The S e ma n t i c s of A na l o g y

Th e S emantics o f Ana log y

Rereading Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia

Joshua P. Hochschild

University of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana 

Copyright © 2010 by University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
www.undpress.nd.edu
All Rights Reserved

Published in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hochschild, Joshua P., 1972–

The semantics of analogy : rereading Cajetan’s De nominum
analogia / Joshua P. Hochschild.
p. cm.
“This work began as a doctoral project at the University of Notre
Dame”—Acknowledgments.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-268-03091-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-268-03091-X (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Cajetan, Tommaso de Vio, 1469–1534. De nominum analogia.
2. Analogy. 3. Semantics (Philosophy) I. Title.
B785.C153D434 2010
169—dc22 2010008769

∞ The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of
the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on
Library Resources.
Contents

Acknowledgments vii
Abbreviations xi
Preface: Reinterpreting a Classic xiii

Introduction: Some Theoretical and Historical Preliminaries 1

Pa rt 1 — Cajetan’s Question

Chapter One Systematizing Aquinas? A Paradigm in Crisis 17

Chapter Two Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question: The
Semantic Intent of De Nominum Analogia 33
Chapter Three Analogy, Semantics, and the
“Concept vs. Judgment” Critique 47
Chapter Four Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy 65

Pa rt 2 — Cajetan’s Answ er

Chapter Five Cajetan’s Semantic Principles 85

Chapter Six The Semantics of Analogy:
Inequality and Attribution 99
vi — Contents

Chapter Seven The Semantics of Proportionality:

The Proportional Unity of Concepts 122
Chapter Eight The Semantics of Proportionality:
Concept Formation and Judgment 143
Chapter Nine The Semantics of Proportionality:
Syllogism and Dialectic 161

Conclusion 173

Notes 177
Bibliography 233
Index 245
Acknowledgments

This work began as a doctoral project at the University of Notre

Dame, and through its gestation there and subsequent development
into the present form I have incurred many debts.
I mention first Gyula Klima, who introduced me to medieval phi-
losophy, and from whom I tried to learn as much as possible through
my undergraduate and graduate studies. His own comments about
Cajetan’s theory of analogy were the seeds of this work, and I hope he
doesn’t regret trusting me to cultivate them.
At Notre Dame I also had the privilege and challenge of en-
gaging two contemporary authorities on analogy. Fr. David Burrell
allowed me to convince him that it might be worth writing on Ca-
jetan’s theory of analogy, and showed great loyalty when it was most
needed. Dr. Ralph McInerny was patient and forgiving; his work and
conversations sharpened my wits and improved my arguments, and
he arranged for crucial material support during my last year at Notre
Dame. As neither of these scholars needs to be reminded, my depar-
tures from their interpretations of Cajetan in no way diminish my
respect for their work, and only increase my appreciation for their
generosity.
In researching this study I benefited from correspondence with
E. J. Ashworth, Angel d’Ors, William McMahon, and Jöel Lonfat.
Thanks also to William McMahon, John Deely, and Fr. Laurence
Dewan, O.P., for sharing prepublication manuscripts of their papers.
And I am especially grateful to Thomas Osborne for his very helpful
comments on substantial portions of the manuscript.
— vii
viii — Acknowledgments

Barbara Hanrahan of the University of Notre Dame Press shep-

herded the work to publication with grace, encouragement, and
patience. Two anonymous reviewers gave the manuscript generous
attention and detailed commentary, and the work benefited from
Margo Shearman’s expert copyediting. Margaret Gloster designed a
lovely cover, integrating an image by a former student of mine, David
Hancock, who kindly granted permission to reproduce his work.
Portions of this work, in earlier versions, appeared as indepen-
dent articles. Much of what is covered in chapter 3 was published
as “Analogy, Semantics, and Hermeneutics: The ‘Concept vs. Judg-
ment’ Critique of Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia,” in Medieval Phi-
losophy and Theology 11 (2003): 241–60. Much of chapter 4 appeared
in “Did Aquinas Answer Cajetan’s Question? Aquinas’s Semantic
Rules for Analogy and the Interpretation of De Nominum Analogia,”
in Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 77
(2003): 273–88. Parts of chapter 5 appeared in “Logic or Metaphysics
in Cajetan’s Theory of Analogy: Can Extrinsic Denomination Be a
Semantic Property?” in Proceedings of the Society for Medieval Logic
and Metaphysics 1 (2001): 45–69. And some portions of what became
chapters 8 and 9 were included in “The Rest of Cajetan’s Analogy
Theory: De Nominum Analogia Chapters 4–11,” in International Philo-
sophical Quarterly 45 (2005): 341–56.
This research project has received more financial support from
more institutions than it deserved. For grants in support of my doc-
toral studies I owe thanks to the University of Notre Dame, the Inter-
collegiate Studies Institute, the Marguerite Eyer Wilbur Foundation,
and the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. Special thanks are
owed to the Russell Kirk Center for the privilege of a residential fel-
lowship during 1999–2000. Subsequent work on the manuscript was
supported by faculty development grants from Wheaton College (Il-
linois) and Mount St. Mary’s University.
Lastly, my family. I can almost measure my progress on this
project by the births of my four lovely children: Stephen Craig, born
about halfway through the dissertation; Jeremy Augustine and Helen
Mary, who entered the world at different stages of manuscript re-
vision; and most recently, as I addressed final corrections, Benedict
 Acknowledgments — ix

John. Among other ways in which these four have blessed me, they
have been inspirations to work on this book, and inspirations not to.
Naturally my greatest debt is to my wife, Paige, who has accom-
panied this project from the beginning and strengthened it with her
faithful support and sacrifice.
Abbreviations

Work s of Cajetan

CDEE Commentaria in De Ente et Essentia. 1495.

Edited by M. H. Laurent. Turin: Marietti, 1934.

CPA Commentaria in Praedicamenta Aristotelis. 1498.

Edited by M. H. Laurent. Rome: Angelicum, 1939.

CPI Commentaria in Porphyrii Isagogen ad Praedicamenta

Aristotelis. 1497.
Edited by I. Marega. Rome: Angelicum, 1934.

CST Commentaria in Summam Theologiae St Thomae. 1507–22.

Rome: Leonine Commission, 1906.

DCE De Conceptu Entis. 1509.

Edited by N. Zammit. Rome, 1934. Revised by H. Hering.
Rome: Angelicum, 1951.

DNA De Nominum Analogia. 1498.

Edited by N. Zammit. Rome, 1934. Revised by H. Hering.
Rome: Angelicum, 1951.

DCE, DNA, and CDEE are cited by section numbers as they appear
in the editions indicated (e.g., DNA §1). CPA and CPI are cited by
— xi
xii — Abbreviations

page numbers of the editions indicated (e.g., CPA 19). CST is cited by
the part, article, and question of the text of Aquinas on which Cajetan
comments, followed by a Roman numeral indicating the section of
Cajetan’s commentary as it appears in the Leonine edition (e.g., the
second section of Cajetan’s commentary on Prima Pars, question 13,
article 5, is CST I.13.5, n. ii). All English translations of these texts are
the author’s.
Preface
Reinterpreting a Classic

Now, the question “To what question did So-and-so intend this proposition
for an answer?” is an historical question, and therefore cannot be settled
except by historical methods. When So-and-so wrote in a distant past, it
is generally a very difficult one, because writers (at any rate good writers)
always write for their contemporaries, and in particular for those who are
“likely to be interested,” which means those who are already asking the
question to which an answer is being offered; and consequently a writer very
seldom explains what the question is that he is trying to answer. Later on,
when he has become a “classic” and his contemporaries are all long dead, the
question has been forgotten; especially if the answer he gave was generally
acknowledged to be the right answer; for in that case people stopped asking
the question, and began asking the question that next arose.
—R. G. Collingwood, An Autobiography

Even disregarding all formal similarities that have nothing to do with the
generic concept, if a person transfers an expression from one thing to the
other, he has in mind something that is common to both of them; but this in
no way needs to be generic universality. Rather, he is following his widening

— xiii
xiv — Preface

experience, which looks for similarities, whether in the appearance of things

or in their significance for us. The genius of verbal consciousness consists in
being able to express these similarities. This is its fundamental metaphorical
nature, and it is important to see that to regard the metaphorical use of a
word as not its real sense is the prejudice of a theory of logic that is alien to
language.
—H. G. Gadamer, Truth and Method

Thomas de Vio Cajetan was a young man, only twenty-nine years

old, when he composed De Nominum Analogia late in the summer
of 1498. He had earlier written about analogy in a commentary on
Aquinas’s De Ente et Essentia (1495) and had already commented on
foundational logical works by Porphyry and Aristotle. Expounding
Aristotle’s Categories, Cajetan spoke briefly about analogy as a variety
of equivocation, and then promised to address the topic in greater
detail, God willing, in a separate “special treatise.”1 As it happens, it
was later that same year that he found the time to fulfill his promise
and write De Nominum Analogia.
Analogy was a central notion in the Thomistic tradition, and
although Aquinas often discussed analogy, he never did so system-
atically and wrote no work dedicated to the subject. De Nominum
Analogia seemed to fill a lacuna in the Thomistic oeuvre and quickly
went on to become the most influential work on analogy not only in
Thomistic circles, but in the broader Aristotelian tradition. Naturally
Cajetan’s teaching was not quite unanimously accepted, but even
those few dissenters, such as Suarez, articulated their alternative posi-
tions using Cajetan’s distinctive terminology. So even for its scattered
critics, De Nominum Analogia at least set the terms of future debate;
the rest, more sympathetic to De Nominum Analogia, considered its
teaching decisive and definitive. John of St. Thomas (John Poinsot,
1589–1644), in his Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, treats analogy in
the section on logic, where he faithfully transmits Cajetan’s teaching.
De Nominum Analogia, says John, handled the difficulties of analogy
 Preface — xv

so subtly and thoroughly that there was nothing else to be considered

on the matter.2 Needless to say, scholars have been able to find more
to say about analogy, but through the twentieth century no scholar
dealing extensively with analogy has been able to ignore Cajetan’s
treatise. The influence of De Nominum Analogia leads us to believe
that even if it had been Cajetan’s only work, it would have made him
famous.
Or would it? Even by the time he wrote De Nominum Analogia,
Cajetan had achieved distinction and seemed destined for renown.
Cajetan had been appointed to the Chair of Thomistic Metaphysics
at the University of Padua in 1493, when he was not even twenty-five
years old and before he had written his remarkable commentary on
Aquinas’s De Ente et Essentia. A year later, he debated the impos-
ing humanist Pico della Mirandola; his performance earned him a
promotion to master of sacred theology. If that were not enough, the
subsequent achievements of its author certainly helped the reputa-
tion of De Nominum Analogia. Among over 150 works by Cajetan,
mostly of philosophical, theological, and biblical commentary, there
stands out a vast and meticulous commentary on Aquinas’s Summa
Theologiae—like most commentaries, much longer than the original,
and deemed so important that it is reprinted with the original in the
Leonine edition. (Written during the years 1507–20, this commen-
tary often refers the reader back to De Nominum Analogia for further
clarification.) And then there is Cajetan’s prominence in his order, his
church, and world affairs. Cajetan was appointed master general of
the Dominican Order in 1508, and received the cardinal’s hat in 1517;
the next year, he was appointed papal legate to Germany, where he
was charged to negotiate with a young Augustinian upstart named
Martin Luther. In 1519 Cajetan was made bishop of his hometown in
Italy, Gaeta (Cajetanus is a latinization of Gaetano).3
In short, posterity’s judgment of the modest treatise De Nomi-
num Analogia is difficult to separate from the fact that its author is
remembered as an authoritative and influential Dominican, a master
commentator, and a prominent representative of official Thomism.
This reputation is no doubt one reason why Cajetan’s De Nominum
Analogia is usually treated as an attempt to comment on, or systema-
tize, Aquinas’s teaching on analogy.
xvi — Preface

Another reason that De Nominum Analogia has been so long

treated as a (attempted) formalization of Aquinas’s views is that its
status as a classic makes it easy for interpreters to neglect inquiry into
its intention. A text, as Collingwood reminds us, must be understood
in relation to the question it aims to answer. One might think that the
motivating question is hardest to discern in the case of little-known
and obscure texts, where the historical evidence may be sparse. But in
fact, as Collingwood points out, it is influential “classic” texts that are
often most difficult to interpret, for if a text has achieved such status, it
will have done so for two reasons: it will have been well-enough writ-
ten to be tailored to an audience already asking the question, and so
is unlikely to have dwelt on formulating the question; and its answer
to that question will have been so effective that people stopped asking
the question, “and began asking the question that next arose.”
In the case of De Nominum Analogia, “the question that next
arose” for the audience (Thomists) was naturally the question of how
far its doctrine accorded with Aquinas’s own teaching. This is the
question that most scholars have treated as an interpretive starting
point. But it is not the question that the text was meant to answer,
and does not indicate anything about Cajetan’s intent in writing on
analogy. It is, however, a question that has elicited plenty of debate,
allowing the prior question—Cajetan’s question, the question that De
Nominum Analogia was intended to answer—to be quietly forgotten.
Even when the treatise was being canonized by John of St. Thomas
for containing the unsurpassed and unsurpassable theory of analogy,
we detect signs of the amnesia of posterity described by Collingwood.
It is clear that John believed that De Nominum Analogia contains all
the answers. But the answers to what questions?

— This study seeks a rereading of D e N ominum A nalogia by

reconstructing the question(s) it seeks to answer, and then explaining
and evaluating the answer(s) it provides.
The study’s order is thus determined by neither purely histori-
cal nor purely theoretical considerations, but by the desire to initiate
readers into the dialectal issues that occasioned it and were occasioned
by it. The introduction thus serves a double purpose. Most obviously,
 Preface — xvii

and most useful to those who are new to Cajetan, it offers three discus-
sions that lay the groundwork for an interpretation of Cajetan’s text:
an overview of the central theoretical issues involved in “analogy,”
a brief history of their treatment from Aristotle to Aquinas, and an
outline of the central doctrines of De Nominum Analogia. But the in-
troduction is not intended just for beginners. Those familiar with the
variety of ancient, medieval, and modern discussions of analogy may
appreciate the attempt to distill a coherent narrative; there is no such
thing as “the history” of “the concept of analogy,” but the introduc-
tion offers some clarifying distinctions and a history that is especially
relevant to appreciating Cajetan’s treatise. Even those familiar with
De Nominum Analogia and its reception may find that the introduc-
tion raises new questions about its historical significance.
As for the main body of this study, part 1 as a whole serves to
reconstruct, and show the importance of, the philosophical questions
that Cajetan intended his treatise on analogy to answer. Chapter 1
recounts the history of interpretation of De Nominum Analogia, with
concentration on twentieth-century debates, revealing that the di-
versity of positions can be understood as constituting an established
“paradigm” that expects De Nominum Analogia to offer a generally
“Thomistic” theory of analogy. The debates within this received para-
digm of interpretation are shown to lead to a variety of anomalies,
failing to account for certain features of De Nominum Analogia, and
contradicting historical and textual evidence. The signs of crisis are
reinforced by the historical work of a handful of scholars—Ashworth,
Tavuzzi, and Riva—who help to show that Cajetan’s treatise needs
to be read as part of ongoing theoretical developments, and cannot be
evaluated simply as an attempt to systematize Aquinas.
Therefore chapter 2 introduces an alternative, more historically
sensitive interpretive paradigm that offers a better account of the par-
ticular questions Cajetan intended his treatise on analogy to answer.
This chapter argues, first, that the treatise belongs to the part of phi-
losophy medieval thinkers understood as logic, and can today be said
to belong more specifically to semantics; and second, that the specific
semantic questions the treatise aims to answer were those raised by
Scotus’s arguments against analogy. The evidence of the text and of
its historical context indicates further that there were principally two
xviii — Preface

semantic questions about analogy that Cajetan was trying to answer:

How is a mean between equivocation and univocation possible? And,
if analogy is a species of equivocation, how can analogical terms avoid
causing the fallacy of equivocation?
Since these are questions that can be answered only by an analy-
sis of the semantics of analogical signification, chapter 3 addresses
the arguments leveled by several scholars to the effect that such a
semantic analysis is inappropriate. One version of this critique has
origins in Gilson’s claim that attention to concepts is Scotistic rather
than Thomistic; another argues more generally that semantic analysis
necessarily reduces analogy to univocity. Replies to these criticisms
require attention to Cajetan’s understanding of a “concept,” and to
his sensitivity, in theory and in practice, to hermeneutic complexity.
Chapter 4 turns from the appropriateness to the urgency of
Cajetan’s semantic questions, arguing that Cajetan would not have
been able to find explicit answers to his questions in the writings of
Aquinas. The chapter reviews various claims made by Aquinas about
analogy, arguing that none of them provides adequate semantic detail
to address Cajetan’s concerns. Finally, this chapter reconstructs the
three views about the unity of analogical concepts alluded to and dis-
missed in the first paragraph of De Nominum Analogia: “disjunction,”
“order,” and “unequal participation.” None of these, it is shown, is
sufficient to address the two semantic questions about analogy that
Cajetan set out to answer.
The exposition of Cajetan’s answers to these questions and the
philosophical consideration of their success is the business of part 2.
Drawing on several other of Cajetan’s works—his commentaries
on Porphyry’s Isagoge, Aristotle’s Categories, and Aquinas’s De Ente
et Essentia and Summa Theologiae—chapter 5 offers a sketch of the
semantic principles that form the general framework within which
Cajetan addresses analogy. Special attention is paid to the notion of
signification and the related notions conceptus and ratio, and to de-
nomination and Cajetan’s distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic
denomination.
Chapter 6 expounds the teachings of the first two chapters of De
Nominum Analogia. It covers Cajetan’s distinction between modes of
analogy, discusses analogy of inequality and analogy of attribution,
 Preface — xix

and compares the presentation in De Nominum Analogia to Cajetan’s

earlier treatments of analogy in his commentaries on Aquinas’s De
Ente et Essentia and Aristotle’s Categories. The chapter responds to
common criticisms of the notion of analogy of inequality and to the
Suarezian objection to Cajetan’s teaching that analogy of attribution
never involves intrinsic denomination, and it argues that Cajetan has
properly semantic reasons for dismissing inequality and attribution
as less than proper forms of analogy.
De Nominum Analogia 3 defines analogy of proportionality and
argues that it is the most proper form of analogy. Chapter 7 of this
study explains Cajetan’s arguments and articulates his notion of pro-
portional unity, responding to common objections that proportional
unity is circular and that it is meaningless, and explaining why analogy
of proportionality cannot be reduced to univocation or equivocation.
Chapters 8 and 9 take up the analysis of proportionality in the
oft-neglected final eight chapters of De Nominum Analogia (chaps.
4–11), which work out the implications of proportionally unified
concepts through all three traditional areas of scholastic logic: simple
apprehension, complex judgment, and discursive reasoning. Chap-
ter 8 explains Cajetan’s account of analogical concept formation and
use, and takes up, among other things, the distinction between per-
fect and imperfect concepts; abstraction and “confusion”; predica-
tion and nonunivocal universality; definition, and the significations
of relations. Chapter 9 treats analogy in discursive reasoning and the
avoidance of fallacy.

— The term ‘analogy’ justly evokes several interconnected

concerns, but the scope of the current study does not directly encom-
pass analogy under some of the rubrics most commonly found in
medieval and Thomistic literature. One is the metaphysics of being
and its various categories, hinted at by Aristotle’s famous dictum that
“being is said in many ways,” and later captured in a Latin phrase:
analogia entis (the analogy of being). There is also the theological con-
cern, about how human language and thought can stretch beyond
the creaturely domain so that we can have and signify meaningful
conceptions of God. And related to both of these is the traditional
xx — Preface

doctrine that such notions as truth and goodness are “convertible”

with being, and therefore, transcending the highest genera, they are
universal without themselves being generic or univocal. However
much light the present study might incidentially shed on these
topics—the analogy of being, divine naming, and the transcenden-
tals—they are not and cannot be the primary concern here.
However, it is hoped that this historical and textual study of a
treatise on the semantics of analogy will draw readers whose inter-
est in analogy is rooted in these related metaphysical and theological
topics. This is not only because Cajetan’s treatise is the most influen-
tial treatise on analogy, whose teachings have already colored debates
in these areas. Nor is it just because, as I argue, Cajetan’s teachings
have been almost universally misinterpreted. Rather it is because,
once interpreted in light of their intended theoretical import, their
continuing philosophical relevance can be appreciated. The foreseen
audience for this study, then, is not just Thomist scholars—although
much of part 1 aims to challenge some standard Thomistic preju-
dices. If the present interpretation is correct, the teaching of Cajetan,
expounded in part 2, should be of interest not only to historians of
medieval philosophy and to metaphysicians and theologians, but to
contemporary philosophers of language, logic, epistemology, and sci-
ence, as well as hermeneutics.
Communication and interpretation must attend to the rational
flexibility of terms and concepts, and as Gadamer has reminded us,
any decent logical theory must accommodate the “fundamental meta-
phorical nature” of “verbal consciousness.” Cajetan’s central concern
is to show that the traditional Aristotelian semantic triangle can ac-
commodate the extraordinary case of analogical language—or, rather,
that the case of analogical language is not so extraordinary after all.
As Cajetan saw, analogical signification is ubiquitous in human dis-
course, not just in metaphysics and theology, and the Aristotelian se-
mantic framework, far from being “a theory of logic that is alien to
language,” provides rich resources for accounting for it.
Introduction
Some Theoretical and Historical Preliminaries

This introduction is intended to orient those readers who may not

already be familiar with discussions of the history of analogy and the
place of Cajetan’s treatise within that history. It first presents a brief
overview of some of the key concepts covered by the term ‘analogy,’
not in specific matters of theology or metaphysics, but in considera-
tions of language, logic, and judgment about the world. It then gives
an abbreviated history of thought about analogy before Cajetan,
and outlines the central claims for which Cajetan’s treatise has been
known.

P reliminary Concepts: Nongener ic Likeness

a n d Associated Meaning

We must recognize at the beginning that it would be misleading to

speak of “the” concept of analogy. What philosophers have come to
treat under the aegis of “analogy” has no single stable meaning. Al-
though an identifiable, coherent stream of philosophizing eventually
emerges, it begins, historically and conceptually, from two distinct
and quite separate tributaries.
The first is a matter of relationships between things. Consider
two things that seem to be similar, although the respect in which they
— 1
2 — Introduction

are similar is difficult to characterize or define. So, for instance, the

items in the following pairs seem to be similar:

1. The feathers of a bird and the scales of a reptile

2. Water for a fish and air for a mammal
3. The sole of a foot and the palm of a hand

In each of these cases, the comparison is apparent, although perhaps

difficult to characterize. Indeed, a definition of the basis of compari-
son may be somewhat awkward, vague, or even elusive. Awkward:
feathers and scales are both kinds of flat, overlapping skin coverings.
Vague: water and air are the appropriate oxygenating environments
for fish and mammals, respectively. Elusive: the sole is the bottom of
the foot, but the palm is not the bottom of a hand; we might call the
palm the inside of the hand, but not the sole the inside of the foot.
But it is interesting that the relevant likeness is easily seen even if
we don’t have a readily available word or description for it. There is
a functional similarity, not a precise equality: we do not say that the
sole and the palm are the same, or that they have the same property,
but that the sole is to the foot as the palm is to the hand. It is easier
to describe these likenesses in terms of comparisons of relationships
than in terms of some univocal features or common qualities equally
realized in them. Feathers are like scales insofar as they each play a
similar role for birds and reptiles respectively. Water is like air insofar
as they each play a similar function in relation to different respective
creatures. Let us call cases like these occasions of nongeneric likeness.
Now consider another phenomenon, this one not so much a mat-
ter of how things are related, but of how words are used. We often
use the same word on different occasions, where the meaning implied
by one use is close, but not identical, to the meaning implied by an-
other use. For examples, consider the italicized words in the follow-
ing pairs of statements:

4. Socrates is wise; Socrates’ advice is wise

5. This is a commercial transaction; this is commercial real estate
6. I saw the moment of impact; the impact of the policy was increased
productivity
 Introduction — 3

At first one might not notice that the italicized words in each
pair have different meanings. These are not cases where the words
play different grammatical functions. (‘Commercial’ can be used as
a noun, but it is an adjective in both statements above; ‘impact’ is
sometimes employed as a verb, but it serves as a noun in both state-
ments above.) And yet, on reflection, it is clear that a definition of-
fered to account for one use might not fit the other use. Socrates and
his advice are not “wise” in the same way: presumably Socrates has
wisdom whereas his advice is either evidence of his wisdom or is likely
to produce wisdom in one who follows it. The word ‘commercial’ as
an adjective can describe what is an instance of, or an instrument of
(or a product of, etc.), the activity of commerce. The noun ‘impact’
can designate either the act of producing an effect, or the effect itself.
(Here I set aside what may be a further issue of trying to analyze any
differences between a literal physical impact, when one body strikes
another, and a more metaphorical impact when something other than
a physical body—a policy or ideology—has consequences for some-
thing else.) In other words, we don’t have strict synonymy here. On
the other hand, we also don’t have arbitrary equivocation, with un-
related meanings that just happen to be attached to the same verbal
expression (as the case of ‘bank,’ which can mean the side of a river,
or a financial institution). This kind of linguistic flexibility—with
distinct but related senses of the same term—is fairly common. The
dictionary is full of definitions that begin with such phrases as “of
or pertaining to.” Such a definition indicates that there are really
several related meanings, meanings which do not make the word
fully equivocal, and yet may be distinct enough to be spelled out with
more precision, at least in principle. Let us call cases like these occa-
sions of associated meaning.
Although conceptually distinct, occasions of nongeneric likeness
and occasions of associated meaning may overlap: we may choose a
common word to describe the likenesses between things. Noticing
two things that are somehow similar (nongeneric likeness), we may
use a word originally appropriate to one in connection with the other
(associated meaning): “he shoveled food into his mouth”; “the sun
kissed his face.” This certainly describes what happens in instances of
metaphor, whether in deliberately contrived poetic metaphors or in
4 — Introduction

those established and conventional metaphors that are often not even
recognized as metaphors in everyday speech.1
Nonetheless, associated meaning and nongeneric likeness remain
theoretically distinct phenomena. One may have cases of associated
meaning that are not based on nongeneric likeness (Socrates and his
advice are both wise, but not because the advice is like Socrates in
some way). And one may notice nongeneric likeness without having
a common word available to signify the relevant associated meanings
(like the sole of the foot and the palm of the hand—very few people
would know, much less find a suitable nonpedantic occasion, to refer
to them both as “volar surfaces”).

A Very Brief History of Anal ogy f rom Aristotle

to Aqu inas

If we try to reconstruct a history of analogy as a general theme in

ancient and medieval thought, we find that the distinction between
these two phenomena—what I am calling associated meaning and
nongeneric likeness—was noticed, even taken for granted, from the
very beginning.2 They were often treated separately and under differ-
ent terminology—and each became connected with other terminol-
ogy, sometimes diverging, sometimes intertwining, so that it is only
very loosely that we can speak of the history of the notion of analogy.
In Aristotle’s writings, the phenomena of associated meaning
and nongeneric likeness remain distinct,3 so much so that a study
of his treatment of one need hardly touch on his treatment of the
other.4 For Aristotle, associated meaning was treated in the context
of, and usually as a subclass of, homonymy or equivocation. His clas-
sic example is ‘healthy,’ which cannot be entirely synonymous when
predicated of an animal, its complexion, and its urine. It is a kind of
equivocation where the different meanings make reference to some
one common or primary meaning. So the phenomenon of associated
meaning is treated by Aristotle as a case of things being named, or of
a word being said, with reference to one (qsap< f_ o mfhftrbj
( ),5 today
commonly called “pros hen equivocation,”6 or what some more recent
philosophers have called signification with “focal meaning.”7
 Introduction — 5

We can see how, in the examples of associated meaning above, the

definitions offered to explain each use of the term would be different,
but related to a common meaning. The meaning of ‘wise’ as predi-
cated of advice would, when fully articulated, make reference to the
wisdom of a person called “wise.” (Presumably “wise” advice is the
kind of advice that would come from a wise person, or it advises one
to do the kind of thing that a wise person would do.) Different senses of
‘commercial’ would all bear some relation to (or “make reference to”)
commercial activity. Different senses of ‘impact’ would relate or refer
in different ways to the production of an effect.
The Greek word analogia was reserved, for Aristotle as well as
other Greek thinkers, for the phenomenon of nongeneric likeness.8
Analogia was originally a mathematical term for the comparison of
ratios. It is captured in the familiar schema A:B::C:D (A is to B as C is
to D). While originally describing quantitative comparisons,9 the no-
tion of analogia and its four-term schema was easily extended to areas
of reflection that are not strictly mathematical.10 Aristotle himself de-
scribes this schema in nonmathematical contexts (e.g., at Topics 108a),
and examples of nongeneric likeness introduced above can readily be
expressed in it:

7. Feathers:bird::scales:reptile
8. Water:fish::air:mammal
9. Sole:foot::palm:hand

Aristotle uses this first example himself (Historia Animalium 486b).

Another Aristotelian example of what we recognize as like by analo-
gia is the bone of an animal, the pounce (i.e., cuttle) of a squid, and the
spine of a fish; in Greek these three organs did not share a name, “al-
though these too possess common properties as if there were a single
osseous nature” (Posterior Analytics 2.14 [98a20ff.]; cf. On the Parts of
Animals 1.4 [644b11] and 2.6 [652a2–3]).
Aristotle’s point here cannot be that analogia involves the same
word being used in different ways, but that it involves things hav-
ing similar relations to, or functions within, their respective con-
texts. Likewise, in the Poetics, analogia describes the relationships
between things named metaphorically (1457b6ff.). Analogia is a kind
6 — Introduction

of likeness or nongeneric commonality. Not surprisingly, then, it

plays a significant role in Aristotle’s biology and natural philosophy,
where new things are analyzed by comparing them to similar things
already known (like an organ in one creature that seems to have a
function similar to that of a different organ in a different creature).
Significantly, analogia appears in the Metaphysics, not when Aristotle
says that ‘being’ is said in many ways, but when he classifies different
kinds of unity; unity by analogia is listed after numerical, specific, and
generic unity (Metaphysics 5.6, 1016b31–1017a3). Clearly for Aristotle,
the phenomena of associated meaning and of nongeneric likeness
should not be confused.
Even when Aristotle mentions both analogia and pros hen equivo-
cation in the same context, it appears that his purpose is to contrast
them: in the Ethics I.4 (1096b27–28) he asks how we should under-
stand the relationship of the different senses of ‘good,’ and two of
the choices are that the different senses are common “pros hen” (with
reference to some one common or primary thing) or by analogia (not
sharing a common genus), apparently assuming that these are alter-
natives. So for Aristotle, even if the relationship of analogia can be
used to explain one of the ways in which a term may be said of many
things, the issues of nongeneric likeness and of associated meaning
remain distinct for him.
This is not the place to explore in detail all that Aristotle had to
say about analogia and pros hen equivocation. Suffice it to say that, if
for Aristotle they were consistently treated as distinct phenomena, the
subsequent history of “the” notion of analogy brings them together
in an increasing entanglement. Not that this entanglement implies
confusion or error. As we have already noticed, there are possible in-
stances of natural overlap between these two issues, and it is only to be
expected that these conceptual possibilities are explored.
One essential part of this history is the tradition of Neoplatonic
Aristotelian commentary. Here, especially in the context of commen-
taries on the Categories, commentators expanded on Aristotle’s sparse
remarks on equivocation to account for associated meaning or “de-
liberate equivocation.” They furthermore often distinguished differ-
ent varieties of such deliberate equivocation.11 Consistent with what
was implicit in Aristotle’s comments in the Ethics, certain kinds of
deliberate equivocation were supposed to take place because of some
 Introduction — 7

relation to something common or primary, and another kind of delib-

erate equivocation was according to Greek analogia. In other words,
nongeneric likeness was used to differentiate some cases of associated
meaning from others.
Another cause of the increasing entanglement of associated
meaning and nongeneric likeness has to do with peculiarities of
sources and translation. Here a pivotal figure, in this as in so many
other instances of the Latin transmission of Greek ideas, is Boethius.
Boethius helped to transmit the Neoplatonic commentary tradition,
which came to treat analogia as something that describes a kind of
equivocation. So, in his commentary on Aristotle’s Categories, Bo-
ethius first distinguishes equivocation that is accidental or by chance
(a casu) from equivocation that is deliberate or intentional (a consilio).
He then lists several ways that the different meanings in deliberate
equivocation can be related. Among them are equivocation by rela-
tion to one (ad unum, translating Greek pros hen), which is distinct
from equivocation by “proportion” (where Latin ‘proportio’ had the
sense of Greek analogia).12 Thereby Boethius transmits the Greek
Neoplatonic tradition’s distinction between deliberate equivocation
by proportion and deliberate equivocation by focal reference.
In this respect Boethius is only passing on distinctions found in
influential Greek commentators like Simplicius and Porphyry. But
in another respect Boethius’s treatment of analogy adds something to
the tradition. Boethius was not always satisfied to translate analogia
as proportio, and he sometimes used another term we credit him with
coining. Note that Greek analogia, when it was not transliterated, was
not precisely translated by Latin proportio, because proportio was also
sometimes a translation, along with ratio, for Greek logos. So to recap-
ture the special sense of a relation among relations, Boethius used the
abstract of proportio, proportionalitas (proportionality), to characterize
the technical mathematical sense of Greek analogia.13
It is worth noting that even in the strictly mathematical context
of Boethius’s De Arithmetica, proportionalitas exhibits some degree of
flexibility. Most generally, it seems to express any kind of common
relationship. Today we are in the habit of interpreting each side of a
geometric proportionality as a function for calculating a quotient, and
so we reduce the relationship between each function to equality. Thus
6:3::8:4 becomes 6/3 = 8/4 [= 2]. For Boethius, however, proportionality
8 — Introduction

is not an equation to be solved so much as an expression of a common

relation. “Proportionality is a similar relationship of two or more ra-
tios” (De Arithmetica 2.40). That is why it was useful for characteriz-
ing incommensurable relationships, which have no whole number or
even rational number equivalent, and why often the proportionality
scheme was used not so much to calculate a fourth term, given three
others, as to exhibit a kind of relationship, given all four terms. (Al-
ternatively, given the relationship, and two terms X and Z, the task
may be to find the “proportional mean” between them—that is, the
one number Y, such that X:Y::Y:Z.) But different kinds of relation-
ships can be exhibited, and so different means between the same two
numbers can be offered depending on the intended relationship or
proportionality: so between 10 and 40, 25 is the arithmetic mean, 20
is the geometric mean, and 16 is the harmonic mean.14 Nonetheless,
for Boethius a geometric proportion is most properly called propor-
tionality (De Arithmetica 2.44), and it seems to be the best model for
nonquantitative proportionalities or analogies, such as sole is to foot as
palm is to hand.
By coining a new term, proportionalitas, to translate Greek ana-
logia (instead of simply transliterating it), Boethius only encouraged
a subtle migration of the Latin term analogia, so that for most scho-
lastics analogia comes to be used to describe not the phenomenon of
nongeneric likeness, but the phenomenon of associated meaning,
still commonly discussed in the context of homonyms or equivocals
in Categories commentaries. Latin analogia thus becomes a mean be-
tween univocation and pure equivocation, a deliberate or intentional
equivocation—thus for many later Latin authors it is effectively syn-
onymous with what Aristotle called pros hen equivocation, not with
what he called analogia.
Thanks to the ongoing influence of the commentary tradition,
including especially Arabic sources, by the middle of the thirteenth
century Latin analogia comes to be linked to other terms used to de-
scribe associated meaning: convenientia (or agreement), ambiguitas,
translatio (transference of a name from one context to another), and
transsumptio (another term for metaphor). Latin translations of Arabic
Aristotelian commentators also introduce the notion of ordered or
prioritized ambiguity, which Avicenna, for instance, understood as
predication or signification per prius et posterius, loosely, “according
 Introduction — 9

to an order of priority and posteriority.”15 In all of these instances,

the emphasis is on associated meanings of words rather than on pro-
portional relationships between things. Analogia for early and high
scholastic thinkers was primarily a linguistic phenomenon, deliberate
equivocation, taken to be a mean between univocation and pure (ar-
bitrary) equivocation, and thus thought to involve diverse but related
meanings exhibiting some order of priority among themselves.
In tracing the history of reflection on associated meaning and
nongeneric likeness, then, we see the convergence, or what I have
called the entanglement, of these two threads. Whether, in general
or in particular authors, this convergence or entanglement involves
a strengthening resonance or a murky confusion is not the question
here. Suffice it to say that the two threads become increasingly inter-
twined by the thirteenth century, when they joined other theological,
logical, and metaphysical terminology (such as participatio and imita-
tio). Even so, the two issues remain logically distinguishable, so that
in Bonaventure, for instance, it is still possible and quite illuminat-
ing to study his understanding of resemblance (including nongeneric
likeness) separately from his theory of analogous naming (that is, as-
sociated meaning).16
Indeed, while Latin analogia comes to be almost synonymous
with what Aristotle called pros hen equivocation, the Greek notion of
analogia, or Boethian proportionalitas, as a fundamental insight about
relationships between things, retains a wide significance across the
disciplines. It is the basis of continuing reflections in mathematics,
music, astronomy, architecture, and the physical sciences.17 There
was even a complicated board game, influential in medieval arts edu-
cation, based on the notion of proportionality as taught in Boethius’s
De Arithmetica, with implicit links to the idea of virtue as a (propor-
tional) mean.18
To be sure, for historians of philosophy nothing compares to the
weight borne by this relationship in the fields of metaphysics and the-
ology. In Aquinas especially, “analogy”—both as associated meaning
and as nongeneric likeness—is a crucial concept for understanding
the different senses of being, and the possibility of true predications of
and knowledge about God.19 Even here, however, the concern is not
purely metaphysical or theological, but rather a nexus of metaphysi-
cal, epistemological, and semantic, logical or linguistic issues. It seems
10 — Introduction

clear that Aquinas, like most other scholastics, used analogia primarily
for cases of associated meaning, rather than for nongeneric likeness;
but by the thirteenth century, as we have seen, many relations between
these concerns have been explored and they are not always carefully
distinguished. Thus one of the ongoing debates among scholars of
Aquinas is whether analogy for him should be considered primarily a
metaphysical question (of how things are related), an epistemological
question (of how we know and judge things in relation to each other),
or a logical question (of how different senses of terms are related to
each other).20
This is not the place to try to enter into this disputed territory or
summarize Aquinas’s teaching about analogy. In the present context,
nothing could do justice to the various primary texts and vast second-
ary literature on the subject. We will limit ourselves to noting that, in
addition to the importance of analogy for Thomistic metaphysics and
theology, there is another major reason that so much has been writ-
ten and continues to be written about analogy in Aquinas: Aquinas
himself never presented a systematic theory of analogy.
It has often been noted that there is no ex professo teaching on
analogy in Aquinas’s corpus. We would notice this just from reading
his texts, where the mentions of analogy are occasional and ad hoc.
There is no dedicated treatise or section of a treatise, no systematically
elaborated doctrine of analogy, and the longest discussions of it are
still tailored to address particular questions in theology. It seems that
Aquinas never wrote comprehensively about analogy as a topic in its
own right. Even passages that present apparently definitive classifica-
tions or explanations seem to be contradicted by other texts.21 It is the
absence of a clear theory or doctrine of analogy in Aquinas, as much
as the obvious importance of analogy in his thought, that accounts for
the extensive reflection on analogy by his later interpreters.

Th e Doctrine of Cajetan’s D e N o min um A n al o gia

The lack of an ex professo analogy doctrine in Aquinas also brings into

stark relief the content of Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia. For when
we turn to Cajetan’s text we find something that, in style and format,
 Introduction — 11

seems quite different from any writing of Aquinas: a dedicated trea-

tise that articulates a systematic theoretical classification and explana-
tion of analogy.
Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia is a treatise of eleven chapters.
It begins by invoking the significance of analogy in metaphysics, al-
luding to common confusions about analogy, and proposing to clarify
these confusions.
The text’s main teaching of analogy, introduced in the first
chapter, is that it occurs in three forms or “modes” (modi, DNA §3).
Analogy of inequality, Cajetan says, occurs when things are called by
a common name and concept, but the concept is shared or partici-
pated in unequally (DNA §4). The example he gives is “body,” which
is predicated equally (univocally) of all bodies, although there is an
order of superiority and inferiority among bodies (a plant is superior
to a stone, incorruptible bodies are superior to corruptible bodies).
The second mode of analogy Cajetan identifies is analogy of at-
tribution, where the common name is used with different relations to
some one term (DNA §8). His first example here is the classic one of
“healthy,” which, depending on whether it is predicated of an animal,
of urine, or of medicine, can signify what is subject of, or sign of, or
cause of health.
In the third mode of analogy, analogy of proportionality, Cajetan
says the different notions are related proportionally—that is, accord-
ing to the scheme that Greeks called analogia and Boethius called pro-
portionalitas (DNA §§23–24). The example here is seeing as predicated
of the eye and the intellect, because “just as understanding exhibits a
thing to the soul, so seeing [exhibits a thing] to an animated body.”
The point is that something can be named in common with another
thing that is in a similar relationship. Cajetan says that sometimes
this takes the form of metaphor, when the transferred word does not
properly belong in the new context: for example, a field doesn’t really
“smile,” although its blooming might brighten it as a smile bright-
ens a face (DNA §25). Other times, analogy of proportionality is not
merely metaphoric, but is a case of proper proportionality, when the
name properly belongs not only in its original context but also in that
context to which it has been transferred (DNA §26): vision is really in
the body, and understanding is really in the intellect, so the intellect
12 — Introduction

can be said properly to see, by analogy with the sense in which the
eye sees.
Cajetan’s treatise goes on to describe different features of these
modes of analogy, among which is that analogy of proper proportion-
ality is distinguished from both metaphor and from analogy of attri-
bution because it always signifies what is intrinsic: intellectual sight is
really in the intellect, while a smile is not really in the field and health
is not really in the urine (DNA §27). At least in part because it always
thus involves “intrinsic denomination,” as opposed to the extrinsic
denomination that occurs in analogy of attribution (and metaphor),
Cajetan insists that analogy of proper proportionality is the most true
and proper form of analogy, and the most important for metaphysics
(DNA §29). Presumably it is for this reason that the rest of Cajetan’s
treatise (chaps. 4–11, or §§31–125) examine further details of analogy
of proportionality.
These, then, in superficial summary, are the signature teachings
of Cajetan’s analogy treatise: a threefold division of analogy, and a
hierarchy ranking analogy of proportionality, with its essentially in-
trinsic denomination, as the most genuine form of analogy. As we
will see in chapter 1, there are significant and sometimes contentious
issues involved here that have drawn the attention of Cajetan’s inter-
preters. The interpretation of Cajetan’s analogy theory offered in the
body of this study emerges from, and is presented within the context
of, some of the established arguments of Cajetan’s previous interpret-
ers. But even without any prior awareness of recent hermeneutic con-
troversies, the sketch of Cajetan’s teaching offered here should raise
several questions. What is the basis of Cajetan’s threefold division?
Is it meant to be exhaustive and exclusive? What theoretical work
does Cajetan’s classification do, what problems might his distinctions
solve? Where does the theory fit into the framework of philosophy:
Logic? Metaphysics? Epistemology?
More questions emerge in light of our preliminary theoretical
distinctions. In the terminology introduced above, does Cajetan offer
a theory of nongeneric likeness, or of associated meaning, or both?
How might one be related to the other? It would seem, for instance,
as if Cajetan is using nongeneric likeness (“proportionality”) to distin-
guish one of several kinds of associated meaning (what he, following
 Introduction — 13

the Latin and not the Greek tradition, calls “analogy”). But then, does
his project differ—and if so, how?—from the earlier medieval tradi-
tion of Categories commentary, which made analogia (proportionality)
the basis of one of several kinds of associated meaning (equivocation
pros hen)? And why does Cajetan insist on a hierarchical ranking of
modes of analogy? What is the basis of his particular ranking? Why
and in what sense is “analogy of proportionality” the most proper
form of analogy? What problem might be solved by insisting on its
preeminence? Can such a hierarchical ranking of kinds of analogy be
found in the work of Aquinas? And in general, how does Cajetan’s
theory relate to Aquinas’s thought about analogy, or to the wider his-
tory of reflection about analogy?
All of these questions arise naturally when Cajetan’s main teach-
ings on analogy are outlined within the context of the general theoreti-
cal and historical overview of “analogy” offered in this introduction.
They are some of the questions that the rest of this study is intended
to address.
 Part 1

Cajetan’s Question
 Chapter One

Systematizing Aquinas?
A Paradigm in Crisis

Cajetan’s theory of analogy has hardly been neglected by modern

scholars. Its influence on all subsequent discussion of analogy has
been widely felt and recognized, by both Cajetan’s defenders and his
critics. As we will see in this chapter, however, debates about Cajetan’s
theory of analogy have taken place within a framework of common
assumptions—assumptions that, once made explicit, will allow us to
suggest an alternative, more fruitful, interpretive approach.

Cajeta n ’s R ecent Interpreters

Central to contemporary concerns is the significance of Cajetan’s clas-

sification and hierarchy of analogy: analogy of inequality, analogy of
attribution, and analogy of proportionality (in order from least to
most proper). For one group of scholars in the past century, the task
has been to argue that Cajetan’s threefold division and his preference
of analogy of proportionality accord with Aquinas’s own thought. Es-
pecially during the first half of the century, several scholars followed
and defended Cajetan’s theory of analogy as faithful to the teaching
of Aquinas. To the extent that such scholars acknowledged novelty
in Cajetan’s presentation, this was explained as the development of
a tradition, naturally growing out of a systematization of Aquinas’s
— 17
18 — Cajetan’s Question

unsystematic remarks about analogy. Thus, according to M. T.-L.

