Whether the Sensitive Powers of Apprehension Are the Subject of
Virtue?
Objection 1: It would seem that it is possible for virtue to be in
the interior sensitive powers of apprehension. For the sensitive
appetite can be the subject of virtue, in so far as it obeys reason.
But the interior sensitive powers of apprehension obey reason: for
the powers of imagination, of cogitation, and of memory [*Cf. I, Q.
78, A. 4] act at the command of reason. Therefore in these powers
there can be virtue.
Obj. 2: Further, as the rational appetite, which is the will, can be
hindered or helped in its act, by the sensitive appetite, so also can
the intellect or reason be hindered or helped by the powers mentioned
above. As, therefore, there can be virtue in the interior powers of
appetite, so also can there be virtue in the interior powers of
apprehension.
Obj. 3: Further, prudence is a virtue, of which Cicero (De Invent.
Rhetor. ii) says that memory is a part. Therefore also in the power
of memory there can be a virtue: and in like manner, in the other
interior sensitive powers of apprehension.
_On the contrary,_ All virtues are either intellectual or moral
(Ethic. ii, 1). Now all the moral virtues are in the appetite; while
the intellectual virtues are in the intellect or reason, as is clear
from _Ethic._ vi, 1. Therefore there is no virtue in the interior
sensitive powers of apprehension.
_I answer that,_ In the interior sensitive powers of apprehension
there are some habits. And this is made clear principally from what
the Philosopher says (De Memoria ii), that "in remembering one thing
after another, we become used to it; and use is a second nature." Now
a habit of use is nothing else than a habit acquired by use, which is
like unto nature. Wherefore Tully says of virtue in his _Rhetoric_
that "it is a habit like a second nature in accord with reason." Yet,
in man, that which he acquires by use, in his memory and other
sensitive powers of apprehension, is not a habit properly so called,
but something annexed to the habits of the intellective faculty, as
we have said above (Q. 50, A. 4, ad 3).
Nevertheless even if there be habits in such powers, they cannot be
virtues. For virtue is a perfect habit, by which it never happens
that anything but good is done: and so virtue must needs be in that
power which consummates the good act. But the knowledge of truth is
not consummated in the sensitive powers of apprehension: for such
powers prepare the way to the intellective knowledge. And therefore
in these powers there are none of the virtues, by which we know
truth: these are rather in the intellect or reason.
Reply Obj. 1: The sensitive appetite is related to the will, which is
the rational appetite, through being moved by it. And therefore the
act of the appetitive power is consummated in the sensitive appetite:
and for this reason the sensitive appetite is the subject of virtue.
Whereas the sensitive powers of apprehension are related to the
intellect rather through moving it; for the reason that the phantasms
are related to the intellective soul, as colors to sight (De Anima
iii, text. 18). And therefore the act of knowledge is terminated in
the intellect; and for this reason the cognoscitive virtues are in
the intellect itself, or the reason.
And thus is made clear the Reply to the Second Objection.
Reply Obj. 3: Memory is not a part of prudence, as species is of a
genus, as though memory were a virtue properly so called: but one of
the conditions required for prudence is a good memory; so that, in a
fashion, it is after the manner of an integral part.
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