The Unity or Oneness of Being

Book Second — Properties of Being

Chapter I — The Transcendental Properties of Being

Article 1. The Unity or Oneness of Being

This Book discusses those aspects of being which are called its transcendental properties or attributes, and studies all their implications. Further, the Book investigates the characteristics or properties of being, which, while not strictly transcendental, are nevertheless most general or universal. These matters are studied in two Chapters, as follows:

This Chapter studies three aspects or phases of being. These are not something different from being itself; they are not something new or additional which we must join to the concept of being. On the contrary, they are entirely coextensive with being and identical with it. But these aspects or phases of being are of great help to our inquiring minds when we come to study all the implications of the concept of being: they serve us as distinct points of approach to that study. For want of a better term we call these phases or aspects of being by the name properties or attributes, and, since they are identified with being itself, which is a transcendental concept, we call these properties transcendental properties or transcendental attributes of being. Such attributes are three, viz., unity or oneness, truth or trueness, and goodness. We shall study the three transcendental properties of being in three Articles:

Article i. The Unity or Oneness of Being a) Meaning of Unity b) Classification of Unity c) Individuality and Individuation d) Identity and Distinction

a) Meaning of Unity

When we speak of the unity or oneness of being we do not mean that all things are really one and that there is no real variety or multiplicity in the world. There have been, and indeed are, philosophers to propound this strange doctrine. We call these teachers i_monists_, and their doctrine monism; the terms are derived from the Greek monos which means “one only,” “single,” “alone.”

Monism has several varieties, although it is a doctrine which denies real variety. First, there is materialistic monism which ignores or denies everything but the bodily universe, and holds that things in this material world are no more different in their essences than biscuits from the same lump of dough or drops from the same sea. Then there is pantheistic monism which denies the existence of everything but God, and, in one way or another, identifies the world with God. A notable form of pantheistic monism is idealistic monism which denies the existence of the world as we experience it, and makes the universe a series or scheme of images in an Absolute Mind, that is, in God.

When we speak of the oneness of being we mean nothing monistic, nothing materialistic, pantheistic, or idealistic. We have already seen that all things are one only in the idea or concept of being and, even there, this oneness is not specific or generic but analogical. In reality as it exists outside our minds there is not being but there are beings; not thing, but things.

By the unity or oneness of being (that is, by the transcendental unity of being) we mean that for a reality to exist or to be existible it must be that reality, that one thing, unbroken, undivided, unmultiplied or unrepeated.

Unity or oneness means undividedness and unrepeatedness. A thing is one, or has unity, inasmuch as it is itself, undivided into parts, and unrepeated as a plurality or multiplication or repetition of itself. To say that a reality has unity, therefore, is simply to say that the reality is itself, that it is this thing, that it is this one thing and no other. It is not suggested that a reality cannot be divided into parts if it has parts; it is only asserted that, as a fact, it is not divided into parts. Further, it is asserted that a unit (a reality which is one) is not at once itself and a repetition or multiplication of itself; it is not at once singular and plural. In passing, we must notice here that this self-evident doctrine which is derived immediately from the concept of being, and which is but a new way of expressing that concept, does not deny the possibility of a multiplied presence of one and the same unmultiplied reality. By a power greater than that which lies at the command of created natures, one single reality remaining that one single reality, may conceivably be present in more than one place. Thus the five loaves and two fishes which, at the command of Christ, fed a multitude of thousands, remained the five loaves and the two fishes; the Lord did not create new supplies of bread and fishes; He multiplied the presence of the original five and two, and each of these served at the same moment as the food of many. Similarly, Christ is one Christ; He is not multiplied into repetitions or multiplications of Himself; this is manifestly a metaphysical impossibility. But His presence is multiplied in the Blessed Sacrament, so that the same Christ is truly and literally present in every consecrated Host and in every part thereof, though there be millions of consecrated Hosts existing at the same moment in the tabernacles throughout the world or within the bosoms of thousands who have just received Holy Communion.

Some realities cannot be divided into parts because they are not made up of parts. Such realities are called simple, in the original Latin sense of that term which means “uncomposed,” “not compounded,” “not made up of parts,” and hence “indivisible.” Such a reality is, for example, the human soul; it cannot be divided into parts because it has no parts. But the unity of a reality does not depend upon its being a simple reality; a reality, a being, has unity whether it be simple or compounded. The unity of a reality consists in its being undivided and unrepeated; such unity consists in actual undividedness, not in indivisibility.

All bodily realities are made up of parts; they are not simple but composed or compounded. Some writers like to call a bodily reality “a manifold” whether they are speaking of one body, such as an apple, or of the whole material world as one world. Such realities, such manifolds, may indeed be divided into their parts, but not into parts which shall also be their complete original selves. Each part, after division has been made, is one thing; it has unity as an independent reality; but each part is not the original undivided whole. An apple is one apple, but the pieces into which an apple is cut are not each one apple, and even if each part were an apple, it would not be the one identical apple which was first divided. Neither the separate pieces of the apple nor their aggregate or sum constitutes the one, complete, unbroken reality with which the experiment started. The aggregate of pieces is one aggregate; each piece is one piece and has its unity as such; but the apple is no longer the precise, unbroken, entire reality that it was at the outset. To begin with, there was an apple; now there are pieces of apple. To begin with, there was a thing; now there are things. An apple had being and unity; now pieces of apple have, severally, their respective being and unity.

