Actuality

Use in the book

The report of Aristotle explains the word through both continuity and completeness. Bronze can become a statue; once it has received the appropriate form, the statue exists in actuality. In the account of soul, Aristotle’s definition calls soul the first actuality of an organic natural body possessing life potentially.

Places to read

1. I.12.1b.2Bronze becomes an actual statue when it receives its form and attains its end.
2. I.14.1bDivision without limit is allowed potentially, but not as an accomplished actuality.
3. I.49.1a.3Soul is defined as the first actuality of a body capable of life.

Translation in this edition

Entelecheia is “actuality”; its adverbial use can be “actually.” Energeia can also require “actuality,” so the English equivalent does not by itself identify which Greek word stands behind it.

Images and comparisons

The bronze statue gives the reader a concrete contrast between a material’s capacity and the completed thing. This is the report’s explanatory example, not an allegory supplied by the lexicon.

Use in the book

Actus can mean actuality, realized being, a present act, or the exercise of a power. Actio and operatio ordinarily emphasize what an agent does. Their relation is clearest in the triad essence, power, operation: the soul remains stable in essence while its operations occur successively; quality changes in all three respects. An operation such as heating water takes time, whereas a superior stable operation completes its work without succession. Natural philosophers also call form act because form supplies determinate being and efficacy. These uses differ from the soul's acquired power passing from potency into act and then into habit.

The opposition to potency becomes a measure of dependence. Matter is pure receptive capacity, while quality, soul, and angel combine actuality with reception: quality receives bodily division, soul acquires what it previously lacked, and angel receives being, illumination, and intelligible forms. Angelic potency does not require bodily matter. God's act alone contains no passive or receptive component. Ficino reasons that act considered in itself is not limited; limits arise from a receiving subject or a limiting cause. A second pure act could not differ from the first without an addition compromising its purity. Colored light illustrates the difference: red or green light is light qualified by something further. Matter contains forms confusedly as possibilities, whereas God contains them distinctly and actually.

Book IV applies the distinction to production and possession. A transition from potency to act requires a cause already possessing the corresponding act, or an equal or superior one; the remote possibility of fire in colliding cold bodies is insufficient by itself to explain its production. Angel holds principles actually and together, soul habitually, and matter potentially. These are modes of holding content, not three unrelated inventories. The lower powers of celestial soul actualize their seeds successively rather than all at once.

In II.4.6, actus primus names the divine act on which primary matter and the essences of minds and souls depend. Divine operation is identical with divine essence and understanding, not an acquired activity that perfects a previously incomplete God. Ficino distinguishes activity remaining within the agent, such as knowing and desire, from activity passing into external matter. This distinction does not deny divine external effects. Creation, indeed, exceeds the actualization of a receptive material: nothingness is not even a passive capacity. Finally, action is prior to the passion of being acted upon, supporting the argument for agents that move without being moved. Context therefore determines whether actus names achieved being, inward activity, an outward operation, or a power's present exercise.

Further passage references. I.3.1; I.4.1, I.4.5; I.5.1–I.5.4234; I.5.19; II.4.1–623456; II.8.4–52; II.9.5–8234; II.9.13; II.11.1; III.1.9–12234; IV.1.15; IV.1.19; IV.1.87; IV.2.9–IV.2.12234; IV.2.19

Places to read

1. I.4.1–52345Essence, power and operation distinguish wholly changing quality from the partially stable third essence.
2. I.5.1–4234Potency, act and habit govern acquired power; perpetual act is contrasted with inactivity.
3. II.8.5Pure being, essential power and deliberation are distinguished as modes of acting.
4. II.9.13Divine voluntary cognition and operation are identified without excluding effects outside God.

Translation in this edition

The translation’s “act,” “activity,” “operation” and “actuality” reflect different objects and contrasts. I.5.1’s transition into habit must not be erased by treating habitus as another occurrence of present activity. In II.8.5 acting through being means pure being only of the first agent; subordinate agents act through an essential power.

actus / actio / agere

actus / actio / agere. Printed forms: Actio; actio; actionem; actionis; actu; actui; Actus; agente; agentis; agit.

Actuality, operation, or acting; the noun’s force depends on its contrast. Act excludes passivity in the infinity argument; operation can remain in an agent or extend into external matter. References: II.4.1, II.7.25, II.8.4, II.9.5. See Act and operation.

agere / actio / agens

agere / actio / agens. Printed forms: agit.

Act, produce, or cause / action / agent. An agent may act without temporal motion: the meadow’s immediate presentation is efficacious, while painting is a gradual act. References: II.11.1, III.1.28. See Act and operation.

calefacere / aqua / aer

calefacere / aqua / aer. Printed forms: aerem; aquam; calefaciendam; calefacit.

To heat, with water and air as different recipients. Ficino uses greater effort heating water than air to illustrate degrees of active power; this remains his example. References: II.4.5, II.8.2, II.8.4. See Act and operation.

calefactio

calefactio. Printed forms: calefactio.