Penido, Cajetan set out to “restore the aristotelico-thomistic theory”
of analogy.1 Admitting that Thomas’s texts are not obviously con-
sonant, Penido admired Cajetan for synthesizing apparently incon-
sistent teachings.2 Similarly, Aloys Goergen defended the harmony
between Thomas and Cajetan. He argued that Cajetan developed,
expounded, and systematized Aquinas’s views. The title of Goergen’s
thesis summarizes the concern that occupied him and most other
interpreters of Cajetan at this time: Cardinal Cajetan’s teaching on
analogy and its relation to Thomas Aquinas.3
The case made by Penido and Goergen depended especially on
two texts in Aquinas. In his commentary on the first book of Sen-
tences, d. 19, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1, Aquinas says that “there are three ways
in which something can be said according to analogy,” and he goes
on to distinguish between things that are analogous (1) “according to
intention only, and not according to being”; (2) “according to being
and not according to intention”; and (3) “according to intention and
according to being.”4 Cajetan indicates (at DNA §§6, 19, and 30) that
his own threefold distinction parallels this threefold distinction in
Aquinas’s I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1.
In another text—question 2, article 11 of the disputed questions
De Veritate—Aquinas distinguishes between analogy according to an
agreement of proportion and analogy according to an agreement of
proportionality. In this text, Aquinas favors the agreement of propor-
tionality as the most useful mode of analogy for theology. Cajetan
cites this passage (at DNA §77) in support of the primacy of what he
calls analogy of proportionality.
For Penido and Goergen, Cajetan’s theory of analogy seemed
to grow out of an assimilation of I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1 and DV 2.11. It
was natural for these interpreters to depend on these two passages in
Aquinas to justify the Thomistic authenticity of the threefold divi-
sion itself, and the priority of analogy of proportionality.
Other scholars endorsed Cajetan’s teaching, especially the classifi-
cation and hierarchy of modes of analogy, but without trying to dem-
onstrate that this was also Aquinas’s own teaching. Without much
argument for its consonance with Aquinas, Garrigou-Lagrange,5 Mar-
itain,6 Phelan,7 Simon,8 and others promoted Cajetan’s classification
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 19

and hierarchy of modes of analogy. Likewise, the extensive discussions

of analogy by Anderson9 follow much of Cajetan’s teaching, articulat-
ing and defending the details of the theory without examining the
textual or historical relations between Cajetan and Aquinas.
It was thus consistent with this early twentieth-century consensus
that De Nominum Analogia’s only previous English translators, Bush-
inski and Koren, presented the work as “the unsurpassed systemati-
zation of the Aristotelian-Thomistic theory of analogy” by “a faithful
interpreter of St. Thomas” who “points out the self-consistency of St.
Thomas.”10
But when Bushinski and Koren published these words in 1953,
the tide of opinion was beginning to turn. Despite—or rather largely
because of—the longstanding influence and status of Cajetan’s theory
of analogy, a new wave of scholarship emerged that tried to separate
Cajetan’s teachings from the teachings of Aquinas. By the middle of
the twentieth century, as the search for the “aristotelico-thomistic”
tradition gave way to the search for the historical teaching of Aqui-
nas, Cajetan’s theory of analogy was immediately called into question
as another of the accretions of tradition which had obscured from
view the authentic Aquinas.
In criticizing Cajetan as a commentator of Aquinas, many
scholars focused on Cajetan’s use of the two key texts of Aquinas al-
ready mentioned (DV 2.11 and I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1). Ramirez, who three
decades earlier had contributed to the tendency to consider Cajetan
as synthesizing “the aristotelico-thomistic doctrine” of analogy,11 was
among the first to call into question the equation of Thomas’s three-
fold distinction at I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1 with Cajetan’s three modes of
analogy.12 According to Ramirez, the tradition that bases a division of
analogy on the Sentences passage “lacks a solid foundation.”13
Several other scholars argued that DV 2.11 and I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1
were not consistent; and indeed, upon examination of the relevant
texts, it became increasingly common to argue that Aquinas’s occa-
sional statements about analogy indicated changes in his views. In
his detailed collation and analysis of Aquinas’s various statements
about analogy, Klubertanz found that Aquinas abandoned his pref-
erence for proportionality after 1256–57, changing his mind after DV
2.11.14 Montagnes came to similar conclusions.15 Descoqs, following
20 — Cajetan’s Question

some older objections by Suarez (further discussed below), made

even stronger claims, saying that analogy of proportionality could not
apply in the crucial case of the analogy between God and creatures.16
Such findings were consistent with the arguments of Ham-
pus Lyttkens, one of the earliest and most influential opponents of
Cajetan’s theory. Lyttkens criticized the “Thomistic” tradition that
privileged proportionality, arguing that in Aquinas proportionality
plays a subordinate role.17 In this Lyttkens, Klubertanz, and Mon-
tagnes have been followed by many others, including Ashworth,18
Mahoney,19 Marion,20 and Masiello,21 who all agree that Cajetan re-
verses a Thomistic priority of attribution over proportionality.22
Scholars also disagreed about Cajetan’s characterization of at-
tribution and proportionality. Cajetan says that analogy of attribu-
tion always involves the extrinsic denomination of analogates, and
analogy of proportionality always involves intrinsic denomination;
thus Cajetan pairs analogy of proportionality with the analogy “se-
cundum intentionem et secundum esse” of Thomas’s I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1.
But according to Ramirez, for instance, Aquinas’s analogy “secundum
intentionem et secundum esse” should not be identified with what Ca-
jetan calls analogy of proportionality, because it can encompass an
intrinsic case of analogy of attribution.23 Ramirez’s criticism on this
point has a long pedigree. The most famous early Cajetan critic, in-
sisting on cases of intrinsic attribution, was Suarez,24 who has been
followed more recently by Descoqs.25
Another question that concerned several critics of Cajetan was
the relative emphasis on logic or metaphysics in Cajetan and Aquinas.
On the one hand, Klubertanz charged that Cajetan had emphasized
metaphysics, while he should have emphasized logic.26 Similarly, Mc-
Inerny argued that Cajetan entirely misinterpreted I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1,
and that the division of analogy found in De Nominum Analogia was
based on metaphysical considerations that are irrelevant to the kind of
properly logical consideration of analogy appropriate for Aquinas.27
On the other hand, some scholars have criticized Cajetan for
emphasizing logic too much, especially for focusing on semantic for-
malities. Many, following Gilson, have disapprovingly cited Cajetan’s
focus on concepts as evidence that he was too influenced by Scotus,
and that he has ignored the role of judgment in a genuine Thomistic
understanding of analogy.28 Probably the most developed criticism of
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 21

Cajetan on this basis is that of David Burrell, whose work rounds out
the list of major scholarly criticisms of Cajetan’s analogy theory from
the early 1950s through the early 1970s.29
In all of these criticisms, the standard of evaluating Cajetan’s
text has been clear, and has been the same as the standard used by
such defenders as Penido and Goergen: fidelity to Aquinas. Battista
Mondin is quite explicit about his criteria for judging De Nominum
Analogia. Cajetan, according to Mondin, was writing as an “inter-
preter” of Aquinas, and De Nominum Analogia, at least in intention,
“systematically explains the whole Thomistic theory of analogy.”30
Mondin speaks of “Cajetan’s interpretation of Aquinas’s doctrine of
analogy,”31 and says, “We do not have the least doubt that Cajetan
intended to give a systematic and faithful presentation of Aquinas’s
doctrine of analogy.”32 According to Mondin, this intention is entirely
reasonable, but it is not realized. “It is not Cajetan’s intentions but his
results that are unsatisfactory.”33
Montagnes also makes it clear that he regards the main standard
for evaluating De Nominum Analogia to be its conformity to Aquinas’s
own teaching.34 He outlines three possible positions on the question.
Some hold that “the accord of master and student is incontestable”;
others hold that Thomas has no explicit theory of analogy, but that
Cajetan’s theory does not accurately describe Thomas’s practice.
Montagnes takes the third position, arguing “that there is an explicit
theory in Thomas which is different from Cajetan.”35
Recently John F. Wippel has approvingly cited Lyttkens, Mon-
tagnes, Klubertanz, and McInerny as having demonstrated that Ca-
jetan’s theory is not Thomistic.36 Indeed, over the last several decades
it is increasingly remarked that the analogy studies of the last century
separated Aquinas from his “commentators,” Cajetan chief among
them.37 David Burrell writes of Lyttkens, McInerny, Klubertanz, and
Mondin that their studies “differ from the bulk of Thomist com-
mentary in their careful attention to Aquinas’ actual usage. The case
against Cajetan is documented from it.”38 Paul G. Kuntz, summariz-
ing the recent scholarship on analogy, especially that of McInerny and
Burrell, remarks that “the history of analogy has . . . been freed from
Cajetan’s dead hand, as has the logic of St. Thomas’ analogy.”39 A
prominent theologian can now refer casually, as if to a familiar phe-
nomenon and established historical event, to “the endless difficulties
22 — Cajetan’s Question

raised by the formulation after the fact of a ‘Thomistic doctrine of

analogy.’”40

Th e Received Paradigm

Because, as so often noted, there is no ex professo teaching on analogy

in Aquinas, it is natural that a treatise on analogy by a major com-
mentator should come to be treated as an interpretation of Aquinas,
and evaluated as such. Recent attempts to understand better what
Aquinas himself thought, which have led to many criticisms of Ca-
jetan, have done nothing to displace this hermeneutic assumption. In
fact, they have reinforced it. Indeed, in general, despite the genuine
opposition between defenders and critics of De Nominum Analogia
during the last century, there has been a startling number of shared
assumptions.
The recent history of interpretations of Cajetan’s analogy theory
can in fact be depicted as constituting a unified research program
in the sense that Thomas Kuhn described, in which genuine dis-
agreements, and genuine advances in inquiry, take place against the
background of a set of shared assumptions. Some of these shared as-
sumptions have already been pointed out, but it is worth enumerating
the common elements of the received paradigm of interpreting De
Nominum Analogia:

1. Cajetan was attempting to interpret or systematize,41 or even com-

ment on and summarize,42 Aquinas’s views on analogy. This assumption
seems supported by an easy inference: Cajetan knew that Aquinas
had not written systematically on the subject of analogy, and Cajetan
therefore knew that in his own systematic work he was going further
than Aquinas; since Cajetan was a Thomist, his aim in writing his
treatise on analogy must have been to impose order and coherence on
Aquinas’s own scattered remarks on analogy.

2. The most important teaching of De Nominum Analogia is its three-

fold division of analogy. What is most commonly remembered about
Cajetan’s theory of analogy is the threefold distinction between kinds
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 23

or modes of analogy. Cajetan himself emphasizes this distinction

from the beginning, and his first three chapters address each mode in
turn. Most scholars have implicitly or explicitly maintained that this
threefold division is the central and distinctive feature of Cajetan’s
theory of analogy. Indeed, reviews of Cajetan’s theory tend to focus
on the first three chapters of De Nominum Analogia, in which each of
these three modes is described in turn.43

3. Cajetan based his threefold classification on Aquinas’s I Sent. 19.5.2

ad 1.44 As we noted already, Cajetan refers to this passage and its lan-
guage in De Nominum Analogia, claiming that each of his three kinds
of analogy pairs up with a different member of Aquinas’s distinction.
It has been concluded that this passage in Aquinas is the basis—both
the inspiration and the justification—of Cajetan’s threefold division.
Indeed, Cajetan’s defenders claim this in support of Cajetan’s fidelity
to Aquinas, while Cajetan’s critics accept that Cajetan was inspired
by I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1 and point to evidence that Cajetan misinter-
preted, or misapplied, Aquinas’s distinction.

4. Cajetan based his preference for analogy of proportionality on Aqui-

nas’s DV 2.11.45 Again, Cajetan refers to this passage as textual support
for the priority of analogy of proportionality over analogy of attribu-
tion. Scholars have therefore treated DV 2.11 as the inspiration for
Cajetan’s ranking, and critics have faulted Cajetan for misinterpret-
ing the text or failing to appreciate how it differs from other texts in
Aquinas.

5. Cajetan distinguishes analogy of attribution and analogy of propor-

tionality in terms of metaphysical differences in the things named by
analogical terms. Cajetan says that analogy of attribution always in-
volves “extrinsic denomination,” and that analogy of proportionality
always involves “intrinsic denomination.”46 Although phrased in
logical or semantic terminology, this has been seen as an ingenious
(or, alternatively, as a fallacious) way of connecting his discussion of
analogy to metaphysical concerns, namely, whether or not the ratio or
form signified by a term really inheres in the thing it names. Accord-
ingly, Cajetan’s interpreters have also tended to conclude that:
24 — Cajetan’s Question

6. Cajetan prefers analogy of proportionality because of its metaphysical

characteristics.47 Cajetan’s clear preference for analogy of proportion-
ality as the most “proper and true” mode of analogy is taken to be
based on his position that analogy of proportionality always involves
intrinsic denomination. In other words, scholars find that Cajetan
prefers proportionality precisely because in this mode the analogous
property or “form” really inheres in each of the things named by that
term.48

Textua l A n om alies

The necessity of approaching Cajetan afresh can best be brought out

by pointing to certain observations that are not obviously or automat-
ically accounted for in the received paradigm just outlined in the six
points above. We may start by pointing out a slight tension between
Cajetan’s supposed dependence on Aquinas (points 1, 3, and 4 above)
and the supposed originality in his threefold division, implied in
point 2. But one may make other and more significant observations.
These can be catalogued in such a way that they correspond roughly
to the points of the received paradigm with which they are in tension
(although sometimes these individual observations pose a difficulty
for the established paradigm in more than one way):

1.* Cajetan’s treatise is not presented as an interpretation, systematiza-

tion, or summary of Aquinas’s views on analogy. Cajetan certainly knew
how to write commentaries, and this is not one. And even as a text
presenting his own thought, it does not give indication of being pri-
marily intended as an interpretation or systematization of Aquinas.
Aquinas is mentioned, as are others—chiefly Aristotle and Averroës.
In all cases, Cajetan appears to be showing (in a rather Thomistic
way) how what other people said is consistent with, or can somehow
be accounted for in, his own theory. But the undeniable impression
one gets from Cajetan’s text is that he is presenting his own teaching.
Indeed, at least one scholar has tried to account for this fact in the old
paradigm by criticizing Cajetan for giving his own views: thus Robert
Meagher complains that “Cajetan’s own independent thought and
writing intrudes itself between exegete and text.”49
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 25

2.* Cajetan had already presented the threefold division three years ear-
lier in his commentary on Aquinas’s De Ente et Essentia. In that com-
mentary, Cajetan speaks first of the sense in which univocal terms
can be said “per prius et posterius” (§18). He then speaks of two more
genuine kinds of analogy, one in which something is said “according
to a determinate relation of one to another” (secundum determinatam
habitudinem unius ad alterum) and another in which something is said
“according to proportionality” (secundum proportionalitatem, §21). It
is clear from Cajetan’s discussion that he is talking about what in De
Nominum Analogia he calls respectively analogy of inequality, analogy
of attribution, and analogy of proportionality.50 But if Cajetan had
articulated this threefold distinction in 1495, can it really be the main
theoretical contribution of his separate treatise on analogy in 1498?

3.* Cajetan does not mention the passage from Aquinas’s Sentences com-
mentary until after presenting his divisions in De Nominum Analogia,
and he does not mention Aquinas’s text at all in his commentary on De
Ente et Essentia. Cajetan cites Aristotle and Averroes in support of
his division, not just Aquinas. But more importantly, he gives argu-
ments, philosophical reasons, for classifying analogy as he does. In the
De Ente et Essentia commentary, Cajetan offers his threefold division
of analogy without mentioning Aquinas’s Sentences text at all. And
in De Nominum Analogia, Cajetan does not cite the Sentences text as
the “basis” of his classification, but rather notes, after the fact, that his
classification is consistent with the Sentences text. Of course, it is hard
to prove the negative position that Cajetan did not base his division on
the Sentences text; but the evidence available just does not support the
widespread contention that Aquinas’s texts are the basis of Cajetan’s
division. Given that a number of Cajetan’s predecessors cited I Sent.
19.5.2 ad 1 in their own discussions of analogy, it is just as reasonable
to conclude that Cajetan was trying to accommodate a text that tradi-
tion had already deemed important.51

4.* Cajetan offers independent reasons for preferring analogy of propor-

tionality, and Aquinas’s DV 2.11 seems to bear little weight here. Cajetan
offers extensive argument for why analogy of proportionality is the
most proper form of analogy, and in addition to his purely theoreti-
cal reasons, he gives historical and etymological support (in Greek
26 — Cajetan’s Question

etymology and the authority of Aristotle and Averroës). Indeed, his

reference to DV 2.11 comes relatively late in his treatise (§77), well
after he has established the priority of proportionality, and later than
one would expect if it were in fact its “basis.”52

5.* Cajetan does not define the two genuine modes of analogy in terms of
extrinsic or intrinsic denomination. Cajetan gives carefully formulated
definitions of each of his three modes of analogy. These definitions
parallel the definitions of univocation and equivocation in Aristotle’s
Categories; they do not include a mention of extrinsic and intrinsic
denomination, which are mentioned only as characteristics or con-
ditions (conditiones) that follow from these definitions. (More is said
about this below in chap. 6.)

6.* Cajetan is clear that he intends to analyze analogy as a logician, not

as a metaphysician. The first and most obvious piece of evidence sup-
porting this claim is the title of Cajetan’s treatise: De Nominum Ana-
logia, “On the Analogy of Names.” But there is more, and in fact the
evidence for Cajetan’s logical, as opposed to metaphysical, intention
is overwhelming. Nonetheless, because this is still a somewhat con-
troversial claim, contradicted by several interpreters of Cajetan, more
will be said in its defense later in this chapter and in chapter 2.

— How should this set of observations affect the inter-

pretation of De Nominum Analogia? One strategy is accommodation:
treating these six points as problems to be solved within the received
paradigm of interpretation—that is (to continue applying Kuhn’s lan-
guage), one may treat these as “puzzles” to be handled by the “normal
science” of the established research program.
In general, to the extent that any of these observations have
been acknowledged, this has been the dominant strategy, especially
among Cajetan’s recent critics, who take these observations as evi-
dence that Cajetan’s theory of analogy is inconsistent, incoherent,
and flawed. Indeed, critics have faulted Cajetan not only for articu-
lating his own views about analogy, but also for trying to separate
logical from metaphysical concerns. Commentators have also faulted
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 27

Cajetan’s treatment of analogy for, among other things, focusing on

“concepts”;53 being too selective in choosing passages from Aquinas;
and attending to differences between Latin and Greek meanings of
terms, especially following Aristotle’s usage rather than Aquinas’s on
the meaning of the term “analogia.”54
All such criticisms stem from a desire to accommodate this sec-
ond list of observations within the received paradigm of interpreta-
tion represented by the first list of assumptions—desperate attempts,
as it were, to preserve that paradigm, in the light of phenomena that
do not fit well with it. But there is another possible interpretive re-
sponse. These observations can be understood, not as mere puzzles to
be solved within the received paradigm, but as genuine anomalies, sig-
naling the crisis of an exhausted paradigm, and pointing to the need
for a new paradigm in interpreting Cajetan’s teachings on analogy.
The received paradigm, consisting of both defenders and critics
of Cajetan, grew up around a shared assumption about what question
it was that Cajetan hoped his treatise would answer. Until recently,
readers of Cajetan’s treatise on analogy have all assumed that it was
meant to answer some such question as: What is a Thomistic theory of
analogy? Or What is Aquinas’s own teaching on analogy? Or How can
order be imposed on Aquinas’s scattered remarks about analogy?
The first of these is too general a question to prompt the kind
of treatise Cajetan wrote. The second question is more specific, but
implies that Cajetan was writing a commentary or gloss, which is
not suggested by the form or tone of his work. Though Cajetan does
mention Thomas’s works, they are cited as corroborating Cajetan’s
teaching, not as clues to Aquinas’s teaching. Cajetan’s manner of citing
Aquinas thus also does not suggest the third question.
Some authors have assumed that the question Cajetan’s text
answers is: What is the genuine metaphysical analogy?55 The textual
evidence that this was Cajetan’s own question is thin. Cajetan does
emphasize that analogy is important for an understanding of meta-
physics, and that metaphysics is one of the most important (though
certainly not the only) areas where analogy is applied.56 For many
interpreters, Cajetan’s discussion of extrinsic and intrinsic denomina-
tion is a discussion of the metaphysical implications of the different
modes of analogy.57 But Cajetan does not say that he is searching for
28 — Cajetan’s Question

the true metaphysical analogy. (The very phrase “metaphysical anal-

ogy,” which some scholars have used,58 is anachronistic—it does not
appear in De Nominum Analogia.)
Many recent criticisms of Cajetan can actually be understood as
following from the observation that De Nominum Analogia does not
answer these questions. That Cajetan has imported his own interests;
that Cajetan articulates his position in later scholastic terminology
that differs from the terminology of Aquinas; that Cajetan’s theory of
analogy cannot really be derived from Aquinas’s texts; that Cajetan
only very selectively refers to texts from Aquinas—all of these have
been taken as evidence of Cajetan’s failure. But rather than conclude
that Cajetan has given bad answers to such questions as “What are
Aquinas’s views on analogy,” we might instead consider that Cajetan
was trying to answer entirely different questions.

Some Lessons of R ecent Historical Scholarship

That Cajetan was asking his own questions about analogy is sug-
gested by the recent work of a handful of scholars who together have
helped to recover the historical and philosophical context of Cajetan’s
treatise. The most important of these scholars are E. J. Ashworth, Mi-
chael Tavuzzi, and Franco Riva.
Ashworth has argued that “Cajetan needs to be read in the light
of his more immediate predecessors, rather than as a man wrestling
in solitude with the works of Aquinas.”59 She notes that Cajetan’s
treatise begins by rejecting three alternative views about the nature of
the unity of the analogical concept. This raises a number of questions
about what Cajetan is talking about, and to whom he is responding,
and yet, Ashworth says, “So far as I can tell, the extensive literature
on both Aquinas and Cajetan offers no satisfactory answers to these
questions.”60 Addressing these questions herself, Ashworth consid-
ers a handful of authors—especially Peter Aureol (d. 1322), Her-
vaeus Natalis (d. 1323), and John of Jandun (d. 1328)—whose views
were considered by some of Cajetan’s immediate predecessors, espe-
cially Johannes Capreolus (d. 1444), Dominic of Flanders (d. 1479),
and Paulus Soncinas (d. 1495). Because these authors all considered
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 29

analogy, Ashworth claims, Cajetan should not be understood or

evaluated just in light of the writings of Aquinas; instead, she finds
that Cajetan “had his own philosophical agenda, which in many ways
owed more to fourteenth-century developments than it did to Aqui-
nas himself.”61
The fourteenth-century developments that Ashworth has in
mind are especially those having to do with philosophical logic, and
the emergence after Aquinas of even more specialized vocabulary for
the semantic properties of terms. She classes many of these as having
“ontological facets,” especially concerning the character of common
natures.62 But even more relevant to the problem of analogy are other
questions:

On the epistemological side, there is the problem of concepts and

how they are to be described. Can one concept have an indetermi-
nate content, or must it be determinate? How does a concept ac-
quire its unity? From an object or nature or from something else?
Can the mind form united concepts in the absence of one nature?
What is the arithmetic of concepts? Can two concepts appear to be
as one, as Henry of Ghent held? Can several concepts be united
without losing their distinctness? Is there a distinction between a
concept as an act of mind, and the content of that concept, what it is
of or about? If so, how is this distinction to be described; and what
status does the content of the concept have? Can it be identified
with a common nature?

Ashworth concludes, “A good deal of the difficulty attached to the

discussions of analogy in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is
closely related to the fact that often several of these questions are
asked at once, without being carefully distinguished.”63
Tavuzzi agrees that “Cajetan was not writing in a vacuum,” and
that Cajetan “was not presenting simply a systematic exposition” of
Aquinas “without recourse to any intermediary.”64 Instead, De Nomi-
num Analogia must be understood within the context of “Renaissance
Thomism.”65 Tavuzzi cites the work of Riva66 (and even Montagnes)67
in support of the suggestion that “Cajetan stood in a tradition with its
roots in the late middle ages.”68
30 — Cajetan’s Question

Like Ashworth, Tavuzzi argues that there are particular philo-

sophical issues that developed after Aquinas which are relevant to
the context of Cajetan’s theory of analogy. These are “issues dealing
with the epistemological background of logic . . . those of the nature
of being of reason (ens rationis), of the nature of first and second inten-
tions and of the nature of truth.” According to Tavuzzi,

When it came to the matter of [these] crucial issues of philosophical

logic . . . the Thomists of the Renaissance found that more often
than not St. Thomas had simply not treated explicitly or even ade-
quately the problems in question—if for no other reason than that
they were problems which had emerged, or at least gained their
greatest intensity and precise identification and definition, in the
years following St. Thomas’ death.69

Tavuzzi is speaking here of general issues in philosophical logic, but

the same is true of specific questions regarding analogy—that often
the question addressed emerged in the years following St. Thomas.
The most basic evidence for this is that “several of Cajetan’s contem-
poraries dealt explicitly with the theme of analogy.”70 It appears that
one of Cajetan’s predecessors in the chair of Thomistic metaphysics
at Padua, Francesco Securo da Nardò (d. 1489), was known for being
a follower of Thomas Anglicus’s theory of analogy. More striking, we
know that one Vencenzo Merlini da Venezia (d. 1502), who was re-
gent master during Cajetan’s student years at the studium generale of
Sant’Agostino in Padua (1491–93), composed a work (now lost) on
analogy, also called De Nominum Analogia.71
Tavuzzi himself has presented a compendium of texts discussing
analogy from a variety of Renaissance Thomists. Among the most
significant from our perspective are those by Dominic of Flanders
and Soncinas. Cajetan could have known Dominic’s work, and may
have actually been taught by Soncinas.72 Dominic and Soncinas both
made divisions of analogy, the latter making use of Aquinas’s distinc-
tions at DV 2.11 and I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1.73
These conclusions of Ashworth and Tavuzzi are confirmed by
the more comprehensive historical investigation of Franco Riva.74
Riva’s thorough study of Cajetan explodes the opposed but sym-
metrical “myths of originality and continuity” that had character-
 Systematizing Aquinas? — 31

ized most reactions to Cajetan, even through the twentieth century.75

Instead, as Riva shows, Cajetan’s theory is neither wholly original,
nor wholly continuous with its predecessors; Cajetan was rooted in
classical sources, and in post-Thomistic developments, and yet within
that tradition he makes specific interpretive choices, often with po-
lemic intent, against not only Scotists but also the “attributionistic
school” of Thomists who had already attempted to classify and ana-
lyze analogy.76
With the work of Ashworth and Tavuzzi, Riva helps to bring to
our attention another common assumption of the received paradigm
which must be rejected. Cajetan’s interpreters have often presented
De Nominum Analogia as if it was the first to formalize distinctions
between modes of analogy. According to both defenders and critics,
a strict classification of varieties of analogy, which was so important
for Cajetan, had never been crucial to discussions of analogy in the
“Aristotelian-Thomistic” tradition. Yet it can no longer be ignored
that other Dominicans, including some of Cajetan’s teachers, had tried
to work out distinctions between modes of analogy. Indeed, as Ash-
worth has helped remind us, the tradition of distinguishing modes
of analogy goes back through Aristotle’s commentators to Aristotle
himself.77 Moreover, Scotus, in his arguments against analogy, even
criticizes a threefold division of analogy.78 It is clear that Cajetan’s
theory of analogy must be understood in light of a tradition of late
scholastic reflection on analogy; and that, regarding those aspects of
his theory that have seemed most original (his emphasis on concepts,
and his classification of different kinds of analogy), he was taking
cues from predecessors, working in and responding to a tradition that
developed through the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

Towa rd a New Interpretive Paradigm

The historical work of Ashworth, Tavuzzi, and Riva points toward

a new paradigm of interpreting Cajetan’s treatise on analogy. Their
findings provide many of the observations listed above as “anomalies”
of the old paradigm, and they reconstruct the historical context of
Cajetan’s treatise. Yet to some extent Ashworth and Tavuzzi remain
within the old paradigm. Although they see that Cajetan’s text needs
32 — Cajetan’s Question

to be evaluated in the context of a tradition of reflection on analogy,

they still can be found evaluating De Nominum Analogia in terms of
its relation to Aquinas,79 and both Ashworth and Tavuzzi are in the
end critics of Cajetan insofar as they find other thinkers among his
contemporaries whose views seem closer to Aquinas’s own. Treating
De Nominum Analogia as a classic, they still do not directly investigate
what question it was trying to answer; instead of recovering this for-
gotten question, they are still asking “the next question that arose.”
Riva more successfully steps outside of the received paradigm.
Yet Riva’s work has not had wide influence in Anglophone circles,
and in any case his historical study does not completely succeed in
distilling Cajetan’s particular philosophical concern.80 So although
this historical work has been important—showing that others were
concerned with analogy at this time, and that Cajetan was not work-
ing in a philosophical vacuum—we must turn directly to the task of
reconstructing the particular question or questions that De Nominum
Analogia was intended to answer.
 Chapter Two

Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question

The Semantic Intent of De Nominum Analogia

What is De Nominum Analogia about? A scholastic commentator

would raise this question in terms of several more specific ones. A
proper prologue, according to longstanding medieval convention,
communicates not only the title (titulus) of the work, the name of the
author (nomen auctoris), and the order of its parts (ordo libri), but also
the intention of the author (intentio auctoris), the subject of the book
(materia libri), the part of philosophy to which it belongs (cui parti
philosophiae supponatur), the method of its procedure (modus agendi),
and its usefulness or significance (utilitas).1 Our less precise question
of what a work is “about” depends mainly on the questions of the part
of philosophy, the intent, and the subject. This chapter addresses these
three questions about De Nominum Analogia.
Framed in terms of Collingwood’s dictum—that a text must be
understood as an answer to a question—the aim here is to discern
as precisely as possible Cajetan’s question. What particular problem
or problems was Cajetan trying to address in writing De Nominum
Analogia? First, we will try to discern the general kind of philosophi-
cal question Cajetan was asking; then try to discern specifically what
that question or those questions were. Together, this twofold inquiry
supports and gives detail to the position taken in the rest of this study,
that the subject of De Nominum Analogia is the semantics of analogy.

— 33
34 — Cajetan’s Question

C u i P a rti P h i l o s o ph i a e , or, What K ind

of Qu estion Was Cajetan Asking?

Although analogy is often treated in the context of metaphysics and

theology, every indication is that De Nominum Analogia is to be under-
stood as belonging to the field of logic. There are several obvious rea-
sons to believe that in composing De Nominum Analogia, Cajetan was
deliberately treating analogy from the point of view of a logician:

1. According to the title of the work, Cajetan is not treating analogy,

but the analogy of names. Even when he is concerned with reality
outside the soul, Cajetan seems to do so in the context of the logi-
cal analysis of names in terms of the traditional semantic triangle of
word, concept, and thing. As Cajetan explains in his fourth chap-
ter, “In names are found three things—namely [1] the word, [2] the
concept in the soul, and [3] the thing outside [the soul] or the objective
concept” (DNA §31). To deal with names is to deal with those items
that names as such (as opposed to names as vocal utterances or ink
marks, for example) necessarily involve; but dealing with these items
in their relation to names as such is the business of logic. As Cajetan
explains in his commentary on Aristotle’s Categories, the first part of
logic, “simple apprehension,” is concerned with words, concepts, and
things; indeed, Cajetan argues that this part of logic can be properly
considered as concerned with things, that is—“things, not [consid-
ered] absolutely but as conceived [i.e., by concepts] simply, and of con-
sequent necessity, as signified [i.e., by words].”2

2. In the first paragraph of DNA Cajetan explains the importance

of the work by claiming that it is required for a correct understand-
ing of metaphysics and other sciences: “Knowledge of this [subject]
is so necessary that without it, it is not possible that anyone reason
about metaphysics, and many errors in other sciences proceed from
ignorance of it.” While this suggests a close connection to metaphys-
ics, it is not a claim that the relevant knowledge of analogy is itself
metaphysical knowledge. To the contrary, we can infer that inso-
far as Cajetan considers an understanding of analogy to be prior to
 Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question — 35

metaphysics, he does not consider it to be a part of metaphysics; and

insofar as it bears on other sciences, it pertains to reasoning itself, and
so to the art of reasoning about reasoning: logic, the “art of arts” or
“science of sciences.”

3. In the first paragraph of DNA, Cajetan also explains the impor-

tance of his work by claiming that it solves problems introduced by
three misguided attempts to explain the unity of the analogical con-
cept. Throughout the work it is clear that Cajetan is concerned to
describe the nature of the unity that characterizes concepts signified by
analogous terms, and this would have been a concern that scholastic
philosophers treated under the auspices of logic.

4. Cajetan regards analogy as a mean between univocation and

equivocation, and says that the nature of the mean is to be made clear
by reference to the extremes.3 That analogy is a mean between uni-
vocation and equivocation became a commonplace among Greek
and early medieval commentators when addressing the first chapter
of Aristotle’s Categories. In the commentary tradition, the example
of equivocation—“animal” predicated of a man and of a picture of
a man—invited consideration of nonarbitrary equivocation, which
might include analogy.4 Univocation and equivocation are defined by
Aristotle in the beginning of the Categories, which medieval philoso-
phers understood to be a work on the first operation of the intellect,
simple apprehension, and so the beginning of the logical Organon.
It is worth noting that in his Categories commentary of 1498, after a
brief discussion of equivocation, Cajetan expresses a desire to write
a separate treatise on analogy—later that same year he would fulfill
this promise by writing De Nominum Analogia. 5

5. Cajetan distinguishes three kinds or “modes” of analogy, and in

doing so gives definitions of each of the three modes. These defini-
tions precisely parallel the Aristotelian definitions of univocation and
equivocation in the Categories. From the Latin version on which Ca-
jetan commented, here are Aristotle’s definitions (literally translated
into English, emphases added):
36 — Cajetan’s Question

They are called equivocals whose name alone is common, while the
essential concepts6 according to that name are different. (Aequivoca
dicuntur quorum solum nomen commune est, secundem nomen
vero substantiae ratio diversa.)7

They are called univocals whose name is common, and the essen-
tial concept according to that name is the same. (Univoca dicuntur
quorum nomen commune est, et secundum nomen eadem ratio
substantiae.)8

Note the parallelism in the definitions Cajetan gives for his three
modes of analogy (again, literally translated):

They are called analogues according to inequality whose name is com-

mon, and the concept according to that name is wholly the same, but
unequally participated. (Analoga secundum inaequalitatem vocan-
tur, quorum nomen est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen
est omnino eadem, inaequaliter tamen participata. §4)

They are analogues according to attribution whose name is common,

while the concept according to that name is the same with respect
to a terminus, but different with respect to relations to that terminus.
(Analoga autem secundum attributionem sunt, quorum nomen
commune est, ratio autem secundum illud nomen est eadem secun-
dum terminum, et diversa secundum habitudines ad illum. §8)

They are called analogues according to proportionality whose name

is common, and the concept according to that name is proportionally
the same. ([A]naloga secundum proportionalitatem dici, quorum
nomen est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen est propor-
tionaliter eadem. §23)

This parallelism of the Categories and De Nominum Analogia defi-

nitions indicates a clear intention to place the analysis of analogy in
the same context as established logical analysis of equivocation and
univocation.9
 Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question — 37

6. After the first chapter’s brief exposition of the first mode of anal-
ogy, analogy of inequality, Cajetan dismisses it on the grounds that,
from the point of view of the logician, it is not a case of analogy but
a case of univocity. “Analogues of this mode the logician calls uni-
vocals” (DNA §5). “Thus it is not necessary to determine how unity,
abstraction, predication, comparing, demonstration and others of the
sort are found in analogues of this mode; for according to truth they
are univocals, and the rules of univocals serve for them” (DNA §7).
Analogy of inequality only counts as a kind of analogy at all from the
point of view of metaphysics, and Cajetan passes over it once he ex-
plains why this is the case. We deduce from this that in De Nominum
Analogia Cajetan wants to treat only what counts as analogy from the
point of view of the logician. (For more on analogy of inequality, see
chap. 6 below.)

Taken singularly, each of these observations provides a strong rea-

son to categorize De Nominum Analogia generally as a work of logic.
Taken collectively they make the case entirely secure. Commenta-
tors in fact tend to agree that Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia is an
attempt to treat analogy from the point of view of logic.10 Cajetan’s
concern is not relations between things but relations between signi-
fications of words; in the terminology of our introduction, what is at
stake is the phenomenon of associated meaning, which in scholastic
philosophy was a matter of logic (as opposed, say, to metaphysics or
theology).
Indeed, most interpreters have noticed the treatise’s logical per-
spective, and apparent exceptions only prove the rule. Robert Mea-
gher, for instance, has written that “Cajetan missed altogether” that
“the analogy of names is a logical rather than metaphysical question.”
It was “the cardinal presupposition of Cajetan,” he continues, that
“the analogy of names is a metaphysical doctrine.”11 This interpreta-
tion, for which Meagher cites no basis in Cajetan’s text, is apparently
derived from an exaggeration of the position of Ralph McInerny, who
argues that Cajetan allowed metaphysical considerations to intrude
on his analysis of analogy.12 But McInerny’s argument—that Cajetan
confused metaphysical and logical distinctions and so did not present
38 — Cajetan’s Question

a properly logical treatment—still assumes that Cajetan in fact in-

tended, but only failed to execute, a logical analysis of analogy.13
Edward Bushinski also mistakenly attributes a metaphysi-
cal, rather than logical, intention to Cajetan’s treatise. Cajetan was
motivated to write about analogy, says Bushinski, because he had dis-
cerned a “neglect of the nature of analogy.”

True, the name itself of this treatise may give the impression that
[Cajetan] considers analogy primarily as a logical subject. However,
as he tells us in Chapter Four, the term names is not to be taken as
synonymous with words, i.e. as grammatico-logical elements, but
comprises not only the external word and the concept in the mind,
but also the reality outside the mind.14

Bushinski infers a “metaphysical” intent from Cajetan’s mention

of extramental reality. But simply talking about the reality outside
the mind is not sufficient to move us from logic to metaphysics. As
already mentioned, Cajetan conceives of the first part of logic as treat-
ing things “not absolutely, but as conceived simply, and, by conse-
quent necessity, as signified.” Indeed, as argued in point (1) above,
the passage to which Bushinski refers as evidence of Cajetan’s “meta-
physical” intention actually strengthens the case for Cajetan’s “logi-
cal” or semantic intention: the concept in the mind and the reality
outside the mind are two corners of the classic semantic triangle of
word-concept-thing.
Why “semantic”? As noted, Cajetan begins the fourth chapter
of his treatise with the observation that “in names are found three
things—namely the word, the concept in the soul, and the thing [res]
outside [the soul], or the objective concept” (DNA §31). Cajetan con-
sidered these to be objects of logic; Bushinski notes that they are not
merely “grammatico-logical elements,” but they are nonetheless se-
mantic elements. Although strictly speaking anachronistic, I call Ca-
jetan’s concern “semantic” rather than merely logical, insofar as the
modern field of semantics is concerned with signs in their relations to
those of which they are signs, and so with relations between language,
thought, and reality. We have seen that this is exactly what Cajetan
 Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question — 39

said was the concern of the logicians, and these are the basic terms of
inquiry in De Nominum Analogia.15

I n te n ti o A u c t o r i s — Cajetan’s Question

The fundamental semantic question about analogy that arises within

the framework of Aristotelian logic is how it is possible to have a
mean between univocation and equivocation. To see how this ques-
tion arises, and why it is difficult to answer, note that classical as-
sumptions about the philosophy of language allow us to understand
univocation and equivocation as involving relations between two
semantic functions. Thus, according to the traditional definitions,
given above from Aristotle’s Categories, things are called equivocals
whose name is common, and the concept or ratio according to that
name is diverse; while things are called univocals whose name is com-
mon, and the ratio according to that name is the same (Categories 1).
Following these definitions of univocation and equivocation, Cajetan
in his commentary on De Ente et Essentia offers the following defini-
tion of analogy:

They are univocals whose name is common, and the ratio accord-
ing to that name is absolutely the same. They are pure equivocals
whose name is common and the ratio according to that name is ab-
solutely diverse. They are analogates whose name is common, and
the ratio according to that name is somehow the same, and some-
how different, or the same in some respect, and different in some
respect. . . . Whence the analogue is the medium between the pure
equivocal and the pure univocal, as between the simply the same
and the simply diverse falls the mean, the same in some respect and
diverse in some respect.16

This characterization of analogy as a mean, and hence as involv-

ing concepts “somehow the same and somehow different,” is in fact
entirely traditional, and uncontroversial within the Aristotelian tra-
dition. However, consider the puzzle that arises should we try further
40 — Cajetan’s Question

to specify how exactly analogy is a mean between univocation and

equivocation. The definitions of univocation and equivocation can
be easily illustrated by showing the relationships between pairs of se-
mantic triangles, representing relationships between word, concept,
and thing:

Figure 1. Univocation

Figure 2. Equivocation

These are the two “extremes” of which analogy is the mean. But how
could one complete a similar picture of the semantic triangles for
analogy?
 Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question — 41

Figure 3. Analogy

The diagram for univocation gives us one concept and one arrow
from word to concept (fig. 1), and the diagram for equivocation gives
us two concepts and two arrows from word to concept (fig. 2). What
could complete the diagram for analogical signification (fig. 3)? How
is it possible that there be a mean between one concept and many con-
cepts? One and many are not the kind of extremes that, at least in
familiar arithmetic, are assumed to admit a mean. This is why one of
the many questions that analogy raises is that concerning what E. J.
Ashworth has called “the arithmetic of concepts.”17
Nonetheless, this is the puzzle of analogy, at least if analogy is
to be considered a mean between univocation and equivocation.
Long before Cajetan, the traditional strategy for solving this puzzle
had been to admit that in a sense, no mean is possible, that anal-
ogy is really a species of equivocation. What makes analogy still a
mean between univocation and equivocation, then, is that in “pure”
equivocation, the equivocated things are signified by means of unre-
lated concepts and only accidentally related by a common term, but
in analogy the equivocated things are intentionally related, so ap-
prehended by the intellect by related concepts. Thus the medieval
distinction, traced back through Boethius, between aequivocatio a
casu (or in Pseudo-Augustine fortuitate) and aequivocatio a consilio
(or in Pseudo-Augustine voluntate).18 Before Cajetan, most divisions
of analogy were based on distinctions between different ways that a
case of equivocation could have two concepts that were deliberately
42 — Cajetan’s Question

related, and so were in a sense more “unified” than in pure (a casu)

equivocation.
But this leads to a further question: if analogy is really a form of
equivocation, how does it avoid the fallacy of equivocation? That it
must do so is obvious if metaphysics and theology are to be genuine
sciences. If they are sciences they must use valid inferences, and yet in
these sciences especially there are key terms used in these inferences
which are not univocal but analogical. Aquinas, aware of this, gives
the following example: Whatever is in potentiality is reduced to act
by something actual; all things are brought into being by God; there-
fore, God is actual (De potentia 7.7, corpus). Cajetan offers as an exam-
ple: Every simple perfection is in God; wisdom is a simple perfection;
therefore wisdom is in God (DNA §105). Bochenski, recognizing
the need for valid syllogisms depending on analogical terms, gives
as an example: Every being is good; God is a being; therefore God is
good.19 In each of these syllogisms, the inference depends on terms
(‘bringing something into act,’ ‘being actual,’ ‘perfection,’ ‘wisdom,’
‘being,’ ‘good’) whose meanings are first learned from created things.
The validity of the syllogisms depends on these meanings also being
stretched to apply to God—for each of these thinkers, God can only
be analogically named. So within the Aristotelian tradition, these syl-
logisms are valid, but their mediating terms are not univocal.
It had long been recognized that (at least some) nonunivocal
terms needed to avoid the fallacy of equivocation, but Aristotle and
Aquinas are typical in acknowledging this need without explain-
ing it.20 Within this tradition, it was simply taken for granted that
this was possible. The crucial figure who forced closer attention and
deeper consideration to this matter was John Duns Scotus. The se-
mantic puzzle of analogy was intensified by the arguments of Scotus
and his followers against the Thomistic notion of analogy.21
While Scotus’s arguments specifically address the analogy of
being,22 much of his objection is not so much metaphysical as logical;
Scotus challenges the very possibility of any sort of analogical signi-
fication.23 In the minds of Thomists, Scotus’s arguments did not so
much refute the Thomistic notion of analogy as intensify the puzzle
of its semantic conditions.
 Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question — 43

At the heart of the matter is Scotus’s understanding of univocity:

I call a concept univocal which is so unified that its unity suffices to

cause contradiction when affirmed and denied of the same thing:
and so it suffices for the middle term of a syllogism, as the extremes
united by a middle term which is so unified are to be united to-
gether without the fallacy of equivocation.24

In other words, only univocity preserves the soundness of scientific

reasoning; equivocation causes the fallacy of equivocation—and this
would appear to be true whether the equivocation is by chance or
by design. Thomists wanted to insist that they could have a science
of being. But if this is the case, and this science is to avoid the fal-
lacy of equivocation, there must be one concept of being, not many
concepts.25 But then it looks as if “being” is univocal. As Scotus sum-
marizes his rigorous and unrelenting position elsewhere, “Where
there is one and the same concept, there is univocation.”26 According
to Ashworth, “John Duns Scotus’ arguments about the univocity of
being seem to have persuaded logicians that it makes sense to postu-
late just one concept of being, even if one goes on to reject the claim
that ‘ens’ is a univocal term.”27
In short, Scotus discerned a tension between analogy, understood
as a species of equivocation, and the notion that metaphysics was a
science. In his mind, the tension was irreconcilable, and he was will-
ing to reject analogy, insisting on the univocity of “being,” in order
to preserve the status of science for metaphysics. Other responses are
available. One could opt to preserve a place for analogy, and reject the
notion of metaphysics as a science. Alternatively, one could preserve
analogy, and yet refuse to analyze it in terms of the traditional seman-
tic assumptions that seem to make it inevitable that analogy would
cause the fallacy of equivocation. (This seems to be the route eventu-
ally taken by James Ross28 and by Burrell.29 Reasons for and against
this strategy will be taken up in the next chapter.) However, if one
wants to maintain traditional semantics and preserve analogy, one
cannot ignore Scotus’s challenge. One must characterize the unity of
the analogical concept.
44 — Cajetan’s Question

Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia is fruitfully read as an answer

to this challenge.30 Scotus raises the question of how many rationes or
concepts are involved in analogy, and of what kind of unity they have.
The general strategy of Thomists after Scotus was still to describe
analogy as a kind of equivocation, but to explain how it is possible
that some kinds of equivocation avoid the fallacy of equivocation.
This is a challenge to which (as argued below in chap. 4) a solution is
not found in the writings of Aquinas. Before Cajetan’s De Nominum
Analogia, other Thomists, such as Dominic of Flanders and Paulus
Soncinas, had included in their discussions of different kinds of anal-
ogy considerations of which kinds do and do not cause the fallacy of
equivocation;31 and Thomas Sutton addressed arguments that anal-
ogy would cause the fallacy of equivocation.32
It is noteworthy that in his commentary on the De Ente et Es-
sentia, Cajetan confronts other Scotistic arguments for the univocity
of being, but he avoids explaining precisely how analogy avoids the
fallacy of equivocation. He responds to the question by asserting that
that some nonunivocal terms still have a unity—the unity of propor-
tion—which for Aristotle sufficed to avoid the fallacy of equivocation
in scientific reasoning.33 But the limitation of this appeal to authority
may explain why Cajetan felt the need to supplement his extensive
treatment of analogy in the commentary on De Ente et Essentia with
further logical analysis in a separate treatise on analogy.34
In that separate treatise, a concern to characterize properly the
unity of the analogical concept is apparent from the first paragraph,
and a specific problem Cajetan wants to solve by the end is: How can
analogy avoid the fallacy of equivocation?35 Indeed, Cajetan pays at-
tention to the unity of the analogical concept in order to explain how
such a concept can have enough unity to avoid fallacy, but yet not so
much unity to make it univocal. While Scotus had defined a univocal
concept as one that is unified enough to avoid a fallacy of equivoca-
tion, Cajetan followed the Aristotelian description of univocity from
the beginning of the Categories (which makes no reference to validity
or fallacy of argument), without assuming that only univocity pre-
serves the validity of syllogisms. He thus set out to determine what
kind of unity could characterize the analogical concept such that it
could mediate valid syllogisms.
 Reconstructing Cajetan’s Question — 45

M ateria L ibri — What Is D e N ominum A nalogia About?

As far as Cajetan and some of his fellow Thomists were concerned,

Scotus’s criticisms of analogy were not so much metaphysical as logi-
cal or semantic. Scotus called into question the possibility of valid
reasoning with nonunivocal terms, and Thomists, given their se-
mantic assumptions about the role of concepts in signification, were
challenged to specify precisely how or in what sense analogical sig-
nification involved a concept “one” or “the same” enough to sustain
valid inferences. That is why, in De Nominum Analogia, Cajetan sets
out to characterize the unity of the analogical concept,36 and why I
call the subject of his treatise “the semantics of analogy.”
Reading De Nominum Analogia as an answer to Scotus’s seman-
tic challenge has significant advantages over previous treatments of
Cajetan’s analogy theory. First, it accounts for what we have called
the “anomalies” of the old “paradigm” of interpretation. Reading
Cajetan’s analogy treatise as a commentary on, summary of, or syn-
thesis of Aquinas’s own teaching on analogy led to too many difficul-
ties, such as the conclusion that Cajetan was both a willful innovator
intentionally departing from his master and a clumsy interpreter
who couldn’t get Aquinas right. Now we see that Cajetan had a very
specific theoretical problem to address. Appreciating his intention to
address this problem, we can thus also account for those distinctive
features of Cajetan’s theory that the old paradigm had tried to ac-
count for—namely, the threefold division of modes of analogy, and
the privileging of analogy of proportionality. The threefold division
is a threefold answer to the question of how it is possible to have a
mean between univocation and equivocation; and Cajetan gives pref-
erence to analogy of proportionality because, he argues, it, and not
analogy of attribution, is sufficiently unified to avoid the fallacy of
equivocation.37

— This reconstruction of the subject and intent of De

Nominum Analogia can best be evaluated and validated in light of a
more thorough exposition of the text, articulated within the frame-
work of Cajetan’s general semantic principles. Such an exposition
46 — Cajetan’s Question

occupies part 2 of this study. But first, the remaining two chapters
of part 1 defend respectively the theoretical appropriateness, and
then the historical urgency, of Cajetan’s attention to the semantics of
analogy.
 Chapter Three

Analogy, Semantics, and the

“Concept vs. Judgment” Critique

A Sema n tic Analysis of Analogy?

Some critics of Cajetan who have discerned his general semantic

intent have charged that Cajetan’s theory had to fail because of this
very intent. If these critics are correct, Cajetan’s theory of analogy
is historically significant for exposing weaknesses latent in medieval
semantic assumptions. According to the critics, the Aristotelian as-
sumptions that words signify by means of discrete “concepts,” and
that the meaning of propositions depends on the significations of its
component terms, cannot do justice to the complexity, variety, and
flexibility of actual human discourse; in De Nominum Analogia they
see the elegant structure of classical semantics collapsing under the
pressure of analogical language.

Obj ections

Ashworth and Ross on the Limits of Classical Semantics

Cajetan, along with other medieval thinkers, analyzed analogy in

accordance with two roughly Aristotelian semantic assumptions: (1)
that the meaning of a proposition depends on the meaning of its com-
ponent terms, and (2) that the meaning of a term is a nature signified
— 47
48 — Cajetan’s Question

(and understood) by means of a “concept.” On these assumptions, a

term is univocal in different sentential contexts if, in the different
contexts, the same term signifies the same nature by means of the
same intellectual act of conception (as ‘animal’ signifies the sensitive
nature when predicated of different animals, as in the sentences “A
horse is an animal” and “A bird is an animal”); and a term is equivocal
in different sentential contexts if, in the different contexts, the same
term signifies different natures by means of different intellectual con-
ceptions (as ‘bat’ must signify a different nature—indeed one natural
and one artificial—when it is predicated of the flying mammal and of
what a baseball player swings at a ball). Analogy, as a mean between
univocation and equivocation, must involve the same term in dif-
ferent contexts signifying a nature (or natures) partly one and partly
many, by means of concepts (or a concept) in some sense the same and
in some sense different.
This raises interesting questions. How can there be a mean be-
tween one nature and many? How can the concept, by virtue of
which that nature (or those natures) is signified and understood, be
somehow the same and somehow different? Obviously context will
be valuable for determining whether particular uses of a term are ex-
hibiting univocity, equivocity, and/or analogy; but even within the
context of individual occasions of utterance, what univocity, equivoc-
ity, and analogy are is primarily a matter of the semantics of terms. It
is on this level that determining how there can be a mean between one
and two natures, or between similar and different acts of conception,
seems to be necessary for a general theory of the nature of analogi-
cal signification. Indeed, the general theoretical semantic questions
raised about analogy as a mean between univocity and equivocity can
be addressed completely independently of, and indeed would be un-
affected by, attention to the actual context of particular utterances of
analogous terms.
This accounts for the phenomenon noted by E. J. Ashworth,
namely that “medieval logicians . . . discussed analogy and equivo-
cation as if they were properties of single terms, as if neither sen-
tential context nor speaker use and intention were at issue.”1 Since
analogical signification manifests itself only in the context of different
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 49

propositions, it does not seem as if an analysis of isolated terms can

entirely explain the fact that human language exhibits the flexibility
that it does. According to Ashworth, however, this indicates a weak-
ness of medieval semantic assumptions, which made it difficult to
analyze analogy in any other way. Paying more attention to “con-
textual clues,” Ashworth writes, “would have required a completely
different approach to language than was found in thirteenth and
fourteenth century logic texts.”2
In another article, Ashworth writes that medieval logicians in-
herited and passed on “a theory of language that tends to take words
as units, endowed both with their signification and their modi signifi-
candi before they enter sentences and independently of speaker inten-
tion on any given occasion.” She continues:

One might think that equivocal and analogical terms are precisely
those whose functioning is best explained through context and use,
but . . . there was a tendency to speak as if equivocal and analogical
terms formed special classes that could be identified in advance of
use. To the extent that Aquinas’s doctrine of analogy is embedded
in such a general theory, one may fear that it will share the theory’s
defects.3

Elsewhere, Ashworth makes similar observations that potentially

“cast doubt on the viability of the whole enterprise” of medieval dis-
cussions of analogy:

The theory of analogy as presented by medieval philosophers is . . .

gravely affected by the belief that each word is endowed with its
signification, including its grammatical features or consignifica-
tion, as a unity. Such an assumption is not easy to reconcile with the
thought that language is flexible, and that one and the same word
can have different shades of meaning.4

Later, Ashworth is willing to put the matter in even stronger terms.

