On the Voluntary and the Involuntary

*« Since through certain acts it is necessary to arrive at beatitude, human acts must consequently be considered, that we may know by what acts one arrives at beatitude, or impedes the way to beatitude. But, because operations and acts are concerned with singulars, therefore every practical science is perfected in particular consideration. Moral consideration therefore, since it treats of human acts, must first indeed be treated in the universal, secondly however in the particular.

» Concerning the universal consideration of human acts, the first thing occurring to be considered is about the human acts themselves, secondly about their principles. Now some human acts are proper to man, others are common to man and other animals. And since beatitude is the proper good of man, those acts stand more closely related to beatitude which are properly human, than acts which are common to man and other animals. First therefore must be considered the acts which are proper to man, secondly the acts which are common to man and animals, which are called the passions of the soul ¹ » ¹ The passions will be treated in the following treatise.

» Concerning the first two things occur to be considered: first, the condition of human acts; secondly, the distinction of those acts. But since those acts are properly called human which are voluntary, because the will is rational appetite, which is proper to man, we must consider acts insofar as they are voluntary. First therefore must be considered the voluntary and the involuntary in common; secondly, the acts which are voluntary as elicited by the will itself, as existing immediately of the will itself; thirdly, the acts which are voluntary as imperated by the will, which are of the will itself through mediating other powers. And because the acts of the will have certain circumstances by which they are judged, first must be considered the voluntary and involuntary, and consequently the circumstances of those acts in which the voluntary and involuntary are found ¹ »] ¹ Hic q. 6.

PRAENOTANDA

[That it may be clearly known of what acts there is question in the present treatise, certain distinctions must be established. Since man is rightly defined « a rational animal, » those acts alone which proceed from his nature perfectly, that is rationally, are to be imputed to him, as human and subject to the rules of morality. Hence

Acts done in man necessarily, such as respiration, are indeed natural; but, as pertaining only to animality, they are imperfect and not properly acts in the sense we understand here, that is, human.

There are acts which would of themselves be human if they were referred to a deliberated and free end, but which sometimes arise unforeseen without any deliberation and intention, such as laughter, which proceeds from a power proper to a rational being, but often not rationally. Such acts are not yet human, but are called acts of a man, as proceeding from a man in a mode not perfectly human.

A human act, in the theological sense, is therefore an operation proceeding from a man in a human manner, that is rationally or from deliberated will, consequently with knowledge of the end and freely. It truly pertains to man as defined above.

A human act proceeds from the will either immediately, without the aid of another faculty, and is elicited, because it is considered only in the will itself, by which immanent operation it elicits it: such are love and hate. If that act of the will does not rest in itself but commands another act, for this reason it is said to be imperating. But the act which proceeds from the will only mediately, that is determined by the command of the will and distinguished from its own act, such as meditation and walking, is imperated.

A human act is not to be considered only physically; but, since it tends to a known and chosen end, it is subject to rules which render the prosecution of the end legitimate or illegitimate, and from this heading it is constituted in moral being. Therefore a human act becomes moral from its relation to the rule of honesty or morals: if it is conformable to it, it is good, because « good is from an integral cause; » if it discord from it, it is evil, because « evil is from any defect whatsoever; » but if it is neither against nor alongside such a rule, the act is indifferent.]

DISSERTATION I

ON THE VOLUNTARY AND THE INVOLUNTARY

St. Thomas, q. 6.