A reality cannot even be thought of except as itself, as that thing, as that one thing, whether it be simple or compound, whether it be spirit or sand-dune, whether it be a blade of grass or a grassy plain, whether it be a drop of water or the mighty ocean, whether it be the infinitesimal heart of an atom or the whole bodily universe. Whatever can be thought of as existing (i. e., any being) is necessarily thought of as one; it is necessarily one; whatever is existent or existible has unity. The very idea or concept of being makes this fact imperative and makes it evident. This sort of unity is called transcendental unity.

The classic definition of unity is indivisio ent is, that is, “the undividedness of a thing in its being.” A reality has unity inasmuch as it has undividedness and unrepeatedness in itself. Now, what is undivided in itself is, in this multiple world, immediately recognized as contrasted with other things, each of which is, in itself, undivided. Thus the immediate consequence of undividedness in a reality is its dividedness, or its being marked off as distinct, from everything else. Therefore, the definition of unity is properly rounded out by a phrase which indicates the distinction of a thing from other things, and we say that unity is the undividedness of a reality as such or in itself, and its dividedness or distinction from all that is not itself. The point is crisply expressed in the familiar Latin formula, unum est id quod est indivisum in se, divisum a quolibet alio.

Before taking up the classifications of unity, we must say a brief word about unicity or uniqueness. A thing has unicity, or is unique, when it is the only thing of its kind. Modern casual speech often employs the term “unique” in the sense of “unusual,” “strange,” “remarkable,” or “notably fine.” But, while we would be foolish to quarrel with a usage long established, we must notice that the original and philosophical sense of the term “unique” is quite different from the casual and colloquial sense. Unique means the only thing of its kind. God is unique as well as one. But true uniqueness is almost unknown among earthly creatures. Every man is one, he has unity, but there are multitudes of men, each of whom is identical in kind with all other men; hence each human being is one, but he is not unique; he has unity, but not unicity.

b) Classification of Unity

We distinguish I. Transcendental Unity and II. Quantitative Unity. Further, we classify transcendental unity as i. Concrete Unity, 2. Abstract Unity, 3. Essential Unity, 4. Non-essential Unity. Certain minor distinctions of these classes must also be made.

I. Transcendental Unity is the unity of a being as such. Every reality, every existent and existible substance or accident, every possible object of thought or fancy, is itself, is that thing, is that one thing and no other. Whatever exists, exists in the oneness of its being; whatever is existible, can come into existence only as that one thing. Thus we see that the unity of reality transcends the boundaries of genera and species, of classes and kinds; not this or that sort of being only, but any being, every conceivable being, has its unity. Even as the idea being soars over the limits and boundaries of kinds and classifications, so unity (which is the synonym of being) soars over these limitations and applies to all reality. Rightly, therefore, do we name this unity transcendental. We say that transcendental unity is a property or attribute of being, because a property or attribute is that which belongs to a reality by natural necessity, and unity belongs by natural necessity to every being as such. Yet the terms attribute and property are used here by analogy, and not in strict and literal meaning. For transcendental unity not only belongs to every being; it is identical with the very concept of being. Inasmuch as a thing has being, inasmuch as it is itself, it is one, it has unity. The concept of being and the concept of transcendental unity are truly identical. Hence we see the justice of the axiom, omne ens est unum; ens et unum convertuntur, that is, “Every reality has unity; being and oneness are synonymous and interchangeable terms.”

Transcendental unity is concrete or abstract, essential or non-essential.

1. Concrete unity is the unity of a thing (existent or existible) apart from the consideration of the mind. If, for example, a blue horse is to exist, it is to exist concretely in nature as an individual reality, and not merely as a mental concept. It will exist as an individual thing, not as a universal species or genus. Things which actually do exist,—whether simple or compound, finite or infinite, spiritual or material,— exist as determinate things, and not as mental abstractions. In a word, each existing thing “in nature” has its own concreteness, its own individuality, its own singular or numerical or real or concrete unity. Concrete unity is the unity of an existent or existible thing as such, not the unity of a thing as conceived by the mind, or classified or predicated by the mind.

2. Abstract unity is the unity of a thing as conceived by the mind. The reality man, as grasped by the mind, has unity; it is one understood essence. Yet there are many men in nature outside the mind, each with his own individual and concrete unity. Tom, Dick, Harry, Mary, Jane, and Rose are concretely or individually distinct beings, each with its own proper concrete unity; but they are one essential kind of thing. Thus they are of one species (that is, they are inferiors of one specific idea or concept),‘and it is this essential kind that is represented by the mind’s grasp of the essence man. Therefore, while human beings are, in nature, distinct beings, and one is not the other, all human beings are one in the mind’s abstract concept of man, of the human essence. Human beings in nature are concretely or individually distinct, and each of them has concrete unity; conceptually or abstractly, all human beings are one; all are inferiors of the one idea; all are abstractly represented in the single idea man. The mind, as we have seen, conceives reality in universal, but reality is existible only in individual. The unity of a thing as grasped by the mind (i. e., abstract unity) is the undividedness and unrepeatedness of the idea itself and as such; the real essence which the idea represents may be repeated indefinitely in individuals which exist (or can exist) in nature outside the mind. Thus the idea man is one (specific) idea and remains one idea, undivided and unrepeated in itself and as such; it has abstract unity. But the real essence man, which the idea represents, is repeated or multiplied in existing and existible human beings, each of which has its own individual or concrete unity as a reality “in nature.” Thus, again, the idea animal is one (generic) idea, unrepeated in itself. But the real essence animal is repeated in all existible men and beasts, each of which has its own individual or concrete unity. Thus, finally, the idea being is one (analogical) idea, and it represents one essence. But, in reality, this one essence is repeated in every existible thing, each of which has its own concrete unity. We see from these examples that abstract unity may be generic, specific, or analogical. If the student will refer to Book First, Chapter I, Art. i, c, he will readily understand that abstract unity may also be differential, proper, or accidental.

