VI. Replies to the preliminary arguments of the first question
THEOLOGY, PRAXIS, AND PRACTICAL SCIENCE
344 At any rate, I hold that theology of contingents is not per se practical, that is, it is not practical in virtue of its object; nonetheless, it can be per accidens practical for a created intellect, that is, for an understanding agent such that the correctness of the agent's praxis is determined by the divine will. As for whether it is practical for the divine intellect, it is clear what the implications are if one accepts or rejects the two assumptions discussed above. But these three claims seem to be the most defensible: first, practical cognition regulates praxis in contingent matters; second, it regulates a power engaged in praxis that can be made correct by something other than itself; and third, in God there is no power engaged in praxis other than the will. From the first and third it follows that if the divine knowledge were practical, it would be such as to rectify or regulate the divine volition or make it correct; but this is false according to the second of these, since the divine will of itself first rightly elicits willing with respect to its first object, whereas with respect to secondary objects, which it wills contingently, it is determined by itself alone, not by any knowledge of correctness that precedes it.
VI. Replies to the preliminary arguments of the first question 345 As for the preliminary arguments of the first question, to the first argument [n. 217]
I say that faith is not a speculative habit, and believing is not a speculative act, nor is the vision that follows believing speculative, but practical. For that vision is apt to be in conformity with enjoyment and to be possessed by a created intellect naturally prior to correct enjoyment's being elicited in conformity with it.
346 To the second [n. 218], it should be said that the contingent thing that practical science concerns is an end or a being for the end; but in the domain of action, action itself is an ultimate end, according to the Philosopher in Ethics VI [1139b3–4]. Therefore, the action's being contingent is sufficient for it to be an object of practical science.
347 Against this it is argued, first, that science concerns necessary things; therefore, there is no science concerning contingents. The antecedent is clear from the definition of science in Posterior Analytics I [71b15–16] [cf. n. 212].
348 Similarly, in Ethics VI [1139a3–15] the scientific part is distinguished from the calculative part on the basis of the necessary and the contingent [cf. n. 226].
Therefore, all the habits of the scientific part concern what is necessary; now science is a habit of that part; therefore, etc.
349 Furthermore, if theology is about something contingent that is within the scope of action, then it is an active habit with correct reason. But as we read in Ethics
VI [1140b20–1], this is the definition of prudence. Therefore, theology is prudence, not science.
ORDINATIO PROLOGUE, PART , QQ. AND (OMITTING NN. –)
I reply to the first [nn. 347–8]: there are many necessary truths about contingents, because one can conclude of a contingently elicited act that it necessarily ought to be such-and-such in order to be correct; so there is science of such an act with respect to a conclusion drawn necessarily, even though the act in itself is contingent as elicited from the relevant power.
And then it is clear how one should respond to the authority of the Philosopher in Posterior Analytics I: there is science of what is said necessarily about something contingent, and thus necessary truths are included in the understanding of a contingent or are conclusions about a contingent drawn on the basis of some prior necessary truth.
We can use the same sort of reasoning to reply to the authority of the Philosopher in Ethics VI: a habit of the calculative part concerns an act insofar as it is elicited contingently; but a scientific habit, or science, concerns the same thing insofar as some conclusion is drawn about it with necessity. As for the objection that a habit of the scientific part cannot have the same object as a habit of the calculative part, I will discuss below [n. 351] how more than one habit can have the same object, although the same habit cannot have more than one object.
To the second [n. 349], I say that this argument would show that moral science is prudence, for moral science is an active habit with true reason. So I say that the definition of prudence should be understood to apply to a proximate active habit, the sort of habit that is acquired from acts. Hence, moral science is related to the habit of prudence in the domain of acts in the same way that art is related to the habit of an expert in the domain of production, since the habits of art and moral science are quasi-remote from giving direction, because they are universal, whereas the habit of prudence and the habit of the expert, because they are generated from acts, are particular and are proximate to giving direction. This exposition is necessary— otherwise there would be no practical science, since every practical science is a habit concerned with either action or production, and that conclusion is untenable and is evidently contrary to the Philosopher in Metaphysics VI [1025b25], contrary to Avicenna in Metaphysics I [c. 1], and contrary to other authors.
To the third argument [n. 219], I say that by 'theology' Boethius means metaphysics.
As for the fact that he says something about the substance of God, I say that God is considered in that science to the extent that it is possible for him to be considered in the acquired sciences.
To the other argument [n. 220], I say that according to the Philosopher in Politics VII [1333a21–22], it is a mark of nobility in what is lower that it touches on something higher. That's why the sensory power in human beings is nobler than the sensory power in non-rational animals, because in human beings the sensory power is ordered to the intellective power. Therefore, it is a mark of nobility in a science that it is ordered to the act of a nobler power. But the Philosopher does not posit any
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science in conformity with the will's praxis concerning the end, because he did not hold that the will has any praxis concerning the end, but instead that it has a certain simple natural motion, and so he didn't hold that there could be any science that was nobler in virtue of its conformity to the end. If, however, he had held that there is some praxis concerning the end, he evidently would not have denied that practical science with respect to that praxis is nobler than speculative science with respect to the same thing: for example, if there were some speculative science concerning the same things that moral science concerns, he would not say that that speculative science is nobler than moral science. We, by contrast, say that there is genuine praxis concerning the end, and that there is cognition that is apt to be in conformity with such praxis, and consequently we say that practical cognition concerning the end is nobler than any speculative cognition. Therefore, the first proposition of the argument—which can evidently be derived from Metaphysics I, though the Philosopher does not explicitly affirm it—should be denied.
354 To the first proof of that proposition, I say that a science that is for its own sake is nobler than a science that is for the sake of an act lower than itself, and every practical science that he recognizes is for the sake of something lower than speculative consideration, at least because any such science concerns an object that is lower than what he says is the object of speculative science; and so any practical science that he recognizes is less noble than any speculative science. But a science that is for the sake of the act of another power, an act nobler than its own act, is not less noble on account of that ordering; for if it were, our sensory power would be less noble than the sensory power of a non-rational animal.
To the second proof of the proposition I have denied, the proof that speaks about certainty [n. 220], I say that every scientific cognition with respect to its object is equally certain in terms of proportion, since every scientific cognition resolves into its immediate principles, but not equally certain in terms of quantity, because some things are more certain cognizables than others. Thus, all the things concerning which the Philosopher posits practical sciences are less certain and less perfect cognizables in themselves than the things concerning which he posits any speculative science; so by his lights any speculative science is more certain, in terms of quantity, than any practical science. We, however, posit something cognizable that is within the domain of action—that is, attainable through an action that is genuinely praxis— that is in itself maximally cognizable, and so science concerning it is not exceeded by any other science either in terms of quantity or in terms of proportion.
355 To the other argument, about the needs of life having been provided for [n. 221], I say that this science was not discovered for the sake of extrinsic needs but for the sake of intrinsic needs—for the sake of order and the moderation of passions and actions— so that if moral science were discovered when all extrinsic needs had been met, it would be no less practical. And it was not discovered for the sake of avoiding ignorance, since many more knowable things could be transmitted in so great a