8. Synderesis And Conscience
The Will and Its Inclinations something, such as fornication, that is in no way ordered to this happiness. And if one continued to think of this fornication, which is in no way able to be ordered to happiness, one could seek such. And thus seeking fornication, one is not doing so as something ordered to happiness. Therefore, the will can seek something and not do so because of happiness.
8. SYNDERESIS AND CONSCIENCE
(Ordinatio II, dist. 39) Questions are raised about conscience and synderesis in the thirtyninth distinction [of Bk. II], and the first is this: Is synderesis in the will?
[Arguments Pro and Conl It is:
[I] For synderesis always protests against evil, and to protest pertains to the will, therefore, etc.
[2] Furthermore, the will necessarily wills what is advantageous, according to Anselm. Hence, it also wills justice with equal necessity, for justice is a perfection suited to the will as much as is the advantageous. But that whereby man necessarily is inclined to justice is stipulated to be synderesis. Therefore, there is something in the will that is assumed to be synderesis.
[3] Also, the natural will necessarily wills that towards which it tends, according to On the Trinity, Bk. XIII, ch. 5, where Augustine says it is certain that all will happiness because of their natural inclination towards it. This would not be certain, however, unless the will necessarily willed it. Therefore what is willed naturally is willed necessarily. But justice is something naturally willed by the will, because it is as natural a perfection for the will as is the advantageous. Therefore, it is necessarily willed, and hence must be presumed to be in the will, for one assumes there is some principle there necessarily inclining the will towards justice. But such is synderesis, therefore, etc.
[4] Likewise, a lesser nature, such as the irrational, has a principle necessarily inclining it to what is suited to its nature according to reason. Hence, the will too will have a principle necessarily inclining it towards the justice it is suited by nature to have.
But the Master in the text [of this distinction] holds otherwise, cit~ ing Jerome's on Ezechiel to the effect that synderesis represents the higher portion of reason, and hence synderesis is in the intellect which is concerned with contemplation or the theoretical.
Synderesis and Conscience Secondly, I ask: Is conscience in the will?
[5] Paul, in his Epistle to the Hebrews, speaks of his "good conscience," but goodness pertains to the will, therefore conscience does likewise.
[6] If it were in the intellect, the more one knew, the more conscientious such a person would be; but the consequent is false, hence the antecedent is also false.
For the opposite view there is that text [Ecclesiastes 7:22], "In your heart you know you have spoken ill of someone." Also this is clear from the acts of conscience, which are to testify, accuse, and judge, all of which pertain to reason and intellect; therefore, etc.
[Body of the Question] [The view of Henry of Ghent] Here it is claimed that the law of nature contains the natural principles for acting. Look it up in Henry's first Quodlibet. You will find it in q. 18.
[Refutation of Henry] Against this it is argued first in regard to synderesis that if this has an elicited act that necessarily tends towards good and resists evil, then there is nothing of this sort in the will.
Hence, synderesis is not in the will. Proof of the assumption: In the first distinction of Bk. I it was shown that the will does not necessarily love and enjoy the end shown to it, neither is there any potency, power, or habit in the will that can be a principle of necessarily enjoying the end; therefore neither is there any necessary principle that requires it to will in accord with the practical principles derived from the nature of its end.
Furthermore, if there were some such potency, power, or part of the will, whereby it would tend to good and resist evil through an elicited act, then this would be the highest thing in the whole of the will, because it would have to do with its ultimate end, from which the first practical [moral] principles are derived. Hence, any lesser power or portion [of the soul] would be in the power of the will to such an extent that if it willed such, the lesser power or part would obey it and be moved accordingly. Therefore, it would prevent any sin in the will, because as this higher portion moved, so would the whole of the will move. For the whole would be moved in the way this higher portion moved it, and if the whole of the will were right, then there would be no sin.
Against his other position on conscience these arguments are brought to bear. First of all, conscience is not an appetitive habit generated by a single [appetitive] act, but is produced deductively by way of a practical syllogism; conscience represents an evident conclusion inferred from first practical principles and hence is not an acquired appetitive
The Will and Its Inclinations habit at all. It is also clear that it is not something innate, nor a part or power [of the soul].
Also, what is suited by nature to be produced by some [proper] cause cannot be caused by any other cause unless this virtually contains the perfection of [its proper] cause. Now, a habit of the will is suited by nature to be caused by an act of the will as its proper cause, and hence it cannot be caused by any other act unless this act contains virtually the act of the will. But an act of the intellect does not virtually contain the act of the will, because according to [Henry] the act of the will is more perfect than that of the intellect. Hence, no act of the intellect could cause such a bias in the will as would weigh upon it like a quasi-habit.
