The Principle of Human Life

Part Second — Major Psychology

Chapter I — Human Life

Article 1. The Principle of Human Life

This Part of our manual is devoted to the study of the life, the nature, and the destiny of man. It studies the human life-principle or rational soul; it discusses the nature of the soul, its union with the human body, its powers or faculties which are the immediate principles of human operations.

These matters are studied in the following Chapters:

Chapter I. Human Life
Chapter II. Human Sentiency
Chapter III. The Intellect
Chapter IV. The Will

This Chapter studies the nature of the human life-principle or soul, and discusses the union of soul and body which constitutes man. The Chapter is accordingly divided into two Articles, as follows:

Article 1. The Principle of Human Life
Article 2. The Union of Soul and Body in Man

c) Origin of the Human Soul

a) The Human Soul

We have already learned that every living body, every organism, has, in its essential constitution, an element or constituent part, by virtue of which the organism is alive. We have also learned that this life-principle is not the material of which the organism is composed, nor is it some special arrangement of that material; neither is it some combination of physical, mechanical, and chemical forces which manifest their interplay in the organism. The life-principle is something over; it is something over and above the body-mass, the body-structure, and the body as a field for the play of lifeless energies. And it is a substantial something, not an accidental of the living body. Nay, it is the substantial form of the living body; the form which constitutes the organism as an actual body, a living body, and a living body of one specific type. The life-principle is the “first act of the physical organic body.” It is the root-source of all the actualness, and all the actual power and operation, which the organism possesses. It is called the soul of the organism.

Now, man, that is to say a human being, is an organism or living body. Therefore man has a life-principle which is in him a basic constituent part; which is the substantial form of the living human body, which is the root-source of all that is actual about the human organism; which is “the first act of the human organic body.” This life-principle is called the human soul.

We have already adverted to the fact that the ancient term soul is seldom used nowadays as a simple equivalent or synonym for life-principle. Modern scientists and philosophers do not, as a rule, speak of the soul of plant or brute animal. We, however, have done so, following a very old and honorable usage. But we are aware of the fact that the unqualified term soul is almost universally understood (among those who use the term at all) to indicate the spiritual, immortal life-principle of man. When, therefore, we speak, in the present study, of the soul, we mean the human soul; the principle of human life; the substantial form of the living human body.

b) Nature of the Human Soul

The life-principle of a plant is called a vegetal soul; that of a brute animal is called a sentient, or an animal soul. Man’s soul is called a rational soul because it is the basic principle of all man’s vital operations, the most important of which are the rational operations, that is to say, the distinctively human operations of understanding and willing. The rational soul is merely another name for the human soul; we use the terms interchangeably.

Man’s rational soul is, like every life-principle, the substantial form of the organism which it vivifies. It is a substantial form; it is a substance. It is, like all substantial forms, simple or uncomposed. It is rational, and therefore spiritual. Being spiritual, it is immortal. In a word, the human soul is a simple, spiritual, immortal substance. We have need to pause upon each point of this description.

1. The human soul is a substance. Speaking with approximate exactness, we may say that all reality is divided into two great classes: substances and accidentals. The term accident is usually employed by philosophers instead of the noun accidental. Realities, then, are substances and accidents. And a reality is anything that can be thought of as positively existing. Anything actual or positively possible is a reality. No creatural reality can exist or even be thought of as existing except (omitting other fine philosophical classifications which do not concern us here) as a substance or as an accident.

A substance is a reality which is fitted to exist itself. It does not exist of itself. It has its producing and constituting causes; ultimately, it has its Creator and Preserver. And, taking the term substance strictly, it always has its causes, for the Divine Being does not come under the full classification of substance inasmuch as this involves limitations and imperfections and God is all-perfect. But, to revert to our point, a substance exists itself. It does not exist as the mere mark, qualification, modification, or limitation of something else. An accident, on the other hand, is fitted to exist as the mark, qualification, modification, or limitation of something else; and this something else is, proximately or remotely, a substance. A block of marble is a bodily substance. An angel is a spiritual substance. A human soul, as we shall see, is a spiritual substance. A man is a bodily substance,—even though his soul is spiritual, the compound or composite of body and soul is the bodily human organism.

