a comment from Aristotle . . .
a comment from St. Thomas . . .
[1] The usage of the multitude, which according to the philosopher is to be followed in giving names to things, has commonly held that they are to be called wise who order things rightly and govern them well. Hence, among other things that men have conceived about the wise man, the Philosopher includes the notion that “it belongs to the wise man to order.” Now, the rule of government and order for all things directed to an end. For, since the end of each thing is its good, a thing is then best disposed when it is fittingly ordered to its end. And so we see among the arts that one functions as the governor and the ruler of another because it controls its end. Thus, the art of medicine rules and orders the art of the chemist because health, with which medicine is concerned, is the end of all the medications prepared by the art of the chemist. A similar situation obtains in the art of ship navigation in relation to shipbuilding, and in the military art with respect to the equestrian art and the equipments of war. The arts that rule other arts are called archtectonic, as being the ruling arts. That is why the artisans devoted to these arts, who are called master artisans, appropriate to themselves the name of wise men. But, since these artisans are concerned, in each case, with the ends of certain particular things, they do not reach to the universal end of all things. They are therefore said to be wise with respect to this or that thing; in which sense it is said that “as a wise architect, I have laid the foundation” (I Cor. 3:10). The name of the absolutely wise man, however, is reserved for him whose consideration is directed to the end of the universe, which is also the origin of the universe. That is why, according to the Philosopher, it belongs to the wise man to consider the highest causes.
[2] Now, the end of each thing is that which is intended by its first author or mover. But the first author and mover of the universe is an intellect, as will be later shown. The ultimate end of the universe must, therefore, be the good of an intellect. This good is truth. Truth must consequently be the ultimate end of the whole universe, and the consideration of the wise man aims principally at truth. So it is that, according to His own statement, divine Wisdom testifies that He has assumed flesh and come into the world in order to make the truth known: “For this was I born, and for this came I into the world, that I should give testimony to the truth” (John 18:37). The Philosopher himself establishes that first philosophy is the science of truth, not of any truth, but of that truth which is the origin of all truth, namely, which belongs to the first principle whereby all things are. The truth belonging to such a principle is, clearly, the source of all truth; for all things have the same disposition in truth as in being.
[3] It belongs to one and the same science, however, both to pursue one of two contraries and to oppose the other. Medicine, for example, seeks to effect health and to eliminate illness. Hence, just as it belongs to the wise man to meditate especially on the truth belonging to the first principle and to teach it to others, so it belongs to him to refute the opposing falsehood.
[4] Appropriately, therefore, is the two-fold office of the wise man shown from the mouth of Wisdom in our opening words: to meditate and speak forth of the divine truth, which is truth in person (Wisdom touches on this in the words my mouth shall meditate truth), and to refute the opposing error (which Wisdom touches on in the words and my lips shall hate impiety). By impiety is here meant falsehood against the divine truth. This falsehood is contrary to religion, which is likewise named piety. Hence, the falsehood contrary to it is called impiety.
. . . how not to philosophize . . . The first rule is as follows: To identify doubt with error is to identify the fear of error with error, the vaccine with the disease. The second rule flows from the first: To inoculate oneself with doubt is not to cure the disease but to contract it. Disease is an evil and not a cure; therefore, doubt as a method, instead of being an infalliable cure for scepticism, only makes it worse, as the histroy of Cartesianism has decisively proved. The third rule: When doubt is identified with error and when what is doubtful to me is considered equal to what is doubtful in itself no criterion of truth and error remains but my mind, which thus becomes THE rule of truth, and the cogito remains the only logical position from which to contruct a philosophy. Fourth rule: If my mind is the only source of truth, it is also the only source of error. Consequently, it must be put on trial to defend itself, that is, to account for the existence of error. In such a context, every philosophic method becomes an analysis of our power to attain to truth. The fifth rule deals with the results of the suit brought against the mind by method. The verdict may not be guilty, once the human soul is considered as a pure spirit, endowed with ideas and truths from the first moment of its existence: In this case, error is imputed to the body and education. The verdict may be guilty, when the soul is defined, not as a pure spirit filled with ideas, but as a Platonic Demiurgos whose creative power can draw from its spontaneity all ideas and forms, but not the matter these forms animate, which must be supplied by sensibility.
1 - Macmillan, New York: 1959
Philosophy is the science which by the natural light of reason studies the first causes or highest principles of all things- is, in other words, the science of things in their first causes, in so far as these belong to the natural order.
The difficulty of such a science is proportionate to its elevation. That is why the philosopher, just because the object of his studies is the most sublime, should personally be the humblest of students, a humility, however, which should not prevent his defending, as it is he duty to do, the sovereign dignity of wisdom as the queen of sciences.
A science, or rather a scientist, may happen to make a mistake in its domain. In such a case the science in question is no doubt competent to judge and correct itself, but it is obvious that a superior science has also the right to judge and correct it, if the mistake should contradict one of its own results and thus come under its jurisdiction. But philosophy, and especially philosophy in the highest sense, that is metaphysics, is the sovereign science. Therefore it is competent to judge every other human science, rejecting as false every scientific hypothesis that contradicts its own results.
Take for example an hypothesis of physics which appears to contradict a truth of philosophy. Physics is competent to judge that hypothesis by the laws of physics, but philosophy is also competent to judge it by the principles of philosophy, determining whether and how far it really contradicts the philosophic truth in question. (If the contradiction is real, it is evident that the hypothesis of physics in question must be false, for one truth cannot contradict another. The physicist must therefore bow to the verdict of philosophy, revise his arguments and make further experiements.) [It is true, no doubt, that we have actually to do, not with philosophy, but with philosophers, and that philosophers are fallible, and a philosopher may therefore be mistaken in judging an hypothesis of physics, but this does not prove that he has no right to judge it.]
Moreover, since the laws of one science are subordinate to laws of a superior science, it clearly follows that itis the office of the superior science to govern the inferior. But since the principles of philosophy (the first principles or metaphysics) are the absolutely first principles of all human knowledge, they possess an authority over the principles of all other human sciences, which are in a certain sense dependent upon them. That is to say, philosophy (ie. metaphysics) governs the other sciences.
Since the principles of philosophy (ie. metaphysics) are the absolutely first principle of all human knowledge, the principles or postulates of all human sciences are in a certain sense dependent upon them.
Philosophy, therefore, and particularly the first philosophy or metaphysics, because it is wisdom and the supreme science, judges, governs, and defends the other sciences. But the ruler is certainly not dependent upon those whom he governs. We therefore conclude that philosophy is independent of the inferior sciencesm, or at any rate depends on them only in the sense that a superior, when he is not strong enough to be self-sufficient, depends on the servants or instruments which he employs. It was for this reason that Aristotle regarded philosophy as the science preeminently free.
1 - Sheed & Ward, London: 1944
"In. . . the Metaphysics, he [Aristotle] is trying to show that men both in his day and in previous times pursued philosophy in order to escape ignorance, since aside from any utilitarian purpose people have a natural desire to know the causes of things. Wonder, accordingly, is the true beginning of philosophy. . . . When, as Aristotle (Meta.) points out in this connection, inquiries concerning the "why" of happenings are pushed to the ultimate causes of things, and so arrive at causes about which one cannot ask a further "why," then one is already in the domain of wisdom or philosophy.
Philosophy, meaning love of wisdom, became therefore the name given to the inquiry into the first principles and causes of things. It is the endeavor to understand all things in light of what is basic and ultimate from the standpoint of human reason."
1 - Appleton-Century-Crofts, INC.: 1959
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