Writing about some fourteenth-century logicians, she summarizes
one significant “result” of her findings:
50 — Cajetan’s Question

The burden of analogy cannot be carried by single words or single

concepts. A term cannot be used to express priority and posteriority
and attribution, and yet these notions are expressed in language.
The obvious solution is to give up the attempt to categorize terms
as equivocal, univocal, or analogical, and to look instead at how
they behave in different contexts and in relation to different sen-
tential structures. Unfortunately, this solution seems to have been
incompatible with medieval approaches to language.5

Ashworth voices this criticism—that medieval semantic assump-

tions limited medieval philosophers from properly handling the
phenomenon of analogy—somewhat more tentatively than James F.
Ross, whose book Portraying Analogy6 she occasionally cites. Ross’s
book begins with severe criticism of “classical” approaches to analogy,
including Cajetan’s. Says Ross:

The key assumptions and metaphors of the classical story about

analogy were exhausted, as far as fruitful theoretical elaboration is
concerned, by the time Cajetan produced De Nominum Analogia in
1498, the last systematic explanation of analogy of meaning since
the middle ages.7

What Ross here calls the “key assumptions . . . of the classical story”
constitute the basic framework of traditional Aristotelian logic. Thus
Ross says that “the classical theory [of analogy] suffers from limita-
tions of scope and perspective,” and furthermore that it is “based on
false premises.” Among the allegedly false premises are two we have
noted and which we could call, respectively, the conceptualist and the
compositionalist assumptions: “that word meanings are ideas- (con-
cepts-, thoughts-) in-the-mind-signified-by-conventional-sounds”
and “that sentence meaning is the molecular sum (syncategoremati-
cally computed) of the atomic meanings of the component words.”8
Ross does little in Portraying Analogy to explain the suspect “classi-
cal” premises, to show that they are indeed “classical,” or to formulate
any particular criticisms of them.9 But his charges are shared implic-
itly and explicitly by others, and on the face of it, the two premises
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 51

criticized by Ross do seem to be assumptions made by Cajetan in De

Nominum Analogia. Cajetan’s explicit project is to describe the char-
acter of the unity of the concepts signified by analogous terms, in order
to explain both the nature of true predication and the possibility of
valid inferences that contain such terms. If the Aristotelian compo-
sitionalist and conceptualist semantic assumptions underlying this
project are false, that is ipso facto an indictment of Cajetan’s theory
of analogy.

Gilson’s “Concept vs. Judgment” Criticism

This is also an indictment of anyone else who would theorize about

analogy within the framework of Aristotelian semantic assumptions.
As such, this criticism could implicate Aquinas as easily as Cajetan (as
is already acknowledged in one of the above quotations from Ash-
worth). This is why some partisans of Aquinas have taken comfort
in the fact that Aquinas never ventured an explicit semantic analysis
of analogical signification on the order of Cajetan’s. That Aquinas’s
writings on analogy are restricted to limited remarks on the occasions
of particular philosophical difficulties, and that these remarks never
suggest anything like a systematic formal analysis, is taken by some
to be evidence of Aquinas’s greater sensitivity to the analogy phe-
nomenon. Even if, as Ashworth suggests, Thomas may have shared
the basic semantic assumptions of the medieval logical tradition,
he never attempted their rigorous application to explain analogical
signification.
In this connection, we must examine another common criticism
of Cajetan: that his theory of analogy is unduly preoccupied with
“concepts” as opposed to “judgment.” The claim made by Thomistic
scholar Armand Maurer is typical:

It is not generally realized that St. Thomas’ doctrine of analogy

is above all a doctrine of the judgment of analogy, and not of the
analogy of concept—at least if we mean by “concept” the expression
of an act of simple apprehension.10
52 — Cajetan’s Question

Elsewhere Maurer elaborates on this point, making it a specific criti-

cism of Cajetan and relating it to a charge of inappropriate Scotistic
influence on Cajetan’s doctrine:

Cajetan’s treatise On the Analogy of Names is an attempt to put into

order the Thomistic notion of analogy. Whereas in St. Thomas’
writings analogy is used with great suppleness and flexibility as a
means of approaching God, who is unknown in his essence, Cajetan
proposes a rigid classification of the types of analogy that excludes
all but the analogy of proper (or non-metaphorical) proportional-
ity as the true metaphysical analogy. Throughout his treatment of
analogy he tends to leave out of consideration the central notion
of esse and to conceive of analogy in terms of concepts rather than
judgment. In both regards he resembles the Scotists against whom
he argued.11

Maurer is not alone in his evaluation of Cajetan’s strategy. Patrick

Sherry has criticized Cajetan’s decision “to devote a disproportionate
amount of time explaining how there can be a single analogical con-
cept.” Anticipating the strategy of Ross, he concludes:

We can avoid such contortions, I think, if we make a radical break

with the tendency to view concepts as psychological entities and
instead approach the matter by examining the truth conditions of
judgments [which involve analogy].12

This recurrent contrast of the role of concepts with the role of

judgment in analogy can be traced back to Étienne Gilson. According
to Gilson:

The Thomist doctrine of analogy is above all a doctrine of the judg-

ment of analogy. It is in fact thanks to judgment of proportion that,
without a change of nature, one can make of the concept a usage
sometimes equivocal, sometimes analogical, sometimes univo-
cal. . . . The analogy of which Duns Scotus thinks is much more an
analogy of concept. For, under the plan of the concept and of rep-
resentation, analogy is practically confused with likeness. It is no
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 53

longer a matter of knowing whether two terms play an analogous

role in a judgment of proportion, but whether the concept desig-
nated by one term is or is not the same as the concept designated
by the other.13

Gilson’s interpretation of Thomistic analogy, and its implicit

criticism of Cajetan’s concern to characterize the analogical concept,
has had wide influence.14 David Burrell has perhaps given it the most
extensive elaboration. According to Burrell:

Whoever understands that analogy is to be explicated “on the level

of judgment” and not of concepts, Gilson contends, has also grasped
the real divergence between Aquinas and Scotus. . . . Judgment is
indispensable precisely because responsible analogous usage re-
quires that we assess the way in which a term is being used in rela-
tion to its primary analogate.15

In Burrell’s presentation, there is a clear connection between the

charge that a concern with concepts is more Scotistic than Thomistic,
and the charge that analogy is not fruitfully subjected to traditional se-
mantic analysis. In his first book about analogy—with which his later
writings about analogy have remained essentially consistent—Burrell
explains that he wants to get away from “attempts . . . to collate the
ways we use analogical expression into one theoretical mold.”16 In a
section on the “limits of formal analysis,” Burrell considers some re-
cent attempts to “salvage” Cajetan’s “formal analysis”:17

Formal attempts to explain analogous usage seem self-defeating.

They shunt from the formally correct but too narrowly stipula-
tive to a more adequate but formally less acceptable scheme. The
very recurrence of this pattern is revealing. Analogy, it seems, is
closely linked to a purposive use of language. One of the service-
able features of analogous terms is their adaptability to diverse
contexts. Yet the language we use to express our judgment about
entire frameworks, and their adequacy to the more comprehensive
purposes of inquiry, is also markedly analogical. Hence a formal
characterization seems impossible in principle since formal logic
54 — Cajetan’s Question

constructs languages and tests their consistency but does not ap-
praise them with respect to extralogical purposes.18

In the words of one commentator, Burrell wants, “in lieu of a theory

about analogy, [to] establish his own thesis that paying close gram-
matical attention to the way analogous terms are actually used will
demonstrate the freedom, fluidity, responsibility, and judgment actu-
ally involved in such usage.”19
Burrell notes that he thinks Ross’s Portraying Analogy actually co-
operates with the work of Gilson and Lonergan and other scholars by
whose efforts “Aquinas is justly liberated from a Thomistic rendition
of ‘abstraction’ often more beholden to Scotus.”20 Burrell elaborates:
“Lonergan’s account of concept-formation in Verbum: Word and Idea
in Aquinas, for example, independently corroborated by Peter Geach,
could offer the necessary bridge linking Aquinas’ efforts with Ross’
semantic sophistication.”21
Thus Burrell can separate Aquinas from the “Thomist” tradition
that has been engaged in the problematic pursuit of a semantic analy-
sis of analogy. For Burrell, it is Thomists such as Cajetan, but not
Thomas Aquinas himself, who attempted to analyze analogical sig-
nification in terms of relations of concepts. In so doing, the “Thomist”
tradition inadvertently succumbed to Scotistic influence,22 necessarily
resulting in philosophical confusion.23
Burrell finds confirmation for this criticism of Cajetan in the
treatment of analogy by Yves Simon. In his article “On Order in Ana-
logical Sets,” Simon speaks of analogical terms as terms that signify
“analogical sets,” sets in which there is some kind of “order.”24 Simon
then considers in what sense a common meaning can be “abstracted”
from the analogical set. Because there is an “irreducible plurality” in
analogy, analogical unity resists abstraction in the proper sense. The
strict impossibility of abstracting a common analogate is not always
recognized, says Simon. Analogates are “partly different,” but they
are also “partly similar,” and so given this similarity it is tempting to
assume that “in spite of it all, the meanings do have a common fea-
ture, albeit a very thin one, which survives the differences and makes
it possible for a term, whose unity is but one of analogy, to play the
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 55

role of a syllogistic term.”25 But for Simon it is naive to assume that

“some common feature will be disclosed” and abstracted from diverse
analogates.26
Of course diverse analogates have analogical unity, but, Simon
says, this “unity is traced to an operation of the mind,”27 an opera-
tion that is only a kind of partial abstraction. Says Simon, “Besides
unqualified abstraction, which pertains to the univocal alone, there
is such a thing as an analogical abstraction, although, in this expres-
sion, the adjective weakens the signification of the noun.”28 Simon
calls this “an abstraction by way of confusion. . . . an incomplete, weak,
partial abstraction” (emphasis Simon’s).29 Reiterating this sense of ab-
straction “by way of confusion,” Simon says, “Analogical abstraction
proceeds by ‘fusing together’ the members of a set. But such ‘fusing
together’ involves assertions and negations that define priorities and
posteriorities.”30
In Simon’s analysis, Burrell finds a confirmation of the Gilsonian
theme that analogy is a matter of judgment rather than concepts,
and that analogy will thus resist semantic analysis. As Burrell puts it,
Simon is saying that “the ‘analogical concept’ . . . is a half-way house,”
that “the ‘analogous concept’ points beyond itself to a series of judg-
ments.”31 For, according to Burrell, the analogical “abstraction” de-
scribed by Simon “is in the order of judgment, not of apprehension.”32
According to Burrell, Cajetan’s search for the unity of the analogical
concept is thus inherently flawed. Rather than speak of formal analy-
sis of analogical concepts, according to Burrell, we must approach
analogy by attention to the different ways that analogical terms are
used.33

Summary

Some of the above commentators could be criticized for failing to

keep separate the general issue of analogical signification on the one
hand, and such specific issues as divine naming and “the metaphysi-
cal analogy of being” on the other hand.34 But such confusions do
not undermine the genuine objections that, although diverse, can be
56 — Cajetan’s Question

amalgamated into the following general criticism of Cajetan: “Sig-

nifying analogically” is not a property of terms independent of their
use in particular sentences; to recognize analogical signification re-
quires judgment. Thus analogical signification cannot be considered
apart from the particular linguistic circumstances in which it arises.
A proper philosophical treatment of the phenomenon of analogical
signification will thus not consider words independently of their con-
text, independently of actual usage. This, however, is not Cajetan’s
strategy; his De Nominum Analogia is not about judgment and con-
text, but about relations of concepts. Cajetan’s attempt to character-
ize the analogical “concept” is evidence that he is concerned with
abstracting the semantic properties of terms from the context of ac-
tual predications and inferences. That this strategy results in a strict
classification of kinds of analogy, rather than a flexible and sensitive
understanding of the varieties of analogous usage, is further evidence
of its inadequacy.

Replies to O bjections

To frame a response to this criticism, the rest of this chapter will

address three things: in particular, (1) Cajetan’s understanding of a
“concept”; more generally, (2) the theoretical question of the compati-
bility of insights about the importance of interpretation, context, and
judgment with a semantic analysis of terms; and lastly, (3) Cajetan’s
own practice of treating cases of analogical signification and his sen-
sitivity to context and judgment.

Cajetan’s Notion of the “Concept”

As we have seen, Cajetan’s critics often charge that his concern with
“concepts” is Scotistic, rather than Thomistic. Now on one level it
must be granted that Cajetan’s concern with concepts is the result of
Scotus’s influence. Scotus and his followers had argued that analogy
was impossible, and some of their arguments were based on the prem-
ise that a concept that could preserve the validity of a syllogism must
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 57

be univocal. Thomists were thus pressed to respond to this premise,

and one common tactic was to discuss the notion of a concept and in
what sense it had to be “unified” in order to preserve the validity of
a syllogism.
But is Cajetan’s understanding of “concepts” un-Thomistic, or
otherwise at odds with a Thomistic understanding of analogy? For-
tunately Cajetan’s writings make very clear what he takes a “concept”
to be. In the most basic sense, the conceptus is just that which mediates
thinking and signifying. The concept is an interior quality that is the
terminus of an act of simple apprehension, the “intention” by virtue
of which some object is understood, and by virtue of which a word is
said to signify a thing. Cajetan spells this out in his commentary on
De Ente et Essentia: “A thing is understood at the time when we form
its concept. . . . [T]he formation of a concept is the making of the ex-
ternal thing actually known.”35 Furthermore, in his commentary on
the Summa Theologiae, Cajetan writes: “Words only signify things
by the mediation of intellectual conception; therefore signification is
caused by conception.”36 In short, a word signifies a thing by the me-
diation of a concept, and a concept is just what causes a thing to be
understood.37
Cajetan’s position about the “conceptus” here is the general me-
dieval one that to form a concept is to establish an understanding.
Given the common notion of signification as the establishment of un-
derstanding,38 it is not at all controversial to assert that signification
takes place by the mediation of a concept.39 And so it should not be at
all controversial that the logical consideration of simple apprehension
manifests itself as consideration of “concepts,” and that terms that
signify analogically would be analyzed with respect to the concepts
by virtue of which they so signify.40
Now obviously such an understanding of “concepts” is not incon-
sistent with the observation that signifying analogically is a property
of terms only in the context of particular propositions, representing
particular acts of judgment. Such is the nature of what medieval
thinkers, including Aquinas, called the first and second acts of intel-
lection—that is, simple apprehension and composing and dividing (or
judgment).41 Indeed, Gilson, who most fully articulated the supposed
contrast between concept and judgment in analogy, not only affirms
58 — Cajetan’s Question

that the “concept” should be understood in the sense Cajetan did,42 he

recognizes that the formation of such concepts is consistent with, in-
deed part of, forming judgments.43 In the long passage quoted earlier,
Gilson makes it sound as if “whether the concept designated by one
term is or is not the same as the concept designated by the other” is a
question raised by Scotus but not by Thomas; but clearly if one makes
a Thomistic “judgment of proportion” that allows one to “make of
the concept a usage . . . [which is] analogical,” the “Scotistic” question
can arise. For instance, judging that there is a proportion between
the relation of the eye to its object and the relation of the intellect to
its object, we agree to predicate “sight” of both the eye and the intel-
lect. But then we can ask: Is the same concept signified by the predi-
cate when we say “the eye sees” as is signified by the same predicate
when we say that “the intellect sees”? To be sure, the question about
the identity or nonidentity of concepts does not need to be answered
before we are able to form the former judgment of proportion; but
the question about concepts is compatible with, in fact raised by, the
judgment. The question becomes especially pressing when we are
confronted with Scotistic arguments that call into question the logi-
cal possibility of making such judgments.
In fact, understood in their context, Gilson’s remarks about the
difference between Aquinas’s emphasis on judgment and Scotus’s em-
phasis on concepts should never have become the basis for an objection
to a semantic analysis of analogy. First, it must be remembered that
in the relevant passage, Gilson is not concerned with analogy as such,
but with “the analogy of being” (analogie de l’être) and Scotus’s objec-
tions to it; Gilson intends to explain how Aquinas and Scotus differ in
understanding the central metaphysical notion, being. Second, in ex-
plaining this difference, Gilson several times emphasizes that Aqui-
nas and Scotus are not so much disagreeing as they are talking past each
other.44 And third, as the source of their different approaches to being,
Gilson identifies their different views of what concepts are, how they
are formed, and how they signify; he nowhere denies, nor could he,
that for Aquinas judgments of proportion are made with concepts.
Indeed, in the long passage quoted above, Gilson said, “It is in fact
thanks to judgment of proportion that, without a change of nature,
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 59

one can make of the concept a usage sometimes equivocal, sometimes

analogical, sometimes univocal” (emphasis added). Such an observa-
tion simply cannot be the basis for the conclusion that it is against the
spirit of Aquinas for a logician to consider the concepts that result
from such a judgment of proportion—that is, those concepts by vir-
tue of which analogous terms signify.
The consistency of attending to both concept and judgment is
further borne out by Yves Simon’s reflections, which Burrell had
taken as implicitly critical of Cajetan. Simon closely follows Cajetan’s
theory,45 and his remarks on analogy demonstrate that even within
the framework of Cajetan’s semantic analysis and an attention to con-
cepts, one can be sensitive to the role of judgment in analogy.
Indeed, the core of Simon’s paper “On Order in Analogical Sets”
can be considered an elaboration of Cajetan’s discussion of abstrac-
tion in the fifth chapter of De Nominum Analogia (§§41–58, Qualis
sit abstractio analogi ab analogatis).46 There, Cajetan clarifies the sense
of “abstraction” that applies to analogy of proper proportionality,47
and his conclusions become the central points of Simon’s reflection. A
more extended discussion of what Cajetan says in that chapter can-
not be articulated here (see chap. 8 below), but we will briefly note
that we can find in Cajetan precisely those points made by Simon
and highlighted by Burrell: since analogical unity is irreducible (DNA
§49), from diverse analogates there cannot be abstraction, properly
speaking (§§44, 56; cf. §§33–34), but there is a qualified sense of ab-
straction (§56) which actually involves a kind of “confusion” (§57);48
thus analogical unity always “retains distinction” (§49), which is why
we must be vigilant lest we ignore the distinctions and treat an ana-
logical term as univocal (§§53–54, 57).
This confirms that Cajetan’s project is not to try to reduce anal-
ogy to something else, but to characterize as specifically as possible
the semantics of analogical terms. That Cajetan’s semantic characteri-
zations vindicate what Simon calls the irreducibility of proportional
unity, and the impossibility of a common element’s being purely ab-
stracted, speaks to both the strength and the limits of semantic analy-
sis; it certainly does not falsify the phenomenon of analogy, nor is it
an abuse of semantic analysis.49 Indeed, these insights only help to
60 — Cajetan’s Question

distill the further semantic question that concerned Cajetan, one that
Simon leaves unanswered (though acknowledged):50 How does pro-
portional unity suffice to unify syllogistic inferences?

Context, Judgment, and the History of Medieval Logic

There is nothing about a semantic analysis of terms as such which is

incompatible with a sensitivity to the role that a sentence or inference
plays in giving context to terms. As a matter of fact, historians of logic
have long noted that it is precisely the context of particular inferences,
especially problematic or questionable inferences (sophismata), which
helped to foster the medieval development of sophisticated treatments
of the logical properties of propositions and terms. L. M. de Rijk has
shown that the analysis of fallacy was a primary motive in the devel-
opment of terminist logic.51 And in his Introduction to Medieval Logic,
Alexander Broadie explains:

It was not uncommon for medieval logicians to begin their logic

textbooks, at least those of their textbooks containing comprehen-
sive accounts of logic, by considering terms first, and then reaching
their study of inferences by way of an analysis of propositions. . . .
But the fact that certain logicians adopted this order of exposition
should not be taken to signify that they would have rejected the
notion that terms, or at least some terms, should be expounded by
reference to the role they play in valid inferences. On the contrary,
their practice shows that they accepted this point.52

As we have seen, the very issue of the unity of the analogical concept
arises out of a concern to account for certain kinds of inferences: in
the face of Scotus’s arguments that nonunivocal terms subject poten-
tial syllogisms to the fallacy of equivocation, Thomists felt obliged
to explain how a nonunivocal term could preserve the validity of a
syllogism. In this sense, the discussion of the semantics of analogical
terms, by Cajetan and others, grows out of a concern to account for
certain kinds of arguments; acts of simple apprehension are discussed
because of their role in predications and inferences—that is, because
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 61

of their role in judgments. The discussion of the semantics of analogi-

cal terms, then, like much of medieval logic, can be seen as arising
from possible sophisms and the intention to avoid them. Understood
in this way, the discussion of analogous terms is of a piece with the
rest of the project of the logica moderna as understood by De Rijk, and
described by Norman Kretzmann:

Perhaps the logica moderna was aimed originally at nothing more

than providing ad hoc rules of inference to cover problematic lo-
cutions in ordinary discourse, but, although it retained that aim
throughout its three-hundred year history, its principal aim soon
became the development of a reasonably general account of the
different ways in which words are used to stand for things and to
operate on other words.53

Cajetan’s Hermeneutic Sophistication

A semantics of terms is not only theoretically compatible with a con-

cern for judgment and context, it is in fact compatible in Cajetan’s
own philosophical work. Though one would not know it from the
above criticisms, De Nominum Analogia deals not only with concepts
but also with inferences in the often-neglected later chapters: the
tenth chapter is about how it is possible to reason using analogous
terms (Qualiter de analogo sit scientia); and the eleventh chapter offers
warnings about understanding and using analogous terms (De caute-
lis necessariis circa analogorum nominum intellectum et usum).
Indeed, this final chapter ends with a passage that explicitly speaks
to the concern that analogy is always a matter of context. Cajetan here
anticipates some possible confusions about analogous usage. After
considering them individually, he concludes with a general warning:

Whence if someone does not wish to err, he ought habitually to

consider the occasion of the speech, and recall that he will apply the
conditions of the extremes to the mean; for then it will be easy to
explain everything soundly, and to follow the truth. . . . [emphasis
added]54
62 — Cajetan’s Question

In other words, Cajetan explicitly reminds his readers that the proper
sense of a term depends on the particular occasion of its use; when
interpreting a term in an argument, one must be aware of the pur-
pose of the argument. Far from recommending that the sense of the
argument be determined from a prior analysis of its terms, Cajetan
is reminding his readers that the only way to avoid mistakes in in-
terpreting terms is to keep in mind the larger dialectical context in
which those terms play a role.
Such a point is rather obvious, and hardly incompatible with a
discussion of the semantics of terms, even analogous terms. Indeed,
even if Cajetan had not included this explicit acknowledgment of
the importance of context in his treatise on analogy, his own practice
would have implicitly affirmed his recognition of it. Cajetan wrote
many commentaries, and even by 1498, when he composed De No-
minum Analogia, he had written commentaries on Porphyry’s Isagoge,
on Aquinas’s De Ente et Essentia, and on several of Aristotle’s logical
works. In each of these his interpretation of terms is consistently sen-
sitive to the context of the arguments in which they are used. Even
later, when he was writing his commentary on Aquinas’s Summa
Theologiae, Cajetan still often referred readers to his analysis of
analogous terms in De Nominum Analogia; and yet in that commen-
tary, Cajetan’s remarks on each article almost invariably begin with
a discussion of how the terms of the article must be understood in
dialectical context—that is, in a manner consistent with the author’s
intended arguments.55 Clearly Cajetan’s concern with concepts did
not preclude attention to context and judgment. Indeed, it would be
more correct to say that it is precisely Cajetan’s concern with acts of
judgment and with the inferential context of propositions which led
him to analyze concepts.

Hermen eu tics and Sem antics

In sum, the criticisms leveled against a semantic analysis of analogy,

and against Cajetan’s discussion of analogical concepts, do point to
important truths about the limits of a semantic analysis of terms, but
 Analogy, Semantics, and the “Concept vs. Judgment” Critique — 63

they fail to condemn Cajetan’s approach to analogy. Context is impor-

tant to analogy, because analogical signification does not take place
outside of particular judgments expressed in propositions, which
themselves usually must be understood in larger dialectical contexts
such as inferences. But Cajetan does not ignore this. His attention to
the signification of terms, and to the concepts that mediate such sig-
nification, does not imply that context and judgment are irrelevant;
indeed it is partly motivated by the recognition that particularly im-
portant dialectical contexts, such as the arguments of metaphysicians,
need to be better understood, and even defended.
So the historical lesson is, first, that Cajetan’s concern with the
“concept” is not exclusively Scotistic or otherwise un-Thomistic.
Moreover, far from polluting Cajetan’s theory, Scotus’s influence clari-
fies the propriety, and precipitates the necessity, of a semantic analysis
of analogy. Interpreters of De Nominum Analogia need to remember
that Cajetan’s concern with concepts is motivated by an attempt to
develop a semantic analysis of analogy which will do justice to cer-
tain inferential contexts. In particular, Cajetan wanted to account for
the possibility of syllogisms mediated by analogical terms, syllogisms,
common in metaphysics and theology, which depend on a judgment
of nonunivocal similarity.
There is also a larger philosophical lesson here about the theoreti-
cal alternatives available to philosophical semantics. The criticisms
considered here all assume that semantic principles that are conceptu-
alist and compositionalist are also necessarily reductionist. As we have
seen, however, it is possible to analyze propositions as if their mean-
ings depended on their component terms, yet without insisting that
the propositions’ meanings are predetermined by fixed meanings that
their terms have independently of sentential and inferential context.
Cajetan, at least, worked with a semantic framework that was con-
ceptualist and compositionalist but also organicist. That is (to draw
an analogy), for Cajetan a proposition is related to its component
terms much as an organism is related to its organs. The function of
the whole depends on the functions of the parts, but the functions of
the parts are also determined by, and in some sense depend on, the
function of the whole. To speak more precisely, the general principle
64 — Cajetan’s Question

of semantic dependence of wholes on parts—compositionality—does

not itself establish the semantic values of the parts. The semantic val-
ues of the parts must be determined by interpretation, with attention
to context; and there is nothing about semantic compositionality that
rules out—indeed we have seen that for Cajetan it presupposes—the
hermeneutic dependence of parts on wholes.
 Chapter Four

Some Insufficient Semantic

Rules for Analogy

Sema n tic Rul es Before Cajetan

Cajetan’s interest in a semantic analysis of analogy was not only theo-

retically interesting and appropriate, but urgent. Cajetan’s teaching on
analogy must be understood as an attempt to respond to a particular
challenge, issued most famously by Scotus, that analogy, understood
as a mean between univocation and equivocation, is semantically im-
possible, and that nonunivocal terms cannot be used in reasoning be-
cause they would precipitate the fallacy of equivocation. It was this
Scotist challenge that led Cajetan, and several of his predecessors, to
try to characterize the nature of the unity of the concept signified by
the analogous term, a unity that must not be the same as the unity
exhibited in univocation, and yet like univocation must differ enough
from equivocation not to cause the fallacy of equivocation.1 The need
for such a semantic analysis of analogy can be highlighted by pointing
out that, before Cajetan, standard semantic analyses of analogy were
insufficient to meet the Scotist challenge.
In Aquinas and in other authors it is possible to find characteri-
zations or “rules” for the semantic function of analogical terms. This
chapter will first review some semantic rules that have a basis in the
writings of Aquinas. It will then consider three proposed rules that
Cajetan himself explicitly identifies and rejects at the outset of De
Nominum Analogia. None of these rules adequately addresses the
— 65
66 — Cajetan’s Question

possibility of nonunivocal terms mediating valid inferences without

causing the fallacy of equivocation.

Th omas’s Semantic Specifications

of A na log ic al Unity

Though Aquinas was not explicitly concerned with the question of

the unity of the analogical concept, or the other attendant semantic
questions that would come to occupy Thomists in the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries,2 he did articulate some apparent semantic rules
that touch on this concern. Moreover, he was interested to establish
that analogical terms do not cause the fallacy of equivocation. In his
discussions of analogy Aquinas is always aware, at least implicitly,
that some cases of analogical signification—especially the central
cases of metaphysics and theology—must exhibit enough unity to
allow valid inferences.3 Indeed, it would be difficult to ignore this
requirement, since this is part of the reason analogy is understood as
a mean between univocation and equivocation: analogical significa-
tion is not so completely unified to count as univocation, and yet it has
sufficient unity to distinguish it from pure equivocation. This is why
so many Thomistic and other commentators have emphasized that
analogy provides orthodox theology a safe path between the Scylla of
anthropomorphism and the Charybdis of agnosticism; God must be
“other” enough that words said of creatures are not univocally said
of Him, and yet, if we are to avoid agnosticism, our language must
apply to God somehow, so that we can legitimately reason from crea-
tures to God.
But despite the essential requirement of (at least some) analogi-
cal terms that they do not cause the fallacy of equivocation like pure
equivocals, and despite this requirement’s central role in orthodox
theology, in only a handful of passages does Aquinas explicitly ad-
dress the issue of analogical terms in valid reasoning. In only two
texts does Aquinas explicitly acknowledge the need for analogy to
have sufficient unity to avoid the fallacy of equivocation. In Summa
Theologiae Ia, q. 13, a. 5, he says that what is said of God and creatures
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 67

cannot be predicated equivocally, because if it were, nothing could

be known or demonstrated about God, because attempts to reason
about him would commit the fallacy of equivocation.4 In De Poten-
tia Dei bk. 3, q. 7, a. 7, he elaborates on the same point, saying that
if words said of both God and creatures are purely equivocal, then
proofs about God would be sophisms; he even gives an example of
a good theological syllogism that would be a sophism if analogical
terms caused the fallacy of equivocation.5
A handful of other texts, while not explicitly mentioning the fal-
lacy of equivocation, directly acknowledge that analogy must sustain
valid inferences. In Summa Contra Gentiles bk. 1, ch. 33, speaking of
the possibility of gaining knowledge of God from creatures, Aquinas
says that pure equivocation would not suffice for us to gain knowledge
about God from our knowledge of creation; equivocal terms “break
the continuity of argument.”6 In the disputed questions De Veritate q.
2, a. 11, Aquinas again addresses the same difficulty in confronting
the question of whether knowledge (scientia) is predicated equivo-
cally or univocally of God and creatures.7 And in his commentary on
Aristotle’s Metaphysics bk. 4, lectio 3, Aquinas insists that ‘one’ and
other central terms of metaphysics are, while not univocal, nonethe-
less unified enough to sustain a single science because of “reference to
one.”8 Similarly, in his commentary on the Sentences (prol., q. 1, a. 2,
obj. 2), Aquinas considers the objection that theology is not a science
because God and creatures do not share a genus; he responds that it is
enough that God and creatures have analogical community.9
While all of these passages acknowledge the possibility, indeed
the necessity, of nonunivocal terms mediating valid inferences, none
of them addresses the semantic puzzle this presents. Aquinas only
asserts that analogy exhibits sufficient unity to sustain valid reason-
ing, without explaining how this is possible. An opportune occasion
for explanation would have been his commentary on Aristotle’s brief
mention of analogical middle terms in the Posterior Analytics, and
yet there too Aquinas’s remarks are very limited.10 And in no other
text does Aquinas explicitly set out to explain how different analogi-
cal uses of a term can be sufficiently unified to avoid the fallacy of
equivocation.11
68 — Cajetan’s Question

Nonetheless, neither this lack, nor the often-noted fact that

Aquinas never presented a systematic, ex professo treatment of anal-
ogy, prevents us from looking in Aquinas’s writings for some further
specificity about the semantics of analogy. What is needed is some
account of the unity of the mediating concept(s) involved in analogy,
an account that provides some specificity to the more general seman-
tic characterization that the analogous concept(s) must be “partly
the same and partly different.”12 What kind of sameness, and what
kind of difference? Further semantic detail, in the form of specific
answers to these questions, is needed,13 and some more specific char-
acterization is available in Aquinas. In several places, and in several
different formulations, Aquinas offers what appear to be general and
categorical descriptions of analogical signification which give some of
the necessary further semantic detail. It is not surprising that some of
these formulations have been taken as universal “rules” for analogy
by Aquinas’s readers, although Klubertanz, in collecting the relevant
texts, has decisively shown that “not every discussion that appears to
be a general description applicable to all analogies is such in actual
fact . . . even when the description is couched in categorical language
and no qualifications at all are explicitly made.”14 For present pur-
poses, it does not matter whether the proposed “rules” are in fact ap-
plicable to all analogies. Indeed, the semantic detail we are looking
for need not be a feature of all analogical terms, as not every instance
of an analogy needs to exhibit sufficient unity to support inferences
between the different analogical senses of a term. But, whether the
rules considered here are applicable to all analogies or not, we will
see that none of them succeeds in explaining how an analogical term
could avoid causing the fallacy of equivocation.
We can find in Aquinas three main characterizations of analogy
that could be treated as semantic rules for analogy. They are the fol-
lowing: (1) analogy involves a term that signifies per prius et posterius;
(2) in analogy the ratio of one analogate is posited in the definitions
of the others; and (3) in analogy there is a “proper ratio” that is found
only in one analogate—ratio propria non invenitur nisi in uno. After
considering these, we will consider one more proposed rule that has a
basis in Aquinas, that (4) in analogy, there is a common res significata
(thing signified) and diverse modi significandi (ways of signifying).
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 69

1. Analogy involves a term that signifies per prius et posterius

The first Thomistic proposal to consider as a semantic rule of analogy

is that an analogical term signifies per prius et posterius. The phrase
“per prius et posterius” (according to priority and posteriority) is one
of the most common descriptions of analogical signification in Aqui-
nas.15 Considered on its own, the phrase seems to offer some of the
semantic detail that is required to explain how analogy can be a mean
between univocation and equivocation. Apparently in analogy, dif-
ferent analogical senses are related according to an order of priority.
This alone, however, does not address the issue of how the different
senses display enough unity to sustain inferences from one sense to
another.
Even if the order of priority is further specified, however, we
still do not have the right kind of semantic detail to respond to the
Scotist challenge. E. J. Ashworth has shown that Aquinas spelled out
the notion of signification per prius et posterius in terms of the order
of reality, the order of knowledge, and the order of the imposition
of terms.16 While distinguishing these different orders allows us to
understand how analogical terms can be learned, and how there are
different senses of priority that are especially important to keep in
mind in discussions of religious language, they do not allow us to
understand why an analogical term is sufficiently unified to sustain
valid inferences.
In most of its occurrences, it is clear that the characterization of
analogy in terms of “per prius et posterius” is meant primarily to distin-
guish analogy from univocation.17 Aquinas will often introduce the
phrase by noting first that univocal things are named equally, and
then noting that, in contrast, things named analogically are not named
equally but exhibit an ordering per prius et posterius.18 Yet the kind of
characterization we are presently looking for would not emphasize
how analogy differs from univocation, but how it differs from pure
equivocation. Specifically, it would emphasize how analogy so dif-
fers that it does not cause the fallacy of equivocation. Signifying “per
prius et posterius” does answer this question partially, for the multiple
significations of purely equivocal terms are not so ordered, but under
this rule analogy is still just a special case of equivocation, exhibiting,
70 — Cajetan’s Question

like equivocation, multiple significations. Thus, as McInerny has put

it, “The analogous name is a name of multiple signification, but the
multiplicity has a unity of order, secundum prius et posterius.”19 While
this does distinguish analogy from pure equivocation, it does not do
so in a way that would exempt analogy from the fallacy of equivo-
cation. If signifying per prius et posterius is for Aquinas a rule of all
analogical signification,20 it is not the kind of rule that addresses with
sufficient detail the semantic unity of analogical signification.21

2. In analogy the ratio of one analogate is posited in the definitions

of the others

At first glance, the rule that “the ratio of one analogate appears in
the definitions of the others” appears more promising as a semantic
rule that distinguishes analogy from pure equivocation. The primary
textual basis of the rule is Summa Theologiae Ia, q. 13, a. 6, where
Aquinas says, “In all names which are said analogously of many, it is
necessary that all are said with respect to one; and therefore it is nec-
essary that that one is posited in the definition of them all.”22 Silvestro
Mazzolini (1456–1527) regarded this passage as offering “the decisive
rule” of Thomistic analogy23 and more famously Francis of Ferrara
(aka Francesco Silvestri da Ferrara, 1474–1528) also regarded this
passage as determinative.24 Authors continue to refer to it as giving
Aquinas’s “rule” for analogy,25 although, as a rule for all analogies, it
is controversial; Aquinas himself denies the universality of the rule in
De Veritate q. 2, a. 11, ad 6. Klubertanz finds the rule rejected as often
as accepted.26 In any case, it is worth considering whether it provides
a semantic characterization adequate to the present concern.
We can see from the quoted passage that the “one in the defini-
tion of the others” rule is connected to, and apparently derived from,
the requirement that analogical signification involves a relation or ref-
erence to one. In this sense, it fits with other well-known descriptions
of analogy, from Aristotle’s pros hen equivocation27 to Owen’s “focal
meaning.”28 Analogy is a special kind of equivocation, where diverse
significates are united by a single, “focal” significate to which all other
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 71

significates are related. This “relation to one,” or pros hen equivoca-

tion, thus entails that the ratio of the “one” in question appears in the
definition of the others, for they are understood under the analogical
term only because of a relation to that ratio.
We know that this “relation to one” is, in Aquinas’s mind, impor-
tant for analogy.29 Moreover, we know that it is important for unify-
ing terms under a single science, for in the passage from Aquinas’s
Metaphysics commentary discussed above, it is “relation to one” that
is supposed to make it possible for things not univocally named to be
the subject of a single science. However, though Aquinas says that this
does unify a science, it is not clear why it does. And upon inspection,
the rule seems to apply best to the cases that are least relevant to our
present semantic concern. This is why Ross, for instance, takes “one
in the definition of the others” as a rule for only one kind of analogy,
analogy of attribution.30 Ross’s classification of kinds of analogies is
more indebted to Cajetan than to Thomas, but even Thomas saw
that the rule works better for some cases of analogy than others. For
instance, the rule seems to apply well to the classic example of an ana-
logical term, ‘healthy,’ but it does not seem to apply as well to other
analogical terms, for example ‘wisdom.’ The health of the animal ap-
pears in the definition of ‘healthy’ predicated of urine and food, be-
cause urine and food have a relation to (respectively sign of and cause
of ) the animal’s health. The animal’s health is obviously the one to
which all the senses of ‘healthy’ are related. But such an analysis does
not obviously work for ‘wise.’ Human wisdom need not be defined
in terms of a relation to divine wisdom, nor need divine wisdom be
defined in terms of a relation to human wisdom.31 But, to stick with
these examples, it is the term ‘wise,’ and not ‘healthy,’ for which we
need sufficient unity to avoid the fallacy of equivocation.
The rule does appear to hold for at least some terms of metaphys-
ics. For example, the term ‘being’ is said analogously of substance and
accident, and ‘being’ as predicated of an accident implies a reference
to and is defined in terms of the being of substance. (This is not the
case for ‘being’ as said of creatures and God.)32 However, the rule still
doesn’t help us to see how such a term could sustain valid inferences
free of the fallacy of equivocation. To say that the ratio of one appears
72 — Cajetan’s Question

in the definition of the others is, then, a rule insufficient to meet the
Scotist semantic challenge.

3. In analogy there is a “proper ratio” that is found only in one

analogate (ratio propria non invenitur nisi in uno)

Another proposed rule for analogy is that it always involves a proper

ratio, which is found in only one of the analogates—ratio propria non
invenitur nisi in uno. One source of textual support for this rule is
Summa Theologiae Ia, q. 16, a. 6: “When something is said analogi-
cally of many, it is found according to its proper ratio in only one of
them, from which the others are denominated.”33 The rule is very
similar to the previous one; whereas the second rule discussed above
described how the definitions of primary and secondary analogates
are related, the present rule emphasizes that secondary analogates
lack a proper ratio, which is found in the primary analogate. We may
assume that the two rules entail each other—secondary analogates
would be defined in terms of the primary analogate precisely because
their definitions must make reference to that ratio that is found only
in the primary analogate. At least, like the previous rule, this one
seems to work best for ‘healthy’ and other terms that exhibit the kind
of analogy that has come to be called analogy of attribution; it is not
clear how the rule relates to ‘truth,’ say, as it is found in both created
intellects and the divine intellect—indeed, this is not even clear in ST
Ia.16.6 where Thomas invokes the rule.
In any case, what is important to note for our purposes is that
this rule could not address the challenge with which Cajetan was
concerned. It emphasizes the difference between analogates, saying
that the proper ratio is found only in one. What we need to address
Scotus’s challenge is a rule that explains how the different analogates,
or the different rationes by which those analogates are signified, are
sufficiently unified to avoid the fallacy of equivocation. The current
rule, ratio propria non invenitur nisi in uno, offers nothing in response
to this, and in this sense is even less helpful than the previous rule,
which told us that the different rationes would at least be unified inas-
much as the ratio of one would appear in all the rest.
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 73

— Taken individually, then, none of the three Thomistic

rules for analogy considered above is sufficient to address the par-
ticular semantic challenge with which Cajetan was concerned. But
before dismissing them, it is worth considering whether taken col-
lectively they provide detail that no individual rule provides. It is not
difficult to consider them together. It is easy to see how (2) can be a
clarification, or specification, of (1); indeed, this is already apparent in
Aquinas, who says that “the prior is included in the definition of the
posterior.”34 And we have already seen that (3) is an implication of
(2). McInerny’s interpretation of Thomistic analogy provides a good
example of how (2) and (3) together can be taken as specifications of
(1). According to McInerny,

The analogous name signifies a plurality of rationes which are re-

lated per prius et posterius; that is, one ratio is primary and presup-
posed by the others, this being revealed by the fact that the first
ratio enters into the others. These secondary rationes signify diverse
proportions or analogies to the first; they are said per respectum ad
unum.35

And again:

Things are named analogously when they share a name that re-
ceives several accounts and one of them is controlling or primary,
a sign of which is that it enters into the other accounts. The rule
expressing this is that the proper meaning of the term, its ratio, is
found in only one of the analogates and the others are named with
reference to, by proportion or relation to, it.36

In these and other passages,37 it is clear that rule (1) can be clarified
by rule (2), which in turn implies rule (3): a term signifies per prius
et posterius in the sense that one ratio is primary and appears in the
definitions of all the others, and this primary ratio is necessarily found
properly only in the primary analogate.
But considering these three rules together does not add to the
semantic detail that they provide when considered separately. The
account of analogical signification that they provide may be true, but
74 — Cajetan’s Question

it is still not sufficient to explain how it is possible that an analogi-

cal term could support valid inferences from one of its analogous
senses to another. Analogy is still a kind of equivocation, albeit an
equivocation in which the different significates are related, but the
characterization of that relation—that the ratio of one is included in
the others—is not sufficient to make this kind of equivocation ex-
empt from the fallacy of reasoning that is named for equivocation.

4. In analogy there is one res significata and diverse modi significandi

Lastly, let us consider a fourth rule for which several interpreters

claim to find support in Aquinas. According to McInerny, for in-
stance, the above rules can be further specified in terms of the logical
distinction between res significata and modus significandi. In particular,
says McInerny, the ratio propria of a term must be understood as not
just what it signifies, but this together with how it signifies. That is,
the ratio propria includes not just the res significata, but also the modus
significandi.38 Thus, according to McInerny, an analogical term is a
term that has one res significata and multiple modi significandi.39
As a proposed Thomistic rule for analogy, this is controversial.
Although McInerny treats this as Aquinas’s express doctrine,40 there
is very little textual support for it as a general rule of analogy. Aquinas
often appeals to the variation of modi significandi to explain how some
terms can be common to God and creatures, but outside of discus-
sions of religious language it is not clear that Aquinas ever describes
analogical signification as involving one res significata and diverse
modi significandi. One of McInerny’s best texts is from Aquinas’s com-
mentary on the Sentences,41 though, as Ashworth has pointed out, the
text speaks not of modi significandi but of modi praedicandi.42 While
other texts do explicitly mention modi significandi,43 according to Ash-
worth the distinction between res significata and modus significandi is
“central to Aquinas’s theory of religious language,” but “it is in no
way central to his theory of analogy (insofar as he has a general the-
ory)”;44 for Aquinas, Ashworth says, “modi significandi have no role in
analogy as such.”45
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 75

Whether or not Aquinas meant it as a general analysis of all ana-

logical terms, it is still worth considering the rule that an analogical
term has one res significata but diverse modi significandi. The interpre-
tation has been widely held by scholars other than McInerny,46 and
even if it was not Aquinas’s view, Ashworth has pointed out that the
rule could be attributed to another medieval figure, Peter of Spain.47
Furthermore, even supposing the rule is not a general one for all ana-
logical terms but pertains only to religious language, it is still worth
considering, for theological reasoning is an important example of the
kind of reasoning involving analogical terms that a semantic analysis
of analogy intends to safeguard. Words like ‘good’ and ‘wise’ said of
both God and creatures are much better examples than, for instance,
the stock example of ‘healthy,’ if what we are looking for is an ac-
count of the unity of the analogical concept that can overcome the
Scotist challenge to the semantic possibility of a nonunivocal term
immune from the fallacy of equivocation.
However, a first indication that multiple modes of signifying a
common significate is not a satisfactory semantic rule is that its pri-
mary recent defender takes it to apply to the word ‘healthy.’ Accord-
ing to McInerny, the analogical term ‘healthy’ can be understood as
having a single res significata (the health that is manifested by a healthy
living thing, say, the proportion of its humors or the harmony of its
life functions), and the term is made analogical by its several modi
significandi—that is, the several ways that health is signified.48 McIn-
erny does not carry out such an analysis, but apparently the various
analogous senses of the predicate “(is) healthy” exhibited by the sen-
tences “Socrates is healthy,” “This food is healthy,” and “This urine is
healthy,” would be achieved by using the common res significata, the
health of the animal, to complete the various respective modi signifi-
candi: “has . . . ,” “is a cause of . . . ,” and “is a sign of . . .”49
Whether or not this analysis of ‘healthy’ is ad mentem Thomae,
it clearly shows that understanding analogical terms in this man-
ner does not help us secure the validity of syllogisms that depend on
analogical terms. For again, ‘healthy’ is not the kind of analogical
term for which we are seeking a semantic rule. The different senses
of ‘healthy’ are logically speaking equivocal in precisely the way that
76 — Cajetan’s Question

should cause a fallacy of equivocation if these different senses are in-

terchanged in an inference. For example, in the syllogism ‘Whatever
is on your plate is healthy, and whatever is healthy is alive; there-
fore, whatever is on your plate is alive,’ the premises, insofar as they
are plausibly true, contain the term ‘healthy’ in different analogi-
cal senses, and this is precisely the reason why the conclusion does
not follow from these premises. Yet if these different senses can be
analyzed in terms of a common res significata and diverse modi sig-
nificandi, then the proposed rule that analogy involves a common res
significata and diverse modi significandi does not help us explain why
some analogical terms can be used in syllogisms without causing the
fallacy of equivocation.

— On the basis of these considerations, it is safe to con-

clude that Aquinas does not offer a rule for the semantic unity of
analogy sufficient to meet the Scotist semantic challenge.50 The claim
is not that Aquinas does not have the intellectual resources to address
the question, but simply that his proffered rules for analogy do not
address the question. Of this we should not be surprised, because,
as Ashworth has shown, the question of the unity of the analogical
concept was considered by Thomists in the contexts of philosophical
developments after Aquinas.51 This further explains why Cajetan’s
treatment of analogy differs from Aquinas’s, to the extent that it does,
and why Cajetan’s departure from Aquinas would in fact seem to
him rather necessary or urgent: Cajetan was trying to answer particu-
lar semantic questions to which he did not find, and could not find,
answers in the writings of Aquinas.

