Prima Secundae
Lecture 143: Whether Habits Are Distinguished by Good and Bad

Transcript
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Whether habits are distinguished according to good and bad, to the third one proceeds thus, it seems that habits are not distinguished according to good and bad, because good and bad are contraries. But there's the same habit of contraries as has been had above. Therefore, habits are not distinguished according to good and bad. Moreover, good is convertible with being, right? It's one of these transcendentals, some of the most common things. And thus, since it is common to all things, it is not able to be taken as a difference to some species, as is clear to the philosopher in the fourth book of the places. Likewise, since bad, since it's a privation and non-being, cannot be the difference of some being, therefore, one cannot distinguish habits and species according to good and bad. That convinces me. Moreover, concerning the same logic, there can be diverse bad habits. Just as concerning concupiscences, there can be intemperance, which goes to excess, right? And insensibility, right? Aristotle says, in the ethics, there's no name for this defective one, right? Because it's so rare, right? So I said, you know, what do we call it? Let's call it, puritanism or something, you know? Likewise, there can be what many good habits, huh? Just as Aristotle distinguishes in the ethics there in this book, huh? Human virtue, right? And what? Heroic or divine virtue, yeah. Thomas comes back there and he talks about the gifts of the Holy Spirit, right? And they're like heroic virtue, right? This is clear through the philosopher in the seventh book of the ethics. Therefore, habits are not distinguished according to good and, what? Bad. But against this is that a good habit is contrary to a bad habit, as virtue to, what? Vice. But contraries are diverse according to species. Therefore, habits do differ in species, huh? According to the difference of good and bad, huh? I answer it should be said, but it has been said. Habits and species are distinguished not only according to objects and active principles, but also in order to nature, right? Which happens in two ways. In one way, according to agreement to nature, or also, what? Disagreement. Yeah. In this way, it distinguishes in species good and bad habits, huh? For by a good habit, one is said to be disposed to an act suitable to the nature of the one acting, right? But a bad habit, one is said, or by one is disposed to an act that is not suitable to, what? Nature, huh? Homosexual acts, huh? Yes, exactly. The frustration of nature as such is what it is. But the acts of what? Virtues. That are suitable to human nature are those which are according to reason, huh? Acts of vices, since they are against reason, are discordant from the clash of human nature, right? And thus is manifested according to the difference of good and bad habits can be, what, distinguished in species, huh? That's what Shakespeare said, the revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse. That's why I got thinking about how we use the word taken from the feet, right? We talk about discourse, but also the word stumble, right? And in Romeo and Juliet, we actually have two things said, right? Wisely and slow, they stumble and run fast. And then later on, you know, we're not so vile that on the earth doth live, but to the earth some special good doth give. We're not so good, but strained from that fair use. Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse, right? Just those words, I think it really shows the excellence of Shakespeare's mind, right? Revolts from true birth, because that's where you get the addiction, right? Stumbling on abuse, right? That's where you really, what, go against your nature, right? We have, the other day, the gospel, I forget which gospel, but it's repeated in more than one, but they often will say, they translate it not accurately for our next thing. Our Lord says, if your hand caused you to sin, cut it off. He didn't say it, he said, if your hand caused you to stumble. That's the word that's from the Greek. If your eye caused you to stumble, or he says, woe to those who cause one of these little ones to stumble, that's the word it uses. So it's kind of interesting that that's. I'm interested in what the word stumble, you know? Shakespeare's kind of a master of words here in the English language. I always call him the master of the English language, he uses his words so well. Yeah, yeah, oftentimes that's what I do when we have a passage of scripture. I don't change the words that are in the scripture, but if it provides, even on the page, it provides this, or in the Greek it says this, I'll put a little bit more accurate, what I think is more accurate. I'll use it. It always tends to say, you know, Obama revolts from true births, stumbling on abuse. In fact, he stuck with a stop, he'll click the wrong one, you know, when he says it like that. For him to change. I just saw an article, it's in the cafe, inside the Vatican there. Some of the gal was just made the head of the March for Life. It's an Irish name, I can't remember. She said, that's one thing, she keeps praying for Obama's conversion. That's what she's doing. In another way, according to nature, habits are