5. Essential unity is the oneness necessary to an essence. If the essence is a substance (as, for example, a man or a tree) its essential unity is also substantial unity. If the essence is an accident (as, for example, whiteness or height) its essential unity is non-substantial, but may not be called accidental, for, as we shall see, the term accidental unity means nonessential unity, and we are speaking here of essential unity. The unity of an accident as such is essential to that accident. The whiteness of a substance,—say, of snow,—is not substantial; it is accidental; yet this whiteness has its being, and hence its unity, as whiteness and as this whiteness, and this unity is non-substantial but essential to the accident itself. However, in nearly every case where essential unity is thought of or exampled, it is referred to a substance, and rightly so, since an accident has its real being dependently upon a substance, and its essential unity is thus actually referable to the unity of the substance on which it depends. Therefore, for practical purposes, the terms essential unity and substantial unity are regularly synonymous and interchangeable. Essential unity is often called unity per se, that is, “the unity of a thing which is one in itself”; it is also known as unitas simpliciter, that is, “unity simply so called.”

Essential (or substantial) unity is distinguished as follows: (a) The unity of simplicity is the unity of a substance which has no parts in itsel f and is therefore indivisible; it is the unity of a simple substance. Such is the unity of a soul, an angel, God Himself. (Z?) The unity of composition is the unity consequent upon the merging or fusion of substantial elements in such wise as to constitute a new substance, that is, a substance not identified with any of the fused elements taken singly nor with their mere aggregate or sum. Thus a man is a substantial unit; he is a composite of body and soul; he is not body alone, nor soul alone, nor the mere sum of body plus soul; he is a single compound substance the elements of which are body and soul. The human substance has, therefore, the unity of composition. Every bodily substance is one by the unity of composition, for no such substance is simple; a body is always fundamentally composed of two substantial co-principles called respectively prime matter and substantial form (C/. Book First, Chap. II, Art. 2, d).

4. Non-essential unity or accidental unity is the oneness of a plurality of things in some point that does not constitute them in a new substantial existence. Two horses hitched together; a number of apples heaped in a basket; a man with his name, age, height, weight, etc.,—these are examples of accidental units, and we speak of them as one team, one basketful, one human individual. Accidental unity is sometimes called unity per accidens, that is, “the unity of a thing by reason of accident”; it is also known as unitas secundum quid, that is, “unity after a fashion” or “unity under a certain aspect.”

Accidental unity has varieties, notable among which are the following, which, as will be seen, are not perfectly exclusive all along the line, but, in some cases, may overlap: (a) Collective unity is the result of mere aggregation or juxtaposition, as in a handful of pebbles or a coachful of passengers. (b) Natural unity is the product of the forces of nature, as in a tree with its size, shape, number of leaves, etc. (c) Artificial unity is the product of human labor and skill (art), as in a radio, a watch, an automobile, an airplane, (d) Moral unity is the unity of a common purpose, the unity of human wills working together, as in a club, a sodality, a church, a trade union, a political party.1

II. Quantitative Unity or Predicamental Unity is distinguished from transcendental unity which soars above classifications and is predicable of every being as such. Quantitative unity is proper to a special class or category of things, and does not soar above the 1

1 It is manifest that the two sets of unities, viz., abstract-concrete and substantial-accidental may overlap. Unity, of course, cannot be at once concrete and abstract from the same point of view; neither can it be simultaneously substantial and accidental. But concrete unity can be either substantial or accidental; abstract unity too may be either essential or non-essential. John Jones, cantering in the park, presents the spectacle of substantial unity (for the man is a substantial unit; so is the horse) and of accidental unity (man-and-horse), and both unities are concrete. Abstractly considered, John and his horse are one in point of being animals; and when the mind adverts reflexly to this fact it notices that the unity in this case is generic; that is, man and beast are at one as inferiors of the genus animal.

boundaries of that class; it is properly predicable of realities that have quantity and of no others. Thus, strictly and properly, quantitative unity is predicable of material things alone, to things subject to measurement and to numbering of amounts, elements, and parts. However, by analogy, we use the terminology of quantitative unity in speaking of non-material things and in speaking of quantities abstractly. Quantitative unity is also called mathematical unity; it is the basis of counting, computing, numbering, measuring.

