly used by them in the sense of principle. We should not be astonished at this. Indeed, while we ourselves persist in giving the name of cause to the formal principle, we should be the last to be surprised at the Greek fathers doing the same.
And now, let us come to another part of our subject. Philosophers, when wishing to give a full account of things, besides principles and causes, point out metaphysical reasons too. We think it our duty to show in what such reasons consist, and in what they differ from principles.
A reason, in general, may be defined as that from which anything immediately results; and since a formal result is not made, but simply follows as a consequence from a conspiration of principles, we can see at once that a reason, or the formal ground of a given result, must consist in a conspiration of given principles. There are logical reasons, which give rise to logical results; and there are metaphysical reasons, which give rise to metaphysical results. We will give an example of each.
In a syllogism, the consequence is the result of a conspiration of two propositions, called premises. The propositions themselves are the principles from which the conclusion is to follow; but the actual following of the conclusion depends on the actual comparison of the two propositions, and on the actual perception of the agreement of two extreme terms with a middle one. It is, in fact, through the middle term that the two premises conspire into a definite conclusion. Hence, when we are asked the reason why a conclusion follows from two premises, we point out not only the fact that the two premises are true, but especially the fact that the extreme terms, which are to be directly united in the conclusion, are already both linked, in the premises, with the same middle term. For it is evident that the whole strength of a legitimate conclusion lies in the universality of the axiom, Quæ sunt eadem uni tertio, sunt eadem inter se. The words, sunt eadem uni tertio,[153] express the formal reason, and the words sunt eadem inter se[154] express the formal result. In scholastic language, the premises would be called the principium formale quod[155] of the conclusion, and the suitable connection of their terms would be called the principium formale quo,[156] or the ratio formalis[157] of the conclusion; whilst the conclusion itself would be called the rationatum.[158]
For an example of the metaphysical order, we will take a known subject, animal life, and ascertain its formal reason. Every one knows that the soul is a principle of life; but animal life, besides the vivifying soul, requires also an organic body as its other principle. These two principles, however, are, with respect to animal life, in the same relation as the two premises with respect to their conclusion. For as the conclusion proximately results from the connection of the premises and their bearing on one another, as we have just explained, so, also, animal life results from the connection of soul and body—that is, from the actuation of the latter by the former, and consequently by the completion of the former in the latter. Hence, the formal reason, or the principium formale quo, of animal life is the very information of the body by the soul, while the soul and the body themselves, taken together, constitute the principium formale quod.
From these two examples, to which it would be easy to add many more, it is manifest that what we call formal reason is a conspiration of correlative principles towards a common actual result. All results are relations between terms, or principles, communicating with one another, either through themselves or through something which is common to them. In the first case, the result, or relation, is transcendental, and is nothing else than the actuality of one principle in the other—of the soul in the body, for instance. In the second case, the result, or relation, is either predicamental or logical (according as its principles and its formal reason are real or not), and is nothing else than the actuality of the terms as correlated.
Let the reader remark that we have pointed out three kinds of so-called formal principles, viz., the form, or act, which is a principium formale properly, and without qualification; then the principium, formale quod of a resultation, consisting of correlated principles conspiring together into a common result; lastly, the principium formale quo, or the proximate reason of the resultation, consisting in the very conspiration of the correlated principles. In English, the better to distinguish the one from the other, it would be well to retain the name of formal principle for the first alone; the second might be called the formal origin, and the third the formal reason, of a resultation. Thus the name of formal principle would be preserved to its rightful owner, without danger of mistaking it for a formal reason, or vice versa.
Before we conclude, we beg to add, though it may appear unnecessary, that the conditions of causation are not principles. We make this remark because nothing, perhaps, is more common in ordinary speech than to confound conditions with principles and causes. It is not uninstructed persons only, but educated people and men of science too, that express themselves as if they believed that conditions have their own active part in producing effects. If a weight be suspended by a thread, the cutting of the thread is popularly said to cause the fall of the weight. He who throws a piece of paper into the fire is said to burn the paper. He who rubs a match is said to light the match. A change of distance between the sun and a planet is said to cause a change of intensity in the central forces. Now, it is scarcely necessary to show that cutting the thread, throwing the paper, rubbing the match, etc., are only conditions of the falling, the burning, the lighting, etc., respectively; and conditions are neither causes nor principles of causation. A condition of causation may be defined to be an accidental relation between principles or causes, inasmuch as they are concerned in the production of an effect. Causes and principles cause and principiate in a different manner, according to the difference of their mutual relations, but do not cause or principiate through such relations, as is evident.