distinguished, right? In that one habit disposes for an act suitable to the, what? Lower nature, right? Yeah. Another habit disposes for an act suitable to a, what? Higher nature. Yeah. And thus the human virtue, which disposes for an act suitable to human nature, is distinguished from the divine virtue, right? Or the heroic virtue, right? Which disposes for an act suitable to a, what? Period. Period nature, right? A government, yeah. Now, to the first, it should be said, that of contraries, there is able to be one habit, right? According as contraries come together in one, what? Yeah. Noble in the same way, you might say. But never does it happen that contrary habits are one species, right? This is a very subtle distinction, right? For the contrariety of habits is according to, what, contrary? I think you can see how there's really trouble to translate gratios, but it's the best way, right? How would you translate that, huh? Say characteristics? I don't know what you'd say. Common ask? Yeah, well, it seems a good thing, yeah. Well, the translator who did those questions likes somebody else. In this, according to good and bad habitations, distinguished, insofar as one habit is good and the other bad, not over from this that one is of the good and the other of the bad, right? So Nicomachean Ethics is both of the good and of the bad, right? It's about virtue and vice, but in the other case, it's the virtue, it's the habit itself that is good or bad, right? So there can be a good habit about the good and the bad, right? I suppose there can be a bad habit about the good and the bad, too, right? But the same habit cannot be both good and bad, but the same habit can be about the good and the bad. That's kind of an interesting thing, right? You know how I like to ask the students, you know, what sense of before, does one sense of before come before another sense of before? Yeah, you can just think about the good and bad and get there. But something a little bit like that, right? A good habit, the same habit cannot be both good and bad, right? But the same habit can be about the good and the bad, about the good and the bad as opposed to that good, right? But the same habit cannot be in harmony with nature and in disharmony with nature, right? You know, logic is about correct reasoning, incorrect reasoning, right? I used to get the kids up on the board, you know, and I'd say, if A is so, B is so, and then I'd write that four times across the thing, and then I'd say, A is so, and then A is not so, B is so, B is not so, right, huh? And I'd get four victims up on the board. And I'd say, anything follows necessarily right underneath what follows, right, huh? And usually, you know, sometimes you get, you know, It's a bit of mixed up. I wonder whether something does follow, they think nothing follows. If something doesn't follow, they think something does follow. So I'd say, this shows the need for logic. I admit to the point, because it's already on the board. You've justified your job. Yeah, yeah. But you see what I'm doing there, right? You've seen the ones where something fouls and something doesn't foul, right? Where the argument would be good and where the argument would be, what? Bad, right, huh? Because at least there's the argument, if A is so, B is so, and then saying A is not so, therefore B is not so, right? And Aristotle says, well, that doesn't what? Foul, right? It is true that if being came to be, it had a beginning, but does it follow that if it didn't? You know? Yeah. If it's raining out, the sidewalk's wet. It's not raining out. If the sidewalk's wet, oh, they've got to put the hose on. So you see, logic is about good and bad reasoning, right? I think it's about virtue advice, and medicine is about health and sickness, right? I did the pork chops last night, pork loin last night, real good, you know? Nice and juicy, you know? It didn't make it all dry, you know? I've got to cover me up the way I did it last night. Did you thank Rosalie for that? No, I did it. I was a leader. Oh, you did it? On the grill, yeah. Oh, my God. That's not easy. Yeah, yeah. And you've got to carry just to get it the right amount. You don't have it, you know, want to eat pork, do pink, you know, or bad pink, you know, but you want to have it tender and moist, right? I know how to do both, right? You say a woman was upset with a man, you know, she'd overcook the meat or something like that. So, it's by the same heart of cooking that she knows how to do it right and how to do it wrong. If you know how much salt and pepper to put on, you know how much would be too much and make it too. See? They're either making food tasty and untasty, right? I think it's interesting to say, right, huh? Not too hard to see a distinction, right, is it? That the same habit cannot be both good and bad, but the same habit can be about the good and the bad, huh? Is that true of the moral virtues and the intellectual virtues? I see it more in the case than intellectual virtues, you know, but maybe it's something like that. I mean, if I have virtue of justice, then I'm inclined to pay my debts, right? But I'm also aroused, so to speak, by some injustice somebody's doing, right? You know, it's about the same moral virtue I'm inclined to a good act, right? And away from a bad act, right? You know, an act is contrary to the virtue, right? Even in the opposite way, in terms of, like, if you've got advice, that's what they talk about, honor among thieves, you know? They know what's right and wrong, they just don't think of it. I mean, the thief knows very well about the self-command, he wants everybody to observe it except himself, he's got to accept it. Everybody says, well, don't take my stuff. It's like the IRS. Can we fix the implied rejection? So we did the first one? Just the one? Okay. Wait a minute. Yeah, yeah, the first one we... No, we did the second one. We just finished the third one, didn't we? Third article, but we haven't answered all the jokes, I don't think. Yeah, okay. Okay? Wow, I lost my point. Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah. We have done it directly. Okay. And the first one is, yeah. Yes, okay, we did. Yeah, see, the last sentence is what I was kind of taking off at. Yeah. And ite se kundum bonum in malum habitus distinguuntur. Yeah, that's right. Insofar as one habit is good and the other habit is bad, right? Not horror from this that one is of the good and the other of the bad, right? Yeah, yeah. Okay. The second should be said that the good common to all being, right, the good that's convertible with being, is not a difference constituting the species of any habit, right? But it's always a certain determined good, right, which is according to its suitability to a determined nature to with the, what, human nature, right, huh? Likewise, bad is not a difference constituting a habit that does do so, is not a pure privation, right, but something determined that is repugnant to a determined, what, nature, right? So it's something that is, something, right, but it has attached to it, you might say, a privation, right, huh? It's not just a pure privation, right? Mm-hmm. Okay. So intemperance is not simply, you know, the lack of reason, but real inclination to eat too much or drink too much or something, right? Mm-hmm. So that excessive desire for food and drink involves deprivation of reason, right? Okay. Desire not modified by reason or not in accordance with reason. This is the third objection. To the third, it should be said that many good habits are about the same instinct. Species are distinguished, huh? Are distinguished, huh? Are distinguished, huh? Many habits, many good habits about the same species are distinguished according to their suitability to diverse natures. Many bad habits are distinguished according to the same thing, according to diverse repugnancies to that which is according to nature. Just as to one virtue or contrary to diverse faces about the same matter. Matter. Matter. Matter. Matter. matter. matter. So the purity is contrary, to reason in a different way than the intemperate man, right? And the coward is what? Opposed to reason in a different way than the foolhardy man. To the fourth one proceeds thus. It seems that one habit is constituted from many habits, right? It was going to take you as a side, I guess. For that whose generation is not perfected at once, but successively, seems to be constituted from what? They raise parts, like build a house, right? Take the foundation first, right? And if you're fool, you don't have anything to finish the rest of the house. Let's get the foundation. But the generation of the habit is not, what? All at once, but successively through many acts. Therefore, one habit is constituted from many habits. Moreover, from parts is constituted the whole. But to one habit are assigned many parts, as Tullius lays down, what? Many parts are fortitude, temperance, and other virtues, huh? Therefore, one habit is constituted from what? Many. Moreover, about one conclusion alone, there can be a, what? Science can be had both in act and habit. But many conclusions pertain to one whole science, as to geometry, arithmetic. Okay, I can buy that now. And therefore, one habit is constituted from what? Many. But against this, a habit, since it is a certain quality, is a simple form. But nothing simple is constituted from many. Many. Therefore, one habit is not constituted from many habits. I answer, it should be said, that a habit ordered to operation, about which now we chiefly intend, right, is a certain perfection of a power, right? But every perfection is proportional to its perfectible. Whence, as the power of senses is one, extends to many things according as they come together in something one, that is in some general notion of object, right? So also, habits extend to many things according as they have the order to something one, to it, to some special object of, or aspect of a, you know, or one nature, or one beginning, as has been said above, right? If, therefore, we consider habit according as it extends itself, thus we find in it a certain multiplicity, right? But because that multiplicity is ordered to something one, one, to which the habit chiefly regards. Hence it is that the habit is a simple quality, not constituted from many habits, even if it extends to many, right? For one habit does not extend to many things, except in order to something one, from which it has its, what, unity, right? Now, to the first, it should be said that succession in the generation of habit is not constituted from this, that part of it is generated after part, but from this that the subject does