A block of marble is a substance. It exists itself. The size of the block of marble, its shape, its color, its roughness or smoothness, its hardness, its tern-perattire, its location, its state of being at rest or moved about—all these are accidents. They are accidents of the block of marble. They mark and qualify and modify and limit the marble. They are said to inhere in the marble, that is, in the substance which they qualify. And the substance gives them actuality. For if you think of the marble as utterly destroyed, where are its shape, its size, its weight, and all the other accidents ? The substance supports the accidents in being; it stands under them, so to speak. And, indeed, that is why it is called substance, for this term comes from the Latin sub “under,” and stare “to stand.” And right here we discern the reason for the statement made above that God is, strictly speaking, not to be called substance; for the Divine Being is not qualified by accidents; It stands under no accidental modifications or limitations; for It is all-perfect and unlimited. But inasmuch as substance is conceived as that which exists itself,—leaving out the note of its supporting of accidents,—God is the Supreme and Perfect Substance.

We have said that accidents cannot exist (except by a miracle) if you take away the substance they qualify. Thus the size and weight and color of the marble block cannot exist themselves, that is, as size in the abstract, without being the size of anything; as weight taken alone without anything which can be weighed, and so on. But the marble can exist, and will, even if you take away its present weight and color and size and all the other accidents. You can change the accidents by dividing the marble block, washing it, grinding it to smoothness, moving it, putting it into the sunlight or into an ice-chest. You change the accidents by such treatment, but you do not change the substance. Accidents may be changed without changing the substance in which they inhere; but if the substance is changed the accidents will regularly change too. Thus the accidents regularly depend on the substance. But the substance does not depend on the accidents. True, the substance will regularly have some accidents; but the point we make is that it need not have precisely the accidents that, at any moment, are found to qualify it. It does not, therefore, depend on its accidents.

Catholic students of this manual will understand our use of the word “regularly” in the foregoing sentences. For Catholics know of one case in which a substance is changed without a change in accidents, and of a substance which exists without any accidents to qualify it. In the Blessed Sacrament we have the true bodily substance of the living Christ (together with His Divinity) without its accidents. The accidents present are those of bread, not those of Christ. In the Consecration at Mass, the substance of bread and the substance of wine are changed into the substance of Christ, but the accidents of bread and of wine remain; and these accidents remain without any substance to support them, for they do not inhere in the substance which is there, namely, the substance of Christ. This consideration does not, of course, properly belong in our present study; it is made merely for the sake of completeness, and to forestall a possible objection arising from misapprehension.

A substance is either complete or it is incomplete. Every substance is fitted to exist itself, but not every substance is fitted to exist by itself, i. e., to exist alone. The life-principle of a plant or animal is a substance. But without the organic body this substance cannot exist. It is incomplete. It is unable to exist by itself. It needs some other substance as coprinciple. But notice: it is not an accident of that coprinciple. The co-principles exist together; one does not inhere in the other after the manner of accidents. An accident exists in its substance; an incomplete substance exists with its co-substance. A complete substance is one that is fitted to exist by itself alone. Thus a plant or an animal is a complete substance. An incomplete substance requires another substance with which it joins in substantial union (and so constitutes a complete substance). Thus the life-principle of a plant or of an animal is an incomplete substance. Thus prime matter is an incomplete substance.

We shall presently see that the human soul is a complete substance. It is not a complete man, but it is a complete soul, and it can exist as a soul by itself. For it is spiritual, and not material (i. e., not dependent on matter for existence and operation) as plant souls and animal souls are. We say, therefore, that the human soul is “complete in the order of substantiality, but incomplete in the order of species.” In other words: the human soul is a complete substance (a spiritual substance) but it is not a complete man (does not, by itself, make the species “man”). But we have, first of all, to prove that the human soul is truly a substance.

Now, the human soul is that which constitutes the human being as a human being. It is that which substantially actualizes man, and makes him substantially different from every other sort of substance: from a lump of coal, a meadow flower, a brute animal. Between man and other substances there is a substantial difference. But that which constitutes a substance in its substantial reality and marks it off as substantially different from other things, is itself a substance. An accident is not competent to go above itself and its capacity, and establish a substance or mark a substantial difference. Therefore the human soul is truly a substance.

