Friday, April 10, 2009

Q87 A2: Whether our intellect knows the habits of the soul by their essence?

No. Habits, like the powers, are known by their acts, because nothing is known but as it is actual.

Habitus per actus cognoscuntur, sicut et potentiae, quia nihil cognoscitur nisi secundum quod est actu.

A habit is a kind of medium between mere power and mere act.

Habitus quodammodo est medium inter potentiam puram et purum actum.

Habits are present in our intellect, not as its object since, in the present state of life, our intellect's object is the nature of a material thing as stated above (Q84, A7), but as that by which it understands.

Habitus sunt praesentes in intellectu nostro, non sicut obiecta intellectus (quia obiectum intellectus nostri, secundum statum praesentis vitae, est natura rei materialis, ut supra dictum est); sed sunt praesentes in intellectu ut quibus intellectus intelligit.

Although faith is not known by external movement of the body, it is perceived by the subject wherein it resides, by the interior act of the heart. For no one knows that he has faith unless he knows that he believes.

Etsi fides non cognoscatur per exteriores corporis motus, percipitur tamen etiam ab eo in quo est, per interiorem actum cordis. Nullus enim fidem se habere scit, nisi per hoc quod se credere percipit.