Thomas Aquinas, Disputed Questions on Truth (De Veritate)

1. Since the singular has existence through matter, things are called physical which have matter in their definition. But the mind, even though it is immaterial, can know physical things. For the same reason it can know singular things.

2. No one can correctly decide about things and use them properly unless he knows them. But the wise man through his mind decides correctly about singular things and uses them properly; for example, his family and his possessions. Therefore, we know singular things with our mind.

3. No one knows a composition unless he knows the components. But the mind makes this conjunction: "Socrates is man." No sense would be able to do so, since it does not perceive man in general. Therefore, the mind knows singular things.

4. No one can command any act without knowing the object of that act. But the mind, or reason, commands acts of the concupiscible power and the irascible power, as is clear in the Ethics. Therefore, since the objects of these are singular things, the mind can know singular things.

5. According to Boethius, a higher power can do anything the lower power can. But the sensitive powers, which are lower than the mind, know singulars. Therefore, the mind can know singulars much more fully.

6. The higher a mind is, the more general is its knowledge, as is clear from Dionysius. But the angelic mind, though higher than the human mind, knows singulars. So, the human mind knows them much more fully.

To the Contrary:

We understand the universal, but sense the singular, as Boethius says.

REPLY:

As is clear from what has been said, human and angelic minds know material things in different ways. For the cognition of the human mind is directed, first, to material things according to their form, and, second, to matter in so far as it is correlative to form. However, just as every form is of itself universal, so correlation to form makes us know matter only by universal knowledge. Matter thus considered is not the principle of individuation. Designated matter, existing under definite dimensions and considered as singular, is, rather, that principle because form receives its individuation from such matter. For this reason, the Philosopher says: "The parts of man are matter and form taken generally, whereas the parts of Socrates are this form and this matter."

From this it is clear that our mind is not able directly to know singulars, for we know singulars directly through our sensitive powers which receive forms from things into a bodily organ. In this way, our senses receive them under determined dimensions and as a source of knowledge of the material singular. For, just as a universal form leads to the knowledge of matter in general, so an individual form leads to the knowledge of designated matter which is the principle of individuation.

Nevertheless, the mind has contact with singulars by reason of something else in so far as it has continuity with the sensitive powers which have particulars for their object. This conjunction comes about in two ways. First, the movement of the sensitive part terminates in the mind, as happens in the movement that goes from things to the soul. Thus, the mind knows singulars through a certain kind of reflection, as when the mind, in knowing its object, which is some universal nature, returns to knowledge of its own act, then to the species which is the principle of its act, and, finally, to the phantasm from which it has abstracted the species. In this way, it attains to some knowledge about singulars.

In the other way, this conjunction is found in the movement from the soul to things, which begins from the mind and moves forward to the sensitive part in the mind's control over the lower powers. Here, the mind has contact with singulars through the mediation of particular reason, a power of the sensitive part, which joins and divides individual intentional likenesses, which is also known as the cogitative power, and which has a definite bodily organ, a cell in the center of the head. The mind's universal judgment about things to be done cannot be applied to a particular act except through the mediation of some intermediate power which perceives the singular. In this way, there is framed a kind of syllogism whose major premise is universal, the decision of the mind, and whose minor premise is singular, a perception of the particular reason. The conclusion is the choice of the singular work, as is clear in The Soul.

The angelic mind, since it knows material things through forms that immediately refer to matter as well as to form, knows by direct vision not only matter in general, but also matter as singular. So, also, does the divine mind.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. The operation by which we know matter through the analogy which it has to form is sufficient for knowledge of physical reality, but not for knowledge of the singular thing, as is clear from what has been said.*

2. The wise man arranges singulars by the mind only through the mediation of the cogitative power whose function it is to know particular intentions, as is clear from what has been said.*

3. The intellect makes a proposition of a singular and a universal term since it knows the singular through a certain reflection, as was said.*

4. The intellect or reason knows universally the end to which it directs the act of the concupiscible power and the act of the irascible power when it commands them. It applies this universal knowledge to singulars through the mediation of the cogitative power, as has been said.*

5. The higher power can do what the lower power can, but not always in the same way. Sometimes it acts in a higher way. Thus, intellect can know what sense knows, but in a way that is superior. For sense knows these things according to their material dispositions and external accidents, but intellect penetrates to the intimate nature of the species which is in these individuals.

6. Cognition of the angelic mind is more universal than cognition of the human mind, because, by the use of fewer media, it reaches more things. Nevertheless, it is more effective than the human mind for knowing singulars, as is clear from what has been said.*