c) Individuality and Individuation

We have learned that a universal idea is the representation (or re-presence) in the mind of an essence regarded as capable of actualization in a plurality of things. Thus the universal idea man is a single representation in the mind, and it represents an essence that can be actualized in many beings outside the mind. Indeed, this idea represents an essence that is actually found in every existing human person, regardless of age, sex, color, culture, state, or condition. The essence thus represented by the universal idea is called the universal. In other words, the universal is the object of (or the essence represented by) the universal idea. When the universal represents a substance, it is called substantia secunda or secondary substance, and is thus contrasted with substantia prima or primary substance or the concrete reality which has the essence in singular which the idea represents in universal. For example, the universal man (that is, the essence man considered abstractly) is a secondary substance, and each single existent human being is a primary substance. Now, this primary substance is what we mean by an individual substance, or simply an individual.’

An individual substance has individuality; it has singularity. It has not only an essence which is (or may be) identical in kind with the essence of other things; it has its own concrete essence which belongs to itself alone and to no other. Thus, John Jones is a human being, and as such he is identical in species or in kind with every other human being; in this fact we discern his specification, that is, his assignment, so to speak, to a definite essential (i. e., specific) class of things. But John Jones is, in himself, a singular and concrete actualization of the essence man; he is this one human person and no other; in this fact we discern his individuation, that is, his assignment, not to a class, but to his place as a single existent member or item of his class. For John Jones is not only a human being in a general or abstract way; he is this human being in a singular and concrete way. If we ask what he is, that is, if we inquire after his essence, we seek to specify him, and to define him in terms of the universal; so we say he is “a man.” If we ask who he is, that is, if we inquire which single one he is among the many with whom he shares a common specification, we seek to individuate him. Our first question asks for his essence or species; our second question asks for his individuality. If we choose to be somewhat priggish, we may say that the first question inquires after the fundamental “whatness,” and the second question inquires after the “thisness” of John Jones. His “thisness” is his individuality, that is, his state of being as this one person and no other; it is his numerical distinction as this one man among all existing men. It is, of course, manifest that we use the term individuality in no loose and casual way, as it is used in current colloquial speech to indicate a special force of character, or a notable originality in thought or speech or action. Every existing substance is an individual; every such substance, in every order of earthly being (lifeless, vegetal, animal, human), has individuality. Every such substance is of a kind, and that is its specification; it is a definite one of its kind, and that is its individuation.

It is of the very nature of the universal that it be communicable, that is, that it be capable of existing as shared unto things, participated in by things, communicated to things. Thus the universal man (that is, the essence represented in the mind by the universal idea man) is shared or communicated, so to speak, to all human beings, one equally with another, for all are equally human beings, equally men. Now, it is of the very nature of the individual that it be incommunicable, that it be incapable of being shared unto things other than itself. The essence man (a universal) is shared unto all human beings (not literally shared, to be sure, since each human being has the entire and complete essence which the universal expresses); the concrete essence of this man Jones (an individual) is not capable of being shared at all.

It will be remembered from our discussion of the universal idea, that the universal (i. e., the object of the universal idea; the essence which the universal idea represents) exists formally or as such (i. e., in true universality) in the mind alone; it has solid grounds for its formation, in reality outside the mind, but it can exist as a universal only in the mind. Outside the mind, or “in nature,” things can exist only in singularity or as individuals. Thus within the mind we have the grasp of the essence man, for example, in universal, and because of that grasp we know what any human being must be in order to be rightly called a human being. But in the trans-subjective world, that is, the world of knowable reality outside the mind, there are only individual human beings. So with all substances. The substances which our ideas represent exist (or are existible) only as individual realities outside the mind, and, as such, each of them is a primary substance; but the mind conceives them abstractly and universally in its universal ideas, and the object of each universal idea (i. e., the universal) is a secondary substance. Now, the point to cling to here is this: the primary substance is so concretely set in its own singular being that it is not communicable. It is not a “iiote” or a phase of something else; it has its own incommunicable being as this one single thing. Further, a primary substance, an individual substance, if it has the full perfection of individuality, is a complete substance; it is not merely an element or constituent part of something else. Thus, for example, a man’s body is not the individual man, nor is man’s soul the individual man; the individual man is the complete substantial composite of body-and-soul.

So much for individuality. We come now to the question of individuation. And on this point two questions present themselves: First, what makes an individual knowable as an individual; what manifests the individual; what reveals it to human knowledge ? In the second place we inquire: what constitutes the individual formally or as such; what makes a thing individual? In answering the first question we state the Principle of Manifested Individuality. In answering the second question we state the Principle of Individuation, properly so called.

i. The Principle of Manifested Individuality.—It is evident to anyone who thinks even briefly about the commonest experiences of daily life that we recognize individual things and events by points that are accidental to them. For example, we know one person from another by such points as name, age, sex, appearance, sound of voice, and so on. We know one tree from another by size, location, shape, appearance; we even recognize the botanical class of a tree (as an individual specimen) by certain accidental features. Now, the accidental marks or points by which we recognize an individual substance among other individual substances of the same kind are called “individuating marks” or “individuating notes,” and these are summed up in an ancient Latin formula:

Forma, figura, locus, tempus, stirps, patria, nomen: Haec ea sunt septem, quae non habet unus et alter. We may translate the couplet freely as follows:

Form, shape, place, time, blood, country, name,

In no two things are all the same.