I n d isju n ction, Order, and Unequal Participation

There are three more semantic accounts for analogy worth consider-
ing, these ones mentioned explicitly and rejected by Cajetan in De
Nominum Analogia. When Cajetan names three mistaken theories
about the unity of the analogical concept, they are not recognizable
as formulations of Aquinas himself. They rather seem to be derived
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 77

from later Thomists. This further confirms our position that Ca-
jetan’s treatise must be read in light of the context of fourteenth- and
fifteenth-century philosophical developments, rather than as a simple
commentary on or interpretation of the writings of Aquinas.
Indeed, Cajetan does not respond directly or primarily to the se-
mantic rules expressed by Aquinas and already discussed. Nonetheless,
it must be admitted that these rules are treated indirectly and by im-
plication in De Nominum Analogia and in other writings by Cajetan.
In general, Cajetan seems to find them not so much wrong as inade-
quate. It is clear, for instance, that Cajetan regards signifying per prius
et posterius as too general a description of analogy,52 and he regards
the rule “the ratio of one is posited in the definition of the others” as
a proper feature of only one kind of analogy, namely analogy of attri-
bution.53 Cajetan also rejects the rule “ratio propria non invenitur nisi
in uno,” saying that it is not universally true of all cases of analogy.54
But these are not the rules that Cajetan sets out to attack in De
Nominum Analogia. In the very first paragraph of the treatise, Cajetan
attributes the need for his treatment of analogy both to its inherent
philosophical importance, and to peculiar confusions regarding anal-
ogy exhibited by his contemporaries. In particular, he names three
theories about the unity of analogy, lamenting that analogy is wrongly
said to be constituted by “[1] unity of (in)disjunction, or [2] of order,
or [3] of a precise concept unequally participated.”55 Cajetan is appar-
ently motivated to correct the errors inherent in each of these three
proposals, and to offer an alternative.
Despite their obvious significance for the motivation of De Nomi-
num Analogia, these three rejected accounts of analogical unity have
rarely been discussed by interpreters of Cajetan’s theory of analogy.
One notable exception is Ashworth, who gives the best historical and
philosophical background.56 Ashworth shows that the question of the
unity of the analogical concept grew up in the context of late scho-
lastic developments of logical and epistemological terminology, espe-
cially the distinction between “objective” and “formal” concepts. As
Ashworth shows, it was widely agreed that an analogical term could
and did involve one formal concept; that is, one intellectual intention
can mediate the understanding of several analogously related things.
Thus the question of the number and unity of the analogical concept
78 — Cajetan’s Question

was a question about the objective concept—the intelligible content

that is grasped by the formal concept.57 As Ashworth presents it, this
question of the unity of the objective concept was related to the ques-
tion of whether the objective concept that covers all the analogates is
distinct from the proper rationes or objective concepts of the analo-
gates taken singly. Thus the three theories that Cajetan rejects can be
understood as three options that present themselves concerning these
questions of unity and distinctness. As Ashworth describes it with
reference to the particular case of the analogous term ‘being’:

If one holds that the analogical ratio expressed by the word ‘being’
is a single ratio which is unequally participated in by God and
creatures, substance and accidents, then it will be distinct from the
proper rationes which apply to God, creatures, substance and acci-
dents taken singly. On the other hand, if the analogical ratio derives
its unity from an ordering of proper rationes, either as a group or as
a disjunction, it is difficult to see how it can be genuinely distinct
from these proper rationes.58

So either an analogical term signifies a single ratio (objective con-

cept), which is distinct from the proper rationes of the analogates
and is unequally participated in by those analogates, or an analogi-
cal term signifies a complex of multiple proper rationes that are ei-
ther ordered—that is, by attribution to something—or united in a
disjunction.59
To understand better these three alternatives and the historical
context in which Cajetan rejects them, it helps to connect the three
views, insofar as possible, with that thinker or those thinkers who
proposed them. It seems that the “unequal participation” theory of
analogy was the most widespread, and is easiest to attribute to particu-
lar thinkers.60 Capreolus (d. 1444) argued that the objective concept
of being was a single ratio diversely participated in by its analogates.61
Capreolus cited the authority of Aquinas, In Sent. 19.5.2.1, and was
followed in this by Soncinas (d. 1495).62 Soncinas said that ‘being’ was
the type of analogical term that had “one ratio in act, but unequally
participated.”63 Johannes Versor (John Versorius, d. 1485) mentions
the view but rejects it.64 Dominic of Flanders (d. 1479) says that in one
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 79

mode of analogy, exemplified by ‘healthy,’ different things are “the

same according to one ratio diversely participated”; but it is not clear
that Dominic believes this to be the case with ‘being.’65 In fact, the
view that analogy involves unequal participation in a single ratio was
not entertained just by Cajetan’s immediate predecessors; Ashworth
argues that it can be traced at least as far back as Simplicius’s com-
mentary on Aristotle’s Categories.66
Of the other two views—unity of order and unity of
(in)disjunction—only one of them can easily be located historically.
As described already, both views involve the denial that there is one
ratio involved in analogy, insisting that there is a group of rationes. If,
following Ashworth, we understand unity of order to be the order
that attends a group of rationes attributed to a single one, this appears
to be the view espoused by John of Jandun (d. 1328) and by Henry of
Ghent.67 It also seems to be the view of Versorius, who says that the
“unity of analogy” consists in a word’s being said “first and princi-
pally of one and of others insofar as each one of them has a relation
to that first.”68
The other possibility, that the multiple rationes are not ordered
by attribution but are unified in a disjunction, seems to have been oc-
casionally considered, but it is not clear who advocated it. Pinchard69
and Ashworth70 find it expressed by Soncinas, but he more often
and explicitly advocated the “unequal participation” view. Dominic
of Flanders considers whether “being signifies a disjunct concept,”
only to deny it.71 Dominic and others attributed the view to Hervaeus
Natalis (d. 1323), who does discuss the view but apparently did not
espouse it.72 Stephen Brown finds the view in Gerard of Bologna, an
early critic of Scotus,73 and finds the view criticized in Peter Aureol
(d. 1322).74
It remains for us to examine why each of these three proposed
rules for the unity of the analogical concept fail to overcome the Sco-
tistic challenge to the semantic possibility of analogy. Cajetan appar-
ently expects that they are plainly seen as mistaken only in light of the
alternative, true theory of analogy that he claims to expound in De
Nominum Analogia, and he does not criticize them except in light of
that theory.75 Yet even before presenting Cajetan’s alternative theory,
we can consider these three proposals on their own terms and see if
80 — Cajetan’s Question

they can meet the semantic challenge that Cajetan had before him, to
find a mean between univocation and equivocation, and in particular
a nonunivocal term that could be used in inferences without precipi-
tating the fallacy of equivocation.
At least two of the proposals obviously fail in light of our previous
considerations. The proposal that analogy involves “unity of order,”
or that analogy is unified by an “ordered concept,” can be assimilated
to the rule already considered that diverse senses of an analogical term
signify per prius et posterius—that is, according to an order of priority.
We have seen that this description of analogy remains too general to
address the specific semantic concerns that occupied Cajetan.
The other proposal that is easy to dismiss is that analogy involves
unity of disjunction. In other words, diverse concepts are unified by
positing another concept in which they are conceived collectively, as
members of a disjunct set. This hardly appears to be an attractive
theory of analogy in the first place, and seems to rely on a merely ad
hoc principle of unification. The diverse analogates still appear only
equivocally related, and this rule provides no sense of how their unity
into one concept is sufficient to avoid the fallacy of equivocation just
like pure equivocation.76
When we turn to the third proposal, that analogy involves a single
concept or ratio that is unequally participated in, it is more difficult to
evaluate whether or not it meets the Scotistic challenge. As a seman-
tic rule for analogy, it avoids the difficulty of the other two proposals
Cajetan mentions and rejects, because it does not posit diverse rationes
that are somehow united; instead, it posits a single ratio, in which the
various analogates participate in diverse ways. Because it involves one
ratio, it appears that it can avoid the fallacy of equivocation.
But we would need to know in further detail what it means for
analogates to unequally participate in a ratio before we could deem
this an adequate characterization of analogy. On the one hand, if
unequally participating in a ratio makes things different enough to
be only analogically, and not generically, related, then we would still
need some account of how this unequal participation would not oc-
casion the fallacy of equivocation. On the other hand, if “unequal
participation” involves a single ratio (a single precise concept), uniting
things alike in conception although different in reality (like “animal”
 Some Insufficient Semantic Rules for Analogy — 81

as predicated of higher and lower animals), then it is really a special

form of univocation (as Cajetan himself describes for what he calls
“analogy of inequality”). In either case, we do not have a satisfactory
answer to the Scotistic challenge to describe nonunivocal signification
sufficiently unified to preserve valid inferences.

Th e C h a llenge

Our analysis of this last “unequal participation” proposal, and of

the other rules considered in this chapter, leads us to acknowledge
a question that may have haunted some readers from the begin-
ning: Is this attempt to find a semantic mean between univocation
and equivocation an impossible balancing act? Would any rule fail?
It certainly seems as if the conceptual space for a nonunivocal, non-
equivocal term shrinks to the infinitesimal once we insist on a rigor-
ous semantic analysis. It appears that as soon as we prevent a term’s
being prone to the fallacy of equivocation, we make it univocal, and
as soon as we distinguish it from the univocal, we make it equivocal.
Of course, before trying to give it a systematic formulation, it seemed
that there was space for such a mean, and in particular that there was
logical space for nonunivocal terms that did not cause the fallacy of
equivocation. But this space proves elusive once we try to define it
with a rigorous semantic analysis. So is a rigorous semantic analysis
asking too much?
As we have seen from the previous chapter, some scholars have
apparently thought so. But whether or not it is asking too much, we
must remember in reading De Nominum Analogia that Cajetan didn’t
think that it was asking too much. Not only was he aware of this
balancing act, but he even thought he pulled it off. On the basis of the
above reflections we may be tempted to think, even before consider-
ing Cajetan’s attempt, that it could not succeed, and that if it even ap-
pears to succeed it could only do so by some kind of magician’s trick.
But before we dismiss his attempted balancing act as a priori
impossible, we owe it to ourselves to try to understand how Cajetan
thinks he can pull it off, to see, as it were, what kind of trick he might
have up his sleeve, and to decide whether the trick is a trickster’s
82 — Cajetan’s Question

deception or in fact what it claims to be: a clever solution to a chal-

lenging puzzle. This will be the business of part 2. Before turning to
Cajetan’s own theory, starting in chapter 6, we must first make sure
that we understand the semantic principles that form the conceptual
framework within which Cajetan’s theory is proposed. Thus part
2 begins with a chapter offering an overview of Cajetan’s semantic
principles.
 Part 2

Cajetan’s Answer
 Chapter Five

Cajetan’s Semantic Principles

I n trodu ct ion

In response to objections to a semantic analysis of analogy, we began to

examine Cajetan’s semantic principles in chapter 3. There I clarified
that for Cajetan the concept was simply that which mediated thought;
a concept is simply the intellectual intention by virtue of which some-
one understands something. Thus, we saw, the concept played a role
in the general notion of signification. For signification is the function
of a word that makes someone aware not of the word but of whatever
is signified by the word. A word that signifies is a word that makes
something known. That is to say, in the common medieval formula-
tion traced back to Boethius, signification is the establishment of an
understanding.
This initial and partial clarification of Cajetan’s notion of the
“concept” needs to be put in the context of a more ordered, if still
sketchy, presentation of Cajetan’s semantic principles. The present
chapter contains such a sketch, preparing the way for a consideration
of Cajetan’s teaching on analogy by providing the philosophical con-
text in which he offered that theory.
Cajetan nowhere systematically articulates what we would
call a theory of semantics, but his semantic principles can be recon-
structed from a variety of his works. His commentaries on two logical
works—Porphyry’s Isagoge and Aristotle’s Categories—are obvious
sources.1 Much can be learned of Cajetan’s semantic principles also

— 85
86 — Cajetan’s Answer

from his commentary on Thomas Aquinas’s De Ente et Essentia. All

three of these works were completed within the few years before Ca-
jetan wrote De Nominum Analogia. We can also learn about Cajetan’s
semantic principles from his commentary on Aquinas’s Summa Theo-
logiae, a work written several years later. These are the sources that
inform the following outline of Cajetan’s semantic principles.
Among the topics we will consider along the way is the relation
between Cajetan’s semantic principles and metaphysics. So, for in-
stance, this chapter addresses the ontological commitment of Cajetan’s
logical “realism.” It also addresses a more particular issue, which will
prove more directly relevant to the later discussion of analogy: the
question of whether claims about terms denominating intrinsically or
extrinsically are metaphysical claims, or more properly logical or se-
mantic ones.

Sig n ification

Cajetan’s notion of signification can be introduced by turning to his

description of the subject matter of Aristotle’s Categories. Briefly, Ca-
jetan explains that while the metaphysician considers things as they
are, the logician considers things as they are understood and signified.
As Cajetan describes it, in the part of logic that regulates the most
basic intellectual act, simple apprehension,

incomplex things are not united and distinguished with the condi-
tions that they have in the nature of things, but as they are received
by the intellect, that is, as they stand under the simple apprehension
of the intellect, that is, as objects of simple apprehension of the in-
tellect, and things so received are nothing other than things said by
interior words, or (which is the same) things conceived by simple
concepts; and things of this sort are nothing other than things sig-
nified by incomplex words (since words are signs of concepts and
concepts [are signs] of things).2

This passage is illuminating in several ways. At the end, as an aside,

Cajetan introduces what has come to be called the “semantic triangle”:
 Cajetan’s Semantic Principles — 87

word, concept, and thing. The discussion leading up to this helps us

to understand how the three terms of this semantic triangle are re-
lated. The concept is equated with an “interior word,” which is just
that which makes simple apprehension possible, in other words, that
by which the intellect is made aware of something in some way. So
in saying that “words are signs of concepts and concepts are signs of
things,” we see that Cajetan means that a word signifies immediately
an intellectual intention or “concept” that necessarily mediates un-
derstanding, and ultimately signifies what is understood by the medi-
ation of that concept, that which the concept makes one understand.
So a word immediately signifies a concept and ultimately signi-
fies some “thing.” The things signified and understood are not con-
crete individuals, but what Cajetan will speak of as their “forms” or
“natures.”3 It is important to note that in a strictly semantic context,
such terms are not to be taken in their full, metaphysical, sense, but
in an extended sense to cover whatever can be understood or signi-
fied as if after the manner of a form. Cajetan will say that the “nature”
is simply “that which is signified by the definition,” to be contrasted
with the “supposit” or referent of the term, which has that nature.4
Again, in such contexts, “by the name ‘form’ we understand anything
by which something is said to be such and such, whether it is really an
accident, or substance, or matter, or form.”5 So the difference between
a “nature” or “form” in its strict, metaphysical sense, and its broader
logical or semantic sense, is that in the former sense it is some real
quiddity of a thing, while in the latter case it is whatever a word can
signify. Cajetan explains this difference at some length:

Note that just as the what of the thing [quid rei] is the quiddity of
the thing, so the what of the name [quid nominis] is the quiddity
of the name. However, the name, since it is essentially a sign of
those passions which are objectively in the soul according to Peri-
hermenias 1, does not have another quiddity except this, that it is
the sign of something understood or thought: a sign, however, as
such, is relative to what is signified. Whence to know the what of
the name is nothing other than to know to what such a name has a
relation as sign to signified. Such knowledge, however, can be ac-
quired through accidents of that signified thing, through common
88 — Cajetan’s Answer

characteristics, through essential characteristics, through nods, and

whatever other ways, as by asking a Greek the what of the name
“anthropos,” if by a finger he indicated a man, then we perceive the
what of the name; and similarly of others. But in asking the what of
the thing, it would be necessary to assign that which belongs to the
thing signified in the first mode of adequate perseity. And this is
the essential difference between the what of the name and the what
of the thing, namely that the what of the name is the relation of the
name to the signified, while the what of the thing is the essence of
the thing related or signified. And from this difference there follow
all others which are usually said, such as that the what of the name
may be of complex non-beings, by accidental, common, or extrane-
ous characteristics; while the what of the thing is of an incomplex
being known properly and essentially. For the relation of the word
can terminate in what is not a being in the nature of things, and in
what is complex, and can be declared through accidents, and such-
like; while the essence of the thing is not had except through the
essential properties of incomplex entities.6

In light of contemporary philosophical concerns, and familiar

criticisms of scholastic logic, two things are worth emphasizing. First,
by speaking of a “concept” Cajetan is not introducing some contro-
versial psychological or epistemological entity, but simply giving a
name to a necessary element of the activities of thought and speech.
Wittgensteinian and other criticisms of “concepts” in philosophy of
mind and philosophy of language notwithstanding, Cajetan’s “con-
cepts,” understood in the sense that he intended them as the intel-
lectual acts that mediate conception and signification, are just not the
kind of things whose existence could be contested. Someone who de-
nied that there were such concepts, or that he had any such concepts,
would be denying that he understood anything, or that he uttered
significant speech.7
Similarly, the claim that what words signify are “forms” or “na-
tures” should be seen as more universally acceptable than it otherwise
might. For as we have seen, reference to “forms” or “natures” in the
context of logic is reference not to metaphysical forms in rerum natura
but to whatever can be understood by simple acts of apprehension,
 Cajetan’s Semantic Principles — 89

or signified by simple terms. That these are not forms in the meta-
physician’s sense is perhaps most easily seen from the fact that we can
think about and refer to nonexistent things, to privations, to beings
of reason, none of which would, on a standard Aristotelian hylomor-
phist account, be construed as real forms or real natures.8 Indeed, it is
worth pointing out that in principle such “forms” or “natures” need
not even imply an Aristotelian hylomorphist metaphysics or philoso-
phy of nature9 (though of course both are present in Cajetan). Fur-
thermore, we see in this clarification the material for an answer to the
famous nominalist charge that realists multiplied entities for every
significant term.10
Cajetan and other semantic “realists” did not distinguish logical
from metaphysical “forms” or “natures” merely as an ad hoc strategy
of ontological reduction; the distinction quite naturally follows from
the nature of logic and the observation with which we began this dis-
cussion, that the business of logic is to consider things not as they are
in reality but as they are understood and signified by the mediation
of human concepts.
It is necessary, however, to clarify further Cajetan’s use of the
term ‘concept.’ Cajetan adopted the later scholastic distinction be-
tween the “formal concept” (conceptus formalis, also sometimes the
conceptus mentis or conceptus mentalis, “mental concept”) and the “ob-
jective concept.”11 As Cajetan explains the distinction:

Note that there are two sorts of concepts: formal and objective. The
formal concept is some likeness that the possible intellect forms in
itself, and which is objectively representative of the thing under-
stood; this by the philosophers is called the intention or the concept,
by the theologians the word. The objective concept is the thing rep-
resented by the formal concept, terminating the act of understand-
ing; for example, the formal concept of a lion is that image which
the possible intellect forms of leonine quiddity, when it wants to
understand it; but the objective concept of the same is the leonine
nature itself, represented and understood. Nor should it be thought
when it is said that a name signifies a concept that it signifies only
one of these; for the name “lion” signifies both, albeit in different
ways; it is the sign of the formal concept as of the means, or that by
90 — Cajetan’s Answer

which [it signifies], and it is the sign of the objective concept as of

the end, or that which [it signifies].12

So what Cajetan here calls the “formal concept” is what was intro-
duced above as simply the concept, that which mediates thought and
signification. What Cajetan here calls the “objective concept” sounds
like what has already been introduced as the object of such a medi-
ating intention, the “nature” that is understood or signified. This is
why, in other contexts, Cajetan will assimilate the “objective concept”
to the “res” or “res extra anima” of the semantic triangle.13 Indeed, it
is fair to think of the objective concept and the signified nature as
the same thing, with this qualification: considered as the nature, it is
the object of understanding and signification considered just in itself,
while considered as the objective concept, it is this object considered as
terminating an act of thought or signification—that is, considered as
an object of conception. So the objective concept, even though it is in
some sense what is “outside” of the soul (res extra anima), is also “in”
the soul—not in it as in a subject, as the formal concept is in the soul,
but in the soul as the object of the intellect’s attention.14
Another and related term that plays a role in Cajetan’s under-
standing of signification is “ratio.” The word is notoriously difficult
to translate. Among the main English renderings that have been em-
ployed are “content,”15 “analysis,”16 and “formality.”17 In clarifying
the use of “ratio” in a passage from Aristotle’s Categories (a passage
that will prove relevant to our discussion of analogy), Cajetan says
that the ratio is the definition, when there is a definition, and other-
wise it is what is “directly signified by the name.” In either case, Ca-
jetan suggests translating “ratio” as “conceptus.” It would seem from
this context that by this suggestion Cajetan does not intend the for-
mal concept or mediating intellectual intention, but what this formal
concept represents to the intellect as terminating its act—that is, the
objective concept.18 However, in another context, Cajetan will clarify
that “ratio” can be taken in either way, as indicating the definition, or
as indicating the formal concept.19
It should not be surprising, then, that the ratio can be said both
to be in things and to be in the intellect. Indeed, the ratio appears to
be even more versatile than the objective concept, which as we have
just seen is in the intellect objectively, and outside of the intellect as
 Cajetan’s Semantic Principles — 91

what is understood. The ratio can be considered (1) as in a thing, as

its own individual intelligible structure, prior to and independent
of our thought and signification; (2) in itself, as just the intelligible
structure that it is, which may be intellectually abstracted from things
and serve as an object of signification; (3) as that intelligible structure,
considered insofar as it is actually conceived and signified by means
of an intellectual intention (the objective concept); and (4) as that very
intellectual intention or “mental word” by which that intelligible
structure is understood, the quality inhering in the intellect which
mediates thought and signification (the formal concept).

P red ication

It is in the second of these four ways of understanding the ratio that

we can say that the ratio is predicated of something. Indeed, this is
why, when there is a definition (id quo explicatur nominis significatum),
it can replace the ratio without changing the sense of the predication.
Cajetan subscribes to what has been called “the inherence theory” of
predication, according to which to predicate a common term of some-
thing is to signify the inherence of the significate of the predicate in
that thing.20 So a predication is true if and only if the significate of the
predicate actually inheres in that of which it is predicated. Here, we
must distinguish between what is predicated, and what verifies the
predication. The significate of the predicate is what is predicated, and
its actuality in the subject is what verifies the predication. Put another
way, what is predicated is the nature, absolutely considered—that is,
the nature considered in itself without any of the conditions that ac-
company it as it exists in a particular thing. That is why, when I say,
“Socrates is a man,” I predicate of Socrates only what is included in
the significate of “man,” namely humanity.21 But what verifies the
predication is the actual humanity in Socrates—that is, Socrates’ hu-
manity, the individuated nature by virtue of which Socrates is a real
living human being.22
In the example just given there happens to be a neat correspon-
dence between the ratio of humanity, which is predicated, and the
real nature humanity, which verifies the predication. This will not
always be the case, because what it is for the significate to be actual
92 — Cajetan’s Answer

or to exist will be different with different kinds of significates. For

instance, when the ratio is a privation, the actuality of that ratio will be
the absence of the corresponding positive form. The typical example
is “blindness,” which is actualized when someone lacks the real form,
sight. Indeed, in this case, this is just what blindness is—the absence
of sight—which would presumably be spelled out in the definition
of the ratio of blindness. But privations are not the only complicating
cases, and in general we can say that what it is for a significate or ratio
to be actual in something will vary with the kind of significate or ratio
that it is.
Indeed, although we can say in general that for Cajetan a predica-
tion is true if and only if the significate of the predicate is (or exists or is
actual) in its subject, there will prove to be different senses of “being”
(or “existing,” or “being actual”) which are appropriate for differ-
ent kinds of significates.23 A fuller account of these different senses,
and how they are systematically related, would be needed for any re-
ally thorough explanation of Cajetan’s semantic principles.24 For our
purposes, the essential point is only that different kinds of predicates
will have different verification conditions—that is, different senses in
which the significates of the predicates can be actual.25

Den omination

The notion of denomination will be of particular importance for un-

derstanding certain claims Cajetan makes about the properties of dif-
ferent modes of analogy. Considered generally, denomination seems
to be closely allied to predication; a term denominates those things
for which it can supposit—that is, those things of which it is truly
predicable. In the typical construction, a thing is denominated by a
term from something. That from which something is denominated
is the denominating form (again, a form in the semantic, rather than
metaphysical, sense). In many cases, this denominating form may just
be the form signified by the denominating term, as a white thing is
denominated “white” on account of its whiteness. Thus, in the dis-
cussion at the beginning of the Categories, Aristotle’s “paronyms”
( paronuma, 1a12) was translated as “denominatives” (denominativa),
and in commenting on the passage Cajetan describes a strict sense of
 Cajetan’s Semantic Principles — 93

denomination in which the denominating form is just that which the

denominating term signifies.26
But this strict sense of denomination is not the most commonly
employed. There are clearly other senses in which the denominat-
ing form is not simply the significate of the term but a part of its
significate or some other connotation or consignificate. It seems that
it was usually thought that the denominating form would have some
connection to the etymology of a term. Thus denomination is closely
allied with imposition—the denominating form could, in principle,
be understood as that from which a term is imposed. However, it
appears that where that from which a term is imposed to signify is
merely an etymology unconnected with the terms’ current significa-
tion, it was not considered the denominating form.27 So it seems to be
that the denominating form needs to be somehow consignified by the
term, in such a way that it would appear as a part of its ratio—that is,
it would be included as part of the definition of that thing insofar as it
is denominated by that term. For instance, something that is not itself
a living, healthy creature can be called “healthy” insofar as it helps
produce or gives evidence of a living healthy creature, so that a meal
or a urine sample may not actually possess the relevant denominat-
ing form (health or healthiness) which is nevertheless that on account
of which they are called “healthy.” This observation, then, raises the
question that will be addressed in terms of whether, on given occa-
sions, denomination is “intrinsic” or “extrinsic.”

Extrin sic vs. Intrinsic D enom ination

Though it becomes commonly invoked by later scholastic philoso-

phers, the technical distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic de-
nomination has murky origins.28 Though there are passages in
Aquinas that seem to describe and employ the distinction,29 it does
not appear to be referred to as such in a technical way.30 The distinc-
tion is formulated in the Summa Totius Logicae, long spuriously at-
tributed to Aquinas,31 as follows:

Now something can be predicated denominatively, or can de-

nominate that thing, in two ways. In one way such predication or
94 — Cajetan’s Answer

denomination is made from something which is intrinsic to that of

which such predication or denomination is made, which namely
perfects that thing either by identity or inherence. . . . In the second
way denomination is made from the extrinsic, namely from that
which is not formally in the denominated thing, but is some extrin-
sic absolute, from which the denomination is made.32

It is completely in accord with this that John Doyle has offered the
following description of extrinsic denomination: “Extrinsic denomi-
nation [is] a designation of something not from anything inherent in
itself, but from some disposition, coordination, or relationship which
it has toward something else.”33 Doyle’s description serves to explicate
the obvious sense of the terms, that in extrinsic denomination some-
thing is named from something that is extrinsic to it, something that,
by implication, is intrinsic to, or “inheres in,” something else. Indeed,
Doyle’s mention of a “disposition, coordination, or relationship . . .
toward something else” recalls a discussion in the Summa Totius Logi-
cae in which the denominating form is described as the foundation to
which the denominated thing is related:

It must be known that extrinsic denomination requires some essen-

tial relation between the extrinsic denominating [form] and what
is denominated from it . . . and therefore it is necessary that that
from which such denomination is made is the essential foundation
of this relation.34

Cajetan seems to think that this description does not entirely

capture all cases of extrinsic denomination. Sometimes extrinsic
denomination requires that the denominating form be an extrinsic
foundation of a relation; other times it needs only to be a relation
itself, which is extrinsic. Defining both of these in contrast with in-
trinsic denomination, Cajetan says:

Denomination is twofold, sometimes intrinsic, and sometimes ex-

trinsic. It is called intrinsic denomination when the denominating
form is in that which is denominated, as white, quantity, etc.; while
denomination is extrinsic when the denominating form is not in
 Cajetan’s Semantic Principles — 95

the denominated thing, as location, measure, and the like. . . . But

there are two ways in which it occurs that something is said to be
such from something extrinsic. In one way, so that the ratio of the
denomination is that relation to something extrinsic, as urine is
called “healthy” only by its relation as sign to health. In the other
way, so that the ratio of the denomination is not the relation of si-
militude, or whatever else, but the form which is the foundation of
the relation of similitude to something extrinsic: as air is said to be
“bright” [lucidus] from the brightness of the sun [luce solari].35

So something can be denominated extrinsically either by an ex-

trinsic relation, or an extrinsic foundation of a relation.
This might suggest that talk of extrinsic and intrinsic denomi-
nation is just a sophisticated way of describing metaphysical states
of affairs, rather than of making a logical claim about the semantic
function of terms. Indeed, when medieval authors said that a term
denominates intrinsically or extrinsically, it is clear that they often
meant to be making a metaphysical claim. Some of the typical exam-
ples of terms that were said to denominate extrinsically—in addition
to the ones mentioned, common examples include “is seen” (videtur),
or “is understood” (intelligitur, cognoscitur)—are often so described in
contexts that make it clear that the main point is metaphysical: that
when an object becomes such, it is not because of some real change in
it, but because something else has changed.36 In such cases, it is safe
to say that to speak of intrinsic or extrinsic denomination, while on
the surface it pertained to terms, was in fact intended as a device to
describe properties of things.37
It is interesting, however, that the metaphysical claim was couched
in semantic language. The claim seems to be the following:

A term P denominates some thing x extrinsically iff for the form

signified by P to be actual in x is for some other form F, consignified
by P, to be actual in something other than x.

According to this definition, determining whether a predicate de-

nominates extrinsically would indeed require metaphysical consid-
eration of what it is for a significate to be actual. But could it ever
96 — Cajetan’s Answer

follow from the semantics of a term that for the significate to be actual
in some thing is for some form to be actual in something else?
Apparently this was considered to be so in the case of the category
of relatives, where reference to something else is built into the ratio
of a relation.38 As Aquinas put it, “Amongst those which are called
relatives, something is denominated not only from that which is in it,
but also from that which is extrinsic to it.”39 Indeed, both of Cajetan’s
alternative occasions of extrinsic denomination described above (air
called “bright” and urine “healthy”) require that there be a relation
between the thing being denominated and something extrinsic to it
on account of which it is denominated. While this may still look like
a metaphysical claim, even if it is one that seems bound up with the
semantics of terms, we must remember that in speaking of the cate-
gories, the medieval tradition took it that we were speaking not of
things as they are in themselves, but of things as they are signified by
our terms.40
One way to see that “denominating extrinsically” can be re-
garded as a semantic property of a term is to imagine a case where
the semantic claim and the corresponding metaphysical claim, which
usually coincide, would diverge, for example a case in which we want
to make the semantic claim that a term denominates a thing extrinsi-
cally, but the corresponding metaphysical claim—that the thing de-
nominated does not actually possess the denominating form—would
be false. We can contrive such a case by altering the classic example
of extrinsic denomination, when something is denominated as “seen”
(videtur). Suppose that what is seen is the very object that is doing the
seeing. For example, when I look at myself in the mirror, we could
say that my eye sees itself, and so my eye is seen by itself.41 From the
metaphysical point of view, “seen” here does not seem to denominate
the eye extrinsically; the sight by virtue of which the eye is seen in-
heres in it, because, ex hypothesi, it is that very eye that is seeing.
But from the point of view of semantics, it is completely acciden-
tal that that which is denominated as “seen” because of its relation to
sight happens to be the very thing in which the sight inheres. But then
we are justified in saying that, from the point of view of the semantics,
the eye is denominated as “seen” not intrinsically but extrinsically. To
be more precise, we could say that, insofar as it is seen, the actuality of
the object of sight (viz., the eye) is distinct from the actuality of the
 Cajetan’s Semantic Principles — 97

sight, indeed, that the sight is logically extrinsic to the thing seen, even
if in this case it happens not to be metaphysically extrinsic.
This is not just a clever theoretical exercise. There are good tex-
tual grounds for making this distinction between a metaphysical and
a semantic reading of claims about intrinsic or extrinsic denomina-
tion. Indeed, the very distinction I am exploiting, between consider-
ing the denomination relation from the metaphysical point of view
and considering it from the semantic point of view, is expressed in
Cajetan’s distinction between taking a relation materially or formally:

The term “to something [ad aliquid]” or “relative” can be taken in

two ways, namely: materially, for that thing which is relative or is
denominated to something [ad aliquid]; and formally for that rela-
tion or thing as it has [ut habet] the relation. For example, “lord”
can be taken for that man, who is denominated lord; and it can be
taken for [that man] insofar as he has lordship [in quantum domi-
nium habet].42

Consistent with Cajetan’s precision, then, we could clarify the defini-

tion of extrinsic denomination given above to make explicit that it
is to be taken “formally” and not “materially”—that is, as making a
semantic as opposed to a metaphysical claim:

A term P denominates some thing x extrinsically iff for the form

signified by P to be actual in x is for some other form F, consignified
by P, to be actual in something other than x insofar as x is P.

On this definition, even though in our example of the eye seeing itself,
for being seen to be actual in the eye is for that very eye to have an act
of sight inherent in or intrinsic to it, we can still say that the denomi-
nation of that eye as “being seen” is extrinsic, because for the eye to be
seen, insofar as it is seen, is not for that act of sight as such to be in that
eye; because, of course, sight is in that eye only insofar as the eye sees,
and it is only by accident, from the semantic point of view, that in this
case the eye that sees is the same eye that is seen.
In sum, then, claims about a term denominating extrinsically
(or intrinsically) can be understood as having semantic, as opposed
to metaphysical, weight; that is to say, talk of extrinsic or intrinsic
98 — Cajetan’s Answer

denomination can be a matter of the semantic properties of terms,

rather than a matter of the metaphysical characteristics of the things
denominated by the terms. That is why this discussion is properly
included in a sketch of Cajetan’s semantic principles; but it is espe-
cially appropriate as a preparation for a reading of Cajetan’s De No-
minum Analogia, for, as we will see in the next chapter, it helps us
understand some of the most controversial claims that Cajetan makes
there, namely that analogy of attribution always involves extrinsic de-
nomination, and analogy of proportionality always involves intrinsic
denomination.

— Let this suffice, then, as a general preparation for the

philosophical context of Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia. It needs re-
peating that this is not a complete outline of Cajetan’s semantic frame-
work. Other topics common to medieval semantics (e.g., supposition,
modi significandi, ampliation, the different semantic properties of ab-
stract and concrete terms) have been omitted here, and a thorough
reconstruction of Cajetan’s semantic principles would include discus-
sion of these and other issues. But what has been discussed will allow
us to appreciate Cajetan’s strategy for characterizing the unity of the
analogical concept, and to understand the central and often contro-
versial claims that Cajetan makes about analogy in general and about
the different particular forms it can take.
 Chapter Six

The Semantics of Analogy

Inequality and Attribution

This is the first of four chapters that directly explicate Cajetan’s

teaching on analogy in De Nominum Analogia. It will consider his
definitions of analogy at the beginning of that treatise, and his rela-
tively brief discussions of analogy of inequality and analogy of attri-
bution. It is relevant to begin, however, with a consideration of two
earlier works, Cajetan’s commentaries on Aquinas’s De Ente et Es-
sentia (1495) and on Aristotle’s Categories (1498). The prior writings
prove valuable because they show us how Cajetan was developing an
analysis of the semantics of analogy before he wrote the De Nominum
Analogia, thus helping to clarify precisely what is, and what is not,
novel in his more dedicated and systematic treatment. Specifically, it
confirms that Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia was intended to an-
swer particular questions about the semantics of analogy: character-
izing the unity of the analogical concept, and explaining how, at least
in some cases, such a nonunivocal unity may suffice to preserve the
validity of demonstrative syllogisms.

The C ategories and D e E nte et E ssentia Commentaries

Cajetan briefly touched on analogy in his commentary on Aristo-

tle’s Categories, in the context of the discussion of equivocal terms.
Aristotle’s definition had said that equivocals have a common name
— 99
100 — Cajetan’s Answer

but were different with respect to the concept. Cajetan clarifies the
sense of “diversity” or “difference”:

The word “diverse” is not taken for simple diversity, but is com-
monly accepted as it comprehends under itself diversity simply,
and in some respect [secundum quid], total or partial, so that they are
called equivocals both whose concept [ratio] according to that com-
mon name is entirely diverse, and whose concept [ratio] according
to that common name is in some way diverse.1

By interpreting Aristotle as intending this more general sense of di-

versity or difference, Cajetan can say that Aristotle means implicitly
to include analogy in his definition of equivocation. Thus Cajetan
continues:

And because of this, do not say that here are defined only pure
equivocals, which are also called equivocals by chance [aequivoca
a casu], but that here are defined equivocals in general, as com-
prehending analogues, which are equivocals by choice [aequivoca a
consilio], and pure equivocals; and pure equivocals have concepts
[rationes substantiae] entirely diverse, while analogues [have con-
cepts] diverse in some way [aliquo modo].2

Cajetan offers two pieces of evidence that it is Aristotle’s intention to

include analogues among equivocals. One is that Aristotle’s examples
of equivocals—a man, and a picture of a man, which can both be
called “animal”—count as an instance of equivocals by choice. The
other is the intention of the work, which is to define things as they are
united under transcendental words, which are not purely equivocal
but analogical.3
Cajetan suggests that there is more to say on the subject of
analogy:

But about how many ways analogy varies, and how, since now we
speak in summary, we pass over in silence; I aim to make a special
treatise about this, if it please God.4
 The Semantics of Analogy — 101

Here is the promise that was fulfilled, later that same year, in the
treatise De Nominum Analogia.
However, even before that treatise, Cajetan had spoken to the
question of “how many ways analogy varies,” in his commentary on
the De Ente et Essentia of Aquinas.5 There, following the definitions
of equivocation and univocation from Aristotle’s Categories, Cajetan
had already given a rough definition of analogy:

They are univocals whose name is common, and the concept

[ratio] according to that name is absolutely the same. They are
pure equivocals whose name is common and the concept [ratio]
according to that name is absolutely diverse. They are analogates
whose name is common, and the concept [ratio] according to that
name is somehow the same, and somehow different [aliquo modo
eadem, et aliquo modo diversa], or the same in some respect, and
different in some respect [secundum quid eadem, et secundum quid
diversa].6

As a general characterization of analogy, this much was, in fact, en-

tirely conventional. But within the framework of this characterization
Cajetan began to sketch different ways in which analogy can occur,
as different ways in which we can say that a concept or concepts are
unum secundum quid and diversa secundum quid. Indeed, within this
framework Cajetan must address the question, pressed by Scotus,
of how analogy, considered as a kind of equivocation (aequivocatio a
consilio), can avoid the fallacy of equivocation. As we will see, Cajetan
shows himself already attuned to this question in his De Ente et Es-
sentia commentary.
Because Cajetan, in this part of the commentary, is considering
analogy as involving a ratio that is “somehow the same, and somehow
different, or the same in some respect, and different in some respect,”
he does not here discuss what he will later call analogy of inequality,
since this “mode” of analogy is really a form of univocation, having
a ratio entirely the same. But Cajetan had mentioned analogy of in-
equality earlier in the commentary, when he introduced the notion of
predication per prius et posterius. Cajetan wrote:
102 — Cajetan’s Answer

There are two ways in which something can be predicated per prius
et posterius. By one way, according to the being [secundum esse] of
that predicate. By another way, according to the proper concept
[secundum propriam rationem] of it. That is said to be predicated
analogically according to being [secundum esse] which has a more
perfect being [esse] in one than in another; and thus every genus is
predicated per prius et posterius of its species, so that it necessarily
has a more perfect being [esse] in one species than in another.7

For the predication per prius et posterius of genus terms, what he will
later call analogy of inequality, Cajetan cites the authority of Aver-
roës. Yet he immediately dismisses the consideration of terms secun-
dum esse as irrelevant to his present concerns, for in this sense even
Scotus would agree that “being” is said analogically of substance and
accident, because Scotus can say that though “being” is a genus term
the species of substance is more perfectly being than the species of ac-
cident. The argument between the Thomists and the Scotists, accord-
ing to Cajetan, is whether “being” said of substance and accident is
said per prius et posterius in the other way—that is, secundum propriam
rationem.
It was in order to answer this question that Cajetan described
analogy as a mean between univocation and equivocation, in the
words cited above. Cajetan continues by distinguishing two different
ways in which this mean between univocation and equivocation can
occur:

Note that there are two kinds of analogates: some according to a

determinate relation of one to another, and some according to pro-
portionality. For example: substance and accident are analogates
in the first way under the term “being”; but God and creature are
analogates in the second way, for the distance between God and
creature is infinite [and therefore there can be no determinate rela-
tion between them]. These differ in several ways: since analogates
of the first sort are so disposed that the secondary, insofar as it is
named by the analogue, is defined in terms of the first—as accident,
insofar as it is a being, is defined in terms of substance. But this is not
 The Semantics of Analogy — 103

the case with analogates of the second sort; for creature, insofar as it
is a being, is not defined in terms of God.8

Sometimes analogates have a determinate relation to each other,

sometimes they are related by proportionality. In terminology, this
much of Cajetan’s presentation seems to be nothing more than a re-
construction of what Aquinas says about the difference between pro-
portion and proportionality in De Veritate q. 2, a. 11. (Cajetan does
not cite that text here, but he does cite it a few paragraphs later when
applying this twofold distinction to a particular theological conclu-
sion.) Cajetan goes further, however, translating this discussion into
the terms of the semantic problem of specifying how there is a mean
between univocation and equivocation—how, that is, the concept
(or concepts) can be the same in some respect and different in some
respect:

Whence analogates of the first sort have a common name, and the
ratio according to that name is in some way the same and in some
way different, in this sense: that the analogue is said simply, that is
without addition of anything, of the first, and of the others it is only
said with some relation to the first, which falls in their definitions, as is
manifest in the example of “healthy.”
Now analogates of the second sort have the name in common
and the ratio according to that name is in some way the same and
in some way different, not because it is said simply of the first and
of the others by relation to the first, but they have the ratio in some
way the same because of the identity of proportion, which is found in
them, and they are in some way different because of the diversity of the
natures of the supposits of those proportions. For example: the form
and matter of a substance and the form and matter of an accident
are somehow analogates under the names “form” and “matter.” In-
deed, they have the common name, namely “form” and “matter,”
and the ratio according to the name “form” or “matter” is the same
and diverse in this way, because the form of the substance is so dis-
posed to the substance, as the form of the accident is to the accident;
similarly the matter of the substance is so disposed to the substance,
104 — Cajetan’s Answer

as the matter of the accident is to the accident. Indeed both pre-

serve the identity of proportion with the diversity of the nature
and the unity of the name. This kind of analogy was mentioned by
Averroës (XII Met., com. 28), and more clearly by Aristotle (Nich.
Eth. I, 6 [1096b29–30]).9

Cajetan here offers definitions of two sorts of analogy. In analogy of

proportion, the analogous concept is “the same in some respect and
different in some respect” in this way, that “the analogue is said sim-
ply, that is without addition of anything, of the first, and of the others
it is only said with some relation to the first.” In analogy of propor-
tionality, the analogous concept is “the same in some respect and dif-
ferent in some respect” in this way, that the “ratio [is] in some way the
same because of the identity of proportion, which is found in them,
and they are in some way different because of the diversity of the na-
tures of the supposits of those proportions.”
Much will turn on what Cajetan has to say about “identity of pro-
portion.” But leaving aside until the next chapter what “identity of
proportion” is, I highlight here the following points about Cajetan’s
presentation: First, the essentials of Cajetan’s threefold division of
analogy are already set out here in Cajetan’s commentary on the De
Ente et Essentia. What will three years later, in De Nominum Analo-
gia, be called “analogy of inequality” is here described as signifying
per prius et posterius secundum esse; what will be called “analogy of
attribution” is here called “analogy of proportion”; and what will be
called “analogy of proportionality” is here called by that name. The
fact that this threefold division is articulated here without much fan-
fare suggests that Cajetan did not think he was setting out anything
controversial or new; and the fact that it is done several years before
De Nominum Analogia suggests that the purpose of the later work
cannot have been merely to introduce and articulate that threefold
division. Nor can the threefold division as presented in De Nominum
Analogia have been some hasty or unconsidered proposal.
Second, only in one mode of analogy are secondary analogates de-
fined in terms of the primary analogate (namely by some relation to
the primary analogate). This is the mode that Cajetan will later call
 The Semantics of Analogy — 105

analogy of attribution. In the analogy of proportionality, the second-

ary analogates are not defined in terms of the primary analogate, be-
cause they are not referred to by the analogical term just by reason of
a relation to the primary analogate.
Third, already it is clear that the same term can be analogous in
different ways, in different contexts. Cajetan’s example in the passage
quoted above is “being.” Said of God and creatures, “being” is analo-
gous by proportionality. God is not called a being just because he is
somehow related to the being of creatures; nor are creatures called
beings just because they are somehow related to the being of God. But
being can be analogous by attribution, as when it is said of substance
and accident, for accident can be called being because of its relation to
the being of substance. Even more importantly, however, even as said
just of substance and accident “being” can be predicated both by anal-
ogy of attribution and by analogy of proportionality;10 that is to say,
accident and substance can be considered as analogates insofar as one
is related to the other, and insofar as they are proportionally one.11
Fourth, Cajetan does not claim to be simply interpreting Aqui-
nas. Cajetan does say that in giving the distinction between attribu-
tion and proportionality he is stating the position of Aquinas (CDEE
§17, “ponetur opinio S. Thomae”). And Cajetan eventually cites the
authority of De Veritate q. 2, a. 11, which describes different kinds
(modi) of analogy, one involving proportion, the other proportional-
ity. However, the first authorities that Cajetan cites in support of his
distinction are Aristotle and Averroës. Furthermore, and more im-
portantly, there is no mention here of I Sent. d. 19, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1, with
its contrast between analogy “secundum esse” and “secundum intentio-
nem,” a text usually cited as the basis of Cajetan’s distinction between
modes of analogy.12
Fifth, in the De Ente et Essentia commentary Cajetan’s discussion
of attribution (or proportion) and proportionality does not mention
intrinsic and extrinsic denomination. So it is manifest here that Ca-
jetan does not define his modes of analogy in terms of intrinsic and
extrinsic denomination, as some of his interpreters have charged.
Sixth and last, Cajetan only asserts that analogy of proportionality
is sufficient for valid reasoning, but he does not explain how or why
106 — Cajetan’s Answer

this is true. Describing the unity that attends analogy of proportion-

ality, Cajetan simply says that since such unity suffices for the object
of science, according to Aristotle, being does not need to be univocal
in order to be the basis for a contradiction.13 So there is a concern to
show, in response to the objections of Scotus, that a nonunivocal term
can preserve the validity of scientific inferences.14 But the response
here is only by appeal to the authority of Aristotle, and there is no at-
tempt to explain why what Aristotle says is true.

Th e Defin it ions from D e N o m i n u m A n al o gia

The above observations all suggest that the primary concern of De

Nominum Analogia is not simply to present a threefold division of
analogy. Instead, we will see that in the bulk of that text Cajetan is
more concerned with explaining one member of his threefold divi-
sion, analogy of proportionality, and accounting for how it can play a
role in valid reasoning. This requires Cajetan to offer a more specific
semantic analysis of analogy than he had offered in his commentar-
ies on Aristotle’s Categories or Thomas’s De Ente et Essentia. So when
Cajetan does present his threefold division, it is appropriate that his
definitions of the three modes of analogy should take a more rigorous
logical or semantic form, and that the bulk of his treatise is given over
to a discussion of only one form, analogy of proportionality.
Turning to De Nominum Analogia, the first thing to notice is that,
despite the claims of many of Cajetan’s interpreters, Cajetan does not
define analogy of attribution and analogy of proportionality in terms
of extrinsic and intrinsic denomination.15 As we will see, Cajetan does
say that analogy of attribution involves extrinsic denomination, and
that analogy of proportionality involves intrinsic denomination; but
he presents these as properties or “conditions” (conditiones) that fol-
low from the definitions of these kinds of analogy.16 So before we can
understand what Cajetan means by these conditions or properties,
we must first attend to the proper definitions Cajetan offers for the
various kinds of analogy.
Cajetan gives the following three definitions in De Nominum
Analogia:
 The Semantics of Analogy — 107

They are called analogous according to inequality whose name is

common, and the ratio according to that name is wholly the same,
but unequally participated.

They are analogous according to attribution whose name is com-

mon, and the ratio according to that name is the same with re-
spect to a terminus, and different with respect to relations to that
terminus.

They are called analogous according to proportionality whose

name is common, and the ratio according to that name is propor-
tionally the same.17

Note that even more strictly than those offered in CDEE, these defi-
nitions parallel the definitions of equivocation and univocation from
Aristotle’s Categories. They are called . . . whose name is common, and
the concept according to that name is . . .18 Again, Cajetan clearly wants
to show how there are three different ways that we can understand a
mean between equivocation and univocation, by showing that there
are three different ways in which the concept(s) or ratio(nes) can be
aliquo modo eadem, et aliquo modo diversa seu secundum quid eadem, et
secundum quid diversa. To see the importance of these definitions, let
us consider each of the three modes of analogy in turn—the first two
in the remainder of this chapter, and the last, analogy of proportion-
ality, in the following chapters.

