On the acts elicited by the will

[ The action elicited by some power is called that of which the power itself is at once the immediate principle and subject. Thus vision is from the sense of sight and is in the sight; to imagine is the action of the imagination and existing in imagination, etc. Vision is said to be an action elicited by sight, and imagining an action elicited by the imagination or phantasy.

To will is generically an act elicited by the will. However, according to the various mode in which it is borne toward objects, it acquires various names, not vain, but most useful to know. There are therefore five acts especially elicited by the will, namely intention, election, consent, use, and fruition: of which the first and last are about the end, the rest about those things which are toward the end, or means.

1° Intention¹ etymologically taken signifies to tend into another. But both that which moves and that which is moved tend toward something which is an end. Yet the motion of that which is moved toward the end proceeds from the motion of that which moves it. Therefore to tend toward the end, or intention of the end, is first and principally the action of one moving another toward the end. Yet the will moves all the other powers of the soul toward the end as to exercise. Therefore intention is an action of the will, namely that action whereby the will looks to the end as a term to be attained. ¹ 1-2a, q. 12, a. 1-5.

Since however the end is twofold, relative or intermediate, which is referred and conduces to another, and ultimate, in which one stops, intention must be considered in two ways, as the Angelic Doctor teaches and explains² : « The motion of the will toward the end and toward what is toward the end can be considered in two ways. In one way, according as the will is borne toward each absolutely and in itself; and thus they are simply two motions of the will toward each. In another way it can be considered according as the will is borne toward what is toward the end on account of the end; and thus one and the same in subject is the motion of the will tending to the end and toward what is toward the end. For when I say: 'I will medicine on account of health,' I designate but one motion of the will, whose reason is that the end is the reason of willing the things which are toward the end... And it is similar with the intellect; because if it consider principle and conclusion absolutely, there is diverse consideration of each; but in this, that it assents to the conclusion on account of the principles, there is but one act of the intellect. » ² Ibid., a. 4, o.

2° The second act of the will is election¹ , which is the essential endowment of liberty. Election however is « the preacception of one with respect to another, » and consequently supposes many things that can be chosen, at least willing and not willing. Whence in things determined to one, such as brutes, election has no place; for although brute animals take one thing before another, yet they do not determine themselves to it from themselves, as happens in election, but are determined by nature. ¹ Ibid., q. 13, a. 1-6.

I said that election is an act of the will. For although the election of the will be only in a good foreknown by reason, and therefore reason be said to concur formally to election, nevertheless the substance of the act, or the act materially taken, belongs to the will, not the intellect: for election is perfected in a certain motion of the soul toward the good chosen; but good is the object of the will. « It is manifest, says St. Thomas² , that reason in a manner precedes the will and orders its act, namely insofar as the will tends toward its object according to the order of reason, because the apprehensive power represents its object to the appetitive. Thus therefore that act whereby the will tends toward something proposed as good, from this that it is ordered through reason to an end, is materially of the will, formally indeed of reason. » ² Ibid., q. 15, a. 1, o.

Election however does not fall upon the end as end, but is concerned about means; for about the end is intention, not election. I said, « about the end as end; » for if the end itself be assumed as medium, as happens in intermediate and subordinate ends, nothing prohibits the end, because it becomes a medium, from being the object of election.

Hence it is understood that several other acts precede election, partly on the side of the intellect, such as counsel, which is the intellectual inquiry concerning the means to be chosen; the discretive judgment concerning the apter means for attaining the end, etc.; partly on the side of the will, such as intention of the end, consent, and others.

3° To consent, if you regard the etymon, is at once to sense, and imports the application of sense to something. Consensus is defined generically as « an act of the appetitive virtue adhering to some thing, » quasi namely taking a certain experience of appetite from the thing to which it adheres, insofar as it pleases itself in it. With respect however to the will, to which in man it pertains to consent or not consent, it is « the adherence of the will to those things which are judged by the intellect useful for attaining the end. »

Hence it is manifest that consensus is not of the end but of the means toward the end. But consensus differs from election in this, that election adds above consensus a certain relation with respect to that toward which something is pre-elected; and therefore after consensus election still remains. For it can happen that through counsel many things are found leading to the end, and while each pleases, one consents to each; but from the many that please we pre-elect one, by electing.