It is manifest that the doggerel refers, first and foremost, to individual human beings, but, by an obvious extension, it can be applied to all bodily substances. Form and shape (and figure) are much at one in their meaning, and we must remember that the form here mentioned is accidental, not substantial, form. Some writers say that form should be used for the bodily outline of artificial things (such as a house or a watch), while figure or shape should be referred to natural substances (such as a man or a tree); but the three terms are readily interchangeable in casual speech. Place and time need no definition here. Blood, of course, means ancestry, lineage, genealogy. Country means nationality, and name means both surname and given name. In no two human individuals (and in no two individual substances) are all seven of these notes or marks found to be identical, not even in identical twins. For even twins cannot occupy the identical spot at the same time, nor can the closest resemblance amount to identity.

2. The Principle of Individuation.—Are the accidental features of a substance which enable one to recognize it as an individual to be considered the factors which make it an individual? Manifestly not. For an individual,—such as this man, or that woman, or the tree in the corner of the garden yonder,—is a substantial thing, a substantial item, a substantial one among all existing substances, substantially distinct from them all, even from those with which it has an identity of species or essential kind. Its individuation is therefore not a matter of mere accident. It is true that Tom and Mary and Joseph and Jane are only accidentally distinguished one from another as inferiors of the universal idea man; there is no essential or specific distinction among them. But when we consider them, not abstractly, but in their concrete existence as individuals, we plainly understand that the substance which is Tom is not the substance that is Mary; the substantial actuality which is Joseph is not the identical substantial actuality which is Jane. Though these persons do not differ in their essence, abstractly considered, they do differ in their substance, concretely considered. They do not differ essentially; they do differ substantially. Therefore, the accidental features or points which manifest or reveal these persons as individuals will not suffice to establish and constitute their substantial distinction as individuals. Hence we must look beyond accidentals for our true Principle of Individuation, that is, for the true determining and constituting factor which makes an individual an individual.

Well, may not each individual bodily substance (for it is of such substances that we are here speaking) be constituted an individual by its own rounded reality; may not its individuality be a phase of its essence? This cannot be. For if a substance were individuated by its essence, there would be no possibility of other things having the same essence; each individual would be unique; it would be the only thing of its kind. Yet we know that trees are all trees; human beings are all human beings, equally, one as truly as another. For an essence can be communicated; it can be given to many; many things may be identical in point of essence. But we have seen that it is of the very definition of an individual that it cannot be communicated. St. Thomas Aquinas says, “That whereby Socrates is a man can be communicated to many; but that whereby Socrates is this man cannot be communicated to anyone but himself alone. If, then, Socrates were made this man by the same factor which makes him a man (i. e., by his essence), there could be no plurality of men any more than there can be a plurality of Socrates.” Therefore an individual substance in this bodily world is not made individual by its own essence. We must look farther for the true principle of individuation.

May not the existence, the actual being here, of a bodily substance be the principle of its individuality? No; for it is quite possible to conceive of individual substances as merely possible and non-existent, which would not be the case if existence were required to confer individuality. An individual substance receives existence; it is not constituted an individual by existence. But, it may be asked, may not the fact that a substance can exist be sufficient to individuate it; may not possible existence and not actual existence, be the true principle of individuation? By Lio means; for possible existence is not an individuating factor; it is common to all reality.

Scotus (d. 1308), one of the most profound of Scholastic philosophers, held that a certain quality of “this-ness” attaches to an existing bodily substance as a kind of property formally distinct from the essence or nature of the substance itself; it is this property which constitutes the individual as such. It is not certain, in the present stage of information about the doctrines of Scotus,—which are now being diligently investigated and reduced to pure form by Franciscan scholars,—just what is meant by a property “formally” distinct from the nature of a substance which it affects; the “formal distinction” of the Scotistic system is still a difficult point to grasp. But it appears that such a principle of individuation would be an accidental rather than a substantial factor, and hence would not suffice to individuate substances. Without presuming to criticize the Scotistic doctrine, we may say that the current interpretation of that doctrine as touching individuation of bodies does not appear to be satisfactory.

St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) proposes the principle of individuation most generally accepted among Scholastic philosophers. He teaches that an individual bodily substance is made individual by the fact that it is a material thing with quantity. The phrase used is materia quantitate signata, or, more simply, materia signata, which we may translate as “quantified matter.” To forestall an objection at the outset, we do not say that quantity individuates bodily substances, for quantity is an accident. We say that matter (a substantial principle of bodily being) individuates bodies inasmuch as it is marked by quantity. Quantity is an accident, but it is proper to matter, and existing matter is necessarily quantified; it is such matter, such substantial reality, that individuates bodily substances. We offer a few points in explanation of this doctrine:

(cr) If quantified matter (which is a bodily reality) is the principle of individuation, there can be no strict and literal individuation of complete spiritual substances. Each complete spiritual substance is con-

stituted as one thing by its own essence, and is therefore a species in itself. And so the term “angel” is not a universal term, like the term “man”; “angel” is indeed a collective term, and serves handily the requirements of our limited minds when we think and speak of pure spirits, but it is not a universal term with individual angels as its real inferiors. There can be no strict and literal individuation except in the realm of bodily substances. As regards human souls in the state of separation,—that is, the state which endures between death and the resurrection of the body,—it is to be noticed that each soul has a real relation to the actual material (i. e., the actual body) with which it was substantially united during earthly life, and with which it is ultimately to be joined again. By this real relation to the body, a soul is said to be individuated. Still, strictly and literally, it is men, and not souls, that are truly individuals.