not at once, or immediately, right, achieve the disposition that is firm and difficult to remove, right? And from this that at first it imperfectly comes to be, or begins to be, in the subject, and is paulatum, is perfected, right? Wisely and slow, right? They stumble and run fast, right? If you go too fast, you're not going to stumble, which is not to acquire the virtue, right? And that's also about other qualities, huh? So he's talking about that in the way the subject is partaking of the virtue, right? Now, to the second, then, it should be said that the parts which are assigned to individual cardinal virtues are not integral parts, right? From which is constituted a whole, but subject parts or what? Potential parts. This is going to be the main distinction there that you follow all the way through, the secundi, right? The different ways in which the thing can have parts, so we have to... Not integral parts. Yeah. That's what he said, right? Yeah. But subject parts are what species, right? Okay. So if you say temperance, you may have a species, one might be concerned with food or drink or something, with sex, something like that, right? And so on. And then potential ones are ones that don't have the full power of the virtue, right? And something other than... Those distinctions will come out more later on. Don't worry about that too much right now. The one who in some science... Third, it should be said. The one who in some science acquires by demonstration the knowledge of one conclusion has the habit, but imperfectly. But when he acquires through some demonstration science of another conclusion, there is not generated in him another habit, but the habit which first was becomes more of what perfect. as extending to what? More things. More things, right? In that the conclusions and demonstrations of one's science are ordered and one is derived from the other, right? Mm-hmm. So I go through all these 13 books of Euclid there, and I'm just getting one habit. I'm going through all these 15 books of St. Augustine, or the 15 books of St. Augustine, or the 12 books of St. Augustine, or the 15 books of Ambrose. It's just what happened. What gives unity to theology, right? Is it because there's one object, it's all about God, and other things in comparison to God, right? That's part of unity, isn't it? Mm-hmm. And, you know, when Thomas says, you know, is theology, you know, we're way back in the first question, right? Is theology one science, right? Mm-hmm. How can it be, you know? It talks about all these different things, you know, it talks even about human virtue, and so on. But it's all in comparison to what? To God, right? Mm-hmm. You talk about God in himself, or the things, because God is the Alpha and the Omega, the first and last, the beginning, the end of things, right? This is very clear in the Summa Conventilis, right, huh? When the first book's about God in himself, and then the second book about God is the beginning of things, right, huh? And then the third book about God is the end of all things, right? So you need to get divine providence, you know, and so on. But it's, they're all ordered to one thing, right, huh? But if you say that, that all this is in the light of what? Faith, right? That's another way of seeing unity, isn't it, of the science? Even though I suppose it comes to what faith is, you're going to have to bring in God, I think. In a sense, you know, God's knowledge, in a sense, is the active principle of our thinking, right? Or in the other case, you're emphasizing, you know, that God is the subject or the object that you're knowing, right, huh? You're knowing in the light of faith, right? But they speak in the light of faith, right? Mm-hmm. That's the new inseparable. Yeah. Yeah. One of my favorite titles of Christ that's given in the Apocalypse is called the Faithful Witness. Because he's testifying to the, I'd say that one light, he's basically testifying to that. Because we don't see that light directly, we only see it through the witness. Mm-hmm. It's a good time to stop, I guess, too. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen. Thank you, God. Thank you, Guardian Angels. Thank you, Thomas Aquinas. Dios, gracias. God, our Enlightenment. Guardian Angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, order the luminary bridges, and arouse us to consider more quickly. St. Thomas Aquinas, Angelic Doctor. Praise God. Help us to understand what you were written. Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen. So, we're starting in question 55, which is going to talk about habits in particular, good and the bad ones, right? So, let's look at the little frame in here, Thomas says in the beginning. Consequente, right? We're not to consider about habits in particular, right? And because a habit, as has been said before, habits are distinguished by good and by bad, right? First, we're not to speak about the good habits. Which are the virtues. And other things joined to them, to wit, the gifts, like the gifts of the Holy Spirit, right? And the Beatitudes, yeah? And the fruits of the Holy Spirit, I suppose, huh? Now, about virtues, there are five things to be considered. First, about the very essence of virtue, what it is. Secondly, about the subject in which it exists. Third, about the division, or the distinction