Ana log y of Inequal ity

Let us first briefly consider the case of analogy of inequality. We will

need to clear up some common confusion about this controversial
mode of analogy, and, in so doing, we will find that Cajetan’s treat-
ment of this mode confirms that in De Nominum Analogia Cajetan’s
interest in analogy is primarily semantic. In short, with his treatment
of analogy of inequality we see that Cajetan excludes from the scope
of his treatise metaphysical considerations that are irrelevant to his
properly logical concerns.
108 — Cajetan’s Answer

Cajetan’s “analogy of inequality” is sometimes taken as his own

invention, but it is clear that it has precedence in a long tradition.
Ashworth points to a phrase from Aristotle, translated into Latin
as “aequivocationes latent in generibus” (equivocations are hidden in
genera; Physics 249a22–25), and says, “Virtually every late thirteenth-
century author felt obliged to fit this claim into the framework of
equivocation and analogy, even if the consensus was that in the end
the use of genus terms was univocal.”19 In both his De Ente et Essentia
commentary and in De Nominum Analogia, Cajetan cites Averroës
for the claim “that priority and posteriority of species does not im-
pede the unity of the genus.”20
According to Cajetan’s definition of analogy of inequality, the
ratio is “wholly the same” (omnino eadem), but it is “unequally partici-
pated” (inaequaliter participata). The example Cajetan uses is “body,”
and, as he says, “the ratio of all bodies, insofar as they are bodies, is
the same.” Nonetheless, that ratio, “corporeity,” is not “in” all bodies
equally. This is the position that sounds most odd, and has confused
some commentators. But we can make sense of it if we remember the
distinction made above in chapter 5, between what is predicated and
what verifies that predication.21
Now consider why Cajetan would say that the same ratio can
be in things unequally. When I predicate “body” of a stone and of
a plant, I predicate exactly the same ratio or objective concept, the
nature corporeity, in both cases. However, when I predicate “body”
of stone, what verifies the predication is the particular corporeity of
the stone, the individualized actuality by virtue of which the stone is
a body. When I predicate “body” of a plant, what verifies the predica-
tion is the particular corporeity of the plant, the individualized act
by virtue of which the plant is a body. But now, given the thesis of
the unicity of substantial forms, and the fact that “body” (corpus) is
a substantial predicate, we know that the corporeity of the stone is
identical with the substantial form of the stone, and the corporeity
of the plant is identical with the substantial form of the plant. Again,
of course what is predicated of stone and plant is exactly the same,
namely, the nature corporeity absolutely considered. But the corpo-
reities that verify the predications—the individualized substantial na-
tures actual in the stone and in the plant—are clearly not equal given
that a plant’s nature includes life. In this sense, although the general
 The Semantics of Analogy — 109

ratio of body applies equally to the plant and the stone, there is more
to the particular “bodiliness” of the plant (as including life) than there
is to the particular “bodiliness” of the stone. Thus Cajetan can say
that “not only is the plant more noble than the stone, but the corpore-
ity of the plant is more noble than the corporeity of the stone.”22
Now we can see from this that in analogy of inequality, the way
in which the different applications of analogous terms differ really
does depend on metaphysics, on the state of things in rerum natura
which verifies various predications. It depends on an order or hierar-
chy among actualizations in things, and this hierarchy does not affect
the semantic properties of the term. There may be more or less actu-
ality in particular instances of a given nature, but insofar as they are
all instances of the same nature in general the relevant term always
signifies those natures in virtue of exactly the same ratio. This is pre-
cisely why Cajetan says that analogy of inequality is only improperly
called analogy. Here we may recall that “unequal participation” was
one of the three inadequate accounts of analogical unity rejected at
the beginning of De Nominum Analogia. While in one sense Cajetan
is willing to count it as one kind of analogy, it is properly, from the
logician’s point of view, a case of univocation,23 in truth “wholly for-
eign to analogy.”24
That Cajetan dismisses analogy of inequality on these grounds,
and does not treat it at all after the brief five paragraphs in the first
chapter of De Nominum Analogia, should confirm that Cajetan is not
interested in confusing his discussion of the semantics of analogous
terms with metaphysical considerations of the things those terms
name. To be sure, analogy of inequality counts as a kind of analogy
at all only if we include metaphysical considerations; but this is why
Cajetan quickly dismisses this kind of analogy, which is analogy only
from the point of view of the natural philosopher, but not from the
point of view of the logician.25 But note further that Cajetan’s original
basis for distinguishing this particular mode of “analogy”—even if it
turns out not to be a kind of analogy after all—is indeed properly se-
mantic and not metaphysical. That is to say, Cajetan distinguishes this
kind of “analogy” from the others by a semantic condition, namely,
that its “ratio” is wholly the same. Indeed, this is precisely why it turns
out to be not a kind of analogy at all, but rather an instance of univo-
cation. So not only does this analysis make sense of what Cajetan says
110 — Cajetan’s Answer

of analogy of inequality, but it confirms that Cajetan’s interest in De

Nominum Analogia is genuinely semantic.
This exposition of analogy of inequality should also help clear up
some common confusion about it. Herbert Schwartz, for instance,
was unable to see how Cajetan could claim that every univocal genus
term could be said to be in some things more than others.26 Schwartz’s
analysis ignores the fact that, for both Aquinas and Cajetan, when
“body” is predicated of a material substance, the significate of the
term in that substance is the substance’s substantial form. Indeed, in
general, when any genus term is predicated of one of its members,
its significate in that member is that member’s specific form. As ex-
plained above, then, a genus term can be more in one of its species
than another to the extent that different species have different (higher
and lower) substantial forms.27

Ana log y of Attribution

According to Cajetan’s definition, analogy of attribution involves a

common name, and “the ratio according to that name is the same
with respect to a terminus, and different with respect to relations to
that terminus.” In other words, in analogy of attribution there is com-
munity with respect to some one form, the form from which all the
analogates are denominated. But that form is the proper significate of
the analogous term only when predicated of the primary analogate.
As predicated of a secondary analogate, the significate of the analo-
gous term is not that form, but rather some relation to that form; that
is to say, that form is the terminus of a relation, which relation is what
is signified by the analogous term in the secondary analogates. So,
Cajetan will say,

“Healthy” is a name common to medicine, urine, and animal, and

the ratio of all insofar as they are healthy, says different relations
to one term (namely health). For if someone says, “What is animal,
insofar as healthy?” one would say, “subject of health.” But [one
would say that] urine, insofar as healthy, is a sign of health; and for
medicine, insofar as healthy, is given cause of health.28
 The Semantics of Analogy — 111

So it is clear that, as predicated of its secondary analogates, a term

analogous by attribution signifies a relation,29 and elsewhere Cajetan
will say just this.30
It is in this context that we must understand what Cajetan calls
the first condition of analogy of attribution: that the secondary analo-
gates are always denominated extrinsically.31 Note again that, con-
trary to common interpretation, the distinction between attribution
and proportionality is not made on the basis of the distinction between
intrinsic and extrinsic attribution; Cajetan has not defined analogy
of attribution in terms of extrinsic denomination.32 Rather, Cajetan
describes the extrinsic denomination of the secondary analogates as
a “condition” that follows from the properly semantic definition of
analogy of attribution.
This clarification helps us to see Cajetan’s point here, that it is
built into the semantics of the term, and is not dependent on extralogi-
cal, metaphysical considerations, that a term analogous by attribution
denominates its secondary analogates extrinsically. In analogy of at-
tribution, when we denominate the secondary analogates, we know
the denominating form is extrinsic, i.e., is an actuality of another, be-
cause ex hypothesi there is a difference between the primary analogate
(which has the form) and the secondary analogate (which is denomi-
nated with reference to that form in the primary analogate). So it
follows from the definition of analogy of attribution that, when de-
nominating secondary analogates, it signifies a relation, from which
it follows that it denominates those analogates extrinsically. So saying
that this kind of analogy involves the extrinsic denomination of the
secondary analogates is here a properly semantic, as opposed to meta-
physical, claim, as it follows from a strictly semantic specification of
analogy of attribution.
In fact, Cajetan goes out of his way to clarify that his words about
extrinsic denomination are meant to be taken as having logical, or
semantic, as opposed to metaphysical, import. Thus he issues the fol-
lowing caveat, one that needs to be discussed at length because it has
been so often misunderstood:

It must be carefully pointed out, that this condition of this kind

of analogy—namely that it is not according to a kind of formally
112 — Cajetan’s Answer

inherent cause, but always according to something extrinsic—is to

be understood formally and not materially. That is, it is not to be
understood by this that every name which is analogous by attri-
bution is common to its analogates such that it only agrees with
the first formally, and with the rest by extrinsic denomination—as
happens with “healthy” and “medical.” For universally this is false,
as is clear from “being” [ens] and “good.” Nor can it be had from
what was said, unless it was understood materially. Rather, it must
be understood from this that every name analogous by attribution
as such, or insofar as so analogous, is common to its analogates such
that it agrees with the first formally and with the rest by extrinsic
denomination.33

Cajetan’s qualification—which recalls the general distinction, dis-

cussed in the last chapter, between taking a relation materially and
formally—is central to Cajetan’s explanation of the occurrence of
“mixed cases”—that is, cases in which there can be analogy of attri-
bution, even if in fact the secondary analogates have an intrinsic form.
To illustrate, Cajetan discusses the example of “being”:

Being [ens] indeed, though it formally agrees with all substances

and accidents, etc., nevertheless, insofar as all are called beings
from subjective being as such, only substance is formally being,
while the rest are called beings because they are passions or genera-
tions, etc., of being—although they could be called beings formally
for another reason.34

Cajetan’s clarification and its application to mixed cases have been

misunderstood or ignored by many commentators. Several com-
mentators have expressed their puzzlement over Cajetan’s position,35
and some scholars have gone so far as to take this clarification as an
implicit admission of weakness in Cajetan’s analysis, a desperate at-
tempt to patch up an incoherent theory. Thus McInerny, for instance,
has argued that Cajetan here presents “tortured language needed to
defend an indefensible position.”36 McInerny perceives here further
evidence that the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic denomi-
nation is irrelevant to analogy, thus vitiating Cajetan’s very distinc-
tion between modes of analogy.37
 The Semantics of Analogy — 113

A more charitable interpretation can be given to Cajetan’s claim

here, an interpretation that confirms Cajetan’s consistent attention to
logical or semantic, as opposed to metaphysical, concerns. According
to Cajetan, “being” is analogous both by attribution and by propor-
tionality: an accident does have its own inherent being, but is also
related to the being of substance, and insofar as an accident is denomi-
nated a being by analogy of attribution—that is, insofar as it is de-
nominated a being because of its relation to the being of substance—it
is denominated a being by extrinsic denomination.
That is why Cajetan’s reduplicative clause is so important: “Every
name analogous by attribution as such, or insofar as so analogous, is
common to its analogates such that it agrees with the first formally
and with the rest by extrinsic denomination.” Again, “insofar as all
are called beings from subjective being as such, only substance is for-
mally being.”38 As argued in the previous chapter, this is exactly the
kind of qualification that is needed to ensure that the consideration of
extrinsic denomination is properly logical and not metaphysical. In-
deed, we can understand this as just an extension of Cajetan’s distinc-
tion between interpreting a relation formally as opposed to materially.
Because the analogous term as predicated of the secondary analo-
gates signifies a relation, and because a relation can be understood
formally, we can understand formally the claim that the analogous
term as predicated of the secondary analogates signifies by extrinsic
denomination.
In the previous chapter we used the example of the self-seeing
eye to illustrate that extrinsic denomination can be understood as a
semantic property. To consider the “mixed cases” of analogy is to do
the same thing—that is, to consider a case in which something is ex-
trinsically denominated despite having the relevant intrinsic form.
Cajetan’s examples of mixed cases are “being” and “good,” but we can
consider less portentous terms, and even more illustrative examples.
Let us posit another scenario in which what is normally taken to be
metaphysically extrinsic would in fact be metaphysically intrinsic,
and yet its denomination would still be extrinsic. Take “healthy” as
predicated of skin.39 Although “healthy” is the traditional example
of a term clearly analogous by attribution, and so exhibiting extrinsic
denomination, it is possible, still within the framework of Cajetan’s
114 — Cajetan’s Answer

general theory, to attribute some intrinsic health not only to substan-

tial organisms but also to some parts of substantial organisms—for
example, organs—and this intrinsic health of living organs would be
proportionally similar to the intrinsic health of living organisms. But
then “healthy” as said of an animal organ would be like “being” as
said of accidents, analogous by both attribution and proportionality.
For example, a surgically removed kidney could be called “healthy”
not only because it came from a healthy person but because it still
exhibits its own well-ordered vital functioning (by virtue of which it
could be a suitable candidate for transplant). In this case, we can say
that there is an inherent health in the kidney, and in fact this may be
why we normally call organs healthy. (It also may be that the intrinsic
health of the organ is causally dependent on the health in the whole
organism.)
Even in this case, however, insofar as it is conceived of as a sign
or effect of health, an organ (like a kidney, or skin) is not denomi-
nated “healthy” because some health (even organ health) is in it, but
because it is somehow related to (as sign or effect) the health of the
organism; although as a matter of biological fact the health (of the
organism) to which the organ is related may be intrinsically related
to the organ (giving the organ its own health), this is a metaphysical
(or merely physical) consideration irrelevant to the semantics of the
term ‘healthy’ taken as denominating something as a sign or effect
of health. Thus Cajetan’s warning to take the rule about extrinsic
denomination formally and not materially helps clarify why we can
say that even in this case the term ‘healthy’ denominates extrinsically,
and indeed, that it necessarily does, because it is a term analogous
by attribution, denominating a secondary analogate insofar as it is
a secondary analogate—that is, insofar as it is related to a primary
analogate.40
It needs emphasizing that the Cajetanian tradition has always
agreed that there are cases in which a term can be used by analogy
of attribution and yet have secondary analogates that happen to pos-
sess an intrinsic form associated with that analogy. The point is that
such a case is logically contingent, and depends on extralogical, meta-
physical considerations. This was the position of John of St. Thomas,
 The Semantics of Analogy — 115

who conceded that in analogy of attribution, “it is possible that there

be presupposed in the secondary analogates some intrinsic respect”;
nonetheless that “intrinsic respect” is not that “by which [the second-
ary analogates] are denominated analogically and placed under the
analogous form,” rather it is that “by which they are related to that
primary analogate, so that as a consequence they are denominated
extrinsically and analogically from that [primary analogate].”41 In
other words, there may be some intrinsic metaphysical reason why a
secondary analogate is related to a primary analogate, but if the sec-
ondary analogate is denominated by the analogous term just as so re-
lated to the primary analogate, as far as the logician is concerned the
secondary analogate is denominated extrinsically. So even in mixed
cases, from the logicians’ point of view, insofar as a thing is a secondary
analogate of a term analogous by attribution, the term denominates that
thing extrinsically.42
This account of Cajetan’s rule that in analogy of attribution sec-
ondary analogates are always denominated extrinsically, and of the
clarification that this rule must be taken formally, puts in perspec-
tive the common complaint that certain “mixed cases” are left out of
Cajetan’s threefold division. It has long been objected against Cajetan
that there are cases of intrinsic attribution. This was Suarez’s famous
criticism of Cajetan, and it has been voiced by others following Su-
arez.43 Indeed, as Ashworth and Riva have shown, commitment to
intrinsic attribution seems to have been the more traditional position
before Cajetan.44 The word most commonly thought to exhibit in-
trinsic attribution was “being” (ens). As Ashworth has noticed: “In
general, it seems to be the case that people took it for granted that ens
involved intrinsic denomination, and if ‘ens’ was a term analogical by
attribution, then obviously there were different kinds of attribution.”
Thus, Ashworth concludes, “Cajetan’s claim that insofar as ‘ens’ can
be regarded as a term analogical by attribution it must be interpreted
as involving extrinsic denomination strikes me as unprecedented.”45
But Cajetan’s position should hardly be surprising. Ashworth’s
wording is felicitous, because Cajetan only claims that insofar as a
term is analogical by attribution its secondary analogates are denomi-
nated extrinsically; this does not preclude, what Cajetan had always
116 — Cajetan’s Answer

acknowledged, that a term that is analogical by attribution could

also, in some other capacity, denominate those things intrinsically.
For “ens” may involve intrinsic denomination, and “ens” may also
be analogical by attribution, but it just does not “obviously” follow
that there are different kinds of attribution, some involving extrinsic
denomination and others involving intrinsic denomination. Instead,
we can conclude that there are things named analogously by attri-
bution, which things also happen to have an intrinsic form, which
form can be signified by that same term, but not insofar as that term
is analogical by attribution, rather insofar as that term is analogical in
some other way. If Cajetan is “unprecedented” in seeing this—and it
seems that Ashworth is correct in so judging—it is because Cajetan is
unprecedented in keeping logical or semantic considerations separate
from metaphysical ones.
It is fitting then that Anderson has described the Suarezian criti-
cism of Cajetan as involving a confusion between considering terms
in actu signato and considering them in actu exercito. He says that in
his treatment of mixed cases Cajetan is simply observing “the distinc-
tion between the order of specification, according to which analogy
is considered formally (in actu signato), and the order of exercise, ac-
cording to which analogy is considered materially (in actu exercito), as
actually existing in the nature of things, as exercised.”46 Cajetan’s De
Nominum Analogia considers analogous terms in actu signato, while
the Suarezians, according to Anderson, consider analogy in actu exer-
cito.47 Taking the forms as they are actually realized in things, rather
than as they are signified by terms and conceived of in the mind, thus
leads the Suarezians to insist on intrinsic cases of attribution—that
is, cases where a secondary analogate’s relation to a primary analo-
gate entails something metaphysically inherent in that secondary
analogate.48
As we have seen, then, not only does Cajetan’s treatment of mixed
cases require a distinction between considering terms “formally,” as
opposed to “materially,” but even considering terms “formally” re-
quires a distinction between different occasions of a term’s use. For
a term can be considered insofar as it is analogous by attribution
(as “being,” for example, can be predicated of accidents insofar as
 The Semantics of Analogy — 117

it signifies their having some relation to the primary being of sub-

stance), or it can be considered in some other way (as “being” can also
be predicated of accidents insofar as it signifies their own inherent
accidental being). Based on Cajetan’s treatment of mixed cases, then,
it is clear that Cajetan is not guilty of some of the naive semantic
assumptions Ashworth has detected in other medieval authors who
tried to describe analogy. Ashworth notes that “medieval logicians . . .
discussed analogy and equivocation as if they were properties of single
terms, as if neither sentential context nor speaker use and intention
were at issue.”49 Thus they tended to “take words as units, endowed
both with their signification and their modi significandi before they
enter sentences and independently of speaker intention on any given
occasion.”50 But it is clear that if we can consider a word insofar as it
denominates extrinsically, and then consider the same word insofar
as it denominates intrinsically, then intrinsic and extrinsic denomina-
tion will not be properties that terms have independent of sentential
context or speaker intent. Likewise, on Cajetan’s conception, being
analogical by attribution just cannot be a fixed property of a term
to be discerned independently of, and prior to, its use in actual sen-
tences. The same term can be analogical by attribution, and analogical
some other way, just as the same term can be analogical by attribution
(“healthy” as said of the dog and his food) and univocal (“healthy” as
said of Fido and of Spot).
Indeed, although Cajetan is trying to analyze analogy in terms
of the relations of concepts signified by the analogous term, he is
consistent in not treating the concept (or ratio) as a fixed property
of a term independent of its sentential use. Thus, Cajetan does not
ask about the ratio signified by “healthy,” rather he asks, “What is
the animal insofar as it is healthy?” and “What is urine insofar as
it is healthy?”51 In other words, what does “healthy” signify when it
is predicated of an animal, and what does “healthy” signify when it is
predicated of urine?
All the other properties (or conditiones) that Cajetan attributes to
this mode of analogy, then, must be understood not as properties of
isolated terms, but as properties of terms insofar as they are analogous
by attribution—that is, insofar as they are being used to denominate
118 — Cajetan’s Answer

something as being related to something else. And understood in this

way, the properties do indeed follow just as Cajetan says they do. We
have already seen that since, as predicated of secondary analogates,
a term analogous by attribution always signifies a relation, it can be
said always to denominate the secondary analogates extrinsically.
As Cajetan notices, this also means that for a given analogous term,
the terminus of the various relations signified in various secondary
analogates (which terminus is directly signified by the analogous
term as predicated of the primary analogate) is numerically one.52
Furthermore, it will also follow that the first analogate is posited in
the definition of the rest of the analogates. That is to say, the ratio of
the significate of an analogous term, as predicated of the secondary
analogates, includes reference to the primary analogate, in which the
one terminus is signified.53
Lastly, it naturally follows from this, and almost goes without
saying, that in this kind of analogy there is no significate common
to all the analogates.54 Different secondary senses of the analogous
term will signify different relations to the primary sense; so second-
ary significates will be different from each other, and different from
the primary significate. In other words, this is logically speaking a
form of equivocation,55 and indeed the Greeks did not call it analogy
but rather a kind of equivocation, equivocation to one, or from one, or
in one.56
It follows that analogy of attribution will behave in most re-
spects like equivocation, even in causing the fallacy of equivocation.
It should not be surprising, then, that Cajetan ends his discussion of
analogy of attribution here. Cajetan had ended his discussion of anal-
ogy of inequality by noting that there is no need to determine other
semantic features, since it will follow the rules for univocation.57 Just
so, he completes his discussion of analogy of attribution by noting that
further semantic questions about it are already answered insofar as
analogy of attribution will follow the rules of equivocation.58
In light of semantic principles presented in the previous chapter,
we may now update the diagrams presented above in chapter 2 (figs.
1–3) and present somewhat more accurate diagrams of the relation-
ships involved in the kinds of analogy presented thus far. In general,
we may represent two uses of the same word, where the same word
 The Semantics of Analogy — 119

denominates different things by denominating forms conceived by

their respective concepts, thus:

Figure 4. Equivocation

Here the “concept” is what Cajetan calls the formal concept, and the
“form” is what he calls the objective concept. The solid arrow repre-
sents a relation of natural signification, the dashed arrow represents
conventional signification, the double arrow represents the inherence
relation, and the dotted arrow represents supposition or denomina-
tion. So, in the case of univocation, concept(1) = concept(2)—that is, dif-
ferent things are denominated by forms that are the same in ratio. In
pure equivocation (equivocation by chance), concept(1) and concept(2)
are unrelated—two things are denominated by forms that are not
connected in ratio.
In the case of analogy of inequality, concept(1) is identical with
concept(2), while form(1) and form(2) are numerically distinct forms that
unequally participate in the same ratio—that is, they are the same in
ratio but different in their individual actualizations in their respective
things. Thus:
120 — Cajetan’s Answer

Figure 5. Analogy of Inequality

In analogy of attribution, on the other hand, concept(1) and con-

cept(2) are not identical, but they are connected, insofar as the form
by which one thing is denominated is some relation of that thing
to the form by which the other is denominated. As a special case of
equivocation, this can be depicted by figure 4 above, with the further
stipulation that concept(2) is a function on concept(1), because form(2)
in denominated-thing(2) is some relation of denominated-thing(2) to
form(1) in denominated-thing(1).
This makes quite clear the need for a third way of describing a
mean between equivocation and univocation, a third way that two
concepts of analogous terms be the same in some respect (unum se-
cundum quid) and diverse in some respect (diversa secundum quid). We
have seen the first two possibilities for such a mean proposed by Ca-
jetan. According to the first, the concepts are the same, full stop ((sim-
pliciter); they differ only in the character of their realization in things.
According to the second, the concepts are diverse, full stop ((simplici-
ter), but they are similar insofar as they share a common element—
more precisely, one is analyzed in terms of a relation to the other.
 The Semantics of Analogy — 121

The former mean between univocation and equivocation, anal-

ogy of inequality, is really a form of univocation. If two concepts are
the same simpliciter, they will be univocal—no matter how they differ
secundum quid. The latter mean, analogy of attribution, turns out to
conform to the general rules of equivocation—including those rules
about the use of those terms in discursive reasoning. If two concepts
are diverse simpliciter, they will be equivocal, and if their unity secun-
dum quid amounts to the ratio of one being included in the ratio of the
other, they will still follow the general rules governing the semantics
of equivocals. In particular, they will occasion a fallacy of equivoca-
tion if the different concepts are used in discursive reasoning as if
they were really the same.
In short, neither mean between univocation and equivocation is
a genuine mean—each is functionally equivalent to one or another
of the extremes. Cajetan’s analysis of analogy proceeds beyond the
first two chapters of De Nominum Analogia because he discerns some
other way that concepts distinct simpliciter can be the same secundum
quid, and because he can argue that this alternative similarity secun-
dum quid allows terms that signify those concepts not to follow all the
other rules of equivocals. As a more genuine mean between univoca-
tion and equivocation, this third mode of analogy will require special
treatment as regards such further logical questions as how it is “ab-
stracted,” and how it can play a role in reasoning. Only by addressing
these issues can Cajetan answer the challenge to the very possibility
of a mean between univocation and equivocation, and the very possi-
bility of a nonunivocal term serving to mediate valid inferences.
 Chapter Seven

The Semantics of Proportionality

The Proportional Unity of Concepts

We have seen that analogy of attribution is a species of equivocation

in which the different concepts are related, so that the ratio of one
appears in the definition of the others. This seems to be the most ob-
vious mean between univocation and equivocation. But for Cajetan
there is another mean: analogy of proportionality. This will turn out
to be a truer mean between univocation and equivocation, so that the
balance of Cajetan’s treatise on analogy expounds the unique seman-
tic characteristics of this analogy, which cannot be subsumed under
univocation and equivocation. In the present chapter, we will begin
to examine Cajetan’s treatment of the definition of analogy of propor-
tionality, and consider some common objections to the “proportional
similarity” or “proportional unity” invoked in that definition.

“ Ana log y” Is an Analogous Term

In turning to analogy of proportionality we are, Cajetan says, “ascend-

ing from what is abusively to what is properly analogy.”1 Why this
mode of analogy is the most “proper” we have already anticipated:
it is expected to meet the semantic challenge that neither analogy of
inequality nor analogy of attribution could meet. Our judgment of
whether this mode of analogy meets this challenge in fact must be
122 —
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 123

deferred until it has been presented in greater detail, but at the begin-
ning it will be useful to clarify what Cajetan means by saying that
certain uses of a term are “proper” and others are “abusive.” This is
especially important because Cajetan’s mention of an “abuse” (abusio)
of terms, or of things “abusively” (abusive) so-called, can help us bet-
ter understand, if not the semantics, at least the genesis and use of
analogous terms. This is also important, because Cajetan’s language
has the potential to mislead.
In De Nominum Analogia, Cajetan uses “abusio” or its cognates
several times. For instance, he says that many names are called analo-
gous “abusively” (abusive, §2); he says that it is an “abuse” (abusio) of
vocabulary to treat signifying per prius et posterius as synonymous with
signifying analogically (§7); he says that counting analogy of attribu-
tion as a kind of analogy is an “abusive” (abusiva) locution (§21); and,
as noted, he says that to ascend from analogy of inequality, through
analogy of attribution, to analogy of proportionality, is to ascend to
the proper from the “abusive” (abusive) forms of analogy (§23). In all
of these cases, the point seems to be that “analogy” is itself analogical.2
Originally (in Greek) proper to mathematics and meaning “propor-
tion,” the term “analogia” was extended to cover other things.3 In-
deed, Cajetan implies that part of the difficulty of explaining what
the term means is that it has been extended to cover such a variety of
things that it would be confusing to try to unify them with a common
definition.4 What is being discussed is the development of language,
a term’s being stretched to cover things that it would not cover in
its original, or strict, sense. Cajetan’s “abusio,” then, need not call to
mind the moral connotations of English “abuse.” To say that a term
is used abusive (“abusively”) is not to say that people who so use it
are “abusers of language.”5 It is not even to say that the term is used
illicitly, but only irregularly, loosely, or in a manner at some remove
from its most proper use.6 That employing an improper sense of a
term is not abusing language, or misusing language, is obvious from
the legitimacy of poetic or metaphorical usage.7
This is especially true if a particular use of a term is abusive or
improper only from the etymological, or strictly technical point of
view, but not from the point of view of established use. This observa-
tion, and Cajetan’s discussion of the meaning of “analogy” in general,
124 — Cajetan’s Answer

illuminates a general point about the genesis of analogous terms.

Terms become analogical by a process of extension; they are extended
from one, original signification to cover another, new signification.
Some of these extensions are more fitting than others. What deter-
mines the fittingness or “propriety” of such an extension is not only
the original meaning of the term, or its etymology, but the similarity
of what is signified in what is originally denominated by the term to
what is signified in that which the term is stretched to denominate.
Etymology and established use may provide a clue to what is primar-
ily, properly, or originally signified, but they do not determine the
matter.
We might say that here is an obvious role for judgment in
analogy—that is, in discerning the proper signification of a term. An-
other role for judgment is in discerning the similarity of this primary
or original signification to the new signification that the term is ex-
tended to cover. Analogy of attribution works because we can extend
a word from its original signification to cover something that is re-
lated to that original signification. Thus ‘healthy’ is extended from the
animal to the food, because the latter is the cause of the health in the
animal originally (and still primarily) signified by the term ‘healthy.’
But do we judge other kinds of similarities? Here we are back to the
question with which we started this chapter. For this is just another
way to ask the question: Can two rationes be the same secundum quid
in some way other than one being a relation to the other? Cajetan an-
swers affirmatively, and to see how, we need to turn to his definition
of the other form of analogy, analogy of proportionality.

S i mi l i s S e c u n d u m P r o p o r t i o n e m

Cajetan’s definition of analogy of proportionality is as follows:

They are called analogous according to proportionality, whose

name is common, and the ratio according to that name is propor-
tionally the same. Or this: they are called analogous according to
proportionality, whose name is common and the ratio according to
that name is similar according to proportion.8
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 125

On the face of it, this seems like a straightforward formulation, espe-

cially given the kind of question Cajetan has posed for himself. How,
besides in the manner described for analogy of attribution, can two
concepts be the same secundum quid? Cajetan’s answer is that they can
be the same according to proportion (secundum proportionem)—that
is, proportionally the same. Proportional unity, or proportional same-
ness, is a perfectly respectable variety of unity or sameness; in the Ar-
istotelian tradition of metaphysics, proportional unity is considered
alongside of numeric, specific, and generic unity.9 According to the
terminology introduced earlier, proportional unity is a nongeneric
likeness. It is the kind of unity that describes what is common be-
tween two things that share no one common element or quality but
still bear a commonality or similarity that must therefore be nonuni-
vocal or nongeneric.
It is not yet clear that “proportional unity” answers the further
question that Cajetan wanted to answer: How does proportional
unity make this kind of deliberate equivocation different enough
from other cases of equivocation that it follows its own semantic
rules—in particular, how does analogy of proportionality avoid the
fallacy of equivocation? Indeed, it is not yet clear that being the same
according to proportion is different from being the same because of
reference to one.10 Cajetan has not begun to address this yet, but just
so far, it seems reasonable that, in looking for a kind of unity or same-
ness, he should invoke proportional sameness.
To illustrate the analogy of proportionality, Cajetan uses the tra-
ditional example of “seeing” (videre), which is predicated of bodily
vision and of intellectual vision, “because, just as understanding ex-
hibits a thing to the soul, so seeing exhibits a thing to an animated
body.”11 Thus, we can predicate “seeing” of the soul because:

(1) understanding:soul::seeing:body

Here we use the well-known schema representing proportionality

‘A:B::C:D.’ However Cajetan quickly points out that the proportional
similarity expressed by this schema—the similarity between ‘A:B’
and ‘C:D’—is not enough to ensure genuine analogy of proportional-
ity. Cajetan must distinguish between improper and proper analogy
126 — Cajetan’s Answer

of proportionality—that is, between metaphor and genuine analogy.

Taking a conventional example of a metaphor, Cajetan tells us that
we can predicate “smiling” of a field, because:

(2) blooming:field::smiling:man

How does the case represented by (2) differ from that represented
by (1)? Cajetan says that a predication is metaphorical “when that
common name has one formal ratio absolutely, which is saved in one
of the analogates, and is said of others by metaphor.” By contrast,
analogy of proper proportionality occurs “when that name is com-
mon to both of the analogates without metaphor”—that is, so that
the signified ratio is “saved” in all of the analogates and “said of them
proportionally.”12
Cajetan’s explanation here is very cursory, and raises a few dif-
ficulties. First, Cajetan seems open to the objection that his defini-
tions are circular: a proportional predication is metaphorical when it
is said by metaphor, and a proportional predication is proper when it
is not said by metaphor. So we can understand the difference between
metaphor and proper proportionality only if we already understand
metaphor. Second, one may object that Cajetan’s distinction between
proper proportionality and metaphor is not based on semantic consid-
erations but on metaphysical ones, namely, on whether or not the rele-
vant formality or ratio is or is not realized in all of the analogates.
Responding to the second objection first, I think we can under-
stand why the distinction between metaphor and analogy of proper
proportionality is not irrelevant from the logician’s point of view. A
metaphor is not literally true; it is a predication made by “poetic li-
cense”—license, that is, to use words in ways other than their proper
sense. Any predication expresses the inherence of the form signified by
the predicate in the subject. This is true even in predicating “smiles”
of a field. But properly speaking the ratio signified by “smiles” is not
actually in the field; rather, there is something in the field (its bloom-
ing) that is proportionally similar to what “smiles” signifies in a face
(its smiling).13 But then, strictly speaking there is nothing in the field
that verifies the proper ratio of “smiles” in it, which just is why we
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 127

say that the predication is not literally true. This is why, properly
speaking, the ratio of a metaphorical term is not verified of those
things of which it is said metaphorically. When it is known that a
term’s ratio is not properly verified of certain things but is predicated
of them anyway because it is as if there were something that verified
the predication, then that term is predicated metaphorically. It is not
a false predication, because although there is nothing in the field that
verifies the form signified by the metaphorical term, there is some-
thing in the field that is somehow like what is signified by the meta-
phorical term. The intention of a metaphorical predication is not to
say what is literally true, or to say what is false, but to express some
truth by way of an improper terminology.
Still, by distinguishing between what is predicated, and what
verifies the predication, it might seem that Cajetan is finally stepping
outside of strict logical or semantic considerations, and importing
metaphysics. Shouldn’t metaphor and proportionality be the same
from the logician’s point of view? Cajetan apparently thought not.
A thing named by metaphor does not just happen to differ in that it
lacks the relevant intrinsic form. Rather, naming something by meta-
phor is an intention different from naming it by proper proportion-
ality—the two are different from the logician’s point of view, because
they do not involve the same intention—that is, the intention to treat
a thing as having a signified form. Metaphor works because, while on
the surface it appears as if something is being described by an intrin-
sic property, the speaker—and the listener—consciously treats this as
“just a manner of speaking.”14
But now, if this much is understood, we have an implicit answer
to the first objection, namely that Cajetan’s definition of metaphori-
cal predication is circular. For we just do know what a metaphor is,
at least insofar as it is a predication not to be taken literally. Cajetan’s
distinction between metaphor and analogy of proportionality clearly
assumes that we already have some sense of what it means for some-
thing to be predicated by metaphor—that is, not literally but by po-
etic license. What Cajetan wants us to learn from his discussion of
metaphor is not that it is metaphorical, but that it has something in
common with analogy of proportionality, namely, that it depends on
128 — Cajetan’s Answer

the recognition of proportional similarity. In analogy of proportional-

ity, we recognize proportionally similar things and signify them each
with the same word. In metaphor, we recognize proportionally simi-
lar things and signify one of the similar things with a word, which
word we then use as if it signified the other thing, in order to call to
mind that other thing’s similarity to that first thing that the word
properly signifies. In either case, what makes the predication possible
is the recognition of proportional similarity, the nongeneric likeness
captured by the classic four-term schema A:B::C:D.
To illustrate this, one may use again the diagram of equivocation
given in the previous chapter:

Figure 4. Equivocation

Analogy of proportionality in general occurs when concept(2) is not

identical with, but is proportionally the same as, concept(1). Since a
concept’s ratio determines which forms it naturally represents, we may
say that concept(1) and concept(2) are proportionally similar when:

form(1):denominated-thing(1)::form(2(2)2):denominated-thing(2(2)2)
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 129

Furthermore, such analogy of proportionality is a case of metaphor

when the word does not really signify concept(2), but what it does
signify, concept(1), is proportionally similar to concept(2). On the other
hand, there is analogy of proper proportionality when the word genu-
inely signifies both concept(1) and concept(2).

Some Obj ections to Proportiona lity

Proportional similarity is a perfectly respectable variety of similarity

in the Aristotelian philosophical tradition, but it is a challenging
notion. Puzzles associated with it in the context of analogy can be
grouped under two species of objection, one having to do with the
usefulness of analogy in its theological applications, and one having
to do with the usefulness of it more generally. These objections shall
be considered in turn.

Proportionality and Divine Names: The “Two Unknowns” Objection

A common criticism of Cajetan’s analysis of analogy of proportion-

ality is that “proportional unity” can only be described by the schema
A:B::C:D, and that this schema is not useful in theology, one of the
areas where it is supposed to have special application.
According to this objection, analogy is supposed to explain how
it is possible to learn about God from creatures, but this is impossible
with the schema A:B::C:D. This is because presumably the schema is
like a sort of equation, in which one unknown term can be calculated
from the other three. But in filling in the schema with an analogy
between God and creatures, one gets something like the following
example:

(man):(being of man)::(God):(being of God)

and in this case, there is not just one unknown, but two unknowns:
God, and the being of God, both of which are beyond our knowledge
130 — Cajetan’s Answer

and are the sorts of things we were supposed to be able to learn about
only by analogy in the first place.
This objection is especially invited by the practice of expressing
the proportionality in quasi-mathematical form,15 thus:

man God
=
being of man being of God

What this form suggests is that we have here an equation, which can
be solved by a kind of calculation. But such an equation cannot be
solved if there are two unknowns, and since both God and his being
are beyond human knowledge, it appears that both terms on the
right-hand side of the equation are unknown, and cannot be solved
for just on the basis of our knowledge of the terms on the left-hand
side of the equation.16
To this objection, there have been two common replies. One is
that there is really only one unknown, not two, and so the “calcula-
tion” can, in fact, be performed. This was the strategy of Garrigou-
Lagrange, who argued that

there are not two unknown elements in each of these proportions,

but two terms known immediately with their created mode, one
term expressing the uncreated analogue which is mediately known
(the first cause), whence we infer the presence of the fourth term,
which until then remained unknown. It may be expressed by say-
ing that there is a similarity of proportion between the creature
with its mode of being and the first cause with its mode of being.17

James F. Anderson replies to the two-unknowns objection similarly,

saying that we can prove that God exists (i.e., that there is a First
Being), so there are not really two unknown terms after all.18
The more common response to the “two unknowns” objection
has been to point out that an analogy, or proportion, is not meant
to be an equation to be solved in the first place. Thus it is properly
pointed out that the proportion ‘::’ should not be interpreted as a
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 131

mathematical identity ‘=’ and that the schema is not intended to be

computational.19
Putnam has offered another argument against using the schema
to calculate an unknown:

If . . . analogia is understood by taking literally the notion of ‘pro-

portion,’ that is, by employing such a formula as:
(1) God’s Knowledge is that F which is to God exactly as Socrates’
knowledge is to Socrates
then the explanation seems to be wholly inadequate. There is no
clear sense of ‘A is to B as C is to D’ that I am aware of which will
justify supposing that such a formula as (1) has a unique solution.
Just to consider the right hand of the formula, is there a single way
in which Socrates’ knowledge is to Socrates? Surely God’s knowl-
edge isn’t to God in every way just as Socrates’ knowledge is to
Socrates!20

Putnam’s objection is made with reference to the use of analogy in

religious discourse, but obviously the question applies to nontheologi-
cal uses of analogy as well. In general, if the proportionality schema is
not supposed to help us compute a fourth term given the three others,
what are we supposed to learn from it? If ‘::’ does not mean ‘=’ then
what does it mean? With this question, we move beyond the particu-
lar objection to the use of analogy in theology, to a more general ob-
jection to the schema A:B::C:D and the meaning of proportionality.

The Circularity Objection

By far the most common objection brought against analogy of pro-

portionality is that it involves a vitiating circularity. Since the Latin
‘analogia’ is just a transliteration of the Greek word for proportion,
circularity appears even at the level of vocabulary. What kind of unity
does an analogical concept have? Proportional, which is to say, ana-
logical, unity.21 But the problem is not only verbal.
132 — Cajetan’s Answer

For instance, one proposed solution to the “two unknowns” ob-

jection is that one of the unknowns can in fact be grasped, by analogy.22
But more generally, we have seen that we seem to face circularity as
soon as we try to clarify that ‘::’ does not mean ‘=’ but some other re-
lation. For on the one hand the schema A:B::C:D seems to have been
offered as an explanation of analogy, and on the other hand it seems
that we cannot understand the ‘::’ without again invoking analogy.
Eric Mascall considers this objection, although he frames it as a
problem of infinite regress rather than a problem of circularity. We
can say that the life of a cabbage is analogous to the life of man. So we
deny the univocity suggested by the equation

life of cabbage = life of man

replacing it with an analogy, which we can represent with the

equation

life of cabbage life of man

=
essence of cabbage essence of man

But the point of analogy is that the ‘=’ of this quasi-mathematical

equation does not mean identity but only a kind of similarity. After
all, “the point is not that the life of the cabbage is determined by the
essence of the cabbage in the same way as that in which the life of
the man is determined by the essence of the man, but that the way in
which cabbage essence determines cabbage life is proper to cabbage-
hood, while the way in which the human essence determines human
life is proper to manhood.”23 So denying the univocity suggested by
this equation, we substitute for it:

way in which life of way in which life of

cabbage is determined by man is determined by
essence of cabbage essence of man
=
essence of cabbage essence of man
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 133

But even here the ‘=’ deceptively implies univocity, and what this
equation really means is something more like:

way in which way-in- way in which way-in-

which-life-of-cabbage-is- which-life-of- man-is-
determined-by-essence-of- determined-by-essence-of-
cabbage is determined by man is determined by
essence of cabbage essence of man
=
essence of cabbage essence of man

It is clear that these qualifications would go on infinitely,

at each successive stage denying progressively more complicated

relationships between cabbages and men, and never managing
to assert a relationship which we shall not immediately have to
deny. . . . Our proportionality has completely collapsed, and all
we are left with is the fact that cabbages have nothing in common
with men except for the fact that, for no valid reason, men have
described them both as being alive.24

Though he frames this objection forcefully, Mascall actually be-

lieves that some sense can be made of the proportionality schema.25
David Burrell is far less sanguine. According to Burrell, “proportion-
ality is a bag of tricks,”26 and the schema A:B::C:D “won’t work.”27
“The ‘::’ relating a:b with c:d may not be interpreted as ‘=’, and this
discrepancy signals the limits of any promise of systematic clarity.”28

To say that the respect in which they are similar is itself propor-
tional, where this cannot be specified, introduces an irremediable
circularity into the use of ‘similar.’ What is really being said here is
that two or more things are similar in similar respects; and when
one asks how the respects are similar, one is told that such a ques-
tion cannot be asked in this case. This is not an ordinary similar-
ity but a proportional one, and irreducibly proportional so that
the proportion cannot even be granted the relative invariance of a
mathematical function, for that would introduce sameness.29
134 — Cajetan’s Answer

Burrell will have none of this circularity. “If one needs to speak of
similitude, it had best be a single one and not a proportional one.”30

An swerin g t he Objections: Two Conditions

for a n Acceptable Analogy Theory

In chapter 3, we considered a variety of objections to the notion of

a semantic analysis of analogy. The threat seemed to be that seman-
tic analysis would be a procrustean bed that could not accommodate
analogy without violating its integrity. Some have found it especially
inappropriate to analyze analogy in terms of concepts insofar as a con-
cept seems to be, by its nature, univocal.
From these worries about the limits of semantic analysis, and
from the objection to proportionality just considered above, we can
discern two distinct conditions of any acceptable analysis of analogy.
According to one, an analysis of analogy should not dissolve analogy
into univocity; let us call this the nonreductionist condition. According
to the other, an analysis of analogy should not be circular (or lead to
an infinite regress); let us call this the explanatory condition.
On first glance these two conditions might appear to be in irre-
solvable tension. Indeed, they seem to pull in directly opposite direc-
tions. It is hard to see how both conditions could be satisfied at once:
a noncircular explanation of analogy would not contain analogy in
its explanans, yet if this were the case it would seem that analogy
had been reduced to other, presumably univocal, terms. In fact, the
desire to satisfy the explanatory condition can push one to violate the
nonreductionist condition. Take the proposal articulated by Paul C.
Hayner, which has not been an uncommon approach to analogy.
Considering a traditional Thomistic account of the relationship be-
tween God and creatures, Hayner finds that it still does not account
for how predicates can be true of God and creatures. He says: “To
invoke the use of analogy [in order to explain how perfections are
predicated of God and creatures] is merely to beg the question. . . .
[To predicate perfections commonly of God and creatures] in the ab-
sence of any specific or generic likeness, [is] to invoke another analogy
to explain the analogy in question, and thus to fall into an infinite
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 135

regress of analogical explanations.” Hayner’s proposal is to escape

this circularity by insisting that in things analogically related there
is, after all, some “one property” had in “common.” Analogically re-
lated things, then, are after all members of the same “class.”31 Though
Hayner does not realize it, on his analysis analogical terms turn out
to be genus terms, predicated of diverse things in light of a common
significate in each, and so analogy has been reduced to univocity. But
he is pushed to this position by a reasonable desire that his treatment
of analogy not be circular.
The kind of proposal Hayner offers is what Yves Simon called
the mistake of the “beginner” who assumes that in analogy “some
common feature will be disclosed.”

In the beginner’s understanding, to say that a term is not purely

equivocal but analogical is the same as to say that, in spite of all, the
meanings do have in common some feature, albeit a very thin one,
which survives the differences and makes it possible for a term,
whose unity is but one of analogy, to play the role of syllogistic
term.32

In Simon’s treatment of analogy, by contrast, we have exemplary at-

tention to the nonreductionist condition. Analogates involve irreduc-
ible plurality, and we should not expect it to go away upon analysis;
indeed, a proper analysis of analogy is one that respects, and eluci-
dates, the nature of this plurality.
That the nonreductionist and the explanatory conditions can be
insisted upon at the same time is evident from the work of Burrell.
Attention to the explanatory condition is manifest in Burrell’s criti-
cism that proportionality will not deliver “systematic clarity,” and in
his complaint that proportionality exhibits “irremediable circularity”
if it cannot be further “specified.” And yet, as we saw in chapter 3,
Burrell is also a strong defender of the irreducibility of analogy, warn-
ing against a semantic approach that might analyze analogy away.
Thus he appreciates Simon’s sensitivity to the “irreducible plurality”
of analogates, and his qualification of the sense in which “one con-
cept” can be “abstracted” from diverse analogates.
136 — Cajetan’s Answer

Ana log y of Proportionality and

P roportiona l Unity

Is Cajetan’s analysis of analogy both explanatory and nonreduction-

ist? As this study has been arguing, what Cajetan is offering is an
analysis of the semantics of analogical signification. Once this key fact
is held in mind, it is also easy to see that the analysis is not circular.
Cajetan does not claim to offer an explanation of what proportionality
is, or to describe proportional unity in terms of something else; what
he offers is an explanation of what it is for a term to be analogous
in a way that is neither univocal nor equivocal. He appeals to pro-
portional unity to explain the semantics of signification in this mean
between univocation and equivocation.33 Most of those who charge
that the teaching is circular focus their arguments on the circularity
of defining proportional unity in terms of a schema (A:B::C:D) that
itself does require an understanding of proportional unity. But while
Cajetan does elucidate proportional unity by reference to the schema
(as Aristotle and so many others had done), this is not the accom-
plishment of his theory, and it is not the central point of his analysis
of what it is for a term to be analogous by analogy of proportionality.
Cajetan’s contribution is to use the notion of proportional unity to ex-
plain the semantics of a mean between univocation and equivocation,
and specifically to explain how two concepts can be the same secun-
dum quid in some way other than occurs in the pros hen equivocation
that is analogy of attribution. Proportional unity, or proportionality,
is thus included only in the explanans, and is not the explanandum.
His account is thus noncircular, satisfying the explanatory condition.
From this we can also see that Cajetan is not guilty of violating
the nonreductionist condition. For the analysis of analogical signifi-
cation does not analyze away analogical similarity. Analogical simi-
larity (as Simon had argued) is irreducible, and despite criticisms
from those who fear that semantic analysis might do violence to the
irreducibility of analogy, Cajetan’s semantic analysis in fact confirms
that irreducibility.
This defense of Cajetan’s theory might raise a further objec-
tion. Even if Cajetan’s analysis may not be formally circular, because
proportional unity is not what is being explained, this mysterious
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 137

proportional unity still does appear in the explanans. So it might seem

that what Cajetan offers is either not helpful—if we wanted to un-
derstand the nature of proportional unity—or it is just vacuous—if
proportional unity just doesn’t mean anything to us.
To this objection, the first thing to point out is again that Cajetan
was not attempting to give an account of proportional unity; indeed,
it is quite clear that he assumes our ability to recognize proportional
unity, and makes no attempt to defend its place in the Aristotelian
philosophical tradition. And within that tradition, unity is the do-
main of metaphysics; as “being,” so too “one” is said in many ways. As
already noted, proportional unity, as a variety of unity, is something
considered by the metaphysician, along with numerical, specific, and
generic unity. Cajetan assumes this, and does not defend it.
Even if proportional unity is a respectable object of metaphysical
attention, it is still difficult to give conditions for recognizing it. Ross
remarks that “rules” for identifying proportionality “are difficult to
imagine,” and judges that this is a “deficiency” of analogy theories
thus far. According to Ross, “a fully accurate and adequate analogy
theory will have to contain a practicable criterion of similarity of re-
lations.”34 From the context of Ross’s remark, it is clear that by an
“analogy theory” he means specifically a theory of the semantics of
analogical signification. But in that context, it is not at all clear that it
is a defect that we lack “rules” for identifying proportional similarity;
what we want is some account of the relations between the relevant
semantic entities, which will distinguish analogy from univocation
and equivocation. And in any case, it is difficult to see how “a prac-
ticable criterion of similarity of relations”—that is, a criterion that
did not itself contain any reference to proportional similarity—might
satisfy the nonreductionist condition.35
To reiterate then, Cajetan is not trying to offer an analysis of pro-
portional unity or proportional similarity, nor is he even describing
conditions under which proportional unity or similarity can be rec-
ognized. And this is well and good, because he is limiting himself
to giving semantic conditions that must obtain for a term to be used
to signify proportional similarity in things. This does assume our
ability to recognize the proportional unity that we signify. Not only
is proportional unity assumed in the analysis of how terms signify
138 — Cajetan’s Answer

analogically—by means of diverse rationes proportionally the same—

but it is assumed in the phenomenon that leads us to use words ana-
logically—for we use words analogically only having recognized that
two things are proportionally the same.
If this is in part intended as a response to the Scotistic objections
to the very possibility of analogy, it is reasonable at this point to ask
to what extent Cajetan’s theory could be expected to satisfy a Scotist.
Scotus effectively denied the possibility of proportional unity in meta-
physics. His reasoning was that ‘being’ is not an analogical term, be-
cause it is semantically impossible for a term’s multiple significations
to have a relationship that is a genuine mean between univocation
and equivocation. Where there is more than one concept correspond-
ing to one term, there is equivocation, and so the possibility of the fal-
lacy of equivocation in using that term. By contrast, where only one
concept corresponds to a given term, there is univocation. Indeed, for
Scotus, univocity is defined as involving a concept that is sufficiently
unified to found contradiction and avoid the fallacy of equivocation.
Cajetan’s response is to defend the logical space denied by Scotus
and his followers, by showing how one could give an account of a
mean between univocation and equivocation. This account did re-
quire him to invoke the metaphysical notion of proportional unity.
So while Scotus and his followers had argued against the possibility
of analogy in metaphysics by denying the semantic possibility of ana-
logical signification, Cajetan’s response is that analogical signification
is semantically possible, because analogical relationships are meta-
physically real.
Put another way, the challenge Cajetan faced was to characterize
the unity of the analogical concept. As a question about the relation-
ships between words, concepts, and things signified, this is a properly
semantic question—a question about how to explain occasions of as-
sociated meaning. But to the extent that the question concerns unity,
the question has an inescapably metaphysical component. Unity, like
being, is said in many ways; and it is metaphysics, and not semantics
as such, that is concerned with elucidating unity and its varieties, in-
cluding the variety of nongeneric or proportional likeness.
In this sense, it would be fair to say that Cajetan’s distinction be-
tween kinds of analogy does depend on metaphysical considerations.
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 139

I have argued that Cajetan’s distinction between modes of analogy

is not based on the kinds of metaphysical considerations that other
commentators have emphasized—consideration of the inherence or
noninherence of forms in things. But in answering the semantic ques-
tion of the unity of the analogical concept, Cajetan must invoke meta-
physical distinctions between kinds of unity. In this sense, however, it
is not a criticism of Cajetan’s semantic analysis to say that it depends
on metaphysical considerations. Given the nature of the semantic
challenge of analogy, it is only proper for a semantic analysis of anal-
ogy to appeal to metaphysical distinctions between kinds of unity.
If this discussion cannot satisfy, that is to say persuade, the Sco-
tist, we are tempted to say that it is nonetheless precisely the kind of
answer that a Scotist merits. For as the Scotistic argument shows, and
Cajetan’s response to it confirms, the Scotist simply refuses to recog-
nize something that is, in fact, real: proportional sameness, analogi-
cal unity. Although Scotus argues against the analogy of “being” by
denying the logical possibility of analogy, we can see based on these
considerations that in fact Scotus’s logical assumptions are just an at-
tempt to shore up his denial of the metaphysical category of propor-
tional unity; that is why he must define univocation in terms of its
capacity to serve as the basis for contradictory statements and so to
preserve inferences from the fallacy of equivocation. While plausible
enough at first sight, this is a radical innovation;36 but Scotus could do
it only because he refused to countenance the reality of proportional
unity.