(b) A bodily substance is fundamentally constituted by the union of prime matter and substantial form. The substantial form is the determining principle, the active substantial factor which makes the substance the essential kind of existing body that it is. Hence the substantial form constitutes the body in its actual and complete essence, i. e., its species, and we therefore call the substantial form the Principle of Specification. But to constitute the substance in its singular and concrete existence, the substantial form requires what may be called the cooperation of matter. Matter (i. e., prime matter) is wholly passive and potential, incapable of independent existence and activity. But unless matter be there to receive the actualizing action of the form, the proper function of the form itself is baulked. Hence, while the term “cooperation of matter” may appear a strong one, it is manifest that we do not assign any action to matter, but a passive cooperation only. The matter must be there with the form, before the form can constitute the actual body. It is in-formed matter that makes the bodily substance, and it is in-formed matter that is individuated. Now, the form of any individual body might conceivably have been conjoined with some other quantity of matter, and in that case the emerging individual would not be, in all respects, this precise individual reality as now we find it. It is rather, therefore, the matter than the form that ultimately constitutes the individual; not pure matter, indeed, but matter subjected to quantity under the actualizing action of the form. The matter as quantified constitutes an individual bodily substance. Father Lor tie {Element a Philo so phiae Christianae, Vol. I, p. 372—edition 1929} has this to say: “The principle of individuation in bodily substance is not matter alone nor quantity alone, but matter under the mark or limitation of quantity. Matter is said to individuate a bodily substance in a basic or primary sense, while quantity is the individuating factor in a secondary sense. The root of individuation, in so far as this involves incommunicability, is matter; and the root of individuation, in so far as this implies being marked off from other things, is mensurable quantity. Hence the principle of individuation is matter marked by quantity ” The quantity here mentioned is, of course, the tri-dimensional quantity found in every bodily substance.

(c) When we say that quantified matter is the principle of individuation, we do not mean that a certain and definite amount of matter, capable of clear expression in terms of cubic inches, yards, or meters, enters into individuation. A baby changes its measurements constantly, but its individuality is not changed at all. Of course, there is an accidental change as the amount of matter increases with the baby’s growth, but the child itself, as a bodily substance, retains its individuality through life as this individual, this human being. The amount of matter necessary for any given substance doubtless lies between a more or less definite minimum and maximum, but the terms of this amount in units of measurement are not available, nor necessary, for quantification and for individuation. Quantified matter is matter subject to the three dimensions. It is mensurable, indeed, but does not necessarily have just these dimensions, which at a given moment it actually possesses, to constitute the individual substance. It is true that trees, for example, have certain maximum and minimum amounts of matter in their actual being. But if the oak by the roadside should suddenly, and miraculously, grow to the height of one mile, it would still be this tree. Therefore, the individuality of the tree is determined, not by the fact that it has this much matter, in its make-up, but by the fact that it has this matter, which happens, at the moment, to have these precise measurements.

(d) Accidents are said to be individuated by their inherence in individual substances. The whiteness of a snowdrift is the individual whiteness of this snowdrift; the whiteness of the page before my eyes is the whiteness of this page. Further, accidents are individuated by their space and time relations to individual substances in which they occur. Thus the action of swinging one’s arms is a series of individual swings, each distinct as an individual action from the others by reason of the fact that the movements are not identical in time. The term “individual” may be applied as an adjective to accidents, but not as a noun, for “individuals” are, strictly and properly, bodily substances.

d) Identity and Distinction

I. Identity is a term derived from two Latin words {idem, and entitas) which mean “the same thing” or “the same entity.” Inasmuch as a thing is itself, it is identical with itself. This is not a senseless mumbling of words. For the mind may view severally, or under different aspects, what is really one in itself, and thus L special act of mind is required to hold in view the fact that what the different aspects present to knowledge is truly one, is truly identical. On the other hand, things really distinct and even separate in the realm of nature outside the mind may be identified in the abstract view, grasp, or concept of the mind. Father Coffey {Ontology} p. 136—edition 1918) says: “When we think of a being as one we must analyze it further, look at it under different aspects, and compare it with itself before we can regard it as the same or identical with itself. Or, at least, we must think of it twice and compare it with itself in the affirmative judgment ‘this is itself/ ‘A is A/ thus forming the logical Principle of Identity; in order to come into the possession of the concept of identity.’’

The identity of a thing with itself in the order of nature outside the mind (or simply “in nature,” as the saying is) is called real identity. And yet the term identity necessarily involves the mind in the act whereby we “think of the thing twice and compare it with itself.” The fact that a thing is what it is in nature, independently of the mind’s consideration, indicates its unity; the fact that it is recognizable by the mind as existing (or existible) in real unity in nature, indicates its identity. On the part of the thing itself, that is, on the part of the object in nature, this identity is real; on the part of the mind which recognizes it, this identity is logical or formal.

