ARTICLE XIII

In the Thirteenth Article We Ask: IS INTENTION AN ACT OF THE WILL?

Difficulties:

It seems that it is not, for

1. In regard to the words of Luke (11:34): "The light of thy body is thy eye," the Gloss explains: "That is, 'thy intention.'" But the eye in the soul is reason or the intellect. Intention therefore pertains to reason or the intellect, not to the will.

2. The answer was given that it pertains to the will as subordinated to reason and in this respect is compared to an eye.--On the contrary, the act of a higher and prior power does not depend upon that of a posterior power. The will, however, is prior to the intellect in acting, because it moves the intellect, as has been said. Then the act of the will does not depend upon reason. If intention were an act of the will, it would therefore in no way pertain to reason.

3. The answer was given that the act of the will does depend upon reason in this respect, that knowledge of the thing willed is a prerequisite for willing; and so, although intention is an act of the will, it nevertheless does in some sense belong to reason.--On the contrary, there is no act of the will for which knowledge is not a prerequisite. Consequently, according to the proposed solution no act should be attributed to the will simply, not even willing and loving, but to will and reason together. This, however, is false. Then so is the preceding contention that intention is an act of the will.

4. The very name intention implies a relation to an end. But it belongs to reason to refer anything to an end. Intention therefore belongs to reason and not to will.

5. It was maintained in answer that there is in intention not only a relation to an end but also an act of the will which is referred to the end, and that both are meant by the name intention.--On the contrary, that act is made the substratum of the relation to an end as a material principle is made that of the formal. But a thing takes its name from its formal rather than its material principle. Intention accordingly takes its name rather from what belongs to reason than from what belongs to will, and so it should be held to be an act of reason rather than of will.

6. Reason directs the will just as the prime mover directs the whole of nature. But the intention in the things of nature is more properly attributed to the prime mover than to the things of nature themselves, since these are said to intend something only in so far as they are directed by the prime mover. Then among the powers of the soul too, intention should be attributed to reason rather than to the will.

7. Properly speaking there is an intention only in a knower. But the will is not a knower. Intention therefore does not belong to the will.

8. There cannot be a single act of things that are in no sense one. But the will and reason are in no sense one, since they even belong to different genera of powers of the soul: the will is in the appetitive genus and reason is in the intellective. Consequently reason and the will cannot have a single act; and so, if intention is in any sense an act of reason, it will not be an act of the will.

9. According to the Philosopher "willing has as its object only the end." But in a single order there is only a single end. The will in its act, then, is referred to only one thing. But where there is only one thing, there is no order. Since intention implies order, it therefore seems that it in no sense belongs to the will.

10. Intention seems to be nothing but the direction of the will to the last end. But it belongs to reason to direct the will. Intention therefore belongs to reason.

11. In the perversity of sin error belongs to reason, contempt to the irascible power, and the inordinacy of will to the concupiscible. In the reformation of the soul, on the other hand, faith belongs to reason, hope to the irascible power, and charity to the concupiscible. But according to Augustine it is faith which "directs the intention." Intention therefore belongs to reason.

12. According to the Philosopher the will is referred to both possibles and impossibles, but intention only to possibles. Intention does not, then, belong to the will.

13. What is not in the soul is not in the will. Now intention is not in the soul, because it is not a power (for then it would be natural, and there would be no merit in it), nor is it a habit (for then it would be in one asleep), nor is it a passion (for then it would pertain to the sensitive part, as is apparent from what the Philosopher says . Since there are in the soul only these three, as is said in the Ethics, intention is not in the will.

14. To order is the function of reason, since this belongs to the wise man, as is said in the Metaphysics. But intention is an ordination to an end. It therefore is the function of reason.

15. Intention is referred to what is distant from an end, since distance is implied in the [Latin] preposition in [here used as a prefix]. But reason is more distant from the end than is the will, because reason merely points out the end, whereas the will clings to the end as its proper object. Intending, then, belongs to reason rather than to the will.

16. Every act of the will belongs to it either absolutely, or by a reference to higher powers, or by a reference to lower powers. Now intending is not an act of the will absolutely, because in that case it would be the same as willing or loving. Nor is intending its act by a reference to a higher power, reason, for in that reference its act is to choose. Nor is it so by a reference to lower powers, since its act in that reference is to command. Intending is therefore in no wise an act of the will.

To the Contrary:

1'. Intention is referred only to the end. But the end and good are the object of the will. Intention therefore pertains to the will.

2'. Intending is a sort of pursuing. But pursuit and flight pertain to the will, not to reason. To reason it belongs only to say that something should be pursued or fled. Intention accordingly belongs to the will.

3'. All merit is situated in the will. But intention is meritorious, and chiefly on the basis of it merit and demerit are reckoned. Hence intention is a function of the will.

4'. Ambrose says: "Affection gives the name to your work." But an act is judged to be good or bad from the intention. The intention is therefore contained in affection, and so it seems to belong to the will and not to reason.

REPLY:

Intention is an act of the will. This shows up very clearly from its object. A power and its act must agree in their object, since a power is referred to the object only through the act. Thus for the power of sight and for vision there must be the same object, color. Now since the object of the act of intention is the good which is an end, and this is also the object of the will, intention must be an act of the will. It is, however, an act of the will, not absolutely, but in subordination to reason.