Further: the human soul is the root-principle of human operations. But operations, in creatures, are not identified with that which operates. The thinker is not the same as his thought; the growth of a body is not the body itself. Operations come from powers to operate, and these powers are rooted in the thing which has the powers And performs the operations. For operations as such are accidents, and accidents require a substance in which to inhere. Therefore, the human soul which is the first principle of human operations is substantial; it is a substance.

For the rest, the soul is the substantial form of the human body, and every substantial form is, at least incompletely, a substance.

2. The human soul is a simple substance. When we say that the human soul is simple we mean that it is not composed or compounded; we mean that it is not essentially compounded of matter and form (as every bodily substance is), and that it is not integrally composed of quantitative parts. The soul is a substance which precludes essential and integral composition.

First of all, the soul is essentially simple; it is not composed of matter and form. For the soul is the first principle of life, and we have seen that such a principle is not, and cannot be, matter. A living thing composed of matter and form is an organism, a living body, not a soul. The soul, therefore, is not composed of matter and form; it is solely a form. Hence it is essentially simple. This essential simplicity is not only a mark of the human soul; it is a mark of every life-principle, even that of plant or brute animal, and of every substantial form, even that of a lifeless body.

Further, the soul is integrally simple; it is not made up of quantitative parts. This follows from the foregoing. Quantitative parts are bodily or material, and that which has no matter in its make-up has no quantitative parts. But the soul has no matter in its make-up; it is a form alone, not matter-and-form. Hence it is integrally simple. Again we must notice that integral simplicity is a property of every substantial form, even of such as are called material (in the sense that they depend on matter for existence and function) and of such as are potentially multiple.

We may leave dry reasoning on this matter and take evidence for the soul’s simplicity from our own consciousness. We are conscious that we can reflect, that is, we can “bend back” the knowing act of the mind (which is a vital function, the principle of which is the soul) upon itself. We can know that we know; we can make the knowing act the thing known; we can study our own mental states and processes. Now, a thing made of parts could not possibly perform such an operation. Part might be bent back upon part, but the entirety could not be wholly bent back upon itself. This operation called reflection is, by the way, a proof of the spiritual nature of the soul as well as of its simplicity. But, for the present, we consider only the fact that the power of reflection is a certain proof of the absence of material or quantitative parts in the substance which reflects.

Since the soul is a simple substance it cannot be divided per se. But there are other simple substances, and hence substances indivisible per se, which are nevertheless divisible per accidens. Lifeless bodies are divisible per se; for lifeless bodies are homogeneous in their structure; one part is like another, and when the parts are divided, each has the nature which the unbroken body had at the outset. A piece of limestone may be broken into many pieces, and each piece is limestone. Living bodies are not divisible per se into a plurality of living bodies. But plants and the lowest sentient organisms are so divisible per accidens. That is, accidentally to the division of the bodily parts in such a way that each part has enough of the organic (heterogeneous) structure to support life, the living creature is multiplied. Thus the rose-bush can be divided into a plurality of rose-bushes, and worms, rightly cut in two, can each become two worms. Such organisms are said to be divisible per accidens, and their respective life-principles are said to be potentially multiple. But with the higher types of animals and with man the case is otherwise. For here the organism is highly diversified and the organic structure is not complete enough in the different parts to make these capable of sustaining a full organic life like that of the undivided original organism. The higher organisms are, therefore, not divisible, either per se or per accidens, and, in consequence, their respective life-principles are not potentially multiple. As to man, we shall presently see that his soul is spiritual, and a spiritual substance is independent (for existence and proper function) of matter, and therefore is in no wise accidentally divisible according to the divisibility of the material organism of which it is the substantial form.

The human soul is a substance essentially and integrally simple and absolutely indivisible.