When one and the same objective reality is regarded under distinct aspects by the mind, we say that the identity of the object is real but not formal or logical. Thus the identity of “Franklin D. Roosevelt” and “Our President” is a real identity, for, as a matter of objective fact, the one person is both Franklin D. Roosevelt and the President of the United States. But one might know Franklin D. Roosevelt as this person without knowing him as this president; the mind may think of him in his personal, and not in his official, character. Thus there is a distinction in the mind between the person and the president, although as a fact in reality, this person is the president. Hence we say that there is a real identity but not a formal (or logical) identity in the two concepts “Franklin D. Roosevelt” and “Our President.”

We see, then, that identity may be real without being formal. Conversely, identity may be formal without being real. Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Lincoln, Wilson, Roosevelt, and others, are all identified in the concept “President of the United States”; they are seen in formal or logical identity. But, manifestly, these are different persons, not identified but distinct and separate in the real order of things. Hence we say that their identity is logical or formal, but not real. Take a further example: All human beings are at one, all are identified, in the concept or idea man; this is formal identity. But each man is an individual in nature, really distinct from every other man and from every other substance; hence men are not really identified.

Logical or formal identity is a matter of degrees or of kinds. For example, all men are identified formally in the specific concept man; this is specific identity, All men and beasts are identified in the concept animal; this is generic identity. All the presidents from Washington to Roosevelt are identified in the concept President of the United States; this is accidental identity.

Generic or specific identity is essential identity; all other degrees or types of formal identity are nonessential or accidental. Any accident may be a point of identity in a group: for instance, leaves, wind, running water, a racing horse, a planet, are all identified inasmuch as all are subject to movement. White men are identical in color. Catholics are identical in faith. Of all points which serve as the basis of accidental identity, quantity and quality are the most notable. Things identical in quantity are said to be equal or to have equality; things identical in quality are said to be alike or similar. Between a pound of sugar and a pound of rice there is an equality (these things are identical in quantity, i. e., in weight); so also, between a six-foot rod of iron and a tree six feet high there is an equality (these objects are identical in quantity, i. e., in height or length). But between two persons that look alike there is not equality, but similarity, for resemblance is a relation based on quality.

In all this, we have been considering being as static. The Principle of Identity thus abstracts from the fact that creatural being is steadily subject to change and is continually undergoing change, substantial or accidental or both. The very nature of the discussion imposes upon us the necessity of making such an abstraction. Nor do we therefore falsify reality or regard it in a distorting light. For no human mind can deal with reality at all, even with the reality called change, without holding it steadily and unchangingly before the mind’s attention. For the rest, actuality is as true a fact as potentiality in the world of real beings. The student is referred to Chapter II, Article 2, of the First Book.

II. Distinction is the absence of identity in a plurality of things. The idea of distinction is bound up with that of identity as its correlated opposite. When we assert the Principle of Identity (“A is A”; “A thing is what it is”: “That which is, is”) we implicitly assert the Principle of Distinction (C/. Book First, Chap. I, Art. 2, d). For the assertion that a reality is itself, is an implicit assertion that it is not anything other than itself.

Distinction is real or logical.

1. Real distinction is the distinction which exists between thing and thing. It is the lack or absence of identity between things existible in nature, independently of the view of the mind. Thus there is a real distinction between Tom and Harry, and between a house and a hill. But real distinction does not always indicate separate things, nor even separable things. Thus between a man’s soul and his body there is a real distinction but not, while the man lives, a separation. Thus again, between the shape of a pictured circle and the color in which it is drawn there is a real distinction, but these things (the shape and the color of this picture) are not physically separable. Real distinction is major or minor.

(a) A major real distinction is a distinction between one thing and another. Thus the distinction between two apples, or the distinction between an apple and its flavor, or the distinction between a substance and its parts, or the distinction between two parts of the same substance, or between a substance and its absolute accidents, is a major real distinction. —(b) A minor real distinction is a distinction between a reality and its mode of being. Thus the distinction between the movement of a flying bird and its rate of speed is a minor real distinction; for the speed or velocity is but a mode of the movement. Again, the distinction between the curvature of a line and its degree of curvature is a minor real distinction; so is the distinction between a man’s health and the state or degree of his health.—A major real distinction is sometimes called an entitative or absolute distinction; a minor real distinction is often called a modal distinction.

2. Logical distinction (called also distinction of reason or rational distinction) is a distinction between or among different aspects which the mind finds in the same thing. It is the lack of identity between or among concepts of what in reality (“in nature”) is one and the same. Logical distinction is either purely logical or logical with a basis in reality.

