Whether and how a human being is truly said to generate a human being
Article IV. Whether and how a human being is truly said to generate a human being.
1. Philosophers and theologians who deny that the soul is translated through the seed, or drawn out of it, still disagree about what human generation is and in what action it consists. Some, pressed with the objection that the generator does not give the child the soul through which he is human and therefore does not generate a human, answer that a human generates a human by supplying the matter — the body — from which the human is made. That reply is cold and unworthy of a philosopher. It yields only that a human generates a human body, not the whole human — which is exactly what the objection proves. No philosopher has made substantial generation out to be the production or supply of matter; if producing a substance were supplying matter for it, the man who hands an artisan marble for a statue would be said to make the statue — which is absurd. To generate a human is to give a human being; and human being or nature is neither soul alone nor body alone. If it were either, separating soul from body would not destroy human nature. Human nature is the union of body and soul — truly consisting of both. If the generator only makes the body and does not make the child something consisting of soul and body, he does not truly give the child human being, and so does not truly generate a human.
2. Others, seeing the first reply fails, offer another almost as weak. They say a human truly generates a human because he not only gives a body but prepares the matter to receive the form, and by prolific virtue reaches the conjunction of soul and body that constitutes a human as a physical composite. They do not say the father joins the child's soul to the body by seminal virtue — that they leave to God who infuses the soul — but that he prepares the seed's matter for the human form, after which preparation the conjunction follows at once. On their view, generating is only a prior alteration and preparation of matter. Nearly all the older philosophers held this, nearly all the moderns, and most Roman theologians; the Coimbra commentators on De ortu 1 admit they once held it because it was common. It satisfies the objection no better than the first. Preparation of matter is a change in quality — alteration — and generation is not alteration: they are specifically different motions, one ending in quality, the other in substance. So generation is not preparation of matter. Generation is one simple change; that preparation is many alterations before the form arrives — dilating, solidifying, increasing or decreasing humor as the form requires. So it is an aggregate of changes, not generation. To generate is to give being; human being is consisting of soul and body. If God couples soul and body by infusion, God gives that being, not the generator. And a human is begotten in an instant, not gradually; so production is instantaneous, not successive.
3. A third reply says the generator gives neither matter alone nor preparation alone, but also a form — not the specific rational soul (God alone creates and unites that), but a vegetative and sensitive soul educed from the seed's potency. This is the weakest view of all. It makes a human generate not a human but a living thing and an animal. Human being is consisting of soul and body; if the child does not owe the father that he consists of a rational soul and a body, human nature has not been communicated by the father.
4. Rejecting these, we follow Du Val, Ruvio, and the Coimbra professors in a fourth account: a human truly generates a human even though God creates the soul — not by giving only a body, not by preparing the body for the soul, not by producing a vegetative or sensitive soul of the child in or from corporeal matter, but because from the generator comes the very action by which the rational soul is substantially united to the body and begins to inform, inhabit, and fill the whole matter of the body. On our view, human generation is that action by which, through prolific virtue, the soul is bound to the body by an essential bond.
Latin
ART. IV. An & quomodo homo vere generare hominem dicatur. 1. Philosophi, & Theologi, qui dicunt animam non traduci per semen, aut ex semine elici, variis modis dissentiunt de generatione hominis, & actione in qua generatio hominis consistit. Primo enim nonnulli, cum iis hoc argumentum objicitur — homo generans non tribuit filio animam, per quam est homo: Ergo homo non generat hominem — Respondent hominem dici generare hominem, quia suppeditat materiam ex qua fit homo, id est, quia tribuit filio corpus hominis: verum haec responsio admodum frigida est & indigna quae ab ullo Philosopho proferatur: primo enim ex ea sequitur, hominem tantum generare corpus hominis, non vero totum hominem; & hoc est ipsum, quod argumentum probat. Secundo, quia nemo Philosophorum dixit, generationem substantialem esse productionem aut suppeditationem materiae; si enim producere substantiam, est suppeditare materiam ad producendam substantiam; pari ratione, is qui suppeditat artifici materiam ad conficiendam statuam, dicetur conficere statuam; quod admodum absurdum est. Tertio, generare hominem, est tribuere esse homini, ut ex ipsis terminis patet: at esse hominis seu natura humana, neque consistit in anima sola, neque in corpore solo, ut omnes fatentur: si enim natura humana in altero horum consisteret, per separationem animae a corpore non destrueretur natura humana: consistit ergo natura humana, in unione corporis & animae, i.e. consistit in eo, quod homo vere constet anima & corpore: si ergo generans non efficit, ut filius sit quid constans ex anima & corpore, sed tantum efficit ipsum corpus, homo generans non vere dicetur tribuere homini genito esse hominis, atque adeo non vere dicetur generare hominem. 