5. The human soul is a spiritual substance. A spiritual substance is a substance which is intrinsically independent of matter for existence and operation. It may be (and in the case of the human soul it is) a substance designed to be the form of a material thing, and hence a co-principle with matter in constituting a specific essence, or simply a species. But in itself and for those operations which are proper to itself as a spiritual substance, it is always independent of matter. If the spiritual substance is, in itself, a rounded and complete specific nature, not designed for union with any other substance as co-principle, it is said to be a substance complete in substantiality and in species. Such a substance is, for example, an angel. But if a spiritual substance be made for substantial union with another substance,—so that the two, when united, constitute a compound but single complete essence or species,—it is said to be incomplete in species, or incomplete as a species. Such a substance is the human soul. For, taken alone, the soul is not the complete human essence; the soul is not the complete man; in order to constitute the complete human essence or species (the complete man) the soul must be substantially united with the body. But the human soul, although it is incomplete as a species, is complete as a substance, or, to adopt a more usual phrasing, the soul is complete in point of substantiality, or in the order of substantiality. It is a complete spirit; it is a complete soul. And it has the operations proper to a spiritual substance of its kind. The human soul does not, therefore, require the body in order to exist and to perform those operations which are proper to it as a human soul, to wit, the operations of understanding and willing.

The vegetal soul in a plant and the sentient soul in an animal are material souls, and not spiritual. They are material inasmuch as they depend upon matter for their existence and operations. These vital principles have no operations proper to themselves considered independently of the organic bodies which, respectively, they vivify or vitalize. A vegetal or a sentient life-principle has no operation of its very own which it does not exercise by the instrumentality of a bodily organ. Such a life-principle is indeed the first principle of the vital operations performed by the organism which it actualizes and vivifies; but these operations are, without exception, organic operations; they are operations which cannot be discharged except in and by means of the body and its organs. And therefore we know that the vegetal and the sentient life-principles have no existence apart from their respective organisms. For if such a life-principle had existence, it would have activities; since every substance has activities once it is constituted in actual existence. The vegetal and the sentient life-principle are therefore incomplete both in point of substantiality and in point of species; they cannot, without their respective organic bodies, exist as substances or as plant or animal. But the human soul is incomplete in point of species only; it is complete in point of substantiality. The human soul can (and when a man dies it does} exist independently of the human body, and in its separate existence it exercises its own proper operations of intellect and will. And this is so because the soul is spiritual, and not material.

How shall we prove that the human soul is spiritual? We shall see what the soul does; we shall notice its operations. Operations follow essence and indicate the nature of that essence. If the operations of the human soul are of a spiritual nature, they infallibly prove that the soul which operates is a spiritual substance. But how shall we come at the soul to observe its operations? We shall observe the operations of man, the substantial composite of body and soul. We shall study the human operations and discover whether these could all be exercised without a spiritual life-principle or, on the other hand, whether some of these operations require a spiritual principle as their sufficient explanation and reason. And what must our conclusion be? If we find that all man’s vital operations are such as require a bodily organism for their exercise (as is the case with vegetal and sentient operations) we shall have no choice but to conclude that man’s soul is material in the sense that it depends essentially on matter for its operations, and hence also for its being or existence. But if we find that some of man’s operations are supra-organic, that is, are of such character as precludes the possibility of their being exercised by bodily parts or organs, we shall be forced to conclude that man’s soul is independent of matter in these operations, and (since operation follows and indicates essence) independent of matter in its essence. But a substance which is essentially independent of matter is a spiritual substance. Therefore, if we find that some of man’s operations are supra-organic or spiritual in character, we have proof incontestable that the soul is spiritual.

Now, as a matter of fact, man has operations which are independent of matter, which are supra-organic, which are of spiritual character. Therefore, he has a soul which,—since it is a substantial principle,—is a spiritual substance. We shall investigate some of the operations of man which prove our point.