of virtues, as you'll see later on. Fourth, about the cause of virtue. And five, about certain, what? Properties of what? Virtue, huh? Virtue. And why does he give the subject of virtue before the division of virtues? Well, essentially, it's what it is, right? Subject in the way it results. Yeah. But why does he talk about that before he talks about the distinction and division of virtues? Well, the division is based on the object. Because it resides in a different subject, and some of the different objects, different kind of objects. Yeah, yeah. It's in the intellect. The truth is a good, maybe. Because later on, you'll distinguish between the virtues of reason and the moral virtues, right? They differ by their subject, right? The one that is in reason itself, and the other are in the will, or else in the concubisable or irascible appetites, right? That's maybe part of the reason why he does it. And then about the cause of virtue, right? Of course, reasonably classed about the properties, huh? Now, about the first four things are asked. First, whether human virtue is a, what? Habit, huh? I suppose there's some confusion about the word virtuosum. Secondly, whether it's a habit that does something, huh? An opportive habit, huh? Whether it's a good habit. Very basic, this guy, huh? Yeah. And last, but not least, the thing that he announced first, the definition of virtuosum. Interesting guy, he's telling us. All the things that are, yeah. Yeah. I think, you know, it's really my favorite book, as you know, is the Summa Contra Gentiles. But you know the scandal that there's four books to this, Summa Contra Gentiles. So, obviously, he's got to be combining, right? More than one division, right? Now, you know, the one where Aristotle gives the division to four in the beginning of the categories, he crisscrosses two divisions, right? When he divides Syilogism into four, he crisscrosses two divisions, right? But when Thomas, say, divides the four kinds of opposites, right? He doesn't do that. But he distinguishes one kind of opposite from the other three, division into two, right? And then he subdivides into three, right? And when Thomas gives this famous distinction, a four-fold distinction of order in comparison to reason, right? You can see that you divide into one in three, because the first order he talks about is the order that reason considers but does not make. And the other three are orders that reason makes, right? So how do you get the four books of the Summa Contra Gentiles, huh? You might think, you know, from past experience, does he do crisscrossing two and two? Or does he have division into one and three, right? Well, neither. He crisscrosses a division of three and a division of two. You say, well, like he does when he takes up the six kinds of government, right? Where it's all of us, right? We have rule by the one, the few, and the many. And then either good or bad, so you get tyranny and monarchy and aristocracy and oligarchy and, you know, republic and democracy and the bad majority since. So why does he end up with six books instead of four, right? He crisscrosses two and three. Well, sometimes it happens, yeah, but that's the way he does here. The two divisions he crisscrosses is the things that can be known about God by natural reason as well as by faith, right? Then the things that are known only by faith, right? That's a distinction into two, right? But in both, he divides into three. You consider God in himself. God is the beginning of things, the alpha. And then God as the end of things, right? Okay. So the first book is about God in himself, right? In so far as he's noble by natural reason as well as faith. Then God as the beginning, the maker of all things, creator of things, and to some extent what he's made, right? And then the third book, God is the end of all things, and therefore his providence towards all things. I'm going to detail the providence. Well, then the fourth book, he does the same three things. The same. The same. Yeah. And, see, first of all, he talks about the Trinity, which is God in himself, right? Then he talks about the incarnation, which is the greatest thing God made, right? And, you know, the seconds are attached to that and so on. And then finally he talks about the last things, right, which is about the end, right? The resurrection of the body and kind of general sort of thing, right? So instead of having, you know, four, five, and six, he has three parts of book, what? Four, right? So he's actually dividing into two, crisscrossing two and three, right? Except that in the part that the reason he can know as well is fate, he has three books for it, and the other one he has three parts of book four, right? Like you say, yeah, yeah. But the first three parts are in separate books, right? And the last one are three parts of the fourth book, because it's shorter, right? I'm going to assume with theology, it's, by the way, it's three parts, right? But it's complicated in another way, huh? I was looking at that little book you gave me there in prayer, right? You know? And of course, when Augustine and Thomas give something for the layman, right? Like an ingredient of Augustine on faith, hope, and charity. Or Thomas' catechetical instructions he gives there in Naples, right? He doesn't divide according to God himself