This consensus, as appears of itself, supposes dominion over one's own act. It belongs therefore not to brutes ¹ , which have not the appetitive motion in their own power, because such motion in them is from the instinct of nature; for they are rather acted upon than acting themselves toward the end. Consequently even in man himself the motion of the sensitive appetite, regarded in itself, is not properly consensus, because it lacks liberty. So long therefore as the will does not in any way consent to those sensitive motions, although sometimes they be so vehement that they seem voluntary, they are neither acts of vice nor of virtue, because they are not human acts, as Augustine observed, saying lib. XII de Trinit., c. 12, n. 17 : « The sensual motion of the soul which is common to us and to beasts is shut off from the wisdom of reason. » ¹ Ibid., q. 15, a. 1, o.

^{2 2} Ibid., a. 2, o.

4° The election of the will is followed by use, which, as Augustine says in lib. X de Trinit., c. 11, n. 17, « is the assumption of some thing into the faculty of the will; » whence the same Doctor says, ibid., that « use is in the will. » For as to consent is to apply appetite to something to be desired, so to use is to apply some principle of action to action. « Use of some thing, says the Angelic Doctor¹ , imports the application of that thing to some operation: whence also the operation to which we apply some thing is called its use, just as riding is the use of a horse and striking the use of a staff. But we apply to operation both the interior principles of acting, namely the very powers of the soul, or the members of the body, as the intellect to understanding and the eye to seeing; and exterior things, as the staff to striking. But it is manifest that we do not apply exterior things to any operation except through the intrinsic principles, which are the powers of the soul, as habits of the powers, or organs, which are the members of the body... Whence it is manifest that to use belongs first and principally to the will as first mover, to reason as director, but to other powers as executors, which are compared to the will, by which they are applied to acting, as instruments to the principal agent. » ¹ Ibid., l. 16, a. 1, c.

Hence it follows that use is of means, not of the end as end, which is not ordered to anything else, as I said of election.

Likewise use belongs not to the animal part ² , but only to the rational. For to apply something to another is only of him who has dominion over that which is applied. Dominion however, or arbitrium, necessarily supposes reason, whereby one can be referred to another, as is known from the notion of free will. ² Ibid., a. 2, c.

5° Fruition is « the love or delight wherewith the will adheres to some thing on account of the thing itself. » This Augustine teaches lib. X de Trinit., c. 10, n. 13 : « We enjoy, he says, things known, in which the will, delighted by them for their own sake, rests; but we use those things which we refer to something else whereby we are to enjoy. » Here you have the difference between fruition and use.

« From sensible fruits, says the Angelic Doctor¹ , the name of fruition seems derived. But sensible fruit is that which is expected last from the tree and received with a certain relish. Whence fruition seems to pertain to the love or delight which anyone has concerning the last expected thing, which is the end. But the end and good is the object of the appetitive power. Whence it is manifest that fruition is an act of the appetitive power. » That however fruition pertains to love, Augustine teaches lib. I de Doctrina christ., c. 4, n. 4, saying: « To enjoy is to adhere to something by love for its own sake. » Yet love pertains to the appetitive power. Therefore also to enjoy is an act of the appetitive power ² . ¹ Ibid., q. 11, a. 1, c. ² Ibid., in arg. Sed contra.

Aptly Augustine says in the place cited above that « we enjoy things known. » For where there is no knowledge, no delight can be given; but where there is knowledge, there fruition is had.

Hence « to enjoy food and any bodily pleasure is not absurdly thought to belong also to beasts, » as the same Aug. says in lib. LXXXIII quaest., q. 30, since beasts too lack not some cognition. Yet imperfect is the cognition in beasts whereby the end and good is known particularly, because their appetitive powers are not freely commanding, but moved according to natural instinct toward those things they apprehend. But we know perfectly the end and good, who rise up to the universal notion of end and good through the intellect. Whence, as the Angelic Doctor concludes ³ , « to rational nature belongs fruition according to perfect reason, but to brute animals according to imperfect reason, while to other creatures in no way. » ³ Ibid., a. 2, c.

It follows from the foregoing that perfect fruition is of the ultimate end only ⁴ . For fruition is the rest of the will. ⁴ Ibid., a. 4, c.

But rest is found perfectly only in possession of the ultimate end, which is the complete good and term of the will. From which it must be concluded that, although some imperfect fruition can be had even of the ultimate end not yet really possessed but only intended, nevertheless perfect fruition cannot be in the soul except from real possession of the ultimate end itself.