A man can think, and reason, and reflect, and exercise acts of the will. These acts or operations are absolutely independent of time and place and concrete circumstances. But an organic operation is not independent of time, place, and concrete circumstances. Nutrition, for example, is an operation which involves definite individual materials worked upon, here and now, within the living body, and transformed into the substance of the living body. So with growth and generation. So also with sensation: a thing seen is a definite, individual object, here and now brought into the range of sight; a thing heard is one definite concrete sound or concert of sounds here and now within the range of the hearing; and so with other sensations, and with appetition, and locomotion. But when a man thinks, he forms an idea, he grasps an essence in general or universal, and this is true even when he thinks of objects in the bodily world. A man can know, for instance, what a house is, or a hill, or a tree, or a horse; he can form ideas of these things, and thus know them in a manner that transcends all organic grasp. If a man looks at a house, he sees that particular house. But man’s idea of house is not limited like the sense-perception (which is organic). Man, by reason of the idea house,—which his mind has formed by working upon the experiences brought to him by the senses,—can understand what house means. If someone speaks of a house, the man in question understands perfectly without having to see any particular house. His mind abstracts from (or neglects to consider) the things which make a house individual and concrete,—things like the style and size of the house, the materials of which it is built, its location, its time of building, etc.,—and holds only the things that make a house a house. The man understands house in universal. But the man cannot see house in universal; he must, to exercise the organic operation of seeing, have within range of his eyes the house in individual; and he must see it in a certain place at the time of his seeing. Here we see that the organic operation is characterized and limited by individuality, space, time, circumstances in the concrete. But the operation of thinking, of forming and having the idea, and of understanding thereby, is not limited or characterized like the organic process. The operation of thinking, of intellectually knowing, is therefore not an organic operation; it is supra-organic; in other words, it is an operation of spiritual character. Therefore it proceeds from a spiritual first principle, which, like every first principle of acting or operating beings, is substantial. Hence the substantial first principle of the human operation of thinking (of intellectually knowing) is spiritual. But this substantial first principle is the human soul. Therefore, the human soul is a spiritual substance.

As with thinking, so with reasoning. To reason is to work a thing out by connected steps of study. One reasons in solving a problem in algebra, or in demonstrating a theorem in geometry. A student who has made a careful study of the preceding paragraph, has been reasoning. Now, obviously, there is no organ or bodily structure by means of which such an operation could be exercised. The finest faculties (i. e., powers for vital operation) that a man has, short of the intellectual faculties here in question, are the sentient faculties.. But which of the sentient faculties is even conceivably competent to study and compare and note relationships and draw conclusions ? By what sentient faculty can you do a sum in mathematics. By what organ can you discover that two and two make four? You can see two bricks; you can hear two sounds; you can smell two odors; you can touch and feel two bodily objects; you can taste two flavors; you can imagine two dragons. But you cannot, by any sense or sense-organ, lay hold of two—that is, of two by itself; not two of this or that, but simply two. But the mind of man can understand what two means. A man, confronted with the exacting problem of adding two and two, does not pause and say, “Two what?” When little boys and girls first go to school the teacher trains them to make pure mathematical concepts (or ideas’) by connecting the quantities with definite and sensible materials. The teacher says, “If John had two apples and Mary gave him two more apples, how many apples had John?” But in a very short time the minds of the smallest children are ready to dispense with the apples and with other material substances, and are able to deal with quantity in the abstract. And so the children add two and two, and three and five, and nine and seven, not being puzzled by the task of handling quantities without any sensible thing that is quantified. What organ could begin to do such a thing? The brain? You might as well say the eye or the ear. For no organ deals with objects in the abstract; no organ can deal with objects in universal. The brain is the organ of the interior senses, of which we shall hear later in this treatise. The brain is the organ of imagination, for example, and sense-memory. Now imagination and sense-memory can deal with their object when it is no longer outwardly and physically present; but to do this they must project the object within themselves in an image that is individual, concrete, circumstanced. This is an example of the highest type of organic operation, and it is still a matter of concreteness and individuality and circumstance. But thinking and reasoning are not limited by concreteness, individuality, and circumstance. Hence thinking and reasoning are operations of a character superior to any organic operation. They are supra-organic; they are of spiritual character. Hence they come from a spiritual first principle. This is the soul. Therefore, the soul is spiritual.

Man’s mind or intellect holds such ideas as being, unity, goodness, truth, ideals, virtue, honor, ambition, purpose, beauty, steadfastness, patriotism, etc. Can any organ lay hold of such things ? Can you see truth ? Can you smell ideals ? Can you imagine what ambition would look like, and draw a picture of it ? These are abstract things; they are things drawn out from concrete and individual limitations or settings (abstract comes from the Latin ab “from” and traho “I draw”), and hence they are beyond the grasp of any organic bodily part. They are things which require a supra-organic power to apprehend them, a spiritual power. But this power is resident in a spiritual substance; this substance is the soul. Therefore the soul is spiritual.