and the beginning in, but he divides it into three, right? According to faith, hope, and charity, right? But then prayer, which is taken up under hope, has a, what, it's a principal part of what? Sacred doctrine, right? It's one of the three parts of the sacred doctrine, you know? And it's very proportionate to people, right? I think it's kind of marvelous to see that he did that, and Thomas followed him. And even the Companion of Theology, which is a short-term version, you know, but much longer than the catechetical instruction that was written for his friend there, I don't want something he could carry around and constantly think about these things, you know, a little bit. And so, I don't know, Thomas didn't finish it, right? But it was, again, faithful, but charity, right? And I think it's kind of marvelous that it was, like, that's when Thomas saw that, I mean, just, you know, how proportionate it is to people, right? And that's where the catechism really is, you know? Marvelous. Okay. To the first one proceeds thus, it seems that human virtue is not a habit, right? And part of this problem arises because of the, what, Aristotle has used the word virtus there, right? Virtus. Virtus. is the ultimate of the power, right? That means exactly right, as far as you can know the power, so to speak. As is said in the first book on the, what, universe, right? That book is usually called in the Latin, Decelo et Mundo, right? But in Greek I think it means it's really one word, and it's about on the universe. So the Greeks have the same word for the universe and the heavens, right? But Decelo in English, or in Latin, seems to mean just the heavens. So to get the whole universe in, you've got to say Decelo et Mundo, right? But here I guess he sees the word Decelo, right? That's a couple of people to turn their things off. Just about, you've got to go to Mass every day, you know, and just about every other Mass, you know, somebody... I'm supposed to have Bojo reach him for a prayer to make sure he just turned it off. I saw, actually somebody sent me a, I don't know how I got this, somebody sent me a video, but it was a Protestant, like a Bible study at church, you would do a Wednesday night, and some one of the ladies, they're just a small group, and somebody's phone goes off, and the pastor walks over to her, puts out his hand, she hands him the phone, he smashes it in the middle of the night, he smashes it in the middle of the night, he smashes it in the middle of the night, and they're all just mortified. Well, if you go to the movies now, you know, the screen tells you to, you know, turn your things off. Oh, really? Oh, yeah, it's a regular thing, you know. It's a real addiction. Yeah. Yeah. You've got to pay attention. But the last of anything is reduced to that genus of which it is the, what, last, right? Just as the point to the genus of, what, line, huh? Although the point's not a line. But it's the end of a line. Therefore, virtue is reduced to the genus of power, and not to the genus of, what, habit, huh? That's kind of a confusion in the word, but anyway. Moreover, Augustine says in the second book on free judgment, huh? Just reading there, Summa Kantian tells us that God is deeper, much, you know, a victory of him, he does have that. Downs gives about five reasons why he does. That virtue is the good use of, what, free judgment, huh? But the use of free judgment is an act. So it's like the use of reason, right, huh? It shakes an agitation, right, to use reason, right? Well, it's the use of reason, but the act of reason, right? Therefore, virtue is not a habit, but an act. So this is kind of confusion in the words here. Moreover, we do not merit by habits, but by, what? Otherwise, a man would merit continually, even when sleeping. But we merit by, what, the virtues, huh? Therefore, virtues are not habits, but they're, what, acts, huh? I guess God's virtues are a matter of acts, right, and not habits. You know, habitual. It's a thing, God. Moreover, Augustine, this guy's pretty important, isn't he? He's even being quoted twice as much as Aristotle, huh? Moreover, Augustine says in the book on the morals of the church, that virtue is the order of love, huh? That's really a margist. Margist. I used to quote that sometimes when I was teaching him, love and friendship, you know, huh? He said, margist, this guy would say, huh? And in the book of the 83 Questions, he says, the ordering, which is called virtue, is to enjoy the things that should be enjoyed and to use the things that should be used and not the reverse. That's what people are doing in the... Yeah, that's the habit of following human nature. Yeah. But order or ordering names the act or relation, right? Therefore, virtue is not a habit, but an act or a, what? Relation, huh? Moreover, just as there are found human virtues, so there are, what? Natural virtues. But natural virtues are not habits, but certain, what? Potencies or powers. Therefore, also neither are human, what? Virtues, habits, but natural powers, huh? But against all this nonsense is what the guy called the Philosopher, the capital P, huh? That's what kind of figure of speech, yeah. But against this is what the philosophy says in the book on the predicaments, the categories, huh? That science, reasoned out knowledge, and virtue