ICAH 581 MAN
any substantial existence of its own. To be exact we The theories of the nature of man so far noticed are
should have to write: "Man's animality is rational"; purelv philosophical. No one of them has been ex-
f or his " rationality " is certainly not something super- plicitlyr condemned by the Church. The ecclesiastical
added to his animality ", Man is one in essence. In definitions have reference merely to the " union '* of
the Scholastic sjmthesis, it is a manifest illogism to body" and "soul". With the exception of the
hypostasise the abstract conceptions that are neces- words of the Council of Toledo, 68^8 (Ex libro responi-
sary for the intelligent apprehension of complete phe- onis JuUani Archiep. Tolet.), in which "soul" and
nomena. A similar confusion of expression may be "bod^r" are referrea to as two "substances" (expli-
noticed in the statement that man is a " compound of cable in the light of subsequent definitions only in the
body and soul". This is misleading. Man is not a hypothesis of abstraction, and as "incomplete" sub-
body vlus a soul — ^which would make of him two indi- stiuioes), other pronouncements of the Church merely
viduals; but a body that is what it is (namely, a hu' reiterate the doctrine maintained in the School. Thus
man body) by reason of its union with the soiu. As a Lateran in 649 (against the Monothelites), canon ii.
special appUcation of the general doctrine of matter " the Word of God with the flesh assumed by Him ana
and form which is as well a theory of science as of in- animated with an intellectual principle shall come
trinsic causality, the "soul" is envisaged as the sub- .'.."; Vienne, 1311-12, "whoever shall hereafter dare
stantial form of the matter which, so informed, is a to assert, maintain, or pertinaciously hold that the ra-
human "body". The union between the two is a tional or intellectual soul is not per se and essentially.
" substantial " one. It cannot be maintained^ in the ihi& form of the human body, is to be regarded as a
Thomistic system, that the " substantial union is a rela- heretic "; Decree of Leo X. in V Lateran, Bull " Apos-
tion by which two substances are so disposed that they tolici Regiminis", 1513, ... with the approval of
form one ". In the general theory, neither " matter*' this sacred council we condemn all who assert that the
nor "form", but only the composite, is a substance, intellectual soul is mortal or is the same in all men... for
In the case of man, though the "soul" be proved a the soul is not only really and essentially the form of the
reality capable of separate existence^ the " body " can human body, but is also immortal; and the number of
in no sense be called a substance in its own right. It souls has been and is to be multiplied according as the
exists only as determined by a form; and if that form number of bodies is multiplied"; Brief Eximiamtuam"
is not a human soul, then the " body " is not a human of Pius IX to Cardinal ae Geissel, 15 June, 1857, con-
body. It is in this sense that the Scholastic phrase demning the error of GOnther, says: " the rational soul
"incomplete substance", applied to body and soul is per ae the true and immediate form of the body",
alike, is to be understood. Though strictly speaking In the sixteenth century Descartes advanced a
self-contradictory, the phrase expresses in a conven- doctrine that again separated soul and body, and com-
ient form the abiding reciprocity of relation between promised the unity of consciousness and personality,
these two " principles of substantial being ". To account for the interaction of the two substances —
Man is an individual, a single substance resultant the one "thought", the other "extension" — **Occa-
from the determination of matter by a human form, sionalism" (Malebranche, Geulincx), "Pre-established
Being capable of reasoning, he verifies the philosophi- Harmony" (Leibniz), and "Reciprocal Influx"
cal defimtion of a person (q. v.) : " the individual sub- (Locke) were imagined. The inevitable reaction from
stance of a rational nature". This doctrine of St. the Cartesian division is to be found in the Monism of
Thomas Aquinas (cf . I, Q. Ixxv, a. 4) and of Aristotle Spinoza. Aquinas avoids the difficulties and contra-
is not the only one that has been advanced. In Greek dictions of the " two substance" theory and, saving
and in modern philosophy, as well as during the Pa- the personality, accounts for the observed facts of the
tristic and Scholastic periods, another celebrated unity of consciousness. His doctrine: (1) disproves
theory laid claim to pre-eminence. For Plato the the possibility of metempsychosis^ (2) establisnes an
soul is a spirit that uses the body. It is in a non- inferential, though not an apodictic argunient, for the
natural state of union, and longs to be freed from its resurrection of the body; (3) avoids all difficulties as
bodily prison (cf. Republic, X, 611). Plato has re- to the "seat of the soul", by asserting formal actua-
course to a theory of a triple soul to explain the union tion; (4) proves the immortality of the soul from the
— a theory that would seem to make personality alto- spiritual and incomplex activity observed in the In-
ge ther impossible (see Matter). St. Augustine, fol- mvidual man; it is not my soul that thinks, or my
lowing him (except as to the triple-soul theory) makes body that eats, but " I " that do both. The particular
the "body" and "soul" two suostances; and man "a creation of the soul is a corollary of the foregoing,
rational soul using a mortal and earthly body" (De This doctrine — ^the contradiction of Traducianism
Moribus, I, xxvii). But he is careful to note that by and Transmigration — ^follows from the consideration
union with the body it constitutes the human being. St. that the formal principle cannot be produced by way
Augustine's psychological doctrine was current in the of generation, either directly (since it is proved to be
Middle Ages up to the time and during the perfecting simple in substance), or accidentally (since it is a
of the Thomistic synthesis. It is expressed in the subsistent form). Hence there remains only creation
"Liber de Spiritu et Anima" of Alcher of Clairvaux as the mode of its production. The complete argu-
(?) (twelfth century). In this work "the soul rules ment may be founa in the "Contra Gentiles" of St.
the body; its union with the body is a friendly union. Thomas^ II, Ixxxvii. See also Summa Theologica, L
though the latter impedes the fuU and free exercise of Q. cxviii, aa. 1 and 2 (against Traducianism) and a. 3
its activity; it is devoted to its prison" (cf. de Wulf, (in refutation of the opinion of Pythagoras, Plato and
" History of Philosophy", tr. Coffey). As further in- Ori^n — ^with whom Leibniz might be grouped as pro-
stances of Augustinian influence may be cited Alanus fessmg a modified form of the same opinion — the crea-
ab Insulis (but the soul is united by a apiriius phyti- tion of souls at the beginning of time).
ctis to the body); Alexander of Hales (union ad mo- II. The Origin of Man. — ^This problem may be
dum forma cum materia); St. Bona venture (the body treated from the standpoints of Holy Scripture, the-
united to a soul consisting of "form" and "spiritual olo^, or philosophy. A. The Sacred Writings are
matter"— /orma completiva). Many of the Francis- entirely concerned with the relations of man to God,
can doctors seem, by inference if not explicitly, to and of God's dealings with man, before and after the
lean 1K> the Platonic Augustimian view; Scotus, who, Fall. Two accounts of his origin are given in the Old
however, by the subtlety of his " formal distinction a Testament. On the sixth and last day of the crea-
parU rei**, saves the unity oC the individual while ad- tion " God created man to Ida qsr\x S5»»^\ nr^ '"^5^^