The soul can reflect. The term is from the Latin re- “bach,” and flecto “I bend.” The soul can bend back upon itself. It exercises this function by its faculty of mind or intellect. The mind can know itself knowing; can think of its thinking; can make itself and its processes the object of its own study. No organic faculty can do as much. The eye cannot see itself seeing, nor can the ear hear itself hearing. The sense of taste cannot taste itself. No organ nor organic faculty can reflect. An organ or bodily part may bend back part of itself upon another part, as the hand can betid fingers back upon the palm. But no bodily part can bend all of itself upon all of itself. The mind can. The mind (or intellect) is therefore supra-organic; it is a spiritual faculty. And, in consequence, it resides in a spiritual substance. Hence the soul is spiritual.

Further: every nature, every operating essence, tends towards that which suits it, which is good for it, which answers its connatural needs. Now the human soul tends towards spiritual things: justice, science, virtue, endless happiness. The human soul exercises this tendency by rational appetition or will. But there must be a proportion and balance between the appetition and the object appetized. A purely bodily thing has no need or tendency or connatural “desire” for that which is of supra-bodily character. Only a spiritual faculty can exercise a spiritual drive or tendency. We must conclude that the human will is a spiritual faculty, and, since this is so, the soul, or substantial principle which exercises will, is a spiritual substance.

Let us close the present study with one additional consideration. The physiologists tell us that the material organic body is continuously being worn out and renewed, and in the course of a long lifetime a man’s entire body-structure must have been completely replaced eight or ten times over. Yet the man of eighty will recount tales of his boyhood, his youth, his maturity. There is something substantial about the old gentleman which has not worn out, and has not been renewed, but has endured unchanged through all the long years. It is not the body; it is not something organic. It is something supra-organic or spiritual. It is the spiritual soul, which constitutes the “self” and holds this self unchanged through all the bodily changes of a lifetime.

The soul of man is a spiritual substance. Therefore we must reject as entirely untenable,—and as a theory which not only does not explain human operations but contradicts them,—the doctrine of the materialists who maintain that there is no such thing as a spiritual reality, and teach that matter is the single cause of all vital phenomena whether in the vegetal, sentient, or human order. Notable materialists of more recent times were: John Tyndall (1820-1893); Herbert Spencer (1820-1903); Auguste Comte (1798-1857); Maximilien Paul Littre (1801-1881); John Stuart Mill (1806-1873); Karl Moleschott (1822-1894); Ludwig Buechner (1824-1898).

4. The human soul is an immortal substance. The term immortal is derived from the Latin negative prefix in (which here changes its n to the next following letter for sake of euphony) and mors (stem mort-) “death.” Thus immortal literally means deathless or undying. When we say that the soul is immortal we mean that the soul is a substance which does not, and cannot, die.

There are degrees of immortality, (i) Perfect, unconditional, and essential immortality belongs to God alone. God is Infinite Life; God is necessary Being. God cannot be non-existent, nor can He be non-living. The immortality of God is called absolute immortality. (ir) The next (less perfect) grade of immortality belongs to created substances which are so constituted as to preclude the possibility of dissolution or death. Such are simple substances that are complete in point of substantiality. These substances have no parts and hence cannot be shattered into parts; further, these substances do not depend upon matter (which has parts) and cannot fade from existence when the matter is shattered into its constituent parts. In a word, such substances cannot die either per se or per accidens. And this is because they are simple and spiritual substances. Their immortality is called natural immortality. Of course, these spiritual substances are contingent and not necessary beings; they are creatures; they would not exist if the Creator did not call them into being. And, absolutely speaking, the power which made them could withdraw its sustaining influence and allow them to be annihilated. But, apart from the pure possibility of annihilation (which is relatively impossible, i. e., impossible because of, or in relation to, the infinite wisdom and goodness which would not create only utterly to destroy) these spiritual substances have no capacity for extinction, no possibility of dying. Such substances are angels and human souls. Therefore, when we say that the human soul is immortal, we mean that the soul is endowed with natural immortality. (Hi) The lowest grade, so to speak, of immortality is that which is found in bodily things which, being bodily, could and would die, but which will not be allowed to die. The nature of such substances inclines them to dissolution, since they are made of parts, but by a divine gift above their nature, or supernatural, they are made immortal. Such were the bodies of our first parents. By their sin Adam and Eve lost the supernatural gift of bodily immortality, and they and all their descendants were doomed to die. The bodies of men, joined with their souls at resurrection, will thenceforth be dowered with this supernatural immortality.