Also, either the will could refuse to receive such a weight, and then the intellect would be insufficient to cause it (for a sufficient cause is effective, above all when a suitable recipient is appropriately present), or it could not refuse to accept it. In such a case, then, given some actual consideration in the mind, the will could not throw off its weight, because reason must be no less effective in conserving than in causing this bias necessarily.
Also, either the will must needs act in accord with this weight put upon it, or not. If it has to act according to it, then it is not free, because the agent producing this weight is a natural cause, and hence its effect will be a natural form. Consequently, something acting necessarily in accord with this bias or inclination will not act freely, because it will no longer be in its power to act in this way or otherwise.
But if it does not have to act accordingly-and it seems manifest it does not from that gloss upon the Apostle's letter to the Romans,
"Whatever is against conscience," etc., which clearly indicates that sin is something committed contrary to one's conscience-then it follows that given a perfect conscience, the will can still will the opposite of what it dictates, and thus [according to Henry's view] one could never corrupt this habit by an act of the will, which seems absurd, assuming it is a habit of the will.
[Scotus' own opinion] I reply to these questions: If synderesis is assumed to be something having an elicited act that necessarily and at all times inclines one to act justly and resist sin, then since nothing of this sort is in the will, we cannot assume it to be there. Consequently, it is in the intellect, and it cannot be assumed to be anything other than that habitual knowledge of principles which is always right. For the intellect, in virtue of its own natural light, assents to these principles immediately on the strength of their terms. And then, insofar as it depends in part upon the intellect, the free will is apt by nature to choose in accord with these principles, though such a choice may fail
Synderesis and Conscience r65 to follow insofar as the other, the principal cause, freely chooses otherwise, because there is no necessitating cause involved here.
According to this line of reasoning, we can also assume that conscience is the habit of making proper practical conclusions, according to which a right choice of what is to be done is apt by nature to follow, and hence it can be called a stimulus to good, insofar as free choice, as a whole, has one partial cause [practical knowledge] disposing it correctly and a volition that is right and good will follow unless there is a defect in the other partial concurring cause needed for willing.
[Reply to the Initial Arguments] [To I] To the first argument I say that synderesis protests effectively because it shows what good ought to be willed, and in this it is an occasion for protesting against evil.
[To 2] To the other, I admit that the will, as a power to act freely, by its elicited act does not will necessarily what is advantageous any more than it necessarily wills what is just. But if this same power be considered insofar as it roots an inclination for the advantageous, and not insofar as it possesses an affection for justice (that is to say, if it were viewed as an appetite that is not free), then it would not have it in its power, as it does at present, to refrain from willing the advantageous, for then it would be only a natural intellective appetite just as the brute's is a natural sense appetite. I say, then, that Anselm's statement that one cannot not will the advantageous must be understood not of the volitional power as a whole, which at present can freely not will not only what is advantageous but also what is just; for it can freely not will this or that. Rather one must understand him to mean the volitional power insofar as it is the seat for the advantageous, i.e., as excluding liberty, and no act is elicited in us in this fashion. Hence, I have said in my solution to the question that synderesis is something having an elicited act.
[To 3] The same can be said in answer to the third objection. The natural will as tending necessarily to the object willed has no elicited act in its regard. It is only a certain inclination in such a nature towards the perfection most appropriate to it. This inclination necessarily exists in nature, even though an act in conformity with such an inclination and nature may not necessarily be elicited. For no act is elicited except by the free will, whether it be conformed or natural or whether it be difformed or against nature. And no matter how much it wills the opposite of that to which it is inclined, that inclination necessarily remains as long as the nature remains.
[To 4] To the last I say that this nature alone is free, having as it does a mode of action superior to any other created nature.
The Will and Its Inclinations [To 5] As for the arguments for the second question, I say that the habits of the practical intellect are called good or bad because of suitability for the will, just as conversely the will can be said to be upright or bent down because of its suitability to a theoretical act, formally residing in the intellect, that is either right or not. Goodness, however, pertains to the will just as rectitude does to the intellect. But in a transferred sense "goodness" is more fittingly applied to the practical intellect than to the theoretical intellect.
[To 6] To the other, one can respond with that observation of the Philosopher, namely, in ch. 3 of Bk. VII of the Ethics, that even men under the influence of passion can recite verses from Empedocles, but such knowledge proves nothing. And thus one could concede that a person is conscientious insofar as he has practical knowledge in an unqualified sense, and is not just uttering words of that sort. And this it seems could be admitted particularly by that person whose opinion we have rejected, because according to him at the same moment of time that the will is bad, reason is blinded. And thus, even if conscience pertained to the will, one would have no less evidence of such; and hence, we have a common argument that applies to him as well as to the other side, and it can be solved in the aforesaid fashion.