P rivileg ing Anal ogy of Prop ortionality

Cajetan is clear and consistent about the privileged place enjoyed by

analogy of proportionality. It alone is “properly” called analogy; and
it precedes all the other forms of (improperly so-called) analogy.37
Many of Cajetan’s interpreters have puzzled over Cajetan’s reasons
giving priority to analogy of proportionality in this way. The issue
has been made all the more urgent by the fact that recent scholarly
consensus finds Cajetan’s order a departure from Aquinas. To the
extent that a distinction between analogy of attribution and analogy
140 — Cajetan’s Answer

of proportionality can be found in Aquinas at all, it seems to most

commentators that the Angelic Doctor’s preferred type was analogy
of attribution. Many commentators thus take Cajetan’s preference for
proportionality as an interpretive gaffe, giving too much weight to
an idiosyncratic text of Aquinas (De Veritate 2.11) and ignoring other
more consistent and representative passages.
We have already seen that Cajetan’s analogy theory should not
be dismissed as a bad interpretation of Aquinas if it isn’t primarily
intended as an interpretation of Aquinas in the first place. Cajetan’s
purpose is instead to answer questions about the possibility of a mean
between univocation and equivocation, questions that Aquinas him-
self never answered or even explicitly asked. Cajetan gives priority
to analogy of proportionality because doing so helps him to answer
these questions—and so this priority cannot be evaluated by a simple
comparison with texts in Aquinas.38
Apart from the charge of mistaken interpretation, most com-
mentators explain that Cajetan preferred analogy of proportionality
because it involves the intrinsic denomination of all of its analogates.
Let us be clear what this means: the term denominates the analogates
on account of something intrinsic to each analogate. For instance,
seeing can denominate the eye on account of its grasp of visible ob-
jects, and it can denominate the intellect on account of its grasp of
intelligible objects. Now this obviously does not entail that the term
denominates two analogates insofar as the analogates are intrinsically
related, although this has been a point of confusion for some com-
mentators. Although there are proportionally similar relationships
between the intellect and its act and the eye and its act (the eye is to
ocular vision as the intellect is to intellectual vision), there is no in-
trinsic connection between the two; the proportional relationship be-
tween physical and intellectual vision is not caused by one’s acting on
the other. It may be that for other cases of proportionality, we would
account for the proportional relationship of the analogates by refer-
ence to an intrinsic causal relationship between them: for instance, as
an accident’s being, proportionate to the being of substance, is caus-
ally dependent on the being of substance and could not have being
without the being of substance; or as the goodness of creatures, caused
by the goodness of God, is good insofar as it is caused by the goodness
 Proportionality: The Proportional Unity of Concepts — 141

of God and would not be good without the goodness of God. One
should not object, then, as does Klubertanz, that proportionality does
not adequately describe the relationship between God and creatures
because it doesn’t refer to their intrinsic causal relationship, but is
based on only “extrinsic comparisons.”39 Much like the Suarezian ob-
jection that Cajetan’s classification does not allow for mixed cases of
“intrinsic attribution,” this objection results from a failure to appreci-
ate Cajetan’s explicit focus on semantic (formal) rather than meta-
physical (material) considerations.
Even with the clarifications and corrections offered here, how-
ever, it is not quite precise to say that Cajetan regards analogy of
proportionality as superior because it denominates all analogates
intrinsically, whereas analogy of attribution denominates its second-
ary analogates only extrinsically. It is true that Cajetan occasionally
encourages this reading, saying that analogy of proportionality pre-
cedes the others because “this occurs according to the genus of formal
inherent cause—since it predicates those which inhere in singulars,
while the other [kinds of analogy] occur according to extrinsic de-
nomination” (DNA §27). Furthermore, he says: “We know, accord-
ing to this analogy, something in things of intrinsic entity, goodness,
truth, etc., which is not known from the prior analogy [i.e., analogy
of attribution]” (DNA §29).
But the problem with such an explanation is that it has tempted
some commentators to conclude that proportionality is preferred for
metaphysical, as opposed to logical or semantic, reasons. It leads us
away from the questions that motivated Cajetan’s theory of analogy,
and the way in which analogy of proportionality serves to answer
those questions. Analogy of proportionality is preferred, not because
of its metaphysical properties, but because it is best able to serve a par-
ticular semantic role: a mean between univocation and equivocation.
As we have seen from our discussions of Cajetan’s definitions of
the modes of analogy, in analogy of proportionality the intrinsic de-
nomination of all of the analogates is not part of the definition but a
feature consequent on its definition: it only follows from the fact that
different concepts of the analogues are proportionally the same. And
it is this proportional similarity that is key to the superiority of analogy
of proportionality. That two things are denominated intrinsically by
142 — Cajetan’s Answer

an analogous term is not enough, without the denominating forms

signified by the analogous term being proportionally the same. So
while, loosely speaking, intrinsic denomination is a part of the reason
Cajetan prefers analogy of proportionality, it is not the full reason;
the full reason is that the concepts by which the denominating term
signifies, and thus the intrinsic “forms” by which the analogates are
denominated, are proportionally one.
Now, while proportional unity is itself a metaphysical notion, the
real reason Cajetan prefers analogy of proportionality to analogy of
attribution has to do not with metaphysics but with logic: for propor-
tional unity allows for a true mean between univocation and equivo-
cation. The “mean” of analogy of inequality turns out to be closer to
univocity—indeed, from the logician’s point of view, it just is a case of
univocity. The “mean” of analogy of attribution turns out to be closer
to equivocation—indeed, Cajetan’s treatment of it implies that as far
as the logician is concerned it behaves in most circumstances just like
equivocation. By contrast, analogy of proportionality seems to be a
truer mean. A term analogous by proportionality signifies by means
of (diverse but proportionally similar) concepts that are more unified
than the (diverse but related) concepts signified by a term analogous
by attribution, and yet not so unified as the (one) concept signified by
a term analogous by inequality. This is why it is the true analogy, the
true mean between univocation and equivocation; and the key to this
is the relation of proportional unity.
 Chapter Eight

The Semantics of Proportionality

Concept Formation and Judgment

If analogy of proportionality is superior because its diverse concepts

are proportionally the same, it remains the case that what it means
to have two concepts proportionally the same is obscure—as Cajetan
himself admits at the end of the third chapter of De Nominum Analo-
gia.1 As a true mean between univocation and equivocation, analogy
of proportionality has semantic properties that cannot be subsumed
under those of equivocation or univocation. Thus more than three-
quarters of De Nominum Analogia (§§31–125) is taken up with eluci-
dating further what is entailed by analogy of proportionality—that is,
analogy in which two concepts are proportionally the same.
The organization and arguments of these chapters becomes in-
telligible if we remember not only Scotus’s particular objections to
analogy but the traditional structure of logic. Scotus objected that
the terms of a scientific metaphysics and theology could not be ana-
logical, for, according to him, nonunivocal terms cause the fallacy of
equivocation in scientific demonstrations. This objection touches on
all three dimensions of logic. If equivocal terms cause the fallacy of
equivocation (in discursive reasoning), it is because they do not predi-
cate the same ratio of those equivocated things (in the second act of
reasoning, composing and dividing); and this is because they do not
allow the abstraction of a common ratio from the equivocated things
(simple apprehension). Cajetan must show how analogy differs from
— 143
144 — Cajetan’s Answer

equivocation in each of these respects, and yet remains different from

univocation as well. So he describes in turn the ramifications of pro-
portional unity in the context of simple apprehension (chaps. 4–5),
composing and dividing (i.e., judgment, chaps. 6–9), and reasoning
(chaps. 10–11),2 laying the groundwork for, and finally formulating,
a response to the objection of Scotus that no nonunivocal term could
avoid causing the fallacy of equivocation.

Th e Ana log ue: Perfect and Imperfect Concepts

( DNA C h a p. 4)

In explicating equivocation in his commentary on the Categories, Ca-

jetan had clarified that both names and things can be called equivo-
cals. Therefore, he said, we must distinguish between the equivocal
equivocating (aequivocum aequivocans) and the equivocals equivo-
cated (aequivoca aequivocata). The distinction is between what is
shared by the things named equivocally (the equivocal name), and
the things named equivocally themselves (the equivocated things).3
Cajetan makes a similar distinction with regards to the univocal and
its univocates,4 but of course in univocals there is more than just a
name in common; not just a name but also a ratio can be considered
as the univocal, common to all the univocates.
This is the background for the question Cajetan raises in his
fourth chapter: How is the analogue distinguished from the analo-
gates? The question arises because Cajetan wants to explain how
analogy is a mean between univocation and equivocation. In equivo-
cation, the equivocal (what equivocates) is just the common word;
the equivocated things are the things denominated by that word. In
univocation, the univocal (what univocates) can be understood as not
only the common word, but the common formal concept by which
that word signifies, and the common ratio which that word signi-
fies as its objective concept. Analogy, as a mean between equivoca-
tion and univocation, will have more in common than is found in the
purely equivocal (just the word) but less in common than is found in
the univocal (the word, and the objective and formal concept). Thus
his fourth chapter clarifies analogy with respect to the three elements
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 145

of the semantic triangle, considered in turn: word, concept, and

thing—where the “thing” is not the analogate that is denominated
by the analogous term, but the objective concept that is signified by
the analogous term.5 All of these can be considered as the analogue,
to be distinguished from the analogates, and in this respect, analogy is
similar to univocation (where word, concept, and thing are common)
and unlike equivocation (where only the word is common). Thus the
bulk of the chapter is an attempt to clarify the difference between
analogy and univocation. Cajetan’s concern here is not just how the
analogue is distinguished from the analogates, but how this differs
from the way that the univocal is distinguished from the univocates.
Just on the basis of Cajetan’s third chapter, we know that in
analogy of proportionality, there are diverse analogates, denominated
with respect to diverse rationes that are proportionally the same. Ca-
jetan explicates this in his fourth chapter by considering the differ-
ence between the foundation of univocation and the foundation of
equivocation. What it is in diverse things that founds a univocation,
while many insofar as they are individuated in those diverse things, is
entirely the same in ratio. “The things founding univocation are like
themselves in such a way that the foundation of similitude in one is of
wholly the same ratio as the foundation of similitude in the other; so
that the ratio of one contains in itself nothing that the ratio of the other
does not contain.” By contrast, what it is in diverse things that founds
an analogy is not of wholly the same ratio.

The things founding analogy are similar in such a way that the
foundation of similitude in one is different simpliciter from its
foundation in the other; so that the ratio of one does not contain
what the ratio of the other contains. And because of this, the foun-
dation of analogical similitude in neither of the extremes can be
abstracted from them; but they remain distinct foundations, never-
theless similar according to proportion.6

This may sound somewhat redundant: the foundation of analogy

is analogical similarity. But what Cajetan is doing here is showing
how the general notion of analogical similarity works itself out in
the semantic details. We started with the claim, in Cajetan’s chapter
146 — Cajetan’s Answer

3, that the rationes in analogy are proportionally the same. Here we

see further that this means that whatever there is in things that have
those rationes, from which those rationes are abstracted, must them-
selves be proportionally the same; indeed, that is just why the rationes
are proportionally the same, because they are the rationes of forms
that are themselves proportionally the same.
Cajetan illustrates with examples of univocation and analogy.
The word ‘animal’ is univocally said of man, cow, and lion, because
each has in it an individual sensitive nature. These natures, though
diverse in being, are so alike that the ratio of animality abstracted
from any one contains nothing more or less than the ratio of animal-
ity abstracted from any other; this is just what it means to say that
‘animal’ is univocal.7 The word ‘being,’ however, is said of substance,
quantity and quality, not because each has in itself an individualized
nature from which some one, generic ratio can be abstracted.8 Rather,
each analogate has a different nature, which is nonetheless similar
enough—proportionally similar—to found an analogy.9
It is in discussing mental concepts that Cajetan makes an im-
portant distinction, crucial to an appreciation of the course he steers
between univocation and equivocation. It is the distinction between
“perfect” and “imperfect” concepts. The proportionally similar but
nonetheless distinct natures signified in analogy of proportionality
are each properly conceived of by distinct “perfect” concepts. These
perfect concepts are themselves proportionally the same, so that while
each represents10 one of the diverse natures properly and perfectly,
it represents the others proportionally and imperfectly. Thus Ca-
jetan says that while there is no perfect concept common to all the
analogates, we can speak of an imperfect concept that is common to
all the analogates. His point could be depicted as in Figure 6. Here,
concept(1) and concept(2) are perfect concepts; concept(1) properly repre-
sents form(1) and concept(2) properly represents form(2). But concept(1)
and concept(2) are proportionally similar (as are form(1) and form(2)),
and this proportional similarity allows us to speak of another, “imper-
fect” concept (concept(3)), a concept that imperfectly represents both
form(1) and form(2).
Cajetan’s introduction of this common, imperfect concept raises
a question. Is what we call the imperfect concept another concept,
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 147

Figure 6. Analogy of Proportionality

in addition to the distinct perfect concepts (as fig. 6 suggests)? Or, is

what we call the imperfect concept really just (any) one of the (many)
perfect concepts, considered insofar as it imperfectly represents the
other analogates of which it is not a perfect concept? (In other words,
is it possible that concept(3) is not a third concept but is really just
concept(1) or concept(2), considered insofar as concept(1) and concept(2)
can imperfectly represent that which is proportionally similar to that
which they perfectly represent?) The latter alternative is suggested
by Cajetan’s claim that “one concept perfectly representing one
analogate imperfectly represents the rest.”11 But in favor of the for-
mer alternative, Cajetan seems to say that there is just one imperfect
concept.12 This wouldn’t seem to be the case if each perfect concept
could be considered as an imperfect concept, for then there would
not be only one imperfect concept but exactly as many as there are
perfect concepts.
In fact the two alternatives may not be so different: the many
imperfect concepts implied by the latter alternative—each a per-
fect concept of a distinct analogate, imperfectly representing other
148 — Cajetan’s Answer

analogates—may be regarded as proportionally one imperfect con-

cept—insofar as they all represent all analogates imperfectly—as im-
plied by the former alternative.
In any case, Cajetan does speak of something at least logically
distinct from the perfect concepts: the imperfect concept, a concept
that would imperfectly represent all the analogates rather than per-
fectly representing one and imperfectly representing the others. It is
also true that any perfect concept, insofar as what it is a concept of
is proportionally similar to other things, is imperfectly a concept of
those other things. (For example, insofar as intellectual apprehen-
sion is proportionally similar to physical sight, the perfect concept of
physical sight is imperfectly a concept of intellectual apprehension.)
So in a sense it seems that Cajetan does not need to find these two
alternatives mutually exclusive, and indeed can endorse them both.13
In any case, it seems unreasonable to press this question too far, espe-
cially in light of Cajetan’s warning that there is a sense in which there
is not a common concept at all. Cajetan cautions that we need to tailor
our characterization of analogous concepts to different audiences. He
thinks it is most proper not to say that there is a common concept, but
to say that there are many concepts, proportionally similar. However,
in some contexts—presumably when speaking with those who deny
the unity that is involved in analogy—it can be appropriate to speak
of a common concept. Given this, Cajetan says, “one ought to be in
the habit of using discretion when it is found written that the analo-
gates agree in one ratio, and when it is found said elsewhere that the
analogates do not agree in one ratio,”14 for these apparently different
claims do not necessarily contradict each other; they may just be at-
tempts to emphasize different aspects of a consistent, delicately bal-
anced analogy theory.15

Th e “Abstraction” of the Anal ogue and the

C on fu sion of the Anal ogues (DNA Chap. 5)

In discussing the proportional unity of the objective and mental

concepts, Cajetan had already introduced the issue of abstraction;
because proportionally similar things are not generically similar, a
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 149

single common ratio cannot be abstracted from them.16 Cajetan turns

to discuss abstraction more directly in his fifth chapter (“How there
is abstraction of the analogue from the analogates”). Cajetan believes
that despite what was said in his previous chapter, it still might appear
that there is some one thing abstractable, as there are in univocals.
Since abstraction always involves “understanding one [thing] while
not understanding others,”17 Cajetan says, “to treat the abstraction of
the analogue from the analogates is nothing other than to ask and de-
termine how the thing signified by the name of the analogue may be
understood without also understanding the analogates, and how its
concept can be had, without the concepts of those [analogates].”18
Cajetan agrees that the common analogue can be understood sepa-
rately, and thus it can be said to be abstracted, but it is not abstracted
in the manner that a generic concept is abstracted in univocation.19
There is not a third, separate simple concept, which can be abstracted
from the two analogous concepts.20 Rather, in analogy, there is a kind
of abstraction by confusion: the diverse proper analogues are consid-
ered as similar, and their diversity is ignored or “confused.” What
is confused (blurred, or made indistinct) is the distinction between
the proportionally similar rationes, so that what is considered is their
proportional similarity. This means that in one sense abstraction is
possible; indeed, just as Cajetan says that there both is and is not one
concept, Cajetan says that there both is and is not abstraction.21
But, it may be asked, if this kind of quasi abstraction is possible,
why is proper abstraction not possible? If in this quasi abstraction it is
the similarity of the diverse analogical rationes which is being consid-
ered, why is there not some common property, with respect to which
they are similar, and which can be properly abstracted from them?22
Yves Simon called it the “beginner’s mistake” to look for a common
element—but why is this a mistake? Must not there be some com-
mon element with respect to which similar things are similar? As
Burrell put it:

If one needs to speak of similitude, it had best be a single one and

not a proportional one. For whether we think of a similitude as
a kind of template or prefer to be guided by a careful use of lan-
guage, the upshot will have to be something invariant, else why
150 — Cajetan’s Answer

invoke the expression? Careful attention to language would note

that ‘x is similar to y’ is an ellipsis which must furnish ‘in respect of
z’ on demand.23

Of course, if Burrell’s ‘z,’ in respect of which things are supposed to

be similar, must always be a common, shared element, it is hard to
see how Burrell could have a place for analogy, without denying that
analogues are similar; and yet analogues are similar. If there cannot
be a common element by virtue of which analogically similar things
are similar, why not?
Interestingly, Cajetan’s response to this question is that it can’t
be answered, because it is inappropriate to ask; it is just the nature
of proportional similarity that it is genuine similarity and yet there is
not some commonly abstractable element. Those who do not see that,
and ask why it is the case, ask what does not fall under question, like
asking why man is a rational animal.24
I take it that this is why Bochenski, in his formal analysis of
analogy, found it necessary to introduce the notion of “isomorphy.”
As Bochenski saw, there could not be one common element between
two proportionally similar things. Indeed, two things are only propor-
tionally similar insofar as they find themselves in proportions which
are similar—A is proportionally similar to C insofar as A is to B as C
is to D. But there cannot even be a common element in these similar
proportions of the form ‘x is to y’; nor could there be a more general
relation that contained the two relations, for in that case there would
be, after all, some univocal element. Bochenski’s “isomorphy” just al-
lows for two relations to be similar without their being specifications
of some more general, common, and so univocal relation.25
Indeed, it seems that Bochenski’s ‘isomorphy’ means nothing
more than this. Though its provenance (it is taken from Principia
Mathematica) gives it a technical connotation, making it suitable
for inclusion in Bochenski’s highly formalized arguments, ‘isomor-
phy’ appears to mean just exactly what Cajetan meant by propor-
tional similarity—that is, genuine similarity of proportions which
yet does not allow the abstraction of a common, general relation.26
If so, the traditional explication of “isomorphy” is illuminating: as-
sume two “structures” S1 and S2, whose elements have a one-to-one
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 151

correspondence, and for any relation R1 between elements a1 and b1 of

structure S1, there is a corresponding relation R2 between elements a2
and b2 of structure S2. Relations R1 and R2 are not the same relation,
but are said to be similar just insofar as they relate corresponding ele-
ments of their respective structures. In this case, S1 and S2 can be said
to be isomorphic, as can R1 and R2. We could also say that they are
proportionally similar. By extension, corresponding elements a1 and
a2 can also be said to be proportionally similar—that is, analogous.
But to understand this is not to understand some common element
shared by a1 and a2, rather it is to understand a1 and a2 as playing cor-
responding roles in their respective (and so proportionally similar)
structures (S1:R1a1b1::S2:R2a2b2).
In short, the primary lesson that Cajetan would have us learn
about analogy on the level of simple apprehension is that there can-
not be a concept or ratio that captures one common element shared
by diverse analogates, but there can be a kind of quasi abstraction—
abstraction-by-confusion—of an imperfect concept, which is an ap-
prehension of diverse things in their proportional similitude.

P red ication: Universal but Not U nivocal

(DNA C h ap. 6 )

The exposition of the semantics of analogy of proportionality at the

level of simple apprehension leads to questions at the level of compos-
ing and dividing. Because it involves only the quasi abstraction of a
quasi concept (the “confusion” that produces an “imperfect” concept),
it is difficult to understand what is involved in predicating a term
analogous by proportionality of its subjects. After all, in general what
is predicated is supposed to be a common nature or ratio, considered
absolutely, which is signified by a term as its objective concept. And
yet, in analogy of proportionality, there is no one proper objective
concept of all the analogates, but instead a proper objective concept
of one analogate (physical sight, for instance), and a different, albeit
proportionally similar, proper objective concept of another analogate
(such as intellectual apprehension). Though it seems to play the role
of a universal predicated of diverse individuals, can there be “one”
152 — Cajetan’s Answer

analogue here, understood as something unified and common to

many? Analogy thus raises its own problem of universals. This par-
ticular difficulty, with which Cajetan is concerned in the sixth chapter
of De Nominum Analogia, is: how can a term analogous by propor-
tionality be predicated of diverse analogates as a superior predicated
of its inferiors?
We say that a univocal term is predicated of its univocates as a
superior of inferiors, because what is predicated of one is wholly the
same as what is predicated of the other, namely the common ratio
abstractable from each univocate and signified as the ratio or objec-
tive concept of that term. The foundation of the “superiority” of the
univocal is the identity of the rationes in the diverse univocates. Not
surprisingly, Cajetan insists that there is a difference between uni-
vocal and analogical superiority. Just as the foundation of similarity
should not be confused with the foundation of univocation,27 so the
foundation of superiority should not be confused with the founda-
tion of univocation. The foundation of univocation is the complete
identity of rationes; the foundation of superiority is the identity of
rationes, where identity here can include even proportional identity.28
So while univocates have both the foundation of superiority and the
foundation of univocity, in analogates there is not the foundation of
univocity, but there is still the foundation of superiority, just insofar
as the diverse rationes of the analogates are the same proportionally.
And the proportional identity of the rationes is enough to found supe-
riority, because it is almost as if there is a common ratio of all analo-
gates, insofar as the ratio of one analogate is proportionally the ratio of
another analogate.29
Here again, then, we see that the logical space between univoca-
tion and equivocation, namely the space for a common and superior
but nonunivocal ratio, can be defended only by appeal to the meta-
physical space between sameness and difference, and specifically to
the metaphysical recognition of proportional sameness. And although
Cajetan does not name Scotus in this chapter of De Nominum Ana-
logia, his distinction between the foundation of superiority and the
foundation of univocity provides some of the response necessary to
the Scotistic criticism of analogy. Cajetan describes a fallacy of con-
cluding from a ratio’s being superior or universal to its being univocal.
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 153

The fallacy results from failing to distinguish between identity and

mode of identity, and thus failing to distinguish between the foun-
dation of superiority and the foundation of univocity.30 While a fal-
lacy about logic, it is clear that it is rooted in a failure to appreciate
the metaphysical category of proportional identity. “For identity and
unity contain under themselves not only complete unity and identity,
but proportional.”31
By this point in his discussion, Cajetan believes he has made good
on the promise at the very beginning of De Nominum Analogia that
he would expose as false three popular characterizations of the unity
of the analogical concept.32 True analogy cannot involve one precise
concept unequally participated (although this is a fair description of
analogy of inequality). Nor can it involve diverse concepts unified
as a disjunction, or as an ordered set (although the latter alternative
might be a fair description of analogy of attribution, with the second-
ary analogues ordered to, by their relation to, the primary analogue).
Rather, genuine analogy, which allows for something common to be
abstracted and predicated as a universal, requires that there be di-
verse concepts that are the same by proportion.33 Cajetan does not offer
further explanation, but he does not need to. If there were only one
precise concept, it would necessarily be a form of univocation; and if
the diverse concepts were not proportionally one, then there could
not even be the kind of confused, or quasi, abstraction that allows the
analogical term to be predicated as a superior of inferiors.

Defin ition: Signifying the Foundation

of a Relation (DNA Chap. 7)

It is clear that just showing the falsity of three popular characteriza-

tions of the analogical concept(s) is not enough for Cajetan. These
alternative characterizations mentioned at the beginning may sound
like the occasion of his work, but Cajetan does not spend much time
discussing them, and comes back to them again only as a kind of
aside. Cajetan’s real aim is to elucidate the nature of the unity of the
analogical concept, and the three incorrect proposals are only symp-
toms of contemporary confusion about the subject, pointing to the
154 — Cajetan’s Answer

need to treat it fully. And Cajetan’s own appeal to proportional unity

still requires further elucidation, for he still has not directly addressed
the Scotistic concern that a nonunivocal term will ipso facto cause the
fallacy of equivocation. Thus Cajetan continues by raising a question
that has to do with definition. Since there are diverse perfect rationes,
how are the different definitions of each ratio related?
More specifically, must one ratio be defined in terms of another?
This had been the case with analogy of attribution, at least with its
secondary analogates, since those secondary analogates are defined
in terms of their relation to the primary analogate. But in analogy of
proportionality, two things are not analogous because one has some
determinate relation to another, but because both are proportionally
the same.
It is in this context that Cajetan makes the important but often
overlooked claim that in analogy of proportionality what is signi-
fied is not a relation but the foundation of a relation34—a distinction
invoked again in Cajetan’s Summa commentary.35 In analogy of at-
tribution, the analogical term, as predicated of the secondary analo-
gates, signifies a relation, namely, the relation between the secondary
analogate and the primary analogue. In analogy of proportionality,
however, this is not the case; the analogical term—as predicated of
any analogate, secondary or primary—signifies not a relation but the
foundation of a relation.
How so? Actually, we can discern two senses in which the ana-
logical term signifies the foundation of a relation, for there are two
different orders of relation in analogy of proportionality. There is
the proportional relation between two analogates (the relation repre-
sented by the double colon [‘::’] in ‘A:B::C:D’), and, on either side of
this proportional relation, there is the relation of the analogate to its
analogue (the relation represented by the single colons [‘:’] on either
side of ‘A:B::C:D’). Which of these two relations does Cajetan have
in mind when he says that a term analogical by proportionality signi-
fies the foundation of a relation? Cajetan is in fact not entirely clear,
although at DNA §83 it seems that he has in mind the former rela-
tion, the “relation of identity or similarity” between two analogates.
But whichever relation Cajetan has in mind, we can see that the same
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 155

thing can be considered as its foundation. Consider the example of

“sees,” which is predicated of the intellect by analogy with the see-
ing of an eye. The proper operation of the intellect, its grasping of its
proper object, is a foundation of the relation that holds between it and
the intellect. And of course this “intellectual vision” is also a founda-
tion of the relation of proportional similitude between the intellect
and the eye; it is insofar as the intellect has this “vision” that it is said
to be proportionally similar to the eye and its “vision.” And this same
thing that is the foundation of both relations we have considered is
in fact what is signified by the analogous term in the analogate; and
the ratio of the analogous term is the ratio of that vision itself, and not
some relation that that vision has to something else.
In light of this we can understand Cajetan’s further point that in
analogy of proper proportionality, one analogous ratio can be known
without knowing the others. Though one ratio of an analogous term
does have a relation to others, namely the relation of proportional
similarity, that ratio can be known without knowing the other ratio-
nes to which it is proportionally similar. In this sense, the ratio of an
analogue is like the ratio of a univocal; for a ratio is univocal if it is
the same as the ratio of another thing, and yet one does not have to
know that relation to the other thing to know the univocal ratio. The
ratio of “animal,” for example, is univocal to man and cow, and so the
ratio of animal, as predicated of man, is related to the ratio of animal
as predicated of the cow; and yet, when we say that man is an animal,
we do not predicate of man that his ratio has some relation to the ratio
of a cow. This is the point that Cajetan makes by introducing the
logician’s distinction between considering a term in the signified act
(in actu signato) and in the exercised act (in actu exercito):

As “animal” said of man and horse implies univocation in the ex-

ercised act, it does not predicate of man, all this, namely “sensitive
nature entirely the same according to ratio as the sensitive nature of
horse and cow,” but [rather it predicates] “sensitive nature” simply.
However, since the predication is univocal, it must be wholly the
same according to ratio, as the sensitive nature of horse and cow.
Just so, “being” [ens], implying proportionality in the exercised act,
156 — Cajetan’s Answer

does not predicate of quantity all this, namely “having itself to being
[esse] proportionally as substance or quality to their being [esse]”; but
[it predicates] “having itself to being [esse] in such a way,” without
any other addition; nevertheless it is necessary that, for the predi-
cation to be analogous, it must be the same proportionally with the
other [rationes] “having itself to being in such a way,” which being
[ens] predicates of substance or quality.36

This is why in analogy of proper proportionality, one analogue can be

known without the other, and does not need to be defined by refer-
ence to another.
Cajetan is careful at this point to clarify that this same rule does
not hold for metaphor. In metaphor, “the analogue taken metaphori-
cally predicates nothing other than that this has itself by similitude to
that, so that without the other extreme it cannot be understood.”37 In
other words, similarity to something else is included in the ratio of
the metaphorical analogue, not only in actu exercito but also in actu
signato. And because of this, the metaphorical analogue is defined by
reference to the other analogue, so that “the one properly taken must
be included in the ratio of the one taken metaphorically; since it is im-
possible to understand what something is according to a metaphori-
cal name without knowing that to which the metaphor refers. Nor
indeed can it happen that I understand what a field is insofar as it is
smiling, without knowing what the name ‘smile’ signifies properly
taken, by similitude to which the field is said to smile.”38
In this respect, metaphor is like analogy of attribution, in that
the secondary analogue cannot be understood without the primary
analogue,39 and the ratio of the primary analogue appears in the defi-
nition of the ratio of the secondary analogue. Indeed, this is just why
it is so easy to distinguish, in both metaphor and analogy of attribu-
tion, what is primary and what is secondary. But this raises a ques-
tion about the issue of priority in analogy of proportionality. If one
is not defined in terms of the other, how can we tell which is the
primary analogate? Indeed, how can there be a primary analogate?
What, if anything, can be the criterion for “primacy” in analogy of
proportionality?
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 157

In order to address this question Cajetan introduces another dis-

tinction at this point of De Nominum Analogia. We can say that there
is an order of things considered under one name, but we must distin-
guish between the order on the part of the thing, and that on the part
of the imposition of the name.40 While it had appeared difficult to see
how there could be priority and posteriority at all, with this distinc-
tion Cajetan reminds us that there are actually two ways order can
occur. That can be considered the primary analogue that the name
was first imposed to signify. (In this sense creatures, for example, are
the primary analogates under the term ‘good,’ which is secondarily
said of God.) However, at the same time that can be considered a pri-
mary analogate which is said to have the analogue in a metaphysically
higher, or primary way. (In this sense, God is the primary analogate
of “good,” which is only secondarily said of creatures.)41

C ompa rison, D ivision, R esolution

(DNA C h aps. 8 and 9)

It is easy to judge priority in the order of imposition of names, for

names are conventional, and as a matter of human intention it will
generally be known what a term was originally or primarily imposed
to signify. But how is it possible to judge priority in the order of
things? We have just said that God has the analogue of goodness “in
a metaphysically higher, or primary way”—how is this discerned? Of
course, in the case of terms analogous between God and creatures, we
have easy theological and metaphysical reasons to grant God primacy,
but what about in other, nontheological cases of proportionality?
How will we be able to discern order then?42
This is the kind of difficulty that prompts Cajetan’s eighth chap-
ter, about “how there is comparison in the analogue.” But the ques-
tion here is even more basic, not just how we can discern priority in the
order of things, but how there can even be such priority and poste-
riority. Since there is no common element in analogy, it seems that
there is no basis for comparison of analogues, and so we could not
say, for instance, that one is greater than another in some respect. And
158 — Cajetan’s Answer

yet this seems necessary if, as we know, analogy involves an order of

primary and secondary analogates, not just in the order of imposition
but in the order of reality. How could there be primary and secondary
analogates if there is no basis of comparison between them, no com-
mon element that they both share to a greater or lesser extent?
Cajetan addresses this problem with a distinction. As with su-
periority,43 the foundation of comparison is not absolute identity or
unity, which is the foundation of univocation, but any manner of iden-
tity or unity.44 So it is sufficient for comparison in analogy that the
different analogues are proportionally one.45 This does not preclude
one of the proportionally similar rationes from being “more perfect”
than another; and such difference would occur if one thing has more
perfect being according to the proportionally common ratio than an-
other thing. Discerning these degrees of perfection is what is required
for identifying what is more prior in itself, and not just on the part of
the imposition of the name.
The analogue can thus be said to be divided into the analogates—
that is, divided according to the different ways the analogates take
up the ratio of the analogue. Cajetan says that the various different
analogates are already contained in the analogue, in a way that the
univocates are not contained in the univocal. The univocates require
something else added, a difference from outside the genus. But the
analogates do not need something else added, rather their confused
inclusion needs to be made more precise.46 Cajetan had already spo-
ken of the quasi abstraction allowed of analogues that happened “by
sort of hiding the diversity” of the perfect concepts,47 so that “not so
much the concepts as their diversity is confounded” in the analogical
concept.48 So the “division” of the common analogue into its analo-
gates involves not the addition of differences, as to a univocal genus,
but the uncovering, or bringing into focus, of hidden diversity.49
The process of division thus has a complementary process that
moves in the opposite direction, bringing together distinct things
and ignoring their diversity. Though the ratio of one analogate is
not defined in terms of the ratio of another, still one ratio (a proper
concept) can be analyzed into the common analogue. This process is
called resolution; the distinct analogate is resolved into the common
analogue.50
 Proportionality: Concept Formation and Judgment — 159

At first glance, it would seem that what Cajetan says about divi-
sion and resolution here in chapter 9 does not add much to his earlier
discussions of distinction and abstraction in chapters 4 and 5 respec-
tively. In both resolution and abstraction, a common ratio of diverse
subjects is discerned; in both division and distinction, the diversity
of analogates within the common ratio is discerned. But chapter 9
does offer further explanation and more precise characterization of
what was earlier only described in terms of a quasi abstraction. We
have already seen that the quasi abstraction possible in analogy must
differ from proper abstraction in not having an abstractable common
element in the diverse things. But a further consequence of this is that
diverse analogates do not differ from each other by differences sepa-
rable from and added to a common (generic) nature. Such differences
would necessarily be outside the common nature, so analogates can
differ only by something that is included in the common analogical
ratio. As Cajetan points out,51 this is one of Aristotle’s arguments why
being is not a genus: the “differences” that are “added” to being to
constitute the categories themselves have being, and so are not outside
of the common “nature” they differentiate.
In general, then, the reason there cannot be genuine abstraction
in the case of analogy is that the common analogue is in principle
inseparable from those features that constitute the diversity of the
analogates. Cajetan appears to offer “division” and “resolution” as
alternative technical terminology, since, properly speaking, there is
no “differentiation” and “abstraction” in analogy. Resolution is the
mind’s capacity to give attention to the proportional unity of neces-
sarily diverse rationes, whose necessary diversity is not constituted by
the addition of differences to a genus absolutely one; and since reso-
lution is attention to proportional unity as such, even this attention
must be accompanied by awareness of the necessary diversity of the
analogates—otherwise, the analogue would collapse into a univocal
ratio, absolutely one. And since the analogous ratio so “resolved” is not
absolutely one, it necessarily includes an order of priority, according
as the analogous ratio results from adding to one ratio (of the primary
analogate) qualifications that allow it to be extended to secondary
analogates, resulting in a modified ratio proportionally one with the
original ratio. To take again the crucial example from metaphysics:
160 — Cajetan’s Answer

being cannot be regarded as abstractable from substance (substantial

being) and from quantity (measurable being) as a genus from species,
because substantial and measurable are not differences constituting di-
verse species of absolutely one genus; rather, they are qualifications
constituting diverse yet proportionally one ratio/rationes of being.
 Chapter Nine

The Semantics of Proportionality

Syllogism and Dialectic

In the middle chapters of De Nominum Analogia, with their continued

emphasis on concepts, Cajetan at first glance seems to be primarily
concerned with matters of epistemology or philosophical psychol-
ogy. The concern, however, remains properly logical or semantic.
The common theme is the acquisition, structure, and deployment of
analogical concepts. Analogy of proportionality was given its formal
definition on the level of the first act of apprehension, in terms of the
semantic triangle. And yet the unique relation of proportional unity
required an exploration of its ramifications through the activities of
the second act of apprehension, loosely called judgment, but which
we have seen involves the definition, predication, and formation of
analogical concepts—everything that arises from the use of predicates
that are neither purely equivocal nor purely univocal. This leaves the
semantics of analogy on the level of the third act of apprehension—
discursive reasoning—to the final chapters of the treatise. In these
chapters Cajetan takes up the challenge of how analogical terms can
mediate syllogistic inference, and he reflects on other hermeneutic
challenges raised by the use of analogical terms in argument.

— 161
162 — Cajetan’s Answer

Scien tific Reasoning (DNA Chap. 10)

How can a term used nonunivocally in different premises of a syl-

logism avoid causing the fallacy of equivocation? That was the ques-
tion pressed by Scotus’s objections to analogy. It is the question that
Cajetan’s treatise on analogy finally addresses directly in the tenth of
its eleven chapters.
By now we can rephrase the question, in light of Cajetan’s se-
mantic analysis of analogical concepts: How can an analogical term
avoid causing the fallacy of equivocation when that term, occurring
in different premises in a scientific demonstration, signifies different
perfect concepts? Cajetan considers the example of wisdom, in the
syllogism “Every simple perfection is in God, wisdom is a simple per-
fection, therefore [wisdom is in God].”1 It seems that this cannot be
a scientific demonstration, because in the minor premise, “wisdom”
signifies the ratio of creaturely wisdom, while in the conclusion it sig-
nifies the ratio of divine wisdom.
Cajetan attributes this objection to Scotus (I Sent. d. 3, q. 1), and
responds that those who follow this argument “are deceived . . . ,
because seeing in the analogue the diversity of rationes, they do not
consider that unity and identity which it conceals.”2 Only when we
accept the proper rationes in themselves, as perfect concepts of their
respective analogates, do they lead to the fallacy of equivocation; but
accepting them as proportionally the same—as imperfect concepts rep-
resenting many analogates—they do not. As Cajetan explains:

Whatever agrees with one, agrees also with the other proportion-
ally; and whatever is denied of one, is denied of the other propor-
tionally; because whatever agrees with a similar, insofar as it is
similar, agrees also with that to which it is similar, while always
saving the proportionality.3

So in responding to the claim that analogy would cause the fallacy of

equivocation, Cajetan invokes a principle that we may call transitivity
by likeness: if something applies to a likeness, insofar as it is a likeness,
it applies also to the thing of which the likeness is a likeness (quidquid
 Proportionality: Syllogism and Dialectic — 163

convenit simili, in eo quod simile, convenit etiam illi, cui est simile).4 (The
principle is so obvious as hardly to need articulating: if you call a pic-
ture of a puppy cute, it follows that you think the puppy of which it is
a picture is cute.)5 It is on the basis of this principle that our syllogism
can move from claims about creatures to claims about God, for al-
though not univocal, the different rationes signified by the analogical
term are sufficiently similar to each other, indeed they are proportion-
ally one. Indeed, that is just why, according to Cajetan, proportional
unity is numbered among varieties of unity, for what is proportionally
one is “affirmable and deniable, and consequently distributable and
knowable, as subject, middle term, and predicate.”6
Applying the principles laid out in early chapters of De Nominum
Analogia, we can say that in analogy of proportionality, the different
rationes of the term do not cause the fallacy of equivocation because
the proportional similarity of those different rationes as predicated of
their different subjects allows for a superior, imperfect concept that
can be predicated of both subjects. This concept is said to be “im-
perfect,” however, because it is not a definite, univocal concept, of
which the diverse proper rationes are specifications derived by the ad-
dition of differences. Rather it is a “confused”—that is, indetermi-
nate—concept of both of those rationes considered in their proportional
similarity. Of course, in the example above, the individual premises
are true because the word ‘wisdom’ as predicated of creatures does
signify creaturely wisdom; and as predicated of God, it signifies di-
vine wisdom. But because creaturely wisdom and divine wisdom are
proportionally the same, the truth of those premises is also saved if
we consider not two different rationes of wisdom, but the superior,
confused apprehension of them both in their proportional similarity.
In other words, the two different rationes of wisdom are, in fact, pro-
portionally the same, and their proportional similarity is a sufficient
similarity to avoid the fallacy of equivocation. So we can, after all,
understand the syllogism as involving three terms, not four.
It is not surprising that in response to Scotus’s argument to the
contrary, Cajetan is pressed to clarify what constitutes contradiction.
According to Scotus, contradiction was affirmation and negation of
a univocal of a univocal—indeed, Scotus defined univocation and
164 — Cajetan’s Answer

contradiction in terms of each other. Cajetan replies that contradic-

tion is “affirmation and negation of the same of the same,” where
sameness can obviously include proportional sameness. “Identity, as
much in thing as in ratio, as is repeated many times, is extended to
proportional identity.”7
Again, then, in the example above “the word ‘wisdom’ does not
stand for this or that ratio of wisdom, but for wisdom proportionally
one, that is, for both rationes of wisdom, not conjoined or disjuncted,
but insofar as they are proportionally undivided, and one is propor-
tionally the other, and both constitute a ratio proportionally one.”8
And this proportional identity means that the word ‘wisdom’ does
not signify different things, but the same thing—albeit analogically or
proportionally the same—in each of its occurrences in the syllogism.9
So we can see that just as Scotus’s argument against analogy in-
volves a confusion of the foundation of univocation with the founda-
tions of similarity and superiority, it also involves a confusion of the
foundation of univocation with the foundation of contradiction. As
Cajetan puts it, “Scotus . . . either poorly explained the univocal con-
cept, or contradicted himself” when he defined a univocal concept
as one sufficing to found contradiction. If this is univocation, then
‘being,’ although analogical, would satisfy the definition of a univo-
cal. Scotus, however, thought his argument proved that ‘being’ had
one concept simply and undivided—that is, that it was not analogical.
But if Scotus intended to exclude proportional unity from his defini-
tion of univocation, then he was wrong to define a univocal concept
as one that suffices to found a contradiction.10
Cajetan believes his position is supported not only by the au-
thority of Aquinas but by the “daily exercise” of analogy in scientific
reasoning. He also finds it supported by Aristotle’s explicit claims in
Posterior Analytics that an analogue is an adequate mean in a scientific
demonstration (98a20ff.; 99a16ff.). Indeed, according to Aristotle’s
example, this does not even require that there already be an analogi-
cal term common to many things, so long as the many things are un-
derstood to be analogically related. For, as Cajetan quotes Aristotle,
“There is not accepted one and the same [word] that ought to name
sepion, spine, and bone. However, there are those [attributes] which
follow as if there were one existent nature of this kind.”11
 Proportionality: Syllogism and Dialectic — 165

Cajeta n ’s Parting Advice (DNA Chap. 11)

Cajetan’s discussion of scientific reasoning includes a warning: even

though a term analogous by proportionality can, like a univocal term,
serve in scientific reasoning without causing the fallacy of equivoca-
tion, still its proportionality must be kept in mind, and it must not
be treated as if it were a univocal term. For the unity of an analogical
term does hide equivocations, and if one were to forget these, and
treat the analogical term as univocal, one might falsely attribute to
one analogate something that is proper only to another analogate.12
While analogical terms can be used in scientific reasoning, it is obvi-
ously not an easy or unproblematic matter. So it is appropriate that
Cajetan not end his treatise on analogy without providing some cau-
tions and helpful practical advice. By signaling possible mistakes in
reasoning with and about analogical concepts, the final chapter of De
Nominum Analogia is effectively a brief de fallaciis to conclude the
logical organon of the preceding chapters.
Cajetan’s first piece of advice is that we should not assume that
just because a term is univocal with respect to some things, it will be
univocal with respect to all. The example Cajetan uses is “wisdom,”
which originally was univocal as applied to different wise men. Yet as
extended to apply to God, the word is not univocal but analogical.13
A second piece of advice is that we shouldn’t be misled by there
being one or many names, for what is important is that there are pro-
portionally similar rationes. Cajetan’s example here is again Aristotle’s
example of the ratio of what supports flesh, which is found in bone,
sepion, and spine, although there is no common word that is applied
to all three of these things.14 Diverse things that lack a common name
may in fact have a common nature; and diverse things that do share a
common name may still be only analogically one.
Cajetan’s third piece of advice is another reminder not to be mis-
led into thinking that an analogical term is univocal. Not only can we
be misled by the unity of the term, but also by the apparent unity of
the analysis or definition of the ratio signified by that term. Cajetan’s
example is that the term ‘principle’ may be analyzed as that from
which a thing becomes (or is, or is known), and this itself might seem to
apply univocally to different things conceived of as principles. Yet the
166 — Cajetan’s Answer

mere “vocal unity” of this analysis should not disguise the fact that
the analysis itself is analogical, which is obvious when it is realized
that it contains analogical terms: “neither to become, nor to be, nor
to be known, nor the word ‘from,’ is wholly one in ratio, but [each] is
saved proportionally.”15
A fourth bit of advice is for those interpreting what others have
said about analogy: Cajetan says that we should not be bothered by the
diversity of what has been said about analogy by “doctors.” Indeed,
diverse kinds of claims should be expected, for insofar as analogy is a
mean between univocation and equivocation, it may appear especially
like or unlike one or another extreme, depending on what feature is
being emphasized. As we have already seen in Cajetan’s own pre-
sentation, sometimes the unity of the analogue will be emphasized,
other times the diversity, and these emphases are not contradictory.16
It is with this in mind that Cajetan says we can see the essential con-
sistency of apparently contradictory things said by Aristotle17 and by
Aquinas.18
This leads to Cajetan’s last piece of advice, which is meant to
conclude the discussion of how to interpret remarks about analogy,
and yet applies to the general difficulty of interpreting any remarks
involving the use of analogical terms. Cajetan commends us to in-
terpret individual claims with an eye to the context in which they
are made: “If someone does not wish to err, he ought habitually to
consider the occasion of the speech.”19 This is the warning mentioned
above in chapter 3, in response to those who feared that Cajetan’s se-
mantic analysis of analogy would necessarily ignore context and the
requirement of using judgment in applying and interpreting analogi-
cal terms. By now we can see that Cajetan’s advice to pay attention
to context is consistent with the whole of his teaching—that is, with
his semantic principles in general, and with his semantic analysis of
analogy in particular.