We say that the human soul is naturally immortal. And we say so because the soul has not, either in itself intrinsically, or in other things extrinsically, anything that could make its death possible.

First of all, the human soul is intrinsically immortal. We have seen that the human soul is a spiritual substance which is the first principle of life in man. It is alive, and it is the source of human vital operations. Now, a spiritual living substance is complete as a substance and it is simple. These points are involved in the very essence of spiritual substance. But a simple substance cannot be dissolved into parts, for it has no parts. But death per se is the dissolution of a thing into its parts. Hence the soul cannot, per se, be corrupted, dissolved, or die. Nor does the human soul depend on that which has parts, namely, the organic body. We have seen that the soul has operations which are definitely and unquestionably supra-organic; and we have concluded perforce that the soul itself (since operation indicates essence) is supra-organic; it does not depend on organs for its existence or proper operations. But death per accidens is the passing of a substance from existence by reason of the dissolution of the material or organic body on which such a substance depends. The soul, however, does not depend on the body, and hence does not perish when the body is broken into its constituent parts. Hence the soul cannot die per accidens. Now, what cannot die per se or per accidens is intrinsically immortal. Therefore the soul is intrinsically immortal. But that which is intrinsically immortal is so either by absolute or by natural immortality. Absolute immortality belongs to God alone. Therefore the human soul has natural immortality; the human soul is naturally immortal.

In the second place, the human soul is extrinsically immortal. That is to say there is no cause outside the soul which can or will destroy it. A spiritual substance cannot be destroyed unless it is annihilated, that is, reduced to absolute nothingness. And annihilation can come only from the cause which can create. To create is to draw out of nothingness into actuality; to annihilate is to withdraw the sustaining creative power and allow the creature to disappear into nothingness once more. But only God can create, and, therefore, only God can withdraw the sustaining creative power. Hence, on the face of it, annihilation is possible; God can annihilate. But when we consider the infinite wisdom of God, and His infinite goodness, we are forced to conclude that to annihilate a spiritual substance would involve a contradiction in the all-perfect Being, and hence such annihilation is impossible. In other words, if we look at God’s power alone, we say that God can annihilate. But when we consider the other divine perfections (which are not really other in God, for all are identified in the Divine Essence, and are seen as distinct only by reason of our limited capacity which cannot adequately take them as they are and view them in infinite identity) we say that God cannot annihilate. For, manifestly, it would not be wise,—and God is infinite Wisdom,—to create a substance capable of endless existence only to negative its capacity and utterly destroy it. Nor would it be kind or good,—and God is infinite Goodness,—to implant in a spiritual soul a “longing after immortality,” such as that to which all sane minds confess, and then render the desire futile by complete destruction of the soul. Therefore we say, in the language of the philosopher and theologian, “In His absolute power God can annihilate the soul; but by his ordered power (i. e., His power brought into alignment and order with the other divine perfections) He cannot annihilate it.”

The argument just concluded is strictly rational; there is not a shred or scrap of sentiment about it. We pause a moment, in passing, to notice this fact, lest we win the unwanted approval of those mistaken sentimentalists who,—incapable of measuring the full stature of a man and recognizing the glorious dignity of human freedom and responsibility,—try to argue themselves out of belief in hell by saying, “How could an all-good or all-wise God condemn a soul to endless torments ?” This sort of thing,—this unworthy whine, —is not on a par with our argument which finds the wisdom and goodness of God insurmountable obstacles in the way of a possible annihilation of the human soul. To put the matter simply and be done with it, it suffices to notice one immense difference in the two arguments: if annihilation of the soul were possible, it would come from the power of God, man being helpless under the process of utter extinction; God would have all to do with it, man would have nothing to do with it. But in the eternal condemnation and torments of hell, man has everything to do with it, and God, strictly speaking, has nothing to do with it. On the contrary, God wills all to be saved, and the eternal loss of a soul is its own doing, in spite of all that God does for it to induce it to choose eternal happiness.

