A third argument in favor of the old theory is drawn from the constitution of man. In man the soul is a substantial form, the root of all his properties, and the constituent of the human substance. Hence all other natural substances, it is argued, must have in a similar manner some substantial principle containing the formal reason of their constitution, of their natural properties, and of their operations. “The fact that man is composed of matter and of substantial form shows,” says Suarez, “that in natural things there is a substantial subject naturally susceptible of being informed by a substantial act. Such a subject (the matter) is therefore an imperfect and incomplete substance, and requires to be constantly under some substantial act.”[66] Whence it follows that all natural substance consists of matter actuated by a substantial form.
This argument, according to Scotus and his celebrated school, is based on a false assumption. Man is not one substance, but one nature resulting from the union of two distinct substances, the spiritual and the material; and to speak of a human substance as one is nothing less than to beg the whole question. Every one must admit that the human soul is the natural form of the animated body, and that, inasmuch as it is a substance and not an accident, the same soul may be called a “substantial” form; but, according to the Scotistic school, to which we cannot but adhere on this point, it is impossible to admit the Thomistic notion that the soul gives the first being to the matter of the body, so as to constitute one substance with it; and accordingly it is impossible to admit that the soul is a strictly “substantial” form in the rigid peripatetic sense of the word; and thus the above argument, which is based entirely on the unity of human substance, comes to naught.
This is not the place to develop the reasons adduced by the Scotists and by others against the Thomistic school, or to refute the arguments by which the latter have supported their opinion. We will merely remark that, according to a principle universally received, by the Thomists no less than by their opponents (Actus est qui distinguit), there can be no distinct substantial terms without distinct substantial acts; and consequently our body cannot have distinct substantial parts, unless it has as many distinct substantial acts. And as there is no doubt that there are in our body a great number of distinct substantial parts (as many, in fact, as there are primitive elements of matter), there is no doubt that there are also a great number of distinct substantial acts. It is not true, therefore, that the human body (or any other body) is constituted by one “substantial” form. The soul is not defined as the first act of matter, but it is defined as the first act of a physical organic body; which means that the body must possess its own physical being and its bodily and organic form before it can be informed by a soul. And surely such a body needs not receive from the soul what it already possesses as a condition of its information; it must therefore receive that alone in regard to which it is still potential; and this is, not the first act of being, but the first act of life. But if the soul were a strictly “substantial” form according to the Thomistic opinion, it should be the first act of matter as such, and it would have no need of a previously-formed physical organic body; for the position of such a form would, of itself, entail the existence of its substantial term. We must therefore conclude that the human soul is called a “substantial” form, simply because it is a substance and not an accident,[67] and because, in the language of the schools, all the “essential” forms have been called “substantial,” as we have noticed at the beginning of this article. We believe that it is owing to this double meaning of the epithet “substantial” that both S. Thomas and his followers were led to confound the natural and essential with the strictly substantial forms. They reasoned thus: “What is not accidental must be substantial”; and they did not reflect that “what is not accidental may be essential,” without being substantial in the meaning attached by them to the term.
But since we cannot here discuss the question concerning the human soul as its importance deserves, let us admit, for the sake of the argument, that the human soul gives the first being to its body, and is thus a strictly substantial form in the sense intended by our opponents. It still strikes us that no logical mind can from such a particular premise draw such a general conclusion as is drawn in the objected argument. Is it lawful to apply to inanimate bodies in the conclusion what in the premises is asserted only of animated beings? Or is there any parity between the form of the human nature and that of a piece of chalk? The above-mentioned Card. Tolomei well remarks that “such a pretended parity is full of disparities, and that from the human soul, rational, spiritual, subsistent, and immortal, we cannot infer the nature of those incomplete, corruptible, and corporeal entities which enter into the constitution of purely material things.”[68]
That “all natural substances must have some substantial principle” we fully admit. For we have shown that in every natural compound there are just as many substantial forms as there are primitive elements in it, and therefore there is no doubt that each point of matter receives its first being through a strictly substantial form. But these substantial forms are the forms of the components; they are not the specific form of the compound. Nor do we deny that the properties of the compound must be ultimately traced to some substantial principle; for we admit the common axiom that “the first principle of the being is the first principle of its operations”; and thus we attribute the activity of the compound nature to the substantial forms of its components. But we maintain that the same components may constitute different specific compounds having different properties and different operations, according as they are disposed in different manners and subjected to a different composition. This being evident, we must be allowed to conclude that the proximate and specific constituent form of a compound inanimate nature is nothing else than its specific composition.