are, what? Habits. Well, what does the master say, huh? I answer, it should be said that virtue names a certain perfection of a, what? Power or ability, right? Now, the perfection of each thing is most of all, especially, considered in order to its, what? End, huh? Maristyle takes up the word perfect as it's found in creatures, at least, huh? You know, in the fifth book of wisdom there. The first sense of perfect or complete is, you know, what has all its parts. So if the chair here is missing a leg, it's imperfect, right, huh? And then the second meaning he gives is that what has all the ability of its kind, huh? So Homer is the perfect poet, right, huh? Because his plots, his characters, and his words, right? Aristotle said he taught all the other Greeks how to make a good plot. And Hegel has this beautiful comparison of the characters of Homer, you know, with the characters in the French tragedies, because they're kind of one-dimensional, like a passion personified. Homer's characters are like a diamond and all these facets to it, you know, magnificent, fully rounded men, right? And then, you know, Hegel and Aristotle both praise the words of Homer, right? The similes and so on, right? So he's got the whole thing, right? Or Mozart is a perfect musician, right? You know, he can write everything, right? For every kind of music, right? For every kind of instrument, right? You didn't realize human voice could be so beautiful until Mozart wrote for it, right? I was reading about one of Mozart's early operas, right? And it was kind of a snickety, you know, soprano, what it was, you know? And she was going to insert some of her aries in there because it's a boy, you know, 15-year-old boy. But when she saw the music he'd written for it, she was beside herself with joy, you know? You know, it's going to be so much, you know, fun to sing these things, you know? You know, everybody's going to be, you know, you know, staring at me, you know? I was listening to the Tullia Liberata there, Mozart, Dr. Phil Pérez. He wrote, he was 15 years old. I said, my God, what a piece of music for a guy to write when he's 15 years old, right? He had some beautiful sort of stuff in there. Anyway. Then the third thing Aristotle says is the thing is perfect when it's reached its end, right? And that's the culminating sense he gives it, perfect, right? Then later on, he speaks to the sense which God is perfect, which is a different sense altogether. It's kind of interesting, you know, talking about creatures, right? I think he has all its parts, you know, you might say, or all the capacity, all the parts of his capacity is, you know, he's a complete poet, right? Or a complete musician, right? Or a complete carpenter, right? Complete cook. I'm missing a few things, yeah. But then the culminating one, huh? That's what he says, Perkippo, right, huh? That means the chief one, right, huh? He calls Plato and Aristotle the philosophie Perkippo, he Thomas does, huh? But the end of any power is its very, what? Act, huh? Okay? So the end of my reason is, yeah. Whence the power is said to be perfect according as it is determined to its own, what? Act, huh? Now there are some powers which, by themselves, huh? Are determined to their own acts as the natural act of powers, right? Including digesting your food, right? Reproducing and so on, huh? And therefore, powers of, what? Natural powers of this sort, by themselves, right? Are said to be, what? Natural powers of this sort, Fruit shoes, right, huh? Fruit shoes of plants. Yeah, yeah. But the rational powers, which are proper or private to man, right, are not determined to some one thing. But they have themselves indeterminably to many. Thomas often goes back to that. That's why we have, when people are living at random, right, they end up with something bad, usually, right? There's many ways to be bad and one way to be good. But they are determined to definite acts through habits, right? As is clear from things said before about habits. And therefore, human virtues are what? Habits, right? And objections are many about the use of the word virtue, so he'll be clearing that up when he applies to them, right? To the first, therefore, it should be said that sometimes virtue is said to be that to which there is virtue, to wit, either the object of virtue or its what? Act, right? Just as faith is said sometimes, not the virtue, but that which is believed, right? This is our faith, right? Don't we say that at the end of the setting of the creed there, right? Sometimes for the what? The very act of believing, right? Sometimes for the habit by which one believes, right? Okay? Isn't that true with other ones? We say, that's justice. What does that mean? That mean the virtue of justice? No. Yeah. What the object is, right? The rectified things, right? So this is nothing unusual to be saying. He's pointing out that, right? Whence, when it is said, like Aristotle says, that virtue is the what? Last. Last thing of the power. Yeah. Virtue is taken for the what? Object of the power, right? For that in which a power can go last, right? Is that towards which is said the what? Virtus of the thing, right? Now, you know, our word English, the word virtue, that doesn't really carry all these senses, right? So that's part of our problem in the Middle East, huh? Mm-hmm. Just as if