Whether the Most Important Circumstances Are "Why" and "In What the
Act Consists"?
Objection 1: It would seem that these are not the most important
circumstances, namely, "why" and those "in which the act is, [*_hen ois
e praxis_]" as stated in _Ethic._ iii, 1. For those in which the act is
seem to be place and time: and these do not seem to be the most
important of the circumstances, since, of them all, they are the most
extrinsic to the act. Therefore those things in which the act is are
not the most important circumstances.
Obj. 2: Further, the end of a thing is extrinsic to it. Therefore it
is not the most important circumstance.
Obj. 3: Further, that which holds the foremost place in regard to
each thing, is its cause and its form. But the cause of an act is the
person that does it; while the form of an act is the manner in which
it is done. Therefore these two circumstances seem to be of the
greatest importance.
_On the contrary,_ Gregory of Nyssa [*Nemesius, De Nat. Hom. xxxi.]
says that "the most important circumstances" are "why it is done" and
"what is done."
_I answer that,_ As stated above (Q. 1, A. 1), acts are properly
called human, inasmuch as they are voluntary. Now, the motive and
object of the will is the end. Therefore that circumstance is the
most important of all which touches the act on the part of the end,
viz. the circumstance "why": and the second in importance, is that
which touches the very substance of the act, viz. the circumstance
"what he did." As to the other circumstances, they are more or less
important, according as they more or less approach to these.
Reply Obj. 1: By those things "in which the act is" the Philosopher
does not mean time and place, but those circumstances that are
affixed to the act itself. Wherefore Gregory of Nyssa [*Nemesius, De
Nat. Hom. xxxi], as though he were explaining the dictum of the
Philosopher, instead of the latter's term--"in which the act
is"--said, "what is done."
Reply Obj. 2: Although the end is not part of the substance of the
act, yet it is the most important cause of the act, inasmuch as it
moves the agent to act. Wherefore the moral act is specified chiefly
by the end.
Reply Obj. 3: The person that does the act is the cause of
that act, inasmuch as he is moved thereto by the end; and it is
chiefly in this respect that he is directed to the act; while other
conditions of the person have not such an important relation to the
act. As to the mode, it is not the substantial form of the act, for in
an act the substantial form depends on the object and term or end; but
it is, as it were, a certain accidental quality of the act.
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