A weight suspended by a thread falls when the thread is cut. But he who cuts the thread is not the real cause of the falling. The true cause is, on the one hand, the earth by its attractive power, and, on the other, the body itself by its receptive potency. Cutting the thread is only to put a condition of the falling. The fall, in fact, depends on the condition that the body be free to obey the action of gravity; and this condition is fulfilled when the thread is cut. In like manner, he who throws a piece of paper into the fire does not burn it, but only puts it in the necessary relation with the fire, that it may be burnt; and he who rubs the match does not light it, but only rubs it, the rubbing being a condition, not a cause, of the lighting. In fact, the lighting of the match is caused by the actions and reactions which take place between the molecules of certain substances on the end of the match; and such actions and reactions depend on the rubbing only inasmuch as the rubbing alters the relations of distance between molecules, disturbs their equilibrium, and places them in a new condition with respect to their acting on one another. Of course, the rubbing is an effect, and he who does the rubbing is a cause; but he causes the rubbing only. So, also, the change of distance between the sun and a planet is neither the cause nor the principle of a change of intensity in the mutual attraction. The action of celestial bodies follows a law. With such or such relation of distance between them, they act with such or such intensity; but distance is evidently not an active principle, and therefore a change of distance is only the change of a condition of causation.
As we have just mentioned the fact that celestial bodies are subject to a law of action, it might be asked whether law itself be a real principle. We must answer in the negative; for law is nothing but the necessity for every agent or patient of conforming to its own nature in the exertion of its powers, and in the subjection of its potency. Such a necessity is permanent, since it arises from the determination of nature itself, and may be divided into moral, physical, and logical, according as it is viewed in connection with different beings or powers; but it is certainly neither an active power nor a passive potency, but only a natural ordination of the same, and accordingly is not a cause nor a principle, but an exponent of the constant manner in which causes and principles bring about the various changes we witness throughout the world.
These few notions may suffice as an introduction to what we intend to say about the principles of things. We have seen that a principle is less than a cause, a reason less than a principle, and a condition less than a reason; and we have determined as exactly as we could the general character of each of them, by ascertaining the grounds of their several distinctions. This was our only object in the present article; and therefore we will stop here, and reserve particulars for future investigation.
TO BE CONTINUED.
FOOTNOTES:
[138] Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1874, by Rev. I. T. Hecker, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.
[139] The principle whence anything exists, is made, or is known.
[140] The same thing cannot at the same time be and not be.
[141] There is no effect without a cause.
[142] Things which are equal to a third thing are equal to each other.
[143] The principle whence anything is, and the principle whence anything is made.
[144] Philosophers teach that one thing can precede another in three ways, to wit, by priority of time, by priority of nature, and by priority of reason. A thing existing while another thing is not yet in existence has, with regard to this latter, a priority of time. A thing, on the existence of which the existence of another depends, has, with regard to this latter, a priority of nature. A thing, the conception of which is needed to form the conception of another, has, with regard to this latter, a priority of reason. The priority of origin, by which one of the divine Persons is prior to another, is a priority of reason, not of nature, and implies no real dependence of one Person from another.
[145] See Liberatore, Metaph. Gen., n. 125.
[146] We advisedly employ the preposition from. There is a vast difference between depending on and depending from. To depend from is properly to be hanging from, as a lamp from the ceiling; but nothing forbids the use of the phrase in a metaphorical sense in order to translate the Latin phrase, pendere ab, for which we have no other equivalent. The usual English phrase, to depend on, corresponds to the Latin pendere ex. Were we to employ it also for pendere ab, a confusion would arise of the two different meanings. Certainly, the two phrases, Homo pendet a Deo, and Exitus pendet ex adjunctis express different kinds of dependence; and we cannot translate them into English in the same manner without setting their differences at naught. We would, therefore, say, that Man depends from God, and that Success depends on circumstances. In philosophy, both prepositions are needed, and, if used with proper discrimination, they will save us the trouble of many useless disputes.
[147] A being and its constituent principles may be said to have a certain dependence on one another, inasmuch as they have such an essential connection with one another that the one cannot be conceived apart from the other. But this so-called "dependence" means only correlation and "mutual exigency"; and therefore does not entail a priority of nature of the one with respect to the other. In a being, which is strictly one in its entity, there are three principles: an act, its term, and the actuality of the one in the other. The act has only a priority of origin with respect to its essential term, and both have only a priority of origin with regard to their formal actuality. They depend on one another in the sense explained, but not from one another. We shall treat of them in a future article.
[148] Toties autem causæ quoque dicuntur (qucties principia); omnes namque causæ principia sunt.—Aristotle, Metaph. 5.
[149] Priority of nature implies in that which is prior an existence independent of that which is posterior; but a mere formal act has no existence independent of the being of which it is a constituent; therefore, the formal act is not prior, by priority of nature, to such a being.
[150] That which causes.
[151] That by which the cause causes.
[152] To say that the human soul can exist apart from the body, is no objection. Our soul is not merely a formal act; it is a subsistent being—that is, an act having its own intrinsic term, and therefore possessing an independent existence; which cannot be said of other forms. And on this account the soul is the only form which without impropriety might be called a formal cause as well as a formal principle.
[153] Are equal to a third.
[154] Are equal to each other.
[155] The formal principle which.
[156] The formal principle by which or through which.
[157] The formal reason.
[158] The product of reasoning.