Whether Love Is the Same As Dilection?
Objection 1: It would seem that love is the same as dilection. For
Dionysius says (Div. Nom. iv) that love is to dilection, "as four is
to twice two, and as a rectilinear figure is to one composed of
straight lines." But these have the same meaning. Therefore love and
dilection denote the same thing.
Obj. 2: Further, the movements of the appetite differ by reason of
their objects. But the objects of dilection and love are the same.
Therefore these are the same.
Obj. 3: Further, if dilection and love differ, it seems that it is
chiefly in the fact that "dilection refers to good things, love to
evil things, as some have maintained," according to Augustine (De
Civ. Dei xiv, 7). But they do not differ thus; because as Augustine
says (De Civ. Dei xiv, 7) the holy Scripture uses both words in
reference to either good or bad things. Therefore love and dilection
do not differ: thus indeed Augustine concludes (De Civ. Dei xiv, 7)
that "it is not one thing to speak of love, and another to speak of
dilection."
_On the contrary,_ Dionysius says (Div. Nom. iv) that "some holy men
have held that love means something more Godlike than dilection does."
_I answer that,_ We find four words referring in a way, to the same
thing: viz. love, dilection, charity and friendship. They differ,
however, in this, that "friendship," according to the Philosopher
(Ethic. viii, 5), "is like a habit," whereas "love" and "dilection"
are expressed by way of act or passion; and "charity" can be taken
either way.
Moreover these three express act in different ways. For love has a
wider signification than the others, since every dilection or charity
is love, but not vice versa. Because dilection implies, in addition
to love, a choice (_electionem_) made beforehand, as the very word
denotes: and therefore dilection is not in the concupiscible power,
but only in the will, and only in the rational nature. Charity
denotes, in addition to love, a certain perfection of love, in so far
as that which is loved is held to be of great price, as the word
itself implies [*Referring to the Latin "carus" (dear)].
Reply Obj. 1: Dionysius is speaking of love and dilection, in so far
as they are in the intellectual appetite; for thus love is the same
as dilection.
Reply Obj. 2: The object of love is more general than the
object of dilection: because love extends to more than dilection does,
as stated above.
Reply Obj. 3: Love and dilection differ, not in respect of
good and evil, but as stated. Yet in the intellectual faculty love is
the same as dilection. And it is in this sense that Augustine speaks
of love in the passage quoted: hence a little further on he adds that
"a right will is well-directed love, and a wrong will is ill-directed
love." However, the fact that love, which is concupiscible passion,
inclines many to evil, is the reason why some assigned the difference
spoken of.
Reply Obj. 4: The reason why some held that, even when applied
to the will itself, the word "love" signifies something more Godlike
than "dilection," was because love denotes a passion, especially in so
far as it is in the sensitive appetite; whereas dilection presupposes
the judgment of reason. But it is possible for man to tend to God by
love, being as it were passively drawn by Him, more than he can
possibly be drawn thereto by his reason, which pertains to the nature
of dilection, as stated above. And consequently love is more Godlike
than dilection.
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