Part II (Pars Prima Secundae) Part 19 (1/2)
QUESTION 11
OF ENJOYMENT [*Or, Fruition], WHICH IS AN ACT OF THE WILL (In Four Articles)
We must now consider enjoyment: concerning which there are four points of inquiry:
(1) Whether to enjoy is an act of the appet.i.tive power?
(2) Whether it belongs to the rational creature alone, or also to irrational animals?
(3) Whether enjoyment is only of the last end?
(4) Whether it is only of the end possessed?
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FIRST ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 11, Art. 1]
Whether to Enjoy Is an Act of the Appet.i.tive Power?
Objection 1: It would seem that to enjoy belongs not only to the appet.i.tive power. For to enjoy seems nothing else than to receive the fruit. But it is the intellect, in whose act Happiness consists, as shown above (Q. 3, A. 4), that receives the fruit of human life, which is Happiness. Therefore to enjoy is not an act of the appet.i.tive power, but of the intellect.
Obj. 2: Further, each power has its proper end, which is its perfection: thus the end of sight is to know the visible; of the hearing, to perceive sounds; and so forth. But the end of a thing is its fruit. Therefore to enjoy belongs to each power, and not only to the appet.i.te.
Obj. 3: Further, enjoyment implies a certain delight. But sensible delight belongs to sense, which delights in its object: and for the same reason, intellectual delight belongs to the intellect. Therefore enjoyment belongs to the apprehensive, and not to the appet.i.tive power.
_On the contrary,_ Augustine says (De Doctr. Christ. i, 4; and De Trin. x, 10, 11): ”To enjoy is to adhere lovingly to something for its own sake.” But love belongs to the appet.i.tive power. Therefore also to enjoy is an act of the appet.i.tive power.
_I answer that,_ _Fruitio_ (enjoyment) and _fructus_ (fruit) seem to refer to the same, one being derived from the other; which from which, matters not for our purpose; though it seems probable that the one which is more clearly known, was first named. Now those things are most manifest to us which appeal most to the senses: wherefore it seems that the word ”fruition” is derived from sensible fruits. But sensible fruit is that which we expect the tree to produce in the last place, and in which a certain sweetness is to be perceived.
Hence fruition seems to have relation to love, or to the delight which one has in realizing the longed-for term, which is the end. Now the end and the good is the object of the appet.i.tive power. Wherefore it is evident that fruition is the act of the appet.i.tive power.
Reply Obj. 1: Nothing hinders one and the same thing from belonging, under different aspects, to different powers. Accordingly the vision of G.o.d, as vision, is an act of the intellect, but as a good and an end, is the object of the will. And as such is the fruition thereof: so that the intellect attains this end, as the executive power, but the will as the motive power, moving (the powers) towards the end and enjoying the end attained.
Reply Obj. 2: The perfection and end of every other power is contained in the object of the appet.i.tive power, as the proper is contained in the common, as stated above (Q. 9, A. 1). Hence the perfection and end of each power, in so far as it is a good, belongs to the appet.i.tive power. Wherefore the appet.i.tive power moves the other powers to their ends; and itself realizes the end, when each of them reaches the end.
Reply Obj. 3: In delight there are two things: perception of what is becoming; and this belongs to the apprehensive power; and complacency in that which is offered as becoming: and this belongs to the appet.i.tive power, in which power delight is formally completed.
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SECOND ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 11, Art. 2]
Whether to Enjoy Belongs to the Rational Creature Alone, or Also to Irrational Animals?
Objection 1: It would seem that to enjoy belongs to men alone. For Augustine says (De Doctr. Christ. i, 22) that ”it is given to us men to enjoy and to use.” Therefore other animals cannot enjoy.
Obj. 2: Further, to enjoy relates to the last end. But irrational animals cannot obtain the last end. Therefore it is not for them to enjoy.
Obj. 3: Further, just as the sensitive appet.i.te is beneath the intellectual appet.i.te, so is the natural appet.i.te beneath the sensitive. If, therefore, to enjoy belongs to the sensitive appet.i.te, it seems that for the same reason it can belong to the natural appet.i.te. But this is evidently false, since the latter cannot delight in anything. Therefore the sensitive appet.i.te cannot enjoy: and accordingly enjoyment is not possible for irrational animals.
_On the contrary,_ Augustine says (QQ. 83, qu. 30): ”It is not so absurd to suppose that even beasts enjoy their food and any bodily pleasure.”
_I answer that,_ As was stated above (A. 1) to enjoy is not the act of the power that achieves the end as executor, but of the power that commands the achievement; for it has been said to belong to the appet.i.tive power. Now things void of reason have indeed a power of achieving an end by way of execution, as that by which a heavy body has a downward tendency, whereas a light body has an upward tendency.
Yet the power of command in respect of the end is not in them, but in some higher nature, which moves all nature by its command, just as in things endowed with knowledge, the appet.i.te moves the other powers to their acts. Wherefore it is clear that things void of knowledge, although they attain an end, have no enjoyment of the end: this is only for those that are endowed with knowledge.
Now knowledge of the end is twofold: perfect and imperfect. Perfect knowledge of the end, is that whereby not only is that known which is the end and the good, but also the universal formality of the end and the good; and such knowledge belongs to the rational nature alone. On the other hand, imperfect knowledge is that by which the end and the good are known in the particular. Such knowledge is in irrational animals: whose appet.i.tive powers do not command with freedom, but are moved according to a natural instinct to whatever they apprehend.