2. Alii, cum vident se non posse evitare vim hujus argumenti per priorem responsionem, aliam responsionem adferunt, sed pene tam invalidam ac est prior: dicunt hominem vere generare hominem, quia non solum tribuit ei materiam, i.e. corpus; sed etiam praeparat materiam ad recipiendam formam; atque adeo per virtutem prolificam, attingit conjunctionem animae & corporis, per quam conjunctionem homo constituitur in esse hominis, & fit tale compositum Physicum: hi ergo non dicunt patrem conjungere animam filii cum corpore filii, per virtutem seminalem, (hoc enim tribuunt DEO qui animam infundit;) sed praeparare materiam seminis ad recipiendam formam humanam, quam quidem praeparationem, postquam completa fuerit, immediate sequitur conjunctio animae & corporis: hinc liquet ex eorum sententia, actionem generandi nihil aliud esse quam praeviam materiae alterationem, & praeparationem ad recipiendam formam: in hac sententia fuerunt pene omnes antiquiores Philosophi; etiam omnes pene Moderni, plerique etiam Pontificii Theologi; nam Conimbricenses, in explicatione lib. 1. de ortu, testantur se ipsos olim amplexos fuisse hanc sententiam, quia fuit recepta apud omnes: verum haec sententia, ut dictum est, non magis satisfacit argumento quam prior. Primo, quia praeparatio materiae est mutatio in qualitate, atque adeo est alteratio. Generatio autem non est alteratio; sunt enim diversi specie motus, in hoc differentes, quod altera terminetur ad qualitatem, altera ad substantiam: Ergo generatio non est mutatio, vel praeparatio materiae; neque generare, est praeparare materiam. Secundo, generatio est una simplex mutatio, vel simplex motus, ut omnes fatentur: at illa praeparatio non est posita in una mutatione, sed in variis alterationibus, quae praecedunt introductionem formae: nam aliquando dilatatur, aliquando consolidatur illa materia, aliquando humor augetur, aliquando minuitur, ita scilicet postulante natura formae introducendae: Ergo illa praeparatio non est generatio, sed aggregata, seu multiplex mutatio, sive alteratio. Tertio, generare est tribuere esse; esse autem hominis consistit in eo, quod constet ex anima & corpore: si ergo DEUS copulet animam cum corpore, infundendo (ut dicunt Theologi,) DEUS tribuit esse homini, non vero generans: solus enim ille qui copulat animam cum corpore, efficit ut homo constet ex anima & corpore. Denique homo in instanti gignitur, id est, in instanti fit homo: Ergo non gradatim; ideoque ejus productio, non est mutatio aliqua successiva, sed instantanea. 3. Tertius modus respondendi est eorum, qui dicunt hominem generare hominem, neque quod ei tribuat materiam, neque quod materiam praeparet; sed quod tribuat ei etiam formam, non quidem specificam, id est, animam rationalem (hanc enim volunt tribui a solo DEO, qui eam creat, & unit cum corpore;) sed quod ex potentia seminis educat animam vegetativam, & sensitivam: verum haec sententia minime omnium placet, quia manifeste ex ea sequitur, hominem non generare hominem, sed hoc vivens, & hoc animal; praeterea (ut dicebam) esse hominis in eo consistit, quod homo constet ex anima & corpore; Si ergo filius non debeat patri, quod constet ex anima rationali & corpore, non habet naturam hominis a patre sibi communicatam. 4. Rejectis his sententiis, nos cum doctissimis Philosophis, Du Val, Sc. Ruvio, & Professoribus Academiae Conimbricensis, quartum dicendi modum amplectimur, asserentes hominem vere generare hominem, quamvis anima a DEO creatur; non quod tribuat ei corpus solummodo, neque quod praeparet corpus ad recipiendam animam; neque quod in materia, aut ex materia corporea, efficiat animam vegetativam, aut sensitivam sui filii; sed quod ab homine generante sit ipsa actio, qua anima rationalis substantialiter corpori unitur, ac incipit informare, inhabitare, & implere totam materiam corporis: adeo ut ex nostra sententia, generatio hominis sit posita in illa actione, qua, per virtutem prolificam, anima essentiali vinculo cum corpore copulatur.
About this text
Robert Baron — Philosophia theologiae ancillans from the 1658 Oxford Latin. Exercitatio Prima Art. I-XII On Being and Essence; Exercitatio Secunda Art. I-XV On the origin of the soul and the propagation of sin. Later Exercitationes / remainder of 213 pp remain.
English follows locked 1658 Oxford Latin. Prima Art. I-XII from IA PDF leaves ~15-53. Secunda Art. I-XV from PDF leaves 56-107 / printed pp.54-105 (tess+pdftotext+DjVu). No modern English copied. Exercitatio Tertia+ remain.
Catalogue & scope
Wing B887. IA bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_philosophia-theologi-an_baron-robert_1658. Exercitatio Prima Art. I-XII; Exercitatio Secunda Art. I-XV (De origine animae & propagatione peccati). Not whole Philosophia (213 pp). Exercitatio Tertia+ remain.
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