De Conceptu Entis

Although written eleven years later, Cajetan’s letter De Conceptu Entis

(On the Concept of Being) is usually reproduced with the treatise De
 Proportionality: Syllogism and Dialectic — 167

Nominum Analogia. This is appropriate, although not for the reasons

that many have assumed. The letter addresses certain questions about
the concept of being, and has contributed to the tendency of some
interpreters to insist that Cajetan’s teaching on analogy is the teach-
ing of a metaphysician, rather than a logician. However, as the title
rightly indicates, the letter treats not being, nor the analogy of being,
but the concept of being. And even if Cajetan had not said so explic-
itly, we would have known from the semantic principles laid out in
his Categories commentary that “it is the same to speak of the concept
of being as to speak of the signification of ‘being.’”20
The letter is appropriately paired with De Nominum Analogia,
then, not because it clarifies metaphysical issues (“the analogy of being”)
but because it clarifies semantic issues (“the analogy of ‘being’”). The
letter fits well with De Nominum Analogia because within the context
of the letter’s concern with a particular concept (being), it reiterates
several of the treatise’s doctrines about analogy in general. The letter
can also be understood as an application and illustration of the advice
Cajetan offered at the end of his treatise, about how to interpret dif-
ferent and apparently contradictory claims about analogy.
In the letter, Cajetan responds to two interpretive problems
raised by his fellow Dominican Francis of Ferrera. The first problem
is that Cajetan seems to contradict himself on the subject of whether
there are one or many mental concepts (formal concepts, as opposed
to objective concepts) of being. The second is that Cajetan’s claim that
a concept of being cannot be abstracted from individual beings seems
to contradict Aquinas’s claim that being is the most simple concept.
In both cases, Cajetan’s response reminds us that because analogy is a
mean between univocation and equivocation, learned men have said
and will say apparently contradictory things about it, claims that can
be reconciled when we remember the nature of analogy itself, and the
context in which claims about it are made.
So in response to the question of whether there are one or many
mental concepts of being, Cajetan first reminds Francis of transitivity
by likeness: “Whatever is the image of something which is similar to
another, is also the image of that other insofar as it is similar to the
first.”21 It follows that numerically one concept existing subjectively
in the mind represents what is one not numerically but analogically;22
168 — Cajetan’s Answer

so there is one mental concept in the mind,23 but this is not one perfect
and adequate concept. It is when speaking of perfect and adequate
mental concepts and what they represent that Cajetan says that in
analogy there cannot be numerically one.24
In response to the second question, Cajetan reiterates his point
from De Nominum Analogia that a perfect and adequate concept of a
common analogue cannot be abstracted from the diverse analogates.
This is because properly speaking abstraction implies the separation
of a distinct ratio common to those things from which it is abstracted.
Indeed, this is why there can be no perfect and adequate concept of
the common analogue. Nonetheless, there can be an imperfect con-
cept of the common analogue; it is possible to resolve a proper ratio
of an individual analogate into a “confused” concept that imperfectly
represents the diverse analogates.25 In the case of being, this means
that a concept can be resolved that is not the concept of one particu-
lar being, or even of one category of being, but of all being. Indeed,
anything, insofar as it is a being, can be resolved into this concept of
being, which is why being is said to be the first known, and the most
simple.26 So Cajetan can say that a perfect and adequate concept of
being cannot be abstracted, and yet being is a simple concept, the first
known, and into which all resolution is made.27
Insofar as Cajetan’s clarifications—especially the second—con-
cern the concept of being, they are, no doubt, important for the meta-
physician. Anyone looking for insight into Cajetan’s understanding
of metaphysics would do well to consider the discussion in De Con-
ceptu Entis, a discussion that supplements, for example, what Cajetan
says about the primacy and simplicity of the concept of being at the
beginning of his commentary on De Ente et Essentia. Yet Cajetan’s
discussion, compressed as it is,28 is primarily a clarification of the se-
mantic analysis given in De Nominum Analogia. To be sure, it in-
volves an application of that theory to the concept of being, but it is
nonetheless made up of essentially semantic clarifications, clarifica-
tions about the different senses of concepts, about which kinds can
be abstracted and how, about the nature of resolution, and, again,
about the care that must be taken in interpreting different remarks
about analogy.
 Proportionality: Syllogism and Dialectic — 169

— At this point, then, we can summarize Cajetan’s treatment

of analogy of proportionality. The initial chapters of De Nominum
Analogia describe, and then set aside, two descriptions of how a term
can signify rationes that are partly the same and partly different. Only
a third proposal, in which diverse rationes are proportionally one, can-
not be subsumed under the semantic rules that govern equivocals and
univocals, and so the balance of Cajetan’s treatise, the heart of Ca-
jetan’s theory of analogy, is an analysis of the semantic ramifications
of proportional unity at all semantic levels—simple apprehension,
judgment, and inference. From the beginning this requires Cajetan
to qualify the sense in which there is and is not one analogue, which
leads to his distinction between the “perfect” mental concept, which
adequately represents only one of the diverse, precise analogues, and
the “imperfect” mental concept, which somehow represents one com-
mon analogue, by representing the diverse analogues in their unity.
This naturally leads to a discussion of the special circumstances of
“abstraction” in the case of analogy. Properly speaking, there can be
no abstraction, insofar as this implies the isolation of a common and
univocal element. But there can be a kind of quasi abstraction, by
which the commonness of the analogates is considered without their
diversity. This involves a making indeterminate, or a “confusion,” of
their distinctness, leaving only attention to their (proportional) unity.
Moving from simple apprehension to judgment, Cajetan explains
that because there can be this kind of quasi abstraction of a common
analogue, so that it is apprehended by one imperfect concept, the
analogue can be predicated as a superior of inferiors. Here again, its
universality must not be conflated with univocity; for the foundation
of univocity is absolute sameness of rationes, while the foundation
of superiority is merely sameness of rationes, where this can include
even proportional sameness. If the analogue is to be defined, how-
ever, this proportional sameness will not enter into the definition of
the analogue. This is why Cajetan clarifies that a term analogous by
proportionality signifies not a relation, but the foundation of a re-
lation. In other words, because analogy of proportionality involves
diverse, proportionally similar relations (the relations between the
diverse analogues and their respective analogates), a term analogous
170 — Cajetan’s Answer

by proportionality signifies one of the relata (one of the analogues) of

one of the proportionally similar relations. But not all of the relata
of these relations, nor the relations themselves, are included in the
definition of the analogue; or, to put it another way, one of the pro-
portionally similar rationes is not defined in terms of another. In this
respect, analogy of proportionality differs from analogy of attribu-
tion, and from metaphor, in which the ratio of a secondary analogue
necessarily includes reference to a primary analogue.
Nonetheless, priority and posteriority are present in analogy of
proportionality, in two ways. First, there is the priority of the origi-
nal signification of a term subsequently extended analogically; this is
priority in the order of imposition. Second, there is the priority in the
order of the thing signified; for diverse, proportionally similar ana-
logues can have more or less excellence, and their respective analo-
gates can have priority or posteriority in the order of being. But the
fact that we can make such comparisons does not imply that there is
some univocal element in virtue of which they are compared, for the
foundation of comparison, like the foundation of superiority, is not
absolute sameness, but any sameness, which can include proportional
sameness.
Lastly, Cajetan describes the implications of proportional unity at
the level of inference, and it is here that he finally addresses the infa-
mous arguments of Scotus, that any nonunivocal term would cause a
fallacy of equivocation. In short, Scotus’s semantic objections ignored
the metaphysical classification of proportional unity, and failed to rec-
ognize that the kind of unity that is the foundation of contradiction,
like that which founds superiority and comparison, includes this pro-
portional unity. So rationes proportionally one are unified enough to
preserve the validity of inferences. An analogous term can be used in
different senses in different parts of the syllogism, and yet the com-
mon term does not disguise an equivocation, for the term signifies an
analogue proportionally one.
By ending with some general advice about employing analogi-
cal terms, and about how to make sense of the sometimes seemingly
contradictory claims others have made about the nature of analogy,
Cajetan reminds us that semantic analysis alone is not sufficient to
guarantee the right use and interpretation of analogical terms. We
 Proportionality: Syllogism and Dialectic — 171

might say that here is a recognition of the limits of semantic analysis,

and a clear acknowledgment of the role of judgment in analogy. But
for Cajetan, it is clear that properly exercising that judgment requires
us to keep in mind the semantic details of analogical terms, and espe-
cially to keep in mind the nature of proportional unity and its impli-
cations in all three parts of reasoning governed by logic.
Conclusion

Modern scholarly discussions of Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia have

focused on the question of Cajetan’s fidelity to Aquinas. But in seek-
ing an answer to that question, the scholarly debate lost sight of the
question or questions that motivated Cajetan to write De Nominum
Analogia, and so lost sight of the most appropriate perspective from
which to interpret, and then to evaluate, the intention and signifi-
cance of Cajetan’s analogy theory.
Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia offers a semantic analysis of
analogy—that is, an analysis of the semantic properties of terms that
exhibit associated meaning, considered as a mean between univoca-
tion and pure equivocation. Cajetan’s starting point was a tradition
that had described analogy as a kind of equivocation (aequivocatio a
consilio), involving diverse rationes that are similar “in some respect”
(secundum quid). Latent in the tradition, but brought out and made
inescapable by the objections of Scotus, were two difficulties. First,
how can the sameness secundum quid be further specified? And sec-
ond, how can any nonunivocal term, exhibiting not sameness sim-
pliciter but only sameness secundum quid, avoid causing the fallacy of
equivocation?
The two central doctrines of Cajetan’s teaching on analogy must
be understood as responses to these two questions. Cajetan’s threefold
division of “modes” of analogy is a description of three different ways
that rationes signified by a term can be somehow the same. And Ca-
jetan’s preference for analogy of proportionality is based on the con-
viction that, of the three modes, only this one is a true mean between
— 173
174 — Conclusion

univocation and equivocation, a nonunivocal term that is nonetheless

sufficiently unified to preserve the validity of inferences.
The centerpiece of Cajetan’s theory of analogy, then, is his ap-
peal to a special category of sameness or unity. By appealing to non-
generic likeness or proportional unity—analogia in the original Greek
sense—Cajetan only draws on another part of the same Aristotelian
philosophical tradition within which the semantic difficulties about
analogy had taken shape. Just in this respect it must be acknowledged
that proportional unity is a perfectly legitimate variety of unity secun-
dum quid. Moreover, proportional unity seems especially suited to an-
swer the question of how diverse rationes in an aequivocatio a consilio
could be unified enough to respond to the Scotistic objections against
the possibility of a true mean between univocation and equivocation.
In one sense, Cajetan’s theory is not a startling innovation. He
pursues, perhaps with greater rigor, the strategy already common in
the earlier commentary tradition on the Categories, of appealing to
proportionality as one of several relationships possible in deliberate
equivocation. The innovation is in seeing that this helps to answer
challenges to the Aristotelian framework that had not been pressed
before Scotus. Proportional unity, as opposed to the relational unity
of attribution, is sufficient to preserve the validity of inferences in
scientific reasoning, and for this reason analogy of proportionality is
the most proper form of analogy—the most genuine mean between
univocation and equivocation—and so superior to other kinds of pros
hen equivocation.
Cajetan’s appeal to proportional unity also has the advantage of
respecting and confirming the limits of semantic analysis. In light of
the present interpretation, we can understand why Cajetan is pre-
occupied with describing the unity of the analogical concept—a
preoccupation that heretofore has seemed inappropriate to many of
Cajetan’s interpreters—and at the same time we can appreciate that
by describing the unity of the analogical concept as proportional, Ca-
jetan refused to follow the Scotistic temptation to regard semantic
analysis as requiring a reduction to univocal concepts. Furthermore,
Cajetan’s analysis of what a proportionally unified concept entails for
the rest of logic confirms the importance of context, and the necessary
role of judgment, in the use and interpretation of analogical terms.
 Conclusion — 175

Cajetan, apparently unlike some of his contemporaries, does not hold

that words have fixed semantic properties independently of their role
in sentences; rather they must be understood and analyzed in light of
propositional and inferential context.
Undoubtedly the most difficult, and alien, aspects of Cajetan’s
semantic analysis of analogy are the discussions of the logical and
psychological implications of proportionally unified concepts—for
example, in the distinction between “perfect” and “imperfect” con-
cepts, and the distinction between proper abstraction and a kind of
abstraction by “confusion.” For many interpreters, these discussions
have seemed obscure and overly technical. And yet at the very least
we can now see the motivation behind them; they no longer need to
seem like unaccountable preoccupations, but can be understood as
necessary expansions of traditional logical and psychological frame-
works to accommodate the phenomenon of analogy.
Indeed, while the present study does not claim to be an exhaus-
tive exploration of Cajetan’s teaching on analogy, it does claim to set
out the terms within which further fruitful exploration must take
place. Most of the history of interpretations of Cajetan’s De Nominum
Analogia can be described, as in chapter 1, as representing a more-or-
less coherent “paradigm,” approaching De Nominum Analogia as if it
were an interpretation or systematization of Aquinas, or a generically
“Thomistic” exposition of analogy. Recent historical scholarship, and
reflection on the text of De Nominum Analogia itself, suggested the
exhaustion of that paradigm, and pointed to the emergence of a new
one, which approaches De Nominum Analogia as a text intending to
answer the particular and focused questions recapitulated here.
Of course, when an old paradigm gives way to a new one, it is be-
cause the new one accounts for all those things that the old paradigm
had tried to account for, and accounts for further things that the old
one could not account for. But an old paradigm also gives way to a
new one because that new one opens up space for new inquiry. The
new paradigm, which this study advocates and tries to embody, brings
with it its own new “puzzles.” Among these puzzles are some relat-
ing to the relevant psychology and epistemology of analogical concept
formation and reasoning. How can we better understand the nature
of an “imperfect” concept and its acquisition? How can we better
176 — Conclusion

understand the psychological process of abstraction-by-confusion?

Among other puzzles are those concerning the articulation, and even
formalization, of the semantics of analogy. Is Bochenski’s “isomor-
phy” an appropriate and useful translation of proportional unity?
Can it contribute to a rigorous formal analysis of analogy?
And of course there will be puzzles about how Cajetan’s teaching
on analogy applies to particular questions or theses, for instance about
the divine names, about being as the first object of knowledge, and
about the use of argument by analogy in the special sciences.
And finally, we may return to the question of how Cajetan’s theory
of analogy relates to the thought and writings of Aquinas. That ques-
tion is not fully addressed here, largely because in describing a new
interpretive paradigm it was necessary to set aside as ill-formed the
question of whether Cajetan’s theory was “an authentic interpretation
of Aquinas.” Only by setting that question aside could we try to make
sense of Cajetan’s theory on its own terms. But once introduced, the
new paradigm may return to the question of how Cajetan’s analysis
of analogy is related to Aquinas’s own teaching. It may even ask, in a
new way, to what extent Cajetan’s theory is “Thomistic.” We now see
that a responsible evaluation of the “Thomism” of Cajetan’s theory of
analogy must take into account the significant development, between
the times of Aquinas and Cajetan, in the terms of Thomistic logic and
psychology (the distinction between formal and objective concepts is
only the most rudimentary example of this). And as we have seen,
strictly speaking, Aquinas did not answer, and did not try to answer,
the specific semantic questions that De Nominum Analogia addresses.
But Aquinas did appreciate the importance of proportional unity, as a
special kind of unity, and one that was not the same as a determinate
relation of one to another. The question of the Thomism of Cajetan’s
theory will depend at least in part on whether we judge that Thomas
himself would have invoked proportional unity if he, like Cajetan,
had attempted to analyze the relationships that hold between the se-
mantic properties of analogical terms.
Notes

Preface

The epigraphs are from R. G. Collingwood, An Autobiography (Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 1939), 39, and H. G. Gadamer, Truth and Method, 2nd ed. (New
York: Crossroad, 1992), 429.

1. CPA 11: “Quot autem modis contingat variari analogiam et quomodo,

nunc quum summarie loquimur, silentio pertransibimus, specialem de hoc trac-
tatum, si Deo placuerit, cito confecturi.”
2. “Difficultates de analogia, quae satis metaphysicae sunt, ita copiose
et subtiliter a Caietano disputate sunt opusc. de Analogia nominum, ut nobis
locum non reliquerit quidquam aliud excogitandi.”Ars Logica, p. 2, q. 13, a. 2
(481b30–35).
3. A brief biography of Cajetan, with further references, is in James A.
Weisheipl, “Cajetan (Tommaso de Vio),” in New Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 2,
2nd ed., ed. Bernard L. Marthaler et al. (Detroit: Gale/Catholic University of
America Press, 2003), 852–55.

Introductio n

1. A recent suggestion of the ubiquity of metaphor in everyday discourse

is George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By (Chicago: Univer-
sity of Chicago Press, 1980). The authors apparently don’t realize that their the-
sis is not new, and could be attributed to Aristotle: see Mary Hesse, “Aristotle’s
Logic of Analogy,” Philosophical Quarterly 15 (1965): 328–40.
2. There is no comprehensive study of the history of analogy. One rea-
son is that there are diverse phenomena to be taken into account besides the
two highlighted here, such as the related but arguably distinct issue of analogy
as a form of reasoning or argument (cf. G. E. R. Lloyd, Polarity and Analogy:
Two Types of Argumentation in Early Greek Thought [Cambridge: Cambridge

— 177
178 — Notes to Pages 4–5

University Press, 1966] and Mary Hesse, Models and Analogy in Science [Notre
Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1966]). Second, a history would
have to cover the many logical, epistemological, and metaphysical issues that
arise in connection with analogy in different fields of thought, from the natural
sciences to politics and theology. (Consider how the issues raised in the works by
Lloyd and Hesse just referenced would differ from the relevant topics in works
on analogical reasoning in jurisprudence or political history, not to mention the
topics treated along with analogy in works on natural theology and divine nam-
ing). Moreover, the very approach to analogy itself varies according to the meth-
ods and conventions of the various disciplines that have taken an interest in it:
in addition to logic, metaphysics, and theology, there is linguistics, epistemology,
cognitive psychology, legal theory, social and political philosophy, philosophy of
science, etc. The history traced briefly here is that typically thought essential for
understanding scholastic considerations of analogy in logic, metaphysics, and
theology; a longer version of such a history (although with some important gaps,
e.g., Boethius) has recently been traced by Joël Lonfat, “Archéologie de la notion
d’analogie d’Aristote à saint Thomas d’Aquin,” Archives d’Histoire Doctrinale
et Littéraire du Moyen Age 71 (2004): 35–107. A more thorough history is in the
third volume of Jacobus M. Ramirez, De analogia, tom. 2 of his Opera omnia
(Madrid: Instituto de Filosofia “Luis Vives,” 1970).
3. The point is well established, but see G. L. Muskens, De vocis b"obmph j( b<
significatione ac usu apud Aristotelem (Groningen: Wolters, 1943) and Pierre
Aubenque, “Les origines de la doctrine de l’analogie de l’être: Sur l’histoire d’un
contresens,” Les Études Philosophiques 33 (1978): 3–12.
4. On nongeneric likeness in Aristotle, see M.-D. Philippe, “Analogon and
Analogia in the Philosophy of Aristotle,” The Thomist 33 (1969): 1–74. On associ-
ated meaning, see Christopher Shields, Order in Multiplicity: Homonymy in the
Philosophy of Aristotle (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).
5. C. Luna, “Paronymie, homonymie qspa < fA o et analogie: A propos d’un
article de J. Hirschberger,” app. 2 in Simplicius: Commentaire sur les Catégo-
ries, ed. Ilsetraut Hadot, Philosophia Antiqua 51, fasc. 3 (Leiden: Brill, 1990),
153–59.
6. For discussion see Joseph Owens, The Doctrine of Being in the Aristote-
lian “Metaphysics”: A Study in the Greek Background of Medieval Thought, 3rd ed.
(Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1978), 118–25.
7. On focal meaning, see G. E. L. Owen, “Logic and Metaphysics in Some
Early Works of Aristotle,” in Aristotle and Plato in Mid-Fourth Century, ed. Inge-
mar Düring and G. E. L. Owen (Göteborg: Studia Graeca et Latina Gothobur-
gensia, 1960), 163–90.
8. See Philippe, “Analogon and Analogia in the Philosophy of Aristotle,”
and Muskens, De vocis b"obmph j( b< significatione ac usu apud Aristotelem. Even
Leszl, who insisted on treating analogy as a function of terms (a “logical device”)
like focal meaning, conceded that “what Aristotle himself normally means by
b"obmph j( b is not the logical device itself, but only the proportion [of things] on
which it is based.” Walter Leszl, Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle: Aristotle’s
Treatment of Types of Equivocity and Its Relevance to His Metaphysical Theories
(Padua: Editrice Antenore, 1970), 126–27.
 Notes to Pages 5–9 — 179

9. Typically analogia was taken to describe quantities in a geometric har-

mony (e.g., 2:3::6:9), although it seems that even in a mathematical context
analogia was a somewhat flexible notion that could apply to other sorts of rela-
tionships, such as succession (2:3::8:9) or the relation of a number to its square
(2:4::8:64).
10. This extension of the technical mathematical term analogia to other
uses is itself a result of discerning nongeneric likeness: qualitative comparison
is somehow like quantitative comparison; strict analogia is to relationships of
numerical quantity as analogia more broadly speaking is to nonmathematical
relationships. So, as a word that gets extended to a new context, the case of
analogia in Greek is also an instance of a term becoming subject to diverse but
associated meanings. But with this observation we are getting somewhat ahead
of ourselves.
11. Simplicius, Ammonius, and Porphyry each take Aristotle’s discussion
of equivocation or homonymy as an occasion to distinguish between deliberate
and chance homonyms, and then further distinguish homonyms “according to
analogy” as a subdivision of deliberate homonyms. On Simplicius’s treatment
of analogy in the context of equivocation in Aristotle’s Categories, see Lonfat,
“Archéologie,” 63–68.
12. Boethius, In Categorias Aristotelis Libri Quatuor (PL, vol. 64), 166.
13. See the commentary in Jean-Yves Guillaumin’s edition and translation
of Boethius, Institution arithmétique (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1995), 215–16.
14. Given the schema X:Y::Y:Z, Y is the mean of an arithmetic proportion
if Y-X = Z-Y. Y is the mean of a geometric proportion if X/Y = Y/Z. Y is the
mean of a harmonic proportion if Z/X = (Z-Y)/(Y-X).
15. For instance, see Avicenna, Metaphysica, in Liber de Philosophia Prima
sive Scientia Divina, ed. S. Van Riet (Leiden: Brill, 1977, 1980), I.5, p. 40, and
V.5, p. 272. For secondary literature, in addition to some of the historical stud-
ies already mentioned, see the work of E. J. Ashworth, for instance: “Medieval
Theories of Analogy,” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N.
Zalta, Winter 1999 ed. (URL = http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win1999/
entries/analogy-medieval/); “Analogical Concepts: The Fourteenth-Century
Background to Cajetan,” Dialogue 31 (1992): 399–413, esp. 401; and “Analogy
and Equivocation in Thirteenth-Century Logic: Aquinas in Context,” Mediae-
val Studies 54 (1992): 94–135, esp. 102–3. On especially the Arabic influence, see
H. A. Wolfson, “The Amphibolous Terms in Aristotle, Arabic Philosophy, and
Maimonides,” Harvard Theological Review 31 (1938): 151–73. On the develop-
ment of analogy theories in the Middle Ages also see Lonfat, “Archéologie,”;
Alain de Libera, “Les sources gréco-arabes de la théorie médiévale de l’analogie
de l’être,” Les Études Philosophiques (1989): 319–45; and Jean-François Courtine,
Inventio analogiae: Métaphysique et ontothéologie (Paris: Vrin, 2005).
16. Compare the two articles by Philip L. Reynolds, “Bonaventure’s The-
ory of Resemblance,” Traditio 58 (2003): 219–55, and “Analogy of Names in
Bonaventure,” Mediaeval Studies 65 (2003): 117–62.
17. Two studies of analogy outside of the more common fields of logic,
metaphysics, and theology are Richard Padovan, Proportion: Science, Philoso-
phy, Architecture (London: Spon, 1999), and John E. Murdoch, “The Medieval
180 — Notes to Pages 9–18

Language of Proportions: Elements of the Interaction with Greek Foundations

and the Development of New Mathematical Techniques,” in Scientific Change:
Historical Studies in the Intellectual, Social and Technical Conditions for Scientific
Discovery and Technical Invention, from Antiquity to the Present, ed. A. C. Crom-
bie (New York: Basic Books, 1963), 237–71.
18. Anne Moyer, The Philosopher’s Game: Rithmomachia in Medieval and
Renaissance Europe (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2001).
19. One could cite numerous works on analogy in the theology of St.
Thomas, but two recent studies are Seung-Chan Park, Die Rezeption der mit-
telalterlichen Sprachphilosophie in der Theologie des Thomas von Aquin: Mit be-
sonderer Berücksichtigung der Analogie (Leiden: Brill, 1999), and Gregory Philip
Rocca, Speaking the Incomprehensible God: Thomas Aquinas on the Interplay of
Positive and Negative Theology (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of
America Press, 2004).
20. Compare for instance the logical emphasis in Ralph McInerny, Aquinas
and Analogy (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1996),
with the metaphysical emphasis in James F. Anderson, The Bond of Being: An
Essay on Analogy and Existence (St. Louis: Herder, 1949). A recent entry in this
ongoing debate is Laurence Dewan, “St. Thomas and Analogy: The Logician
and the Metaphysician,” in Laudemus viros gloriosos: Essays in Honor of Armand
Maurer, ed. R. E. Houser (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press,
2007), 132–45.
21. Cf. George P. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy: A Textual
Analysis and Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1960).

Chapter O ne

1. M. T.-L. Penido, Le rôle de l’analogie en théologie dogmatique (Paris: Li-

brairie Philosophique J. Vrin, 1931), 143n2: “En réalité Cajetan ne prétendait
aucunement innover, mais restituer la théorie aristotélico-thomiste. . . . Il ne veut
pas innover mais restaurer.”
2. Ibid., 35–36.
3. Aloys Goergen, Kardinal Cajetans Lehre von der Analogie; Ihr Verhältnis
zu Thomas von Aquin (Speyer a. Rh.: Pilger-Druckerei, 1938).
4. I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1: “aliquid dicitur secundum analogiam tripliciter: vel
secundum intentionem tantum, et non secundum esse. . . . Vel secundum esse et
non secundum intentionem. . . . Vel secundum intentionem et secundum esse.”
5. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, La synthèse Thomiste, nov. ed. (Paris:
Desclée de Brouwer and Cie., 1950), 144–55; Garrigou-Lagrange, The One God:
A Commentary on the First Part of St. Thomas’ Theological Summa, trans. Bede
Rose (St. Louis: Herder, 1943), 396–400; Garrigou-Lagrange, God: His Existence
and His Nature, 2 vols., trans. Bede Rose (St. Louis: Herder, 1934/1936), vol. 1,
214, 224–27; vol. 2, 203–21.
6. Jacques Maritain, Distinguish to Unite, or The Degrees of Knowledge,
trans. Gerald B. Phelan (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959), 418–21
 Notes to Pages 18–20 — 181

(“Appendix 2: Analogy”). (Maritain called De Nominum Analogia “authentically

Thomistic”; 420.)
7. Gerald B. Phelan, St. Thomas and Analogy (Milwaukee: Marquette
University Press, 1941).
8. Yves Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” in Philosopher at Work:
Essays by Yves R. Simon, ed. Anthony O. Simon (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and
Littlefield, 1999), 135–71 (reprinted from New Scholasticism 34 [1960]: 1–42).
But note that Burrell portrays Simon as departing from the Cajetanian tradi-
tion. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1973), 202–9; Burrell, “A Note on Analogy,” New Scholasticism 36 (1962):
225–32. The position of Simon and the interpretation of Burrell are considered
in chaps. 3 and 8 below.
9. James F. Anderson, The Bond of Being: An Essay on Analogy and Ex-
istence (St. Louis: Herder, 1949); Anderson, Reflections on the Analogy of Being
(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1967); Anderson, “Some Basic Propositions
Concerning Metaphysical Analogy” (with comments and responses), Review
of Metaphysics 5 (1952): 465–72; Anderson, “Mathematical and Metaphysical
Analogy in St. Thomas,” Thomist 3 (1941): 564–79; Anderson, “Bases of Meta-
physical Analogy,” Downside Review 66 (1948): 38–47.
10. Edward A. Bushinski and Henry J. Koren, trans., The Analogy of
Names and the Concept of Being, by Cajetan (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University
Press, 1953), ix, 7.
11. Jacobus M. Ramirez, “De analogia secundum doctrinam Aristotelico-
Thomisticam,” in Ciencia Tomista 24 (1921): 20–40, 195–214, 337–57; 25 (1922):
17–38.
12. Jacobus M. Ramirez, “En torno a un famoso texto de Santo Tomas
sobre analogia,” reprinted as an appendix to Ramirez, De analogia, in Ramirez,
Opera omnia, tom. 2 (Madrid: Instituto de Filosofia “Luis Vives,” 1970), vol. 4,
1811–50. (The article originally appeared in Sapientia 8 [1953]: 166–92.)
13. Ramirez, De analogia, 1400–17.
14. George P. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy: A Textual Analy-
sis and Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1960).
15. Bernard Montagnes, La doctrine de l’analogie de l’étre d’après
Saint Thomas d’Aquin (Louvain/Paris: Publications Universitaires/Béatrice-
Nauwelaerts, 1963). There is now an English edition, The Doctrine of the
Analogy of Being According to Thomas Aquinas, trans. E. M. Macierowski (Mil-
waukee: Marquette University Press, 2004).
16. P. Pedro Descoqs, Praelectiones Theologiae Naturalis, 2: 758ff. Descoqs,
Institutiones Metaphysicae Generalis, vol. 1, 262–71.
17. Hampus Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World: An Inves-
tigation of Its Background and Interpretation of Its Use by Thomas of Aquino (Upp-
sala: Almqvist and Wiksells Boktrycheri AB, 1952).
18. E. J. Ashworth, “Suárez on the Analogy of Being: Some Historical
Background,” Vivarium 33 (1995): 57; Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts: The
Fourteenth-Century Background to Cajetan,” Dialogue 31 (1992): 401; Ash-
worth, “Analogy and Equivocation in Thirteenth-Century Logic: Aquinas in
182 — Notes to Pages 20–21

Context,” Mediaeval Studies 54 (1992): 128; Ashworth, “Language, Renaissance

Philosophy of,” in Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. 5 (New York: Rout-
ledge, 1998), 411–15, §4.
19. Edward P. Mahoney, “Cajetan (Thomas De Vio),” in Routledge Ency-
clopedia of Philosophy, vol. 2 (New York: Routledge, 1997), 171–75, §2.
20. Jean-Luc Marion, Sur la théologie blanche de Descartes: Analogie, créa-
tion des vérités éternelles et fondement (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France,
1981), 88, 92.
21. Ralph J. Masiello, “The Analogy of Proportion According to the Meta-
physics of St. Thomas,” Modern Schoolman 35 (1958): 91–105.
22. Copleston denies that Aquinas “ever abandoned analogy of propor-
tionality”; Frederick C. Copleston, A History of Philosophy, vol. 2, Medieval, part
2, Albert the Great to Duns Scotus (Garden City, N.Y.: Image, 1962), 74. But Co-
pleston also says, “I venture to doubt whether [Cajetan’s teaching on analogy]
represents the view of St. Thomas”; A History of Philosophy, vol. 3, Late Medieval
and Renaissance Philosophy, part 2, “The Revival of Platonism to Suarez” (Gar-
den City, N.Y.: Image, 1963), 158.
23. Ramirez, “En torno a un famoso texto de Santo Tomas sobre analogia.”
Cf. Ramirez, De analogia, 1473, 1482–88.
24. Suarez, Disputationes metaphysicae, vol. 2 (Hildesheim: Georg Olms,
1965), disp. 28, sect. 3, nn. 14, 17; disp. 32, sect. 2, n. 14, pp. 17, 19, 323.
25. Descoqs, Institutiones metaphysicae generalis, vol. 1, 260–69; Descoqs,
Praelectiones theologiae naturalis, vol. 2, 765ff. On Descoqs’ “slightly modified
Suarezianism” see Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World, 238–40.
Descoqs discusses Suarez at Praelectiones theologiae naturalis 2: 768.
26. George P. Klubertanz, “Analogy,” in New Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 1
(New York: McGraw Hill, 1967), 462–63.
27. Ralph McInerny, The Logic of Analogy: An Interpretation of St. Thomas
(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1961); McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy (Wash-
ington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1996). McInerny’s criticism
of Cajetan is addressed below in chap. 6.
28. For references to Gilson and those who have followed him, see chap.
3 below where this criticism is addressed. For another discussion of this issue
see Gregory Philip Rocca, Speaking the Incomprehensible God: Thomas Aquinas
on the Interplay of Positive and Negative Theology (Washington, D.C.: Catholic
University of America Press, 2004), 154–95.
29. David Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1973). Cf. Burrell, “A Note on Analogy,” New Scholasticism
36 (1962): 225–32; Burrell, “Beyond the Theory of Analogy,” Proceedings of the
American Catholic Philosophical Association 46 (1972): 114–21.
30. Battista Mondin, The Principle of Analogy in Protestant and Catholic
Theology, 2nd ed. (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1968), 36.
31. Ibid., 40.
32. Ibid., 42.
33. Ibid.
 Notes to Pages 21–23 — 183

34. Montagnes, La doctrine de l’analogie de l’étre d’après Saint Thomas

d’Aquin, 126: “La doctrine de Cajetan sur l’analogie est-elle conforme à celle de
S. Thomas?”
35. Ibid., 126–27.
36. John F. Wippel, The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas: From Fi-
nite Being to Uncreated Being (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of Amer-
ica Press, 2000), 73n30; 90n87.
37. Leo O’Donovan, “Methodology in Some Recent Studies of Analogy,”
Philosophical Studies (Dublin) 16 (1967): 78. Cf. Michael McCanles, “Univocal-
ism in Cajetan’s Doctrine of Analogy,” New Scholasticism 42 (1968): 18–47.
38. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language, 122.
39. Paul G. Kuntz, “The Analogy of Degrees of Being: A Critique of Ca-
jetan’s Analogy of Names,” New Scholasticism 61 (1982): 72.
40. Jean-Luc Marion, God Without Being: Hors-Text, trans. Thomas A.
Carlson (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 81.
41. Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World, 205; Edward A.
Bushinski, “Introduction” to The Analogy of Names and the Concept of Being,
by Thomas de Vio Cardinal Cajetan, trans. Edward A. Bushinski and Henry J.
Koren (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1953), ix, 5; Edward Mahoney,
“Cajetan,” in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. 2, 171; Mondin, The
Principle of Analogy in Protestant and Catholic Theology, 36–42; Burrell, Anal-
ogy and Philosophical Language, 11; Robert E. Meagher, “Thomas Aquinas and
Analogy: A Textual Analysis,” The Thomist 34 (1970): 231, 237; James F. Ross,
“Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language,” in Aquinas: A Collec-
tion of Critical Essays, ed. Anthony Kenny (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books,
1969), 93 (this essay also appears in International Philosophical Quarterly 1 [1961]:
468–502, and in Inquiries into Medieval Philosophy: A Collection in Honor of
Francis P. Clarke, ed. James F. Ross [Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1971], 35–74);
Jean-François Courtine, Inventio analogiae: Métaphysique et ontothéologie (Paris:
Vrin, 2005), 163, 339. But cf. Ralph McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 24: “It is
not at all clear that Cajetan in his opusculum intends to give an account of St.
Thomas’s teachings on analogous naming . . .”
42. Frank R. Harrison, “The Cajetan Tradition of Analogy,” Franciscan
Studies 23 (1963): 180; Ralph J. Masiello, “The Analogy of Proportion Accord-
ing to the Metaphysics of St. Thomas,” Modern Schoolman 35 (1958): 92; Michael
McCanles, “Univocalism in Cajetan’s Doctrine of Analogy,” New Scholasticism
42 (1968): 18.
43. A typical presentation is Mondin, The Principle of Analogy in Protestant
and Catholic Theology, 35–40.
44. As already noted, Penido and Goergen invoke this claim in defense
of Cajetan’s fidelity to Aquinas. The claim that Cajetan’s classification is based
on the Sentences passage is made in: Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the
World, 205; Harrison, “The Cajetan Tradition of Analogy,” 182; Ralph J. Ma-
siello, “The Analogy of Proportion,” 93, 105; McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy,
5, 11, 12, 17; McInerny, The Logic of Analogy, 2–4, 22, 80; Robert E. Meagher,
184 — Notes to Pages 23–25

“Thomas Aquinas and Analogy,” 231; George P. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aqui-
nas on Analogy: A Textual Analysis and Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola Uni-
versity Press, 1960), 7; Kevin Flannery, S.J., review of McInerny, Aquinas and
Analogy, in Fellowship of Catholic Scholars Quarterly 20 (1997): 34; Rocca, Speak-
ing the Incomprehensible God, 113; Mondin, The Principle of Analogy in Protestant
and Catholic Theology, 42; Seung-Chan Park, Die Rezeption der mittelalterlichen
Sprachphilosophie in der Theologie des Thomas von Aquin: Mit besonderer Berück-
sichtigung der Analogie (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 358, 404. The passage from Aquinas
“inspired” Cajetan’s division, according to Montagnes, La doctrine de l’analogie,
136, and Henry Chavannes, The Analogy Between God and the World in Saint
Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, trans. William Lumley (New York: Vantage
Press, 1992), 52. Ian Wilks, “Aquinas on Analogy: The Distinction of Many-
to-One and One-to-Another,” Modern Schoolman 75 (1997): 40n12, says that
Aquinas’s text “gives rise to the Cajetanian classification in the first place.” And
Cajetan “follows” Aquinas’s division, according to Vernon J. Bourke, “Cajetan,
Cardinal,” in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. 2, ed. Paul Edwards (New
York: Macmillan, 1967), 5.
45. Penido and Goergen both invoke this in defense of Cajetan’s theory,
and the claim is also maintained by the now classic critics of Cajetan (Kluber-
tanz, Montagnes, and Lyttkens) who have been followed since by McInerny,
Wippel, and many others. To cite some recent works, see Courtine, Inventio
analogiae, 339n3 (“C’est sur ce passage du corpus thomasien que se fonde toute
la doctrine de Cajétan”), and Park, Die Rezeption, 396–97, 404.
46. On intrinsic and extrinsic denomination, see chap. 5 below; on their
role in Cajetan’s theory of analogy, see chaps. 6 and 7.
47. Park, Die Rezeption, 452.
48. E.g., Anderson, who takes himself to be following Cajetan, empha-
sizes the metaphysical dimension of analogy. See Anderson, The Bond of Being.
Marion is typical of critics of Cajetan who say that Cajetan preferred analogy
of proportionality because it involves intrinsic denomination. Marion, Sur la
théologie blanche de Descartes, 93. On the priority of proportionality, see chap. 7
below.
49. Meagher, “Thomas Aquinas and Analogy: A Textual Analysis,” 240.
50. Cajetan’s discussion of analogy in CDEE is taken up again in chap. 6
below.
51. Both Capreolus and Soncinas cited I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1 in connection with
their proposed threefold divisions of analogy. Michael Tavuzzi, “Some Renais-
sance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” Angelicum 70 (1993): 100–102. Fifteenth-
century Thomists apparently found the passage compatible with a threefold
division of analogy made by a late thirteenth-century anonymous commenta-
tor on the Sophistici Elenchi. See Ashworth, “Suárez on the Analogy of Being,”
59–61. Ashworth concludes that “neither Cajetan’s use of Aquinas’s Sentences
commentary nor his threefold division of analogy were novel” (61). Chap. 2 will
further pursue the historical background to Cajetan’s division; more will be said
about the philosophical, as opposed to textual, basis of Cajetan’s threefold divi-
sion in chap. 6.
 Notes to Pages 26–30 — 185

52. Philip L. Reynolds’s study of Bonaventure leads him to conclude that

with respect to the priority of proportionality, we “should construe Cajetan’s
position rather as one of several traditional options than as a misreading of
Thomas.” Philip L. Reynolds, “Analogy of Names in Bonaventure,” Medieval
Studies 65 (2003): 161–62.
53. This criticism is addressed in chaps. 3 and 5, below.
54. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 21, 30, 36, 46.
55. Anderson, The Bond of Being.
56. DNA §1.
57. However, I will argue in chaps. 5 and 6 below that even this is still a
properly semantic and not strictly metaphysical consideration.
58. E.g., Maritain, The Degrees of Knowledge, 418; Anderson, “Bases of
Metaphysical Analogy,” and “Some Basic Propositions Concerning Metaphysi-
cal Analogy.”
59. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts: The Fourteenth-Century Back-
ground to Cajetan,” 409.
60. Ibid., 399.
61. Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation in Thirteenth-Century Logic:
Aquinas in Context,” 94. Cf. Ashworth, “Equivocation and Analogy and Four-
teenth Century Logic: Ockham, Burley, and Buridan,” in Historia Philosophiae
Medii Aevi: Studien zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, vol. 1, ed.
Burkhard Mojsisch and Olaf Pluta (Amsterdam: Gruner, 1991), 24. Ashworth
also considers views of Dominic of Flanders, Capreolus, and Soncinas in “Suárez
on the Analogy of Being,” 68–72.
62. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts, 402.
63. Ibid., 402–3.
64. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 93.
65. Tavuzzi defines the period as extending from 1444 to 1545—i.e., from
the death of Capreolus to the opening of the Council of Trent. Tavuzzi, “Her-
vaeus Natalis and the Philosophical Logic of the Thomism of the Renaissance,”
Doctor Communis 45 (1992): 132.
66. Franco Riva, Tommaso Claxton e l’analogia della proporzionalità (Milan:
Vita e Pensiero, 1989).
67. Montagnes suggests that Thomas Sutton and Thomas Claxton are
“precursors” of Cajetan, especially that Cajetan “developed” Claxton’s correl-
lation of attribution with extrinsicality, and proportionality with intrinsicality.
Montagnes, La doctrine de l’analogie, 124, 125n33.
68. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 94.
69. Michael Tavuzzi, “Hervaeus Natalis and the Philosophical Logic of
the Thomism of the Renaissance,” Doctor Communis 45 (1992): 133–34.
70. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 94.
71. Ibid. Tavuzzi cites Luciano Gargan, Lo studio teologico e la biblioteca
dei Domenicani a Padova nel tre e Quattrocento (Padua: Editrice Antenore, 1971),
150–51.
72. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 99. Dom-
inic studied under John Versorius (d. 1485), who himself discussed analogy in a
186 — Notes to Pages 30–33

work published in Cologne in 1494 (96n11). Tavuzzi notes that Dominic died in
1479 and so, contrary to the speculations of Marega (CPI xv) and Pinchard (Mé-
taphysique et semantique [Paris: Vrin, 1987], 30, 96n11), could not have been one
of Cajetan’s teachers. However, according to Tavuzzi it is likely that Dominic
would have taught Soncinas. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of
Analogy,” 97.
73. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 100–102.
Tavuzzi suggests that Soncinas was following Capreolus in his use of I Sent.
19.5.2 ad 1.
74. Franco Riva, Analogia e univocità in Tommaso de Vio “Gaetano” (Milan:
Vita e Pensiero, 1995). See also Riva, L’analogia metaforica: Una questione logico-
metafisica nel tomismo (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1989); Riva, Tommaso Claxton e
l’analogia della proporzionalità (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1989); Riva, “L’analogia
dell’ente in Dominico di Fiandra,” Rivista di Filosofia Neo-scolastica 86 (1994):
287–322; and Riva, “Il Gaetano e l’ente come «primum cognitum»,” Rivista di
Filosofia Neo-scolastica 85 (1993): 3–20.
75. With my overview of Cajetan’s interpreters, compare the more de-
tailed, but also schematic and essentially compatible, overviews in Riva, Analo-
gia e univocità in Tommaso de Vio “Gaetano,” 3–17 and 343–49.
76. I will explore further what Riva describes as the polemic context of
DNA in chap. 2, below.
77. Ashworth, “Suárez on the Analogy of Being: Some Historical
Background.”
78. Duns Scotus, Librum Praedicamentorum Quaestiones, in Opera omnia,
vol. 1 (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1968; reprint of Lyon, 1639), 129b–130b.
79. Ashworth, “Suarez,” 75, concludes by considering whether Cajetan or
Suarez is “the correct interpreter of Aquinas.”
80. This is not a criticism of Riva. To the contrary, Riva’s scholarship pro-
vides much more historical detail than the present study, and the claims that
will be offered here about how to interpret De Nominum Analogia could be vin-
dicated only by the kind of thorough and nuanced research presented in Riva’s
Analogia e univocità in Tommaso de Vio “Gaetano.” Yet as a history, Riva’s book
is more concerned with reading Cajetan in the context of his immediate con-
temporaries and less concerned with isolating Cajetan’s distinctive theoretical
concern.

C hapter Two

1. The list of expected elements in a scholastic prologue is not fixed; this

one is taken from A. J. Minnis, Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary
Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages (London: Scholar Press, 1984), 19. Compare,
for instance, Cajetan’s own prologue to CPA, which, following the advice of
Averroës’ Physics commentary, lists “intention, utility, order [i.e., place among
other works in the same subject; alternatively, the end or purpose the work is
“ordered” to], division [i.e., order of parts], proportion [i.e., the relation to other
 Notes to Pages 34–37 — 187

works and subjects], way of teaching [i.e., method of proceeding], name of the
book, and subject of the author” (CPA 1). Other scholastic lists include such ele-
ments as the purpose or end (causa operis, finis, or causa finalis).
2. CPA 5: “si quaeratur, de vocibus an de rebus principaliter hic tracte-
tur, respondendum est quod de rebus non absolute sed incomplexe conceptis et
consequenti necessitate significatis.” While this may sound like a reversal of the
Porphyrian/Boethian tradition, which held that the Categories is about “words
insofar as they signify things,” Cajetan argues that his position is in fact the
same. CPA 4–5: “Idem enim est tractare de rebus ut conceptis simplici appre-
hensione, et de vocibus ut significant illas sic conceptas, quoniam quicquid attri-
buitur uni, attribuitur reliquo, servata tamen proportione, quia res sic conceptae
et significatae attribuitur ut rei, voci vero ut signo.” For a more extended discus-
sion of this argument, see Joshua P. Hochschild, “Words, Concepts and Things:
Cajetan on the Subject of the Categories,” Dionysius 19 (2001): 159–66.
3. DNA §31. Cf. CPA 10–11, 13, and CDEE §21.
4. Aristotle himself apparently had a somewhat different equivocation
in mind: the Greek word zôon could mean both animal and picture. But the
commentary tradition soon mistook the intended sense, and even sometimes
replaced the example, taking anthropôs as equivocal between a picture of a
man and an actual man. The misunderstanding (finding an analogy or pros hen
equivocation where Aristotle probably intended only pure equivocation) does
not make it any less appropriate that analogical usage be addressed in the context
of Aristotle’s discussion of univocation and equivocation. In the medieval Latin
tradition the notion of analogy as a mean between univocation and equivocation
can be traced to Porphyry (transmitted by Boethius, In Categorias Aristotelis), to
Pseudo-Augustine (Categoriae Decem), and to Simplicius’s commentary on the
Categories (in the translation of William of Moerbeke).
5. CPA 11: “Quot autem modis contingat variari analogiam et quomodo,
nunc quum summarie loquimur, silentio pertransibimus, specialem de hoc trac-
tatum, si Deo placuerit, cito confecturi.”
6. On translating “ratio” as “concept,” see chap. 5.
7. CPA 8.
8. CPA 11.
9. Indeed, it is the precision of Cajetan’s parallel definitions that allowed
Bochenski to apply the tools of twentieth-century formal mathematical logic to
articulate Thomistic notions of analogy. I. M. Bochenski, “On Analogy,” The
Thomist (1948): 425–77. Bochenski’s paper was reprinted with corrections in
Logico-Philosophical Studies, ed. Albert Menne (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1962), and
in Inquiries into Medieval Philosophy: A Collection in Honor of Francis P. Clarke,
ed. James F. Ross (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1971), 99–122.
10. “Pour mieux situer le lecteur, si besoin est, rappelons que le présent
Traité est un traité de Logique.” Hyacinthe-Marie Robillard, De l’analogie et du
concept d’être de Thomas de Vio, Cajetan: Traduction, commentaires et index (Mon-
treal: Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1963), 218.
11. Robert Meagher, “Thomas Aquinas and Analogy: A Textual Analy-
sis,” The Thomist 34 (April 1970): 240, 241.
188 — Notes to Pages 37–39

12. Meagher cites pages 35, 91, 93, and 98 of Ralph McInerny, The Logic
of Analogy (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1961). The views articulated there
appeared subsequently as well in McInerny, Studies in Analogy (The Hague:
Martinus Nijhoff, 1968), 105–6, 108; McInerny, “The Analogy of Names Is a
Logical Doctrine,” in Being and Predication: Thomistic Interpretations (Wash-
ington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1986); McInerny, “Saint
Thomas on De hebdomadibus,” in Being and Goodness: The Concept of the Good
in Metaphysics and Philosophical Theology, ed. Scott MacDonald (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1991), 90; McInerny, Boethius and Aquinas (Washington, D.C.:
Catholic University of America Press, 1990), 238; McInerny, Aquinas and Anal-
ogy (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1996), 11.
13. Against the exaggerated claims of Robert Meagher, see for instance
McInerny, The Logic of Analogy, 34, 75. McInerny’s criticism of Cajetan will be
addressed in chap. 6.
14. Edward A. Bushinski and Henry J. Koren, The Analogy of Names and
the Concept of Being (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1953), 6.
15. Not surprisingly, other commentators have described Cajetan’s con-
cern in De Nominum Analogia as semantic. James F. Ross, “Analogy as a Rule
of Meaning for Religious Language,” in Inquiries into Medieval Philosophy, 36,
says “‘being analogous’ will signify a semantical property of a term in several of
its instances.” David Burrell, in “Religious Language and the Logic of Anal-
ogy: Apropos of McInerny’s Book and Ross’ Review,” International Philosophical
Quarterly 2 (1962): 643, in a note to the claim that analogy is a “logical doctrine,”
says: “‘Logical’ is used here in the comprehensive scholastic sense of the science
of the argumentation whereby one proceeds from what is known to what is
unknown. . . . As such it includes the study of words and their meanings as pre-
liminaries to reasoning, as well as formal deductive procedures. We should say
rather: ‘analogy is a semantic doctrine.’” See also Bruno Pinchard, L’Analogie des
Noms, in Metaphysique et semantique: La signification analogiques des termes dans
les Principes Metaphysiques (Paris: Vrin, 1987), although Pinchard’s approach to
“semantics” is itself idiosyncratic. For the point that medieval logic in general
is closer to what we today call semantics than to the mathematical formalism
often associated with modern logic, cf., e.g., E. J. Ashworth, “Logic, Medieval,”
in Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (New York: Routledge, 1998), §4: “The
purpose of logic had nothing to do with the setting up of formal systems or
the metalogical analysis of formal structures. Instead, it had a straightforwardly
cognitive orientation.” Cf. also Ernest A. Moody, “The Medieval Contribution
to Logic,” Studies in Medieval Philosophy, Science, and Logic: Collected Papers,
1933–1969 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975), 387–90: “The histori-
cal significance of medieval logic seems to lie in the part it played in disclosing
the insecure semantical presuppositions of the Aristotelian logic of terms. . . .
What medieval logic has to contribute, to the further development and enrich-
ment of modern logic, is [a] semantical bridge between the abstract, axiomati-
cally derived, formal system of modern mathematical logic, and the concrete,
empirically oriented forms in which natural languages exhibit the rational
structure of experience on its phenomenological level.”
 Notes to Pages 39–42 — 189