Summing up the arguments for the immortality of the soul, we say: the human soul is intrinsically immortal because it cannot die either per se or per accidens; it is extrinsically immortal because there is no cause outside the soul capable of annihilating it. Therefore, the human soul will not die at all. Its immortality is natural immortality, for its spiritual nature makes it capable of endless existence and excludes a connatural tendency to dissolution or extinction. Therefore, the human soul is naturally immortal.

c) Origin of the Human Soul

The human soul can come into existence in only one way, namely, as the immediate product of a cause which produces it in its entirety out of nothing. In a word, the human soul can come into existence only by being directly created. Now, God alone can create. Therefore, the human soul can come into existence only by the direct or immediate creation of God.

The human soul cannot be derived from the souls of parents. For we have seen that the human soul is a simple spiritual substance. Hence the souls of parents cannot be divided per se or per accidens to give off parts, germs, or elements, to form the soul of offspring. The fallacious doctrine, long abandoned by philosophers generally, that the soul of a child is derived from the soul of its parents, is known as Traducianism, from the Latin trans-ducere “to lead or draw out or across”; the name is meant to indicate the theory that the soul of human offspring is “drawn out or across” from the souls of the father and mother.

The human soul cannot be derived from the bodies of parents. The statement is self-evident. For the spiritual substance called the soul can have no origin in a mere material substance. Generation, as a vital process, produces a result that is of like nature with the source or generator; all that could possibly be generated out of a body is bodily in nature.

Now, if the human soul cannot come into existence by being generated by parents, it must come into existence by being, in each man, directly created by God. There is no other way in which it might originate.

Each human soul is, therefore, directly and immediately created by Almighty God. Now, the question arises: when is the human soul created ? The human soul is a substantial form, and no substantial form is produced until the conditions requiring it are present. Hence the human soul is not first produced and held ready for its body. This would be “pre-existence of souls,” a doctrine theologically reprobated, and philosophically unsound. The soul does not exist until it exists as the substantial form of a human body. Therefore, the moment of the soul’s creation is the moment of its substantial uniting with its body. The language usually employed to express this truth is this: the human soul is created and infused into the body at one and the same instant. The moment of a soul’s creation is the moment of its infusion, i. e., its substantial uniting with the body.

Now, when does that instant of creation and infusion occur ? Is it the moment of conception, that is, the moment when the male and female elements join to compose the primal cell of the offspring? Many Scholastic psychologists think so; in fact, this view may be called traditional, since it has met general favor for five or six centuries. St. Thomas Aquinas and many of the older Scholastics believed that the new life which emerges at the moment of conception within the body of a human mother is, for a time, plant-life, and later, when the new organism is developed to sufficient complexity, the plant soul or substantial form is displaced by a sentient or animal soul, and this, in turn, at a later stage of development, is displaced by the human soul which is then immediately created and infused by a single act of divine power. Thus, according to this view, the moment of the soul’s creation occurs some weeks after conception. The arguments offered for each of these two conflicting doctrines are interesting and not without weight, but none of them is absolutely conclusive. In the light of authority on the subject, and also in view of the relative merits of argument on either side, it appears that the more probable doctrine is that which asserts the moment of conception as the moment of the soul’s creation and infusion. But the point we make here is that, whenever the soul is created and infused, its creation and infusion are absolutely simultaneous, and come of a single direct act of divine power. The soul does not pre-exist to its body. The first moment that finds a human soul without its body is the moment it leaves the body when a man dies.

Summary of the Article

In this Article we have described and defined the human soul as the first principle of life in man. We have made a detailed study and proof of the substantiality, simplicity, spirituality, and immortality of the soul. We have seen that the soul can come into existence only by way of creation, direct and immediate in each instance. We have discussed the moment of the soul’s creation, and have found that the soul does not pre-exist to its body, but is created and infused by a single divine act and therefore at a single instant, which is, to follow the more probable opinion in the matter, the moment of conception.