Question Forty-One
[QUESTION FORTY-ONE
Whether From a Privation a Regression to a Habit Can Happen] Further, in contraries it is also <possible for a change to happen into the other>.1
ristotle posits the following difference between con-
traries and privative opposites. There is a mutual
change between contraries, <there is> not <a mutual change> between privative opposites. Since "a change can happen from a habit to a privation"; but not the other way around.2
About this, it can be asked whether a regression can happen from a privation to a habit.
1. It seems that it can:
Since, according to Aristotle in Bk. I of the Physics,3 privation and form are two principles of change, so that privation is the term from which and form is the term toward which; but a change is from the term from which to the term toward which; therefore, etc.
2. Second, this is evident in an example: for darkness is privatively opposed to light, otherwise, illumination would be in an intermediate with motion and succession, which is disproved in Bk. II of On the Soul.4 The implication is evident, since one contrary is not cast off and the remaining one acquired without motion; but a regression is possible from darkness to light, as is manifest; therefore, etc.
1. Categories, Ch. 10 (13a 19–20).
2. Categories, Ch. 10 (13a 31–32).
3. Physics, Bk. I, Ch. 7 (191a 8–17).
4. On the Soul, Bk. II, Ch. 7 (418b 23–26).
QUESTION 41
3. According to Aristotle in Bk. X of the Metaphysics;5 of all contraries, one of the two includes the privative opposite of the other; and, this notwithstanding, there is a change among contraries; therefore, there is also <a change> among privative opposites.
4. To the opposite is Aristotle.6
[I. The First Way] [A. The Response of Scotus] 5. To that <question>, it can be said, when speaking generally about privative opposites, that it is not universally impossible for there to be a regress from privation to a habit. Since, in speaking in this way, "privation" is said to be "a lack of a form in a subject when <the subject is> of such a nature that it is apt to have it";7 and from such a privation it is possible for there to be a regress to a form. Therefore, that saying of Aristotle is true about some particular privation. For this reason, the first differentia8 that Aristotle posits between contraries and privative opposites is general. The second <differentia>9 is particular.
6. Therefore, to save the saying of Aristotle, "privation" is distinguished in three ways. In one way, thus: a certain <privation> is a lack of a form to which the subject is not ordered except by a mediating habit; another <privation is that> to which it is not ordered by a mediating habit. In a <second> way, thus: a certain privation is deprived of a habit according to act and according to potency; another <privation> is deprived <of a habit> only
<according> to act. In a third way, thus: there is a certain privation of which the habit is in <its subject> by an innate principle, of which kind is blindness, since sight is from an intrinsic principle; there is another privation of which the habit is in <its subject> by an extrinsic principle, as darkness is in a medium.
7. Concerning privation in any of these <three> ways, Aristo5. Metaphysics, Bk. X, Ch. 4 (1055b 18–19).
6. Categories, Ch. 10 (13a 33–34).
7. Metaphysics, Bk. IV, Ch. 2 (1004a 14–16).
8. Categories, Ch. 10 (12b 26–13a 17).
9. Categories, Ch. 10 (13a 19–36).
JOHN DUNS SCOTUS
tle understands the saying in the first way, <i.e., about the first member>, not in the second way, <i.e., not about the second member>.
Nevertheless, the first distinction seems less competent, since no subject seems to be ordered to a privation by a mediating habit. Or, if the subject is understood to be ordered to a privation by a mediating habit, <it is> so <understood> that the subject is not of such a nature as to receive a privation unless it previously receives the habit, then this is manifestly false, since someone <who has> not previously seen <anything> can be blind. Or if it is understood in this way: unless it was previously of such a nature as to receive a habit; then in this way there is no distinction, since every subject is so ordered to a privation by a mediating habit.
The reason why Aristotle understands <the saying> about the first member and not the second member, however, is manifest from the words of the distinction.
8. Why he can understand <the saying> about the first member of the third division, and not about the second <member>, is for the reason that when the habit that is <caused> by an intrinsic principle is not in <the subject>, then there is not a sufficient principle of that habit in the subject. And since the nature of <anything> changeable always tends to non-being, it is not possible for that principle to be regained in the subject, and so neither is it possible for that habit to be brought forward
<again>. Therefore, if there is ever a privation of such a habit in <the subject>, it is impossible for that habit to exist subsequently in that <subject>. But when the habit is there from an extrinsic principle, as light <that is> from a luminous body is in a medium, then even though there is a privation in it at some time, it is nevertheless possible for the habit to be regained by that extrinsic <principle>.
[B. To the Arguments of Each Part] 9. To the arguments, it is evident that the first arguments10 proceed about privation in the first way, and the arguments to the opposite11 <proceed> about privation in the other way.
10. Cf. supra, nn. 1–3.
11. Cf. supra, n. 4.
QUESTION 41
Since, as it was said,12 that differentia is not a general <differentia> between privative opposites and contraries. For there are many opposites, where one is only a lack of the other one in <a subject that is> apt by nature <to have it>, which cannot be posited otherwise except privatively; and nevertheless they do not have this property. Take for example light and darkness, which if they were contraries, one of the two could not be expelled and the other be brought forward again without motion, and so an intermediate could not be illuminated in an instant, of which the opposite is held in Bk. II of On the Soul;13 <consider also> justice and injustice, <or> knowledge and ignorance: for it is possible for an unjust <person> to do some works of justice, since injustice does not necessitate the doing <of something> unjustly; although it inclines <that way>; and through frequently acting justly, one can acquire the habit of justice; therefore, from injustice one can be changed to justice.
[II. The Second Way] [A. The Response of Scotus] 10. Otherwise, it can be said to the question that between mutual contraries there is motion properly speaking, since each
<one> is some positive nature; nor can it be expelled except in time. But there is never a motion from a privation to a habit by reason of a privation, since the matter subject to privation has only the lack of a form. And with this it remains that it is disposed in the highest degree to receive the form, and so it is not necessary for that <matter> to be moved to that <habit>; but once the agent is present, it immediately receives that <form> without motion. According to this, it must be said that this differentia is universal between contraries and privative opposites.
[B. To the Principal Arguments] 11. To the first argument,14 it can be said that from privation, which is a principle, there is not motion, properly speaking, to a form, except when a privation is joined to a contrary.
12. Cf. supra, n. 5.
13. Cf. supra, n. 2.
14. Cf. supra, n. 1.
JOHN DUNS SCOTUS
12. To the second <argument>,15 it is evident from those examples how there is not motion from a privation to a habit.
13. To the third <argument>:16 it does not follow that there is not motion between contraries, since there is not <motion> between privative opposites, since a more ignoble extreme of a contrariety is not only a privation of the remaining, but with this there is some positive form, and for this reason, it cannot be expelled without motion.
15. Cf. supra, n. 2.
16. Cf. supra, n. 3.