Our opponents cannot evade this conclusion, which annihilates the whole peripatetic theory, unless they show either that there may be a compound without composition, or that in natural things there is no material composition of substantial parts. The first they cannot prove, as a compound without composition is a mere contradiction. Nor can they prove the second; for they admit that natural substances are extended, and it is evident that there can be no material extension without parts outside of parts, and therefore without material composition.
As to the passage of Suarez objected in the argument, two simple remarks will suffice. The first is that “the fact that man is composed of matter and substantial form does not show that in other natural things there is a substantial subject naturally susceptible of being informed by a substantial act”; unless, indeed, the epithet “substantial” be taken in the sense of “essential,” as we have above explained. But, even in this case, there will always be an immense difference between such essential forms, because the form of a human body must be a substance, whilst the form of the purely material compounds can be nothing else than composition. The second remark is that, as the first matter, according to Suarez, has its own entity of essence and its own entity of existence, “the substantial subject naturally susceptible of being informed” has neither need nor capability of receiving its first being; whence it follows that such a substantial subject is never susceptible of being informed by a truly and strictly substantial form. We know that Suarez rejects this inference on the ground that the entity of matter, according to him, is incomplete, and requires to be perfected by a substantial form. But the truth is that no strictly substantial form can be conceived to inform a matter which has already an actual entity of its own; for the substantial form is not simply that which perfects the matter (for every form perfects the matter), but it is that which gives to it the first being, as all philosophers agree. On the other hand, it might be proved that the matter which is a subject of natural generations is not an incomplete substantial entity, and that the intrinsic act by which it is constituted, is not, as Suarez pretends, an act secundum quid, but an act simpliciter; it being evident that nothing can be in act secundum quid unless it be already in act simpliciter; whence it is manifest that the first act of matter cannot be an act secundum quid.
It would take too long to discuss here the whole Suarezian theory. Its fundamental points are two: The first, that the matter which is the subject of natural generations “has an entity of its own”; the second, that “such an entity is substantially incomplete.” The first of these two points he establishes against the peripatetics with very good reasons, drawn from the nature of generation; but the second he does not succeed in demonstrating, as he does not, and cannot, demonstrate that an act secundum quia precedes the act simpliciter. For this reason we ventured to say in our previous article that the first matter of Suarez corresponds to our primitive elements, which, though unknown to him, are, in fact, the first physical matter of which the natural substances are composed. What we mean is that, though Suarez intended to prove something else, he has only succeeded in proving that the matter of which natural substances are composed is as true and as complete a substance as any primitive substance can be. And we even entertain some suspicion that this great writer would have held a language much more conformable to our modern views, had he not been afraid of striking too heavy a blow at the peripatetic school, then so formidable and respected. For why should he call “substantial” the forms of compound bodies, when he knew that the matter of those bodies had already an actual entity of its own? He certainly saw that such forms were by no means the substantial forms of S. Thomas and of Aristotle; but was it prudent to state the fact openly, and to draw from it such other conclusions as would have proved exceedingly distasteful to the greatest number of his contemporaries? However this may be, it cannot be denied that the Suarezian theory, granting to the matter of the bodies an entity of its own, leads to the rejection of the truly substantial generations, and to the final adoption of the doctrine which we are maintaining in accordance with the received principles of modern natural science. But let us proceed.
The fourth argument in favor of the old theory is the following: If the components remain actually in the compound, and do not lose their substantial forms by the accession of a new substantial form, it follows that no new substance is ever generated; and thus what we call “new substances” will be only “new accidental aggregates of substances,” and there will be no substantial difference between them. But this cannot be admitted; for who will admit that bread and flesh are substantially identical? And yet who can deny that from bread flesh can be generated?
We concede most explicitly that no new “substance” is, or can be, ever generated by natural processes. God alone can produce a substance, and he produces it by creation. To say that natural causes can destroy the substantial forms by which the matter is actuated, and produce new substantial forms giving a new first being to the matter, is to endow the natural causes with a power infinitely superior to their nature. The action of a natural cause is the production of an accidental act; and so long as “accidental” does not mean “substantial,” we contend that no substantial form can originate from any natural agent or concurrence of natural agents. It is therefore evident for us that no “substance” can ever arise by natural generation.