Causes of individuals presuppose causes of the species, which are not univocal yet not wholly equivocal either, since they are expressing themselves in their effects. We could call them analogical. In language too all universal terms presuppose the non-univocal analogical use of the term *being*.

Thomas Aquinas
About This Quote

The Causes of individuals presuppose causes of the species, which are not univocal yet not wholly equivocal either, since they are expressing themselves in their effects. We could call them analogical. In language too all universal terms presuppose the non-univocal analogical use of the term *being*. According to this quote, causes of individuals will be understood as causes of the species, which are not univocal yet not wholly equivocal either, since they are expressing themselves in their effects.

When we use a term like 'being', we're thinking about it in a way that makes everything else that we mean by that word something that's related to it. Like, if we think that there's only one kind of being - like there is only one kind of real entity - then thinking about it as an entity is going to be very useful for explaining things like why two people can have the same name and look exactly alike. But if we think about it as something that's different from all other things, then thinking about what makes it different from all other things is going to be very useful for explaining things like how two people can have the same name and look exactly alike.

People who don't think about being in quite the right way are going to have trouble figuring out whether two things are really identical or totally different. They're going to be able to tell what's really the same thing or really different - but they're not going to know just what those two things are that are really the same or really different.

Source: Summa Theologiae: A Concise Translation

Some Similar Quotes
  1. The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. - Elie Wiesel
  2. Is it possible, in the final analysis, for one human being to achieve perfect understanding of another? We can invest enormous time and energy in serious efforts to know another person, but in the end, how close can we come to that person's essence? We... - Haruki Murakami
  3. The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace. - Mahatma Gandhi
  4. He suddenly recalled from Plato's Symposium: People were hermaphrodites until God split then in two, and now all the halves wander the world over seeking one another. Love is the longing for the half of ourselves we have lost. - Milan Kundera
  5. It does not matter how long you are spending on the earth, how much money you have gathered or how much attention you have received. It is the amount of positive vibration you have radiated in life that matters, - Amit Ray
More Quotes By Thomas Aquinas
  1. The soul is like an uninhabited worldthat comes to life only when God lays His headagainst us.
  2. Better to illuminate than merely to shine to deliver to others contemplated truths than merely to contemplate.
  3. The Study of philosophy is not that we may know what men have thought, but what the truth of things is.
  4. Because philosophy arises from awe, a philosopher is bound in his way to be a lover of myths and poetic fables. Poets and philosophers are alike in being big with wonder.
  5. Causes of individuals presuppose causes of the species, which are not univocal yet not wholly equivocal either, since they are expressing themselves in their effects. We could call them analogical. In language too all universal terms presuppose the non-univocal analogical use of the term *being*.
Related Topics