someone is able to carry a hundred, what? Pounds. Pounds? And no more. His virtue is considered according to a hundred, what? Pounds, right? Not however, according to... Section 2. Like I was pointing out, when Shakespeare defines reason by large discourse, right? It's even more capable of a small discourse. So why does he define it by what it's less capable of? Yeah. Because that's the ultimate that it has, a large discourse, right? You can have a discourse even about God himself, right? Mm-hmm. Discourse about the universe, right? Mm-hmm. Discourse about human happiness, right? These are great things to be discoursing, right? So he defines it by its ultimate, huh? He's a smart guy, you know? He's got some brains out there. Okay. I was looking at the picture of Shakespeare today, and it appeared in the original edition of Shakespeare, I mean, the first folio back in 1623, right? And of course, then, you had that picture on one page, another page, you had the thing from Ben Johnson, right, praising Shakespeare, right? And how the artist, you know, was trying to capture him. But if he could have captured his wisdom, you know, it would have been the greatest painting ever, right? But in order to get that, he's got to go read him now, he says. You know, beautiful, you know, phrase there by Ben Johnson. Yeah. Okay, now the objection proceeds as if, essentially, virtue was the, what? Yeah, yeah. Rather than its object, right, huh? To the second objection, which is the one taken from the first text, from Augustine, right, huh? Okay. Virtus is the good use of free will or free judgment. To the second should be said that the good use of free judgment is said to be virtue according to the same reason, right? To it, that that to which virtue is ordered as to its own, what? Act. Act, right? So he took these two things, the object or the act, as both examples, or things to which virtue is ordered, right? Rather than being what virtue itself is, right? Okay. For nothing other is the act of virtue than the good use of free judgment. Now, what about meriting, right, huh? To the third it should be said that we are said to merit by something in two ways, huh? In one way, by the merit itself, in the way in which we are said to run by what? Yeah. By the running. And in this way, of course, we merit by acts, right? In another way, we are said to merit by something as by the cause or the beginning of the meriting, right? Just as we are said to run by our motive power, right, huh? Okay. So do I run by running or do I run by my muscles? Yeah. But in two different senses of the meaning, right? Is that clear enough, right, huh? Okay. Do I teach by my words or do I teach by my knowledge? Well, both, right, huh? I'll be reading a commentary on the Psalms there, you know. I think it's the 48th Psalm there where Thomas has to divide, you know, the beginning there. He says, who teaches, teaches either things or words. And he says, when we teach things, we teach faith or morals, right? When we teach scripture, we teach words, right? But you've got to understand properly, right? Obviously, you're not going to just talk about words, words, words. But if you're going to come and say on the Bible, let's say, right, up front you've got the words of Matthew and the words of Mark and the words of Luke and the words of John and so on, right? And now you've got to, what, explain those words, right? What he's saying and why he's saying it and so on, right? And so on. So you're teaching words in that sense, right? But the words of it doesn't signify something, right? But you talk about, pick up the summa, then you're talking about God or you're talking about virtue or you're talking about something, right? Now, even though the words are talking about, right? It'd be a bit of a little way Thomas has distinguishing those two and you can distinguish the difference between Thomas when he's writing his commentary in Matthew or John, say, and he's writing the two summas and so on. So you see, it's a question of the different uses of the word, right? It's explained here, right? To the fourth, it should be said, huh? That virtue is said to be the order or ordering of love just as of that to which virtue is, right? For through virtue or by virtue, love is ordered in us, right? Inviting in to the, what? Cellar, wasn't it? The wine cellar? Yeah, and you ordered what? What order? Yeah, what charity you ordered? Yeah, yeah. I mean, but the virtue charity in the race is going to order my love, right? That I express, right? If we said, huh? Now, the fifth objection is talking about natural powers that are of themselves or by themselves determined to something one, right? Okay. So I don't have to habituate my reproductive power to produce a man rather than a dog or a cat, right? Okay. But I can apply my reason, though, to thinking about God or thinking about virtue or thinking about something else and I have to be perfecting that, you know? I don't want to go do some cooking and I made some turkey marshal the other night, you know? I kind of, you know? I don't think about it. Yeah, yeah. I can plan it out. My wife taught me a few things I should be doing, you know, that I don't think of doing. I'd be perfecting my thing, right? Mm-hmm. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it. I don't think about it.