(a) A purely logical distinction has no foundation in reality outside the mind; it is a distinction made by the mind for its own requirements (for purposes of closer study and investigation) or is required by the mind because of the limitations of human understanding. Thus when we analyze and define one idea in terms of another, the idea defined and the essential definition indicate an identical reality, but they present to the mind logically distinct concepts. Thus when we define “man” as “rational animal” there is no distinction, but real identity, in the object, the thing, indicated by both terms, i. e., by both “man” and “rational animal.” For the second term (“rational animal”) is an essential definition of the first (“man”), and between a thing and its essential definition there must be absolute real identity. Yet “man” and “rational animal” are logically distinct concepts, inasmuch as one is an essence viewed simply in its complete totality, and the other is the same essence viewed more penetratingly and understandingly in its elements. The foundation for this sort of distinction is not in the identical reality considered, but in the mind itself and in the requirements and processes of the mind. Such a distinction is, therefore, a purely logical distinction; recall that the Greek word logos (and hence the English logical) is expressive of what belongs to mental requirements and processes. Such a distinction is also called, “a distinction of reason without a basis in reality,” or, in the old Latin formula, distinctio rationis sine fundamento in re. This (purely logical) distinction is also known as, “a distinction ascribable to the mind of the person making it,” or, in the Latin phrase, distinctio rationis ratiocinantis.

(b) A logical distinction with a basis in reality is one for which the mind may find justification in the reality itself which is considered, even though the points distinguished are not really distinct. Thus, for example, we make a distinction between God and His attributes, or between God’s mercy and His power, although we know that in God there is no real distinction except that which exists among the Three Divine Persons. God is simple; all that God has He is; there is perfect identity between the Divine Substance and the Divine Attributes, and so, of course, there is perfect identity among the Divine Attributes themselves; all are identified in the Divine Substance. Yet, despite this real and perfect identity, God stands revealed in His creation in a manner that may be called piecemeal; the world shows its Creator as supremely knowing or intelligent, as supremely powerful; man’s history shows God as most wise and provident, most good and merciful. Thus God affords the human mind what may be called really distinct aspects of His infinite identity. True, this piecemeal view of what is in Itself a perfect identity, is due to the limitations of the human mind, yet not entirely so; for the aspects we take of Infinite Being are justified in that Being Itself. To use a very imperfect simile, a diamond is a single stone, but it may flash out from its facets a variety of dazzling hues. That we perceive different colors is indeed due to the fact that we view the diamond from different angles; yet there is a foundation in the gem itself for the varying views, since it is really manifested or revealed as glowing, now with this color, now with that. Take a further example of logical distinction with a basis in reality: Man is defined as rational animal. Now, between man’s animality and his rationality there is no real distinction, for these are not physical parts or elements of man’s essence, as body and soul are. Yet there is here a rational or logical distinction, not entirely ascribable to the mind which makes it. For man has real aspects, real points to justify the view of the mind, in which he may be seen now as animal, now as rational. Hence we say that the distinction here in question is a distinction of reason (or a logical distinction) with a basis in reality. The old Latin phrase for this distinction is distinctio rationis cum fundament o in re. Sometimes this distinction is called, “a logical distinction based upon the object in which points are distinguished,” or, distinctio rationis ratiocinatae. This distinction is also, and most commonly, known as a virtual distinction.

Now, when the points distinguished by a virtual distinction are such as to include one another of necessity, so that, in the reality considered, these cannot exist separately, nor can they exist separately even in different things than the reality in which the mind distinguishes them, we have a minor virtual distinction. Thus the infinite attributes of God are really identified in God, nor can any one of these infinite attributes exist in another being than God, nor, if it could, would it be able to exist apart from all the other infinite attributes. But when the points distinguished by a virtual distinction do not, of necessity, include one another, but may be found, one without the other, in other things than the reality considered (and in which the distinction is made), we have a major virtual distinction. Thus animality and rationality are distinguished in man; for in beasts we find animality without rationality; animality does not of necessity include rationality (although it does in man).

The following schema may help the student to fix in memory the classification of distinctions:

major (absolute; entitative)

rReal

minor (modal)

Distinction -

purely logical (no basis in reality)

(major

virtual (basis in

minor

Closely allied to the subject of individuality, and of identity and distinction, is that of ‘multiplicity or, more properly, of multitude. A multitude is a plurality of units or individual things, each of which is unidentified with (is really distinct from) the others. Thus it appears that the idea of multitude is at least indirectly implied in the idea of individuality and in that of identity and distinction. A multitude, inasmuch as it is measurable by a unit (that is, by one of the individual items or instances that compose it) is called a number. Therefore a number is defined as “a multitude measured by one.” In figuring, that is in measurements of quantities in the abstract or in concrete, we employ numbers, and each of these is either a sum of ones (of units) or a division of ones (of units).

Summary of the Article

In this Article we have learned the meaning of unity or oneness. We have seen that transcendental unity is synonymous with being itself, so that a being as such is necessarily one. We have classed transcendental unity as concrete and abstract, essential and non-essential, and we have made certain sub-classifications. After studying transcendental unity, we have discussed quantitative {mathematical) unity. We have investigated the question of individuality and individuation, and have established the principle of individuation among bodily substances as materia signata, that is, matter marked or conditioned by quantity, without, however, involving set and determinate measurements of the quantity. We have noticed the principle of manifested individuality, and have listed the individuating notes by which each individual is recognizable among those with whom it has a common essence or specific nature. We have studied identity and distinction, and have noted that each is real or logical. We have made important sub-classifications of distinction, especially of logical distinction, which is either based on reality {cum fundamento in re) or is due entirely to the needs and limitations of the mind {sine fundamento in re). We have added a word on multitude and number.