IV. Reply to the second question
THEOLOGY, PRAXIS, AND PRACTICAL SCIENCE
object too is a circumstance; and on this basis there is a straightforward argument against the antecedent. For that from which the very first circumstance of an act considered just by itself is taken is evidently prior to anything else; and thus the object, by which the act is first specified so that it is called a generically good act, is evidently the very first thing of all in practical cognition. There is no need at the moment to pursue the question of whether this line of argument is conclusive or not, because that discussion belongs in Book III.29
So on the present topic I say, briefly, that practical [cognition] does not first have the extension that characterizes it from the end qua end, for the reasons given above
[n. 262].
IV. Reply to the second question 265 From this the answer to the second question [n. 223] is evident. I answer no. Rather, a practical science has the first relation, conformity [n. 236], per se from its object, which is either the correctness of praxis or something that virtually includes that correctness, and it is because the cognition is of that sort of object that praxis must be conformed to that cognition if the praxis is to be correct.
266 But as for the other relation, priority [n. 236], it is unclear in virtue of what that relation characterizes cognition. I say that necessarily some intellection naturally precedes praxis, as is evident from what was said on the first topic [nn. 229–33]; and accordingly praxis is posterior and cognition prior by reason of the corresponding powers, intellect and will, as naturally ordered in acting. But that prior intellection is not always practical; it is practical only when it determines the correctness, or is of the determinate correctness, of praxis itself, whether virtually or formally. When, however, that previous apprehension involves no virtual or formal determination of the correctness of praxis, then even though there is priority, conformity is absent in that case, because that is not an apprehension to which praxis must be conformed if it is to be correct, since that apprehension does not present anything determinate about the correctness of praxis.
So it can be said that although cognition is prior absolutely, in virtue of the nature of the intellect and will, cognition's being such as to require conformity is prior in virtue of both the object and the ordering of the powers, taken together.30 For even if the object determines the intellect to cognition of correctness naturally prior to the will's willing, and the will is in some way regulable by something outside itself, it is not merely apprehension that precedes practice, but apprehension that requires conformity. Now this happens whenever the determinate correctness of praxis is a 29 Ordinatio III d. 26 q. un. nn. 89–95, d. 38 nn. 16–19. See also II d. 7 q. un. nn. 27–39, 73–93, d. 40 q. un. n. 9. Cf. below, n. 362.
30 Reading hoc est simul ex obiecto et ordine potentiarum. The edition adds et potentiae practicantis, which is omitted by a number of MSS.
ORDINATIO PROLOGUE, PART , QQ. AND (OMITTING NN. –)
necessary object of cognition, either as a principle through intellect or as a conclusion through science.
What has been said so far about the source from which the twofold relation of conformity and priority characterizes practical knowledge should be understood generally; otherwise one would have to add something to exclude the case of the divine intellect, namely, that the power engaging in praxis, to whose praxis the cognition that requires conformity is prior, is in some way determinable from the outside, or in other words is conformable to something else as its rule in acting.
Whether this is required for knowledge or not will be discussed in the reply to the fourth objection that is raised against my answer to the principal question
[nn. 324–31].31
But when determinate correctness characterizes praxis contingently, then there is no object that determines the intellect to cognizing its correctness determinately before a will wills it—and here I'm speaking of intellect and will in general, for that contingent object is not determined to one alternative or the other before every act of will. If instead we compare this intellect and that will in particular, a determinate cognition of correctness that precedes cognition requiring conformity can in turn precede praxis; a determinate cognition of correctness that does not precede cognition requiring conformity cannot precede praxis. Such cognition can precede praxis in all and only those intellects whose wills are not the primary determinant of the correctness of that praxis.
An example to illustrate these claims:
The correctness of the praxis loving God is necessary, and it is included virtually in the notion of God. And it is not merely apprehension, but apprehension requiring conformity—that is, apprehension to which praxis must be conformed in order to be correct—that is apt to precede this praxis in every intellect. So in this case the knowledge that is prior to praxis and to which praxis must conform is had from (a) the object that is of itself what first determines the intellect to knowledge of the determinate correctness of that praxis and (b) the ordering of the intellect and will in acting. And so it is for every other praxis that necessarily has determinate correctness.
By contrast, the correctness of the praxis worshiping God in the sacrifice of the altar is contingent: sometimes it is a correct act, as now, and sometimes it is not, as in the Old Testament. And so there is no object that determines the intellect to knowledge of this correctness before any act of will, and so such knowledge as requiring conformity does not precede every act of will. It does precede an act of some will— only of a will that is not the primary determinant of the correctness of this praxis.
31 This paragraph is marked in the edition as "an addition of Scotus himself."