Heating as an action. Fire heats water over time rather than instantaneously, illustrating why quality’s operation belongs to motion. References: I.4.1. See Act and operation.

calor / ignis / lignum

calor / ignis / lignum. Printed forms: igne; lignum.

Heat / fire / wood. Heating begins in fire and ends in wood, furnishing the example of transitive activity contrasted with inward intellectual operation. References: II.11.14. See Act and operation.

collisio

collisio. Printed forms: collisione.

A collision of bodies. Fire from cold colliding bodies illustrates the alleged insufficiency of remote potency without a substantial productive cause. References: IV.1.19. See Act and operation.

essentia / virtus / actio

essentia / virtus / actio. Printed forms: actio; essentia; virtus.

Essence, power and action as three respects of a thing. Quality changes in all three; the third essence has stable essence, changing operation, and power that is stable in one respect and acquired in another. References: I.4.1, I.4.5, I.5.1. See Act and operation.

intrinsecus / extrinsecus

intrinsecus / extrinsecus. Printed forms: extrinseca; extrinsecum; extrinsecus; intrinseca; intrinsecos; intrinsecum; intrinsecus.

Inward and outward. Ficino distinguishes life as inward operation from temporal outward work; the shared temporal dispersion does not erase the distinction. References: I.5.2. See Act and operation.

Inward or outward in relation to a thing’s own perfection and spread. In the reported account, enduring always is inward and superior to the outward achievement of presence everywhere. References: II.6.19, II.6.20. See Perfection.

From outside / from within. God’s government acts inwardly in things he made, unlike an artisan working upon alien matter from outside. References: II.13.12. See Indwelling and presence.

manere in agente

manere in agente. Printed forms: in agente manent.

Remaining in the agent, as contrasted with passing into external matter. Cognition and appetite perfect the agent; this distinction helps explain the identity of divine essence and operation. References: II.9.5. See Act and operation.

migrare / transire

migrare / transire. Printed forms: migrant; migrat; transeunt; transire; transit.

To pass or move between states, or to traverse a sequence. Bodies pass between being-states; an endless chain cannot be traversed before action; immanent operation does not pass into external matter. References: II.7.7, II.8.3, II.9.5. See Act and operation.

Migrate or pass into. Soul passes into particular things without abandoning the others; the verbs describe communicative range rather than spatial relocation alone. References: III.2.23. See Indwelling and presence.

opus / operari / operatio

opus / operari / operatio. Printed forms: operari; operatio; operationem; operatur.

Work as effect; acting or operation as exercise of power. The same family names an angel’s product and divine operation, whose relation to essence differs from creaturely activity. References: II.7.23, II.8.5, II.9.5. See Act and operation.

paulatim / subito / sero

paulatim / subito / sero. Printed forms: cito; paulatim; sero; subito.

Little by little, instantaneously, late and quickly. Ficino distinguishes intensity, gradual completion and delay over distance. Rapid action is not automatically the same as instantaneous action. References: I.2.4. See Act and operation.

peragere / explere

peragere / explere. Printed forms: expletur; peragitur.

To perform or accomplish completely. Operations are distinguished by whether they proceed through deliberation, essential power, or pure being. References: II.8.4, II.8.5. See Act and operation.

perducere in actum

perducere in actum. Printed forms: in actum perduci.

To bring a possibility into actuality. A corresponding, equal, or superior actuality must already belong to the actualizing cause. References: IV.1.15. See Act and operation.

promptus / agilis

promptus / agilis. Printed forms: agili; agilis; promptissimum.

Ready for motion or agile in acting. Bodily bulk inhibits readiness; form’s natural agility becomes impaired in matter. Readiness here concerns efficacy rather than a moral disposition. References: I.2.2, I.3.1. See Act and operation.

prorumpo / migro

prorumpo / migro. Printed forms: migrat; prorumpit.

To break forth and to pass from one condition to another. Movement from potency and inactivity into act signals incomplete actuality and a sought end. References: I.5.4. See Act and operation.

terminus operationis

terminus operationis. Printed forms: utrumque terminum.

A term or endpoint of an activity. Intellectual activity retains both terms within the agent, unlike heating that begins in fire and ends in wood. References: II.11.14. See Act and operation.

transigo / perago / consummation

transigo / perago / consummation. Printed forms: consumaret; peragitur; transigitur.

To accomplish, carry through or finish. The bodily action example separates gradual completion from late completion across space. The apparatus retains consumaret with an implicit agent rather than the later passive regularization. References: I.2.4. See Act and operation.

vigor

vigor. Printed forms: vigor.

Effective energy or strength. God is called pure vigor of acting, separated from the recipient’s mode of undergoing. References: III.1.10. See Act and operation.

Philebus (authorities and cited works)

Philebus. Appears in the causal discussion and in Ficino's explanation of limit and infinite through actuality and potency. II.11.26; III.1.11. See Cause; Infinity; Act and operation.