organically “fused” with the common nature (op. cit., p. 403). “As unity in common,” says Scotus (op. cit., p. 406), “per se accompanies entity in common, so some sort of unity accompanies per se every entity; therefore, unity simpliciter (and such is the unity of the individual, often hereinbefore described, namely, the unity which forbids division into many partes subjectivas, and which forbids that the individual should fail to be this designated object) — unity simpliciter, in case such unity exists in beings, as all opinion supposes, accompanies per se some entity. But this unity does not accompany per se the entity of the common nature, for the latter” (e.g. the nature of man) “has its own special sort of real unity — and so the unity of the individual” (e.g. of Socrates) “accompanies some other entity determined as that.” Thus the entity of the individual appears as something essentially intelligible, and in no sense either accidental or material. This individuality of Socrates belongs to the idea of Socrates as an idea, in advance of the existence of Socrates; and remains with Socrates even when this materia signata of his flesh and bones wholly changes.
An objection to this view of the intelligible hæcceitas appears, of course, in the well-known fact of the actual indefinability of the individual — a fact often cited, upon Aristotle’s authority, by the schoolmen. To this objection Scotus replies (p. 414): “The singular is per se intelligible, in so far as it exists ex parte sua,” i.e. in so far as itself is concerned. “But, if it is not per se intelligible to a particular intellect, such as ours, the impossibility is once for all