16. CDEE §21: “Univocata sunt, quorum nomen est commune, et ratio
secundum illud nomen est eadem simpliciter. Pura aequivocata sunt, quorum
nomen est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen est diversa simpliciter.
Analogata sunt quorum nomen est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen
est aliquo modo eadem, et aliquo modo diversa seu secundum quid eadem, et
secundum quid diversa. . . . Unde analogum est medium inter purum aequivo-
cum et univocum, sicut inter idem simpliciter et diversum simpliciter cadit me-
dium idem secundum quid et diversum secundum quid.” It is worth remarking
that, although he has replaced Aristotle’s “dicuntur” with “sunt” in rephrasing
the definitions of univocals and equivocals, Cajetan should not thereby be as-
sumed to have ignored or failed to appreciate the import of Aristotle’s wording.
Cf. CPA 9: “Signantur quoque dixit «dicuntur» et non dixit «sunt», quia rebus
non convenit aequivocari ut sunt in rerum natura, sed ut sunt in vocibus nostris.
Aequivocari enim praesupponit vocari, quod rebus ex nobis accidit.”
17. E. J. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts: The Fourteenth-Century Back-
ground to Cajetan,” Dialogue 31 (1992): 403.
18. Boethius, In Categorias Aristotelis, lib. I (PL, vol. 64, 166b–c); Pseudo-
Augustine, Categoriae Decem, §17 (PL, vol. 32, 1421–22).
19. I. M. Bochenski, “On Analogy,” The Thomist (1948): §16.
20. See chap. 4 for a discussion of what Aquinas has to offer on this
matter.
21. The influence of Scotus’s arguments on the development of Thomistic
theories of analogy, including Cajetan’s, has been widely noted. See, e.g., Ber-
nard Montagnes, La doctrine de l’analogie de l’être d’après Saint Thomas d’Aquin
(Louvain/Paris: Publications Universitaires/Béatrice-Nauwelaerts, 1963), 125,
154; Jean-Luc Marion, Sur la théologie blanche de Descartes: Analogie, création
des vérités éternelles et fondement (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1981),
79ff.; Joseph J. Przezdziecki, “Thomas of Sutton’s Critique of the Doctrine of
Univocity,” in An Etienne Gilson Tribute, ed. Charles J. O’Neil (Milwaukee: Mar-
quette University Press, 1959), 189; Patrick J. Sherry, “Analogy Today,” Philoso-
phy 51 (1976): 443; E. J. Ashworth, “Equivocation and Analogy in Fourteenth
Century Logic: Ockham, Burley and Buridan,” in Historia Philosophiae Medii
Aevi: Studien zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, vol. 1, ed. Burkhard
Mojsisch and Olaf Pluta (Amsterdam: Gruner, 1991), 25; Aloys Goergen, Kardi-
nal Cajetans Lehre von der Analogie; Ihr Verhältnis zu Thomas von Aquin (Speyer
a. Rh.: Pilger-Druckerei, 1938), 31–32; Michael Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance
Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” Angelicum 70 (1993): 93–94; Ashworth, “Anal-
ogy and Equivocation,” 121. The influence on Cajetan of some particular fol-
lowers of Scotus is considered by Franco Riva, Analogia e univocità in Tommaso
de Vio “Gaetano” (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1995), 25–36, 89; see also Ashworth,
“Analogical Concepts,” 401, and Ashworth, “Medieval Theories of Analogy,” in
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta (Winter 1999 ed.), URL
= http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win1999/entries/analogy=medieval/, §7.
22. Accordingly most other attempts to give historical context to Cajetan’s
treatise emphasize the controversy over the concept of being. Cf., e.g., Mon-
tagnes, La doctrine de l’analogie de l’être d’après Saint Thomas d’Aquin, 150ff.
190 — Notes to Pages 42–44

23. Robert Prentice, “Univocity and Analogy According to Scotus’s Super

Libros Elenchorum Aristotelis,” Archives d’Histoire Doctrinale et Littéraire du
Moyen Age 35 (1968): 42–47.
24. Duns Scotus, Commentaria Oxoniensia, I, d. 3, qq. 1 & 2, a. 4, ¶346,
ed. Marianus Fernandez Garcia (Florence: Collegii S. Bonaventurae, 1912), 309:
“conceptum univocum dico qui ita est unus, quod eius unitas sufficit ad con-
tradictionem affirmando et negando ipsum de eodem: sufficit etiam pro medio
syllogistico, ut extrema unita in medio sic uno sine fallacia aequivocationis con-
cludantur inter se uniri.”
25. As Franco Riva has noted, Trombetta’s Scotistic defense of univocity
rests in part on the denial that a nonunivocal concept can be the subject of a
science. Franco Riva, Analogia e univocità in Tommaso de Vio “Gaetano,” 32: “La
difesa dell’univocità da parte di Antonio Trombetta si lascia cogliere secondo . . .
la negazione che un concetto non univoco possa essere soggetto di scienza.”
26. Duns Scotus, In Librum Praedicamentorum Quaestiones, q. 1: “ubi est
idem conceptus, ibi est univocatio.” Cf. In Libros Elenchorum Quaestiones, 2
(Paris: Vives, 1891), 20a–25a. For more references and discussion see Prentice,
“Univocity and Analogy According to Scotus’s Super Libros Elenchorum Aristo-
telis,” 39–64.
27. Ashworth, “Equivocation and Analogy in Fourteenth Century Logic,”
25. Cf. Burrell, “A Note on Analogy,” 226: “Any concept, in so far as it is one
concept, is univocal.”
28. Ross, Portraying Analogy.
29. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language.
30. Actually, as suggested in the previous chapter, the polemic context is
more complicated. As Riva has shown, Cajetan is responding not only to Scotus
but to other Thomists. But Cajetan (implicitly) criticizes the alternative “attri-
butionistic” Thomistic school because he finds the analogy of attribution insuf-
ficient to satisfy Scotus’s semantic challenge.
31. For citations and excerpts of texts, see Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance
Thomist Divisions of Analogy.” Tavuzzi also cites Soncinas, Super artem vet-
erem (f. 19 r–v), published in 1499—the year after Cajetan’s De Nominum Ana-
logia—which explictly addresses the fallacy of equivocation. On Dominic, see
Franco Riva, “L’analogia dell’ente in Dominico di Fiandra,” Rivista di Filosofia
Neo-scolastica 86 (1994): 287–322, and Riva, Analogia e univocità in Tommaso de
Vio “Gaetano,” 140–46, 154–59, 344.
32. Thomas Sutton, Quaestiones ordinariae, q. 33 (5th objection and reply),
ed. Johannes Schneider (Munich: Verlag der Bayerischen Akademie der Wis-
senschaften, 1977), 911, 929.
33. CDEE §21: “quod cum talis unitas apud Aristotelem (IV Metaph. [6],
text. com. II) sufficiat ad objectum scientiae, ens non oportet poni univocum
ad hoc quod passiones habeat et contradictionem fundet, et reliqua hujusmodi
habeant sibi convenientia.”
34. Cajetan’s remarks on analogy in CDEE are discussed at greater length
in chap. 6.
35. Cf. DNA chap. 10, esp. §§104, 106, 113. Bochenski noticed the impor-
tance of this issue in De Nominum Analogia and in considerations of analogy
 Notes to Pages 45–48 — 191

generally, and concluded his application of modern methods of formal analy-

sis to the issue of analogy by evaluating different conceptions of analogy on
the basis of whether they allow for the validity of syllogisms with analogical
middle terms. Bochenski, “On Analogy,” §§12, 14–19. Among those others who
have noted that Cajetan was interested in avoiding the fallacy of equivocation
are Frederick C. Copleston, A History of Philosophy, vol. 3, part 2 (Garden City,
N.Y.: Image Books, 1963), 158, and James F. Anderson, The Bond of Being: An
Essay on Analogy and Existence (St. Louis: Herder, 1949), 260.
36. Patrick J. Sherry seems to have missed the connection between the mo-
tivation to respond to Scotistic arguments and the necessity of characterizing the
unity of the analogical concept. After noting, in more detail than most scholars,
that Cajetan specifically wanted to respond to Scotus’s argument that nonuni-
vocal concepts cause the fallacy of equivocation, Sherry immediately says that
Cajetan’s “promising logical approach is marred by Cajetan’s ‘ideational’ theory
of meaning, which leads him to devote a disproportionate amount of time to
explaining how there can be a single analogical concept.” Sherry, “Analogy
Today,” 443.
37. Robillard is sensitive to the semantic concerns of De Nominum Ana-
logia, noting that the text is organized to treat analogy with respect to all three
parts of medieval logic: simple apprehension (DNA chaps. 3–5), judgment
(chaps. 6–9), and reasoning (chap. 10). Robillard, De l’analogie et du concept
d’être de Thomas de Vio, Cajetan, 253. Among the few others who have already
read Cajetan in light of the explicit semantic concerns described here are Bo-
chenski (“On Analogy”) and Ross (“Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious
Language”). However, Bochenski’s article “On Analogy” did not so much argue
for a particular interpretation of Cajetan as formalize some of Cajetan’s conclu-
sions. Furthermore, though the article has been reprinted a few times, it remains
somewhat inaccessible: a compressed style, obscure symbolic language, and ap-
parently parochial Thomistic interests have reduced the exposure of Bochenski’s
important analysis. Ross’s article also formalizes a Cajetanian theory of analogy,
with results similar to Bochenski, but he frames it as a particular issue regarding
religious language; and Ross’s later criticisms of the Cajetanian tradition have
undoubtedly diminished the authority of what he accomplished in this article.
In any case, in neither article would it be apparent to the average reader that
what is being offered is a particular interpretation of Cajetan’s theory of analogy,
viz., as a theory addressing the semantic puzzles described above.

Chapter Th ree

1. E. J. Ashworth, “Equivocation and Analogy in Fourteenth Century

Logic: Ockham, Burley and Buridan,” Historia Philosophiae Medii Aevi: Stu-
dien zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, vol. 1, ed. Burkhard Mojsisch
and Olaf Pluta (Amsterdam: Gruner, 1991), 28. Ashworth makes similar ob-
servations in Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying in Thirteenth-
Century Logic: A Preface to Aquinas on Analogy,” Medieval Philosophy and
Theology 1 (1991): 45–46; Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation in Thirteenth-
192 — Notes to Pages 49–53

Century Logic: Aquinas in Context,” Mediaeval Studies 54 (1992): 107; and Ash-
worth, “Language, Renaissance Philosophy of,” in The Routledge Encyclopedia
of Philosophy, in which she writes that in the period she considers “there was
little discussion in logic texts of how words relate to each other in propositional
contexts” (411).
2. Ashworth, “Equivocation and Analogy in Fourteenth Century Logic,”
42–43.
3. Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying in Thirteenth-
Century Logic,” 67.
4. E. J. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts: The Fourteenth-Century Back-
ground to Cajetan,” Dialogue 31 (1992): 400.
5. E. J. Ashworth, “Analogy, Univocation, and Equivocation in Some
Early Fourteenth-Century Authors,” in Aristotle in Britain During the Middle
Ages, ed. John Marenbon (Turnhout: Brepols, 1996), 246–47.
6. James F. Ross, Portraying Analogy (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1981).
7. Ibid., ix.
8. Ibid.
9. Josef Stern makes similar observations on the limitations of Ross’s book
in his review in Journal of Philosophy 84 (1987): 392–97.
10. Armand Maurer, “St. Thomas and the Analogy of Genus,” New Scho-
lasticism 29 (April 1955): 143. Maurer’s claims are considered in Michael P. Slat-
tery, “Concerning Two Recent Studies in Analogy,” New Scholasticism 31 (1957):
237–46.
11. Armand Maurer, Medieval Philosophy, 2nd ed. (Toronto: Pontifical In-
stitute of Medieval Studies, 1982), 351.
12. Patrick J. Sherry, “Analogy Today,” Philosophy 51 (1976): 443.
13. Étienne Gilson, Jean Duns Scot: Introduction à ses positions fondamen-
tales (Paris: Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin, 1952), 101–2: “La doctrine thomiste
de l’analogie est avant tout une doctrine du jugement d’analogie. C’est en effet
grâce au jugement de proportion que, sans en altérer la nature, on peut faire
du concept un usage tantôt équivoque, tantôt analogique, tantôt univoque. . . .
L’analogie à laquelle pense Duns Scot est beaucoup plutôt une analogie du con-
cept. Or, sur le plan du concept et de la représentation, l’analogie se confond
pratiquement avec la ressemblance. Il ne s’agit plus alors de savoir si deux terms
jouent un rôle analogue dans un jugement de proportion, mais si le concept dé-
signé par un terme est ou n’est pas le même que le concept désigné par l’autre.”
Gilson advances this interpretation of Thomistic analogy in terms of judgment
versus concepts elsewhere as well: Gilson, The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas
Aquinas, trans. L. K. Shook (New York: Random House, 1956), 106–9. Gilson,
Le Thomisme: Introduction a la philosophie de Saint Thomas d’Aquin, 5th ed. (Paris:
Vrin, 1944): “Sur le plan du concept, il n’y a pas de milieu entre l’univoque et
l’equivoque” (155; the word ‘concept’ is translated as ‘quiddity’ in the English
translation by L. K. Shook). See also Gilson, Being and Some Philosophers, 2nd
ed. (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1952), 190–215.
14. In addition to Maurer, Sherry, and Ross, already mentioned, Gilson’s
interpretation on this point is followed by: George P. Klubertanz, St. Thomas
 Notes to Pages 53–54 — 193

Aquinas on Analogy: A Textual Analysis and Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola

University Press, 1960), 116 (“Analogy is primarily an affair of judgment rather
than concept”); Henri de Lubac, The Discovery of God, trans. Alexander Dru
(New York: P. J. Kennedy and Sons, 1960), 201; cf. E. L. Mascall, Existence and
Analogy (London: Longmans, Green, 1949), 116–21; Gregory Philip Rocca,
Speaking the Incomprehensible God: Thomas Aquinas on the Interplay of Positive
and Negative Theology (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press,
2004). Battista Mondin has dissented from Gilson’s interpretation, arguing for
the compatibility of judgment and concept. Mondin, The Principle of Analogy in
Protestant and Catholic Theology, 2nd ed. (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1968),
58n2; 60n2. Rocca also admits the compatibility of emphasizing judgment and
concept (165–73). For a summary of the history of the emphasis on analogy as
judgment, see Rocca, Speaking the Incomprehensible God, 154–59.
15. David Burrell, “From Analogy of ‘Being’ to the Analogy of Being,” in
Recovering Nature: Essays in Natural Philosophy, Ethics, and Metaphysics in Honor
of Ralph P. McInerny, ed. Thomas Hibbs and John O’Callaghan (Notre Dame,
Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1999), 259–60. Cf. Burrell, Analogy and
Philosophical Language (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973), 204.
16. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language, 5.
17. Burrell has in mind specifically Bochenski, “On Analogy,” and James
F. Ross, “Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language”; this latter was
written before Ross’s own rejection of such approaches in Portraying Analogy.
18. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language, 15.
19. Philip A. Rolnick, Analogical Possibilities: How Words Refer to God (At-
lanta: Scholars Press, 1993), 101.
20. David Burrell, review of James F. Ross, Portraying Analogy, in New
Scholasticism 59 (1985): 349.
21. Ibid., 347. In a footnote Burrell clarifies that he is speaking of “Peter
Geach’s observations in Mental Acts . . . regarding abstraction, together with Lo-
nergan’s comprehensive review of the matter in Verbum, explicitly designed to
correct the vaguely Scotistic accounts which had paraded as standard Thomistic
epistemology.”
22. Bernard Lonergan does seem to be under the specific impression that
Cajetan’s view of concepts has been unduly influenced by Scotus; see Bernard
Lonergan, Verbum: Word and Idea in Aquinas, ed. David Burrell (Notre Dame,
Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1967), 25n122. But cf. Lonergan, Insight:
A Study of Human Understanding, 3rd ed. (New York: Philosophical Library,
1970), 368–71.
23. Cf. Michael McCanles, who has argued that “once . . . analogy is dealt
with on the level of concepts, the pressure seems of necessity to push esse to-
ward a univocal concept, as both Scotus and Ockham show. Cajetan’s analogi-
cal concept cannot maintain its integrity.” McCanles, “Univocalism in Cajetan’s
Doctrine of Analogy,” New Scholasticism 42 (Winter 1968): 47. McCanles thus
describes what he sees as the problem of a semantic analysis of analogy which
makes reference to the analogical concept: “[Cajetan’s] method of treating the
problem is at odds with itself, and to a very large extent undercuts the very doc-
trine he is overtly trying to refine” (19). Unfortunately McCanles’s argument is
194 — Notes to Pages 54–57

complicated by a confusion; McCanles does not sufficiently distinguish the issue

of analogical signification in general (which is Cajetan’s main concern in De
Nominum Analogia) from the metaphysical issue of describing “the analogy of
being.”
24. Yves R. Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” in Philosopher at Work:
Essays by Yves R. Simon, ed. Anthony O. Simon (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and
Littlefield, 1999), 135–71; originally in New Scholasticism 34 (1960): 1–42.
25. Ibid., 140.
26. As an example of one tempted by this naive assumption: “The sugges-
tion here proposed is that, in order to employ analogical predication . . . we must
hold that any two entities standing in an analogical relation to each other . . .
must have a minimum of one property in common.” Paul C. Hayner, “Analogi-
cal Predication,” Journal of Philosophy 55 (1958): 860.
27. Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” 145.
28. Ibid., 143.
29. Ibid., 145.
30. Ibid., 156.
31. Burrell, “A Note on Analogy,” New Scholasticism 36 (1962): 226.
32. Ibid., 225; cf. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language, 203.
33. Burrell’s emphasis on use is the most obvious manifestation of his (ac-
knowledged) debt to Wittgenstein. Cf. Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Lan-
guage, 17, 122, 123.
34. Perhaps it could be argued that to insist on such a distinction is already
to grant Cajetan too much, to separate analogy from the “context” of particular
theological and metaphysical judgments. Nonetheless, the phenomenon of ana-
logical signification does take place outside of theology and metaphysics, and it is
reasonable to insist on the logical distinction between considering the phenom-
enon of analogical signification in general, and considering particular terms,
such as ‘being’ or divine names, which can exhibit analogical signification.
35. CDEE §67: “res intelligitur quando ejus conceptum formamus. . . .
conceptus formatio est factio rei extra actu intellectae.”
36. Cajetan, Commentaria in Summam Theologiae St Thomae, I.13.1, n. 3:
“voces significant res non nisi media conceptione intellectus; igitur significatio
causatur ex conceptione.”
37. Actually the “concept” discussed in this paragraph—that by which
something is signified and understood—is by Cajetan and other Thomists in
some contexts called by a more technical name, the formal concept, to distin-
guish it from the objective concept; cf., e.g., CDEE §14. Cf. Jacques Maritain,
Distinguish to Unite, or The Degrees of Knowledge, trans. Gerald B. Phelan (New
York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959), app. 1, “The Concept,” 387–417. So, as will
be discussed in chap. 5, Cajetan’s use of conceptus thus does not always imply a
mental act, but often (more like ratio) implies the intelligible content of a thing
that might be conceived by a mental act.
38. Gabriel Nuchelmans offers as the standard definition of “significare”
for late-scholastic philosophers: “representing some thing or some things or in
some way to the cognitive faculty.” Nuchelmans, Late-Scholastic and Humanist
 Notes to Page 57 — 195

Theories of the Proposition (Amsterdam: North Holland, 1980), 14. Paul Vincent
Spade makes a similar point when he notes that “signification is a psychologico-
causal property of terms” which is traced back to Boethius’s claim that “‘to
signify’ something was ‘to establish an understanding of it.’” P. V. Spade, “The
Semantics of Terms,” in The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 188–98, 188. Cf. Paul Vincent
Spade, Thoughts Words and Things: An Introduction to Late Medieval Logic and
Semantic Theory, version 1.0, chap. 3: the interpretation of significare as “to es-
tablish an understanding” (from Boethius, “constituere intellectum”) is “the pre-
dominant one throughout the Middle Ages.” Cf. Ashworth, “Signification and
Modes of Signifying in Thirteenth-Century Logic,” 44: “to signify is to establish
an understanding (significare est intellectum constituere).”
39. Cajetan is also thus far consistent with Geach, cited above by Burrell as
an important corrective to “Thomistic” epistemology: like Cajetan, Geach un-
derstood “concepts” to be “mental capacities” the possession of which are “pre-
supposed by acts of judgment,” and the “abstractionism” criticized by Geach is
in no way implied in Cajetan’s understanding of concepts sketched here. Peter
Geach, Mental Acts: Their Content and Their Objects (London: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1957), 14 and passim.
40. Indeed, this medieval notion of the “conceptus” can easily be traced to
the Greek tradition, as Sten Ebbesen has done, noting the connection between
the classification of different kinds of equivocation (including analogy) on the
one hand, and concept formation on the other. The Greek logical tradition’s
classification of different kinds of equivocals “can be understood as a classifica-
tion of the reasons for choosing the same word to signify different concepts and
things, deriving this classification from one that shows in how many ways con-
cepts are formed.” Sten Ebbesen, Commentators and Commentaries on Aristotle’s
“Sophistici Elenchi”: A Study of Post-Aristotelian Ancient and Medieval Writings on
Fallacies, vol. 1, The Greek Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 1981), 190. In this endeavor,
the role of judgment (“reasons for choosing the same word to signify different
concepts and things”) is undeniable.
41. Nuchelmans clarifies that there are actually two senses of judgment
one can consider: there is a kind of judging that is really an apprehension that
forms a mental proposition (the “apprehensive proposition”), and there is a kind
of judging that is the act of knowing, believing, or opining that this mental
proposition is (or is not) true. Nuchelmans, Late-Scholastic and Humanist Theo-
ries of the Proposition, 74–76. But since the latter judgment requires the former
apprehensive proposition, which in turn implies an apprehension of the terms
of the apprehensive proposition, Nuchelmans’s analysis only confirms that judg-
ment is not opposed to, but rather presupposes, semantic considerations. As he
puts it: “In general questions concerning acts of judging, knowing, and believ-
ing, and concerning objects of knowledge and belief, were treated by scholas-
tic philosophers for other reasons than sheer curiosity about the semantics of
declarative sentences. . . . But in dealing with the psychological and epistemo-
logical issues which were forced upon them by their theological interests or the
pursuit of wider inquiries of a similar type, they were unavoidably faced with
196 — Notes to Pages 58–59

problems which have a predominantly semantical character” (103). On the late-

scholastic Thomist understanding of apprehensive propositions and the object
of judgment, see 99–102, 111–12.
42. Cf. Étienne Gilson, Linguistics and Philosophy: An Essay on the Philo-
sophical Constants of Language, trans. John Lyon (Notre Dame, Ind.: University
of Notre Dame Press, 1988), 75–78, 187n25.
43. Cf. Étienne Gilson, The Elements of Christian Philosophy (New York:
New American Library, 1963), 250.
44. “Les interlocuteurs ne parlent pas la même langue. . . . lorsqu’il ren-
contre l’analogie thomiste, on ne peut pas dire exactement que Duns Scot le
réfute, on dirai plutôt qu’il ne peut pas y croire. . . . Évidement, ce serait perdre
son temps que do vouloir concilier les deux doctrines et, tout autant, de réfuter
l’une par l’autre.” Gilson, Jean Duns Scot, 101–2.
45. Simon’s article assumes, and never dissents from, Cajetan’s treatment
of analogy. Simon makes it clear he is using Cajetan’s classification of analogous
modes, and Cajetan’s terminology for that classification (Simon, “On Order
in Analogical Sets,” 137); he agrees with Cajetan that “in [analogy of] attribu-
tion . . . the object signified by the analogical term exists intrinsically in only
one” of the analogates (137); like Cajetan, Simon regards analogy of proper pro-
portionality as the most genuine form of analogy (138ff.), and, as in Cajetan’s
theory, this is connected to the fact that in analogy of proportionality “the form
designated by the analogical term exists intrinsically in each and every one of
the analogates” (138; cf. 140); Simon defends Cajetan against the criticisms of
F. A. Blanche (165–67n27); and he cites approvingly other unabashed Cajetani-
ans (John of St. Thomas and James Anderson).
46. Simon might also be benefiting from John of St. Thomas’s own re-
flections on this part of Cajetan’s theory, in Ars Logica, p. 2, q. 13, a. 5, “Utrum
in analogis detur unus conceptus ab inferioribus praecisus” (491a40–500b47).
Simon was the chief translator of sections of the Secunda Pars of the Ars Logica,
published (five years before Simon’s “On Order in Analogical Sets”) as The Ma-
terial Logic of John of St. Thomas: Basic Treatises (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1955). At one point the translation renders the phrase “Analoga attribu-
tionis et analoga metaphorica” (491b21–22, literally: “analogues of attribution
and metaphorical analogues”) as “The terms of an analogous set, in analogy of
attribution or of metaphor” (168, emphasis added).
47. Contra Burrell (Analogy and Philosophical Language, 203), Simon does
take analogy of proper proportionality as the “normal form” or genuine kind of
analogy.
48. All of this is why, in the previous chapter of De Nominum Analogia,
Cajetan had already acknowledged that one must qualify the sense in which one
may speak of an analogical concept (DNA §§36–37).
49. In this regard, we might say that Cajetan’s treatment of analogy cor-
roborates Gadamer’s judgment: “The merit of semantic analysis, it seems to me,
is that it has brought the structural totality of language to our attention and
thereby has pointed out the limitations of the false ideal of unambiguous signs
or symbols and of the potential of language for logical formalization.” Hans-
Georg Gadamer, “Semantics and Hermeneutics,” trans. P. Christopher Smith,
 Notes to Pages 60–66 — 197

in Hans-Georg Gadamer, Philosophical Hermeneutics, trans. and ed. David E.

Linge (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976), 83.
50. Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” 139. From his papers archived
in the Jacques Maritain Center at the University of Notre Dame, we learn that
Simon planned to take up just this question in a book on analogy with the work-
ing title “The Science of the Unknown,” of which the paper “On Order in Ana-
logical Sets” would constitute one chapter. Yves R. Simon Papers, 1920–1959,
University of Notre Dame, box 2, folder 18.
51. L. M. de Rijk, Logica Modernorum: A Contribution to the History of
Early Terminist Logic, vol. 1, On the Twelfth Century Theories of Fallacy (Assen:
Van Gorcum, 1962), 22: “In the course of the present study it will become evi-
dent that the frequent occurrence of fallacies is not just a concomitant—as a
reader of the Summulae might think—, but that the doctrine of fallacy forms the
basis of terminist logic. For this logic developed as a result of the fact that, to a
much greater extent than it had been done by Abailard and his contemporaries,
the proposition was beginning to be subjected to a strictly linguistic analysis.”
However, elsewhere de Rijk does indicate that he believes that “the contextual
approach” to language and “the doctrine of signification” are in tension; vide
L. M. de Rijk, “The Origins of the Theory of the Properties of Terms,” in The
Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1982), 161–73.
52. Alexander Broadie, Introduction to Medieval Logic, 2nd ed. (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1993), 8–9.
53. Norman Kretzmann, “Semantics, History of,” in The Encyclopedia of
Philosophy, ed. Paul Edwards (New York: Macmillan, 1967), vol. 7, 371. Cf. Ash-
worth, “Logic, Medieval,” §4: “Indeed, the avoidance of fallacy is at the heart of
all new types of logical writing.”
54. DNA §125: “Unde si quis falli non vult, solerter sermonis causam coni-
ectet, et extremorum conditiones medio applicaturum se recolat; sic enim facile
erit omnia sane exponere, et veritatem assequi.”
55. The phenomenon really is ubiquitous, but one example of Cajetan’s
careful clarification of terms with respect to the role they play in the context of
particular arguments is his commentary on ST Ia, q. 3, a. 3, which is discussed in
Joshua P. Hochschild, “A Note on Cajetan’s Theological Semantics,” Sapientia
54 (1999): 367–76.

C hapter Four

1. Some examples, already cited in chap. 2: from Aquinas: Whatever is

in potentiality is reduced to act by something actual; all things are brought into
being by God; therefore, God is actual (DPD III.7.7, corpus, cited below, n. 5).
From Cajetan: Every simple perfection is in God; wisdom is a simple perfection;
therefore wisdom is in God (DNA §105). From Bochenski: Every being is good;
God is a being; therefore God is good (“On Analogy,” The Thomist [1948]: §16).
2. E. J. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts: The Fourteenth-Century Back-
ground to Cajetan,” Dialogue 31 (1992): 399–413.
198 — Notes to Pages 66–67

3. Several scholars have noted Aquinas’s concern that analogy avoid the
fallacy of equivocation: James F. Ross, “Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Reli-
gious Language,” in Inquiries into Medieval Philosophy: A Collection in Honor of
Francis P. Clarke, ed. James F. Ross, Contributions in Philosophy, no. 4 (West-
port, Conn.: Greenwood, 1971), 37; Hampus Lyttkens, The Analogy Between
God and the World: An Investigation of Its Background and Interpretation of Its Use
by Thomas of Aquino (Uppsala: Almqvist and Wiksells Boktrycheri AB, 1952),
204; Patrick J. Sherry, “Analogy Today,” Philosophy 51 (1976): 443; Ralph Mc-
Inerny, “Scotus and Univocity,” in Being and Predication: Thomistic Interpreta-
tions (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1986), 161; Yves
Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” in Philosopher at Work: Essays by Yves R.
Simon, ed. Anthony O. Simon (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999),
139; Vernon J. Bourke, “Cajetan, Cardinal,” in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
vol. 2, ed. P. Edwards (New York: Macmillan, 1967), 5–6. Cf. Michael P. Slat-
tery, “Concerning Two Recent Studies of Analogy,” New Scholasticism 31 (1957):
238. Garrigou-Lagrange also recognizes the importance of analogical terms in
syllogisms, in God: His Existence and Nature, vol. 1, trans. Bede Rose (St. Louis:
Herder, 1934, 1936), 224–27; he provides his own account of how this is possible
in vol. 2, 203–21.
4. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia.13.5.c: “Sed nec etiam [nomen
de Deo et creaturis praedicatur] pure aequivoce, ut aliqui dixerunt. Quia secun-
dum hoc ex creaturis nihil posset cognosci de Deo, nec demonstrari, sed semper
incideret fallacia aequivocationis.”
5. Thomas Aquinas, Quaestiones disputatae de potentia Dei III.7.7.c: “. . .
cum omnis cognitio nostra de Deo ex creaturis sumatur, si non erit convenientia
nisi in nomine tantum, nihil de Deo sciremus nisi nomina tantum vana, quibus
res non subesset. Sequeretur etiam quod omnes demonstrationes a philosophis
datae de Deo, essent sophisticae; verbi gratia, si dicatur, quod omne quod est in
potentia, reducitur ad actum per ens actu, et ex hoc concluderetur quod Deus
esset ens actu, cum per ipsum omnia in esse educantur; erit fallacia aequivoca-
tionis; et sic de omnibus aliis.”
6. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles I.33: “Quando unum de
pluribus, secundum puram aequivocationem, praedicatur, ex uno eorum non
possumus duci in cognitionem alterius. Nam cognitio rerum non dependet ex
vocibus, sed ex ratione nominis. Ex his autem, quae in rebus aliis inveniuntur,
in divinorum cognitionem pervenimus, ut ex dictis (c. 30 et 31) patet. Non igitur
secundum puram aequivocationem dicuntur hujusmodi attributa de Deo et aliis
rebus. . . . Aequivocatio nominis processum argumentationis impedit. Si igitur
nihil diceretur de Deo et creaturis, nisi pure aequivoce, nulla argumentatio fieri
posset, procedendo de creaturis ad Deum.”
7. Thomas Aquinas, Quaestiones disputatae de Veritate 2.11.c: “. . . nec
tamen potest dici quod omnino aequivoce praedicaetur quidquid de Deo et
creatura dicitur; quia si non esset aliqua convenientia creaturae ad Deum se-
cundum rem, sua essentia non esset creaturarum similitudo; et ita cognoscendo
essentiam suam non cognosceret creaturas. Similiter etiam nec nos ex rebus
creatis in cognitionem Dei pervenire possemus; nec nominum quae creaturis
 Notes to Page 67 — 199

aptantur, unum magis de eo dicendum esset quam aliud; quia ex aequivocis

non differt quodcumque nomen imponatur, ex quo nulla rei convenientia
attenditur.”
8. Thomas Aquinas, In duodecim libros Metaphysicorum expositio IV, lect. 3
(§568 Cathala): “Non enim sequitur, quod si aliquid dicitur multipliciter, quod
propter hoc sit alterius scientiae vel diversae. Diversa enim significata si neque
dicuntur «secundum unum», idest secundum unam rationem, scilicet univoce,
nec ratione diversa referuntur ad unum, sicut est in analogicis: tunc sequitur,
quod sit alterius, idest diversae scientiae de his considerare, vel ad minus unius
per accidens. . . . Haec autem omni referuntur ad unum principium. Sicut enim
quae significantur per hoc nomen Unum, licet sint diversa, reducuntur tamen
in unum primum significatum; similiter est dicendum de his nominibus, idem,
diversum, contrarium, et hujusmodi.”
9. Thomas Aquinas, Scripta super libros Sententiarum prol., q. 1, a. 2, obj.
2: “. . . una scientia est unius generis, sicut dicit Philosophus in I Posteriorum.
Sed Deus et creatura, de quibus in divina doctrina tractatur, non reducuntur
in unum genus, neque univoce, neque analogice. Ergo divina scientia non est
una . . .”; ibid., ad. 2: “. . . dicendum quod Creator et creatura reducuntur in
unum, non communitate univocationis sed analogiae.”
10. Thomas Aquinas, In Aristotelis Libros Peri Hermeneias et Posteriorum
Analyticorum Expositio, ed. Raymundi M. Spiazzi (Rome: Marietti, 1955), book
2, lectio 17, n. 4: “. . . ostendit investigare propter quid reducendo ad aliquod com-
mune analogum; et dicit quod alius modus investigandi propter quid est eligere
commune secundum analogiam, idest proportionem. Contingit enim unum
accipere analogum quod non est idem secundum speciem vel genus; sicut os
sepiarum, quod vocatur sepion, et spina piscium, et ossa animalium terrestrium.
Omnia enim ista conveniunt secundum proportionem, quia eodem modo se ha-
bent spinae ad pisces sicut ossa ad terrestria animalia.” Aristotle’s example of
the analogical relationship between bone, spine, and pounce will be invoked by
Cajetan at DNA §§109, 117, and De Conceptu Entis §3, and Cajetan obviously
finds it useful for answering questions about the role of analogical notions in
scientific reasoning. Interestingly, Aquinas’s comment on Aristotle quoted here
is not among the texts collected by Klubertanz in St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy:
A Textual Analysis and Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola University Press,
1960), although Klubertanz’s catalogue of texts does include another passage
from later in the Posterior Analytics commentary (book 2, lectio 19, n. 3).
11. The De fallaciis describes three species of the fallacy of equivocation,
and briefly mentions analogy in connection with the second: “secunda species
est quando unum nomen principaliter unum significat, et aliud metaphorice
sive transumptive. . . . et ad hanc speciam reducitur muliplicitas nominum anal-
ogorum quae dicuuntur de pluribus secundum prius et posterius.” De fallaciis,
in Opuscula philosophica, ed. Raymundi M. Spiazzi (Rome: Marietti, 1954), c. 6.
There is some doubt about whether Aquinas authored De fallaciis, but the text’s
teaching is such that the attribution to Aquinas is plausible. On this point about
analogy and fallacy it is consistent with, and doesn’t add anything to, Aquinas’s
remarks elsewhere.
200 — Notes to Pages 68–70

12. In Met. IV, lect. 1, §535; XI, lect. 3, §2197; cf. Joseph Bobik, Aquinas on
Being and Essence: A Translation and Interpretation (Notre Dame, Ind.: Univer-
sity of Notre Dame Press, 1965), 55–56.
13. Cf. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy, 38: “Analogous intelli-
gibles are neither exactly the same nor completely different; they are halfway be-
tween the two extremes. Though this is not an especially revealing description,
it provides us with a minimum meaning which can be applied to all analogies.”
14. Ibid., 37.
15. There are fifty-eight occurrences of the phrase in twenty-one works
listed in Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy, 301. Klubertanz also notes
several occasions of other terminology that also expresses priority and posterior-
ity, p. 65. Aquinas was not the first to describe analogy as signification per prius
et posterius; the scholastic use of the phrase is traced to the twelfth-century Latin
translation of Avicenna. For some citations of this phrase in authors before
Aquinas, cf. E. J. Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation in Thirteenth-Century
Logic: Aquinas in Context,” Mediaeval Studies 54 (1992): 107–8; Alain de Libera,
“Les sources gréco-arabes de la théorie médiévale de l’analogie de l’être,” Les
Études Philosophiques (1989): 333; and H. A. Wolfson, “The Amphibolous Terms
in Aristotle, Arabic Philosophy, and Maimonides,” Harvard Theological Review
31 (1938): 151–73.
16. Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation in Thirteenth-Century Logic:
Aquinas in Context,” 125, and Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signify-
ing in Thirteenth-Century Logic: A Preface to Aquinas on Analogy,” Medieval
Philosophy and Theology 1 (1991): 50; cf. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy (Wash-
ington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1996), 70–74.
17. SCG I.32: “Quod praedicatur de aliquibus secundum prius et posterius,
certum est univocum non praedicari.”
18. E.g., ST I.5.6, ad 3.
19. Ralph McInerny, The Logic of Analogy: An Interpretation of St. Thomas
(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1961), 79. Cf. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy,
98: an analogous term “signifies a plurality of rationes which are related per prius
et posterius . . .”
20. Klubertanz notes that Aquinas sometimes seems to deny that the per
prius et posterius rule applies to analogy between God and creatures (St. Thomas
Aquinas on Analogy, 29–30), yet later he discusses the rule as a “doctrinal con-
stant” in Aquinas (64–69).
21. Yves Simon recognized the inadequacy of the “per prius et posterius”
rule. Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” 148.
22. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia 13.6.c: “in omnibus nomini-
bus quae de pluribus analogice dicuntur, necesse est quod omni dicantur per
respectum ad unum; et ideo illud unum oportet quod ponatur in definitione
omnium.” Cf. Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia 13.10: “in analogicis vero opor-
tet quod nomen secundum unam significationem acceptum ponatur in defini-
tione ejusdem nominis secundum alias significationes accepti.” Cf. Aquinas,
Summa Contra Gentiles I.32: “Quod praedicatur de aliquibus secundum prius et
 Notes to Pages 70–71 — 201

posterius, certum est univoce non praedicari: nam prius in definitione posteri-
oris includitur.”
23. Silvestro Mazzolini, Conflatum ex S. Thoma: “regula decisiva totius
quaestionis,” quoted in Michael Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divi-
sions of Analogy,” Angelicum 70 (1993): 110.
24. “. . . ad mentem Sancti Thomae, quod in omni modo analogiae verum
est quod prius ponitur in definitione posterioris, inquantum analogice consid-
eratur et significatur” (from Silvestri’s commentary on Summa Contra Gentiles,
quoted in Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World, 226n7). For discus-
sion see Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World, 225–28, and Kluber-
tanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy, 10–11.
25. E.g., McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 98; Bobik, Aquinas on Being and
Essence, 53; Ian Wilks, “Aquinas on Analogy: The Distinction of Many-to-One
and One-to-Another,” Modern Schoolman 75 (1997): 37.
26. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy, 32–34.
27. Cf. Joseph Owens, The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian “Metaphys-
ics”: A Study in the Greek Background of Medieval Thought, 3rd ed. (Toronto:
Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1978), 118–23.
28. G. E. L. Owen, “Logic and Metaphysics in Some Early Works of
Aristotle,” in Aristotle and Plato in Mid-Fourth Century, ed. Ingemar Düring
and G. E. L. Owen (Göteborg: Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia, 1960).
Cf. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 40: “What Owen calls focal meaning—a
common predicate’s having different but connected definitions in its different
uses, the connection being provided by its primary sense on which the others
depend—answers to what Thomas Aquinas calls an analogous name.”
29. Cf., e.g., Aquinas, De principiis naturae 6: “Analogice dicitur praedicari
quod praedicatur de pluribus, quorum rationes diversae sunt, sed attribuuntur
alicui uni eidem.”
30. Ross, “Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language,” 50.
Yves Simon agrees, saying that in analogy of proper proportionality, “no first
analogate needs to be included in the definition of the secondary analogates.”
Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” 138–39. Both Ross and Simon here are
in agreement with Cajetan.
31. Aquinas himself raises this point at De Veritate 2.11., obj. 6. Nor is this
point unique to De Veritate. In a parallel case, Aquinas denies that a term as
predicated of God can be defined in terms of the meaning of that term as it
refers to creatures (“God is good” cannot be taken to mean only that “God is
the cause of good things,” nor can it mean that “God is the cause of [creaturely]
goodness”); Summa Theologiae I.13.2.c. When Aquinas does give a working defi-
nition of Divine goodness, it does make reference to creaturely goodness, but
not as something other than God to which God is related, rather as something
that itself pre-exists in a higher manner in God (“Cum igitur dicitur Deus est
bonus, non est sensus Deus est causa bonitatis . . . , sed est sensus, id quod boni-
tatem dicimus in creaturis, praeexistit in Deo, et hoc quidem secundum modum
altiorem”). Aquinas’s point is that it is not essential to the goodness of God that
202 — Notes to Pages 71–74

it be understood in terms of some other goodness (“non sequitur Deus competat

esse bonum, inquantum causat bonitatem; sed potius, e converse, quia est bonus,
bonitatem rebus diffundit”).
32. Cajetan, CDEE §21: “. . . analogata primo modo [i.e., analogy of at-
tribution] ita se habent, quod posterius secundum nomen analogum diffinitur
per suum prius: puta accidens, inquantum ens per substantiam. Analogata vero
secundo modo [i.e., analogy of proportionality] non: creatura enim inquantum
ens non diffinitur per Deum.”
33. Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia, 16.6.c: “. . . quando aliquid dicitur ana-
logice de multis, illud invenitur secundum propriam rationem in uno eorum
tantum, a quo alia denominantur . . .”
34. Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles I.32 : “Nam prius in diffinitione pos-
terioris includitur.” Cf. Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I.13.6: “Et quia ratio quam
significat nomen est definitio, ut dicitur, necesse est quod illud nomen per prius
dicatur de eo quod ponitur in definitione aliorum, et per posterius de aliis, se-
cundum ordinem quo appropinquant ad illud primum.”
35. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 98. We should note that the rubric “per
prius et posterius” does not have to be given the interpretation McInerny here
gives it, as involving multiple rationes ordered to one. Signifying “per prius et pos-
terius” could alternatively describe a common ratio that is unequally participated
by its several analogates.
36. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 114.
37. E.g., McInerny, The Logic of Analogy, 78: “The analogous name names
one thing primarily, and others insofar as they relate in some way to what it
principally names. The rationes of the secondary analogates will express their
reference to the thing which perfectly saves the ratio propria of the word.”
38. McInerny, Studies in Analogy (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1968), 75;
McInerny, “The Analogy of Names Is a Logical Doctrine,” in Being and Predica-
tion, 285; McInerny, “Scotus and Univocity,” in Being and Predication, 162; Mc-
Inerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 99.
39. McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 99–100; McInerny, “Can God Be
Named by Us?” in Being and Predication, 274–75; McInerny, “Scotus and Uni-
vocity,” 162–64.
40. McInerny, “The Analogy of Names Is a Logical Doctrine,” 283: “St.
Thomas will say that a term used analogously signifies the same res significata
but has different modi significandi.”; McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 103–4: “In
a pithy text, Thomas compares univocals, equivocals and analogously named
things. . . . Univocal terms have the same res significata and the same way of
signifying it in all relevant uses; equivocal terms have different res significatae;
things are named analogously when their common name has the same res signi-
ficata, which is signified in different ways in each of the accounts.”
41. I Sent. 22.1.3 ad 2: “dicendum quod aliter dividitur aequivocum,
analogum et univocum. Aequivocum enim dividitur secundum res significa-
tas, univocum vero dividitur secundum diversas differentias; sed analogum
dividitur secundum diversos modos. Unde cum ens praedicetur analogice de
 Notes to Pages 74–75 — 203

decem generibus, dividitur in ea secundum diversos modos. Unde unicuique

generi debetur proprius modus praedicandi.”
42. Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying,” 60.
43. E.g., I Sent. 25.1.2 c: “Dicendum quod persona dicitur de Deo et crea-
turis non univoce nec aequivoce sed secundum analogiam; et quantum ad rem
significatam per prius est in Deo quam in creaturis, sed quantum ad modum
significandi est e converso, sicut est etiam de omnibus aliis nominibus quae de
Deo et creaturis analogice dicuntur.”
44. Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying,” 60.
45. Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation,” 122. Cf. Ashworth, review of
McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, in Speculum 74 (1999): 216. Cf. also Irène Rosier,
“Res significata et modus significandi: Les implications d’une distinction médi-
evale,” Sprachteorien in Spätantike und Mittelalter, ed. Sten Ebbesen (Tübingen:
Gunter Narr Verlag, 1995), 152–57. See also Seung-Chan Park, Die Rezeption
der mittelalterlichen Sprachphilosophie in der Theologie des Thomas von Aquin: Mit
besonderer Berücksichtigung der Analogie (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 128–67, 267–307.
46. In addition to McInerny, the view can be found in Mascall (Analogy
and Existence [London: Longmans, Green, 1949], 100, 120), and is common in
Copleston, although the latter’s comments are always made in the context of
a discussion of religious language. Cf. Fredrick Copleston, A History of Medi-
eval Philosophy (New York: Harper and Row, 1972), 196–97; Copleston, Aquinas
(Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1955), 129–35; and Copleston, A History of Philos-
ophy, vol. 2, Mediaeval Philosophy, part 2, “Albert the Great to Duns Scotus”
(Garden City, N.Y.: Image Books, 1962), 70. Before his more recent criticisms
of the “classical” approach to analogy (in James F. Ross, Portraying Analogy
[Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981]), Ross apparently agreed that
having one res significata and multiple modi significandi is a feature of analogy.
Cf. Ross, “A Critical Analysis of the Theory of Analogy of St. Thomas Aqui-
nas” (Ph.D. diss., Brown University, 1958), 102; Ross, review of McInerny, The
Logic of Analogy, in International Philosophical Quarterly 2 (1962): 635; and Ross,
“Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language,” 55–57. But Ross re-
garded this as only a necessary, not a sufficient, condition for language about
God; to it Ross added the stipulation that there be “proportional similarity” of
properties (Ross, “Analogy as Rule of Meaning for Religious Language,” 62–63).
Burrell appears to take a similar view, agreeing that the distinction between res
significata and modus significandi is a part of Aquinas’s analysis of analogy, at
least with respect to religious language, but adding that the distinction is insuf-
ficient without the further stipulation that all predicates said analogously of God
and creatures must be perfections. Cf. David Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical
Language (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973), 136. For that matter, Mc-
Inerny also says that having a single res significata and diverse modi significandi
is a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition of a term’s being analogous (McIn-
erny, Aquinas and Analogy, 104). Lyttkens is also willing to consider the role of res
significata and modi significandi in Aquinas’s understanding of analogy, though
like Copleston, Ross, and Burrell he does so only in the context of discussion
204 — Notes to Pages 75–77

about predicates said analogously of God and creatures (Lyttkens, The Analogy
Between God and the World, 374–82, 468–71).
47. Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying,” 56–57, 61.
48. McInerny, “Scotus and Univocity,” 163. Cf. McInerny, Aquinas and
Analogy, 104.
49. This attempted reconstruction of McInerny’s analysis of analogy as in-
volving one res significata and several modi significandi probably does not exhibit
a Thomistic use of modi significandi. Being a cause of something and being a sign of
something are not modi significandi in Thomas’s sense, and a Thomistic analysis
of the various senses of “healthy” would rather assign a different res significata to
each sense of “healthy”: animal health, cause of animal health, and sign of animal
health.
50. Lyttkens observed, “We have no direct evidence of St. Thomas’ own
attitude to the question of the unity of the concept in the analogy of proportion-
ality.” Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World, 471. Wilks frames the
semantic issue felicitously: “For a word to retain the same meaning through suc-
cessive uses is for it to remain linked to exactly the same ratio in each case. This
is how univocity is to be understood; non-univocity will, conversely, involve
successive uses with linkage to different rationes. Whether that non-univocity
amounts to analogy or equivocation depends on the conceptual space that ex-
ists between the two rationes; the difference between them is capable of being
greater or less, and if sufficiently less then the usage is said to be analogical.”
Then, Wilks says, “Aquinas gives us no theoretically comprehensive way of ex-
plaining what constitutes closeness of ratio.” Of the rule that Wilks considers,
viz., “that in each case one ratio constitutes part of another,” he admits, “we can-
not get a rigorous semantic account of analogy from this.” Wilks, “Aquinas on
Analogy,” 37.
51. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts”; Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivo-
cation,” 126.
52. DNA §7.
53. DNA §§14, 20. Elsewhere Cajetan says that this is not a rule for anal-
ogy as such, but a rule for determining of which thing a term is said prius (CST
I.13.6, nn. i–ii), and Cajetan rejects it as a universal rule for analogy (CST I.13.6,
n. iii: “dicit non esse verum universaliter quod primum analogatum poni debeat
in rationibus aliorum analogatorum,” citing Aquinas, DV 2.11).
54. CST I.16.6, n. vi: “illa regula de analogo tradita in littera, non est uni-
versalis de omni analogiae modo.” Cf. John of St. Thomas, Ars Logica, p. 2, q.
13, a. 4 (490b28–491a22): “. . . respondetur, quod in illa universali loquitur S.
Thomas non de omnibus analogis absolute, sed restrictive de analogis attribu-
tionis tantum. . . . In loco autem ex q. 16 non loquitur universaliter de omnibus
analogis . . .” While it may seem bold for an interpreter to reject as universal
rules what clearly appear to be formulated universally, there appear to be genu-
ine inconsistencies in Aquinas; we must remember Klubertanz’s inescapable
conclusion about Aquinas’s formulation of analogy rules, that “not every discus-
sion that appears to be a general description applicable to all analogies is such
 Notes to Pages 77–78 — 205

in actual fact.” Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy, 37. Also, note that
Cajetan will describe a way in which, even in analogy of proportionality, we can
understand that the ratio of the analogue is wholly saved in one of the analogates
but imperfectly in the others—yet he warns that this rule must be taken with a
grain of salt. DNA §§100–101: “. . . in uno eorum, tota ratio divisi salvari dicatur;
in alio autem imperfecte et secundum quid. Quod non est sic intelligendum
quasi analogum habeat unam rationem, quae tota salvetur in uno, et pars eius
salvetur in alio. Sed cum totum idem sit quod perfectum, et analogo nomine