Form and Being: Studies in Thomistic Metaphysics (Studies in Philosophy & the History of Philosophy)

284 Pages·2006·0.91 MB·English

by  Lawrence Dewan

FORM AND BEING
STUDIES IN PHILOSOPHY
AND THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY
General Editor: Jude P. Dougherty
Studies in Philosophy
and the History of Philosophy Volume 45
Form and Being
Studies in Thomistic Metaphysics
Lawrence Dewan, O.P.
THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA PRESS
Washington, D.C.
Copyright © 2006
The Catholic University of America Press
All rights reserved
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the
American National Standards for Information Science—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
∞
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dewan, Lawrence, 1932–
Form and being : studies in Thomistic metaphysics / Lawrence Dewan.
p. cm. — (Studies in philosophy and the history of philosophy ; v. 45)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-8132-1461-0 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-8132-1461-0 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Thomas, Aquinas, Saint, 1225?–1274. I. Title. II. Series.
B21.S78 vol. 45
[B765.T54]
100 s—dc22
[189'.4] 2005033359
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction ix
Abbreviations xv
1. What Is Metaphysics? 1
2. What Does It Mean to Study Being “as Being”? 13
3. St. Thomas and the Seed of Metaphysics 35
4. St. Thomas, Physics, and the Principle of Metaphysics 47
5. St. Thomas and the Principle of Causality 61
6. St. Thomas and Analogy: The Logician and the 81
Metaphysician
7. The Importance of Substance 96
8. St. Thomas, Metaphysics, and Formal Causality 131
9. St. Thomas, Metaphysical Procedure, and the 167
Formal Cause
10. St. Thomas, Form, and Incorruptibility 175
11. St. Thomas and the Distinction between Form and 188
Esse in Caused Things
12. Nature as a Metaphysical Object 205
13. The Individual as a Mode of Being according to 229
Thomas Aquinas
Bibliography 249
Index of Names 255
Index of Topics 257

Acknowledgments
The following chapters are reprinted with permission of the original
publishers.
Chapter 1, “What Is Metaphysics?” appeared in Études Maritainiennes/
Maritain Studies 9 (1993), 145–60; chapter 2, “What Does It Mean to
Study Being ‘as Being’?” in International Journal of Philosophy [Taipei]
(July 2004), 63–86; chapter 3, “St. Thomas and the Ground of Meta-
physics,” in Philosophical Knowledge, edited by John B. Brough, Daniel
O. Dahlstrom, and Henry B. Veatch, Proceedings of the American Catholic
Philosophical Association, vol. 54 (Washington, 1980), 144–54; chapter 4,
“St. Thomas, Physics, and the Principle of Metaphysics,” in The Thomist
61 (1997), 549–66; chapter 5, “St. Thomas and the Principle of Causal-
ity,” in Jacques Maritain: philosophe dans la cite [A Philosopher in the World]
(1985), 53–71, and chapter 10, “St Thomas, Form, and Incorruptibility,”
in Être et Savoir (1989), 77–90, both edited by Jean-Louis Allard and re-
printed by permission of the University of Ottawa Press.
Chapter 7, “The Importance of Substance” (1997), and chapter 12,
“Nature as a Metaphysical Object” (2001), were originally published on
the website of the Jacques Maritain Center at the University of Notre
Dame. Chapter 8, “St. Thomas, Metaphysics, and Formal Causality,” ap-
peared in Laval théologique et philosophique 36 (1980): 285–316; chapter
9, “St. Thomas, Metaphysical Procedure, and the Formal Cause,” in The
New Scholasticism 63 (1989): 173–82; chapter 11, “St. Thomas and the
Distinction between Form and Esse in Caused Things,” in Gregorianum 60
(1999): 353–70; and chapter 13, “The Individual as a Mode of Being ac-
cording to Thomas Aquinas,” in The Thomist 63 (1997): 403–24.
vii

Introduction
The present collection of papers, the earliest of which originally ap-
peared in 1980, has been selected from more than a hundred published
over the years. If there is a dominant theme in these thirteen, it is the
centrality of form in metaphysics. I hope to publish subsequently collec-
tions on the doctrine of the act of being, and on natural theology. The
general outlook in these papers is fairly uniform, and so I am placing
them in a somewhat systematic, rather than chronological, order: from
the general to the particular, and from principles to conclusion.
I begin with a paper providing a kind of caveat. It focuses on the ob-
jectivity and certainty, yet the diffi culty for the human mind, proper to
metaphysics. While every human being possesses the seed of metaphys-
ics, not all possess the soil in which it can grow. The very fi rst article of
the fi rst question of Thomas Aquinas’s Summa theologiae speaks of how
rare real metaphysical knowledge of divine things is, and how necessary
it is that we have the benefi t of revelation as regards the very conclusions
of this natural knowledge.
The second paper is a general statement of the metaphysical task, an
overall conception of the science, presented in some detail. As will be
seen, I insist not only on the need to begin with sensible, material things,
but also on the need to establish the existence of a higher mode of be-
ing, absolutely imperishable substance. The fi eld of the science is hierar-
chical, including the contingent and the necessary. It is such a fi eld that
constitutes the spiritual trampoline or launching pad, leading to the con-
sideration of something still higher, the highest cause, the fi rst principle.
The third and fourth papers have much in common. That on “the
seed of metaphysics” was an eye-opener for me. The subject, of course, is
an inevitable one for the metaphysician, bearing as it does on the knowl-
edge which one must possess at the outset, in order for metaphysics to be
possible. The teaching of Thomas Aquinas is clear, that our fi rst intellec-
tual knowledge bears upon what is expressed by the words “a being” or
“that which is” [Latin: ens], but the analysis of this situation is something
else. The paper’s title, as originally published, used the term “ground”
rather than “seed”; this was in conformity with Cornelio Fabro’s paper
ix