That this may be seen clearly it should be noted that, whenever there are two agents standing in an order, the second agent can move or act in two ways: (1) according to what belongs to its own nature, and (2) according to what belongs to the nature of the higher agent. The influence of the higher agent remains in the lower, and for this reason the lower acts not only by its own action but also by the action of the higher. The sphere of the sun, for example, moves by its own motion, which is completed in the course of a year, and by the motion of the first mobile, which is the motion of one day. In like fashion water moves by its own motion, tending to the center, and it has a motion from the influence of the moon moving it, as is revealed in the tides. Compounds also have certain reactions proper to themselves which are based upon the natures of the four elements, such as to tend downward, to heat, and to cool; and they have other operations from the influence of the heavenly bodies, as a magnet attracts iron.

Though no action of the lower agent takes place unless that of the higher agent is presupposed, nevertheless the action which belongs to it in accordance with its own nature is attributed to it absolutely, as it is attributed to water to move downward; but that which belongs to it from the influence of the higher agent is not attributed to it absolutely but only with reference to something else. Thus the ebb and flow of the tides are said to be the proper motion of the sea, not in so far as it is water, but in so far as it is moved by the moon.

Now reason and the will are operative powers related to each other. Viewed absolutely, reason is prior, although by reflection the will is made prior and superior inasmuch as it moves reason.

The will can accordingly have two types of acts. (1) It has one which belongs to it according to its own nature inasmuch as it tends to its own object absolutely. This act is attributed to the will without qualification, e.g., to will and to love, although even for this act the action of reason is presupposed. (2) It has another type of act which belongs to it inasmuch as the influence of reason is left in the will. Since the proper function of reason is to order and compare, whenever there appears in the act of the will any comparison or ordering, such an act does not belong to the will absolutely but in subordination to reason. It is in this way that intending is an act of the will, since to intend seems to be nothing but to tend from what one wills to something else as to an end. Thus intending differs from willing in this, that willing tends to an end absolutely whereas intending expresses a reference to an end inasmuch as the end is that to which the means are referred. Since the will is moved to its object as proposed to it by reason, it is moved in various ways according as the object is variously proposed. When reason proposes something to it as a good absolutely, the will is moved to it absolutely. This is willing. When reason proposes something to it under the aspect of a good to which other things are referred as to an end, then the will tends to it with a certain order, which is found in the act of the will, not in accordance with its own nature, but in accordance with the demands of reason. In this way intending is an act of the will in subordination to reason.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. Intention is likened to an eye as regards the characteristic of reason which is found in it.

2. Reason moves the will in a certain sense, and the will in a certain sense moves reason, as is evident from what has been said. Thus each one is higher than the other in a different respect, and to each can be attributed an act in subordination to the other.

3. Although any act of the will presupposes knowledge on the part of reason, nevertheless there does not always appear in the act of the will what is proper to reason, as is clear from what has been said.* Hence the argument proves nothing.

4. An active relation to the end belongs to reason, for it is its function to refer or relate to an end. But a passive relation can belong to whatever is directed or referred to an end by reason, and so it can also belong to the will. It is in this sense that the relation to an end pertains to intention.

5. From what has just been said the answer is clear.

6. In the prime mover there is found not only knowledge but also will, and so intention can properly be attributed to it. But only knowledge belongs to reason. The case is accordingly not the same.

7. Intending also has to do with non-cognitive beings, since even the things of nature intend an end, even though intention supposes some knowledge. But if we speak of an intention of the soul, this has to do only with cognitive beings, as does willing. Yet it is not necessary that intending and willing be acts of the same power as knowing, but merely of the same supposite. Properly speaking, it is not a power which knows or intends, but the supposite through a power.

8. Reason and the will are one by order, just as the universe is said to be one. In this case nothing prevents a single act from belonging to both, to one immediately, to the other mediately.

9. Although the will is chiefly concerned with the end in view of the fact that the means are desired only for the sake of the end, nevertheless the will is also concerned with the means to the end. The statement of the Philosopher that "the will is concerned with the end; choice, with the means," does not mean that the will is always directed to the end, but merely sometimes and chiefly. From the fact that choice is never directed to the end it is shown that choosing and willing are not the same thing.

10. Active direction to an end belongs to reason, but passive direction to an end can belong to will. In the latter way it belongs to intention.

11. Faith directs our intention as reason directs our will. Intention accordingly is a function of the will as faith is of reason.

12. The will is not always concerned with impossibles but merely sometimes. In conformity with the Philosopher's meaning this suffices to show the difference between willing and choice, which is always concerned with possibles; that is, it shows that to choose is not altogether the same as to will. Similarly, neither is to intend altogether the same as to will. But this does not keep it from being an act of the will.

13. Intention is an act of the soul. But in that threefold division proposed by the Philosopher the actions of the soul are not included, because actions do not belong to the soul as being in the soul but rather as being from the soul.--Or it may be said that actions are included under habits as that which proceeds from a principle is contained within its principle.

14. To order is the function of reason, but to be ordered can be the function of the will. In this way intention implies ordering.

15. That argument would prove something if nothing else were required for intention besides mere distance. But along with distance there is required an inclination; and that inclination is in the province of the will, not of reason. Hence the conclusion does not follow.

16. Intention is an act of the will in subordination to reason as it directs to an end the means to it. Choice is an act of the will in subordination to reason as it compares among themselves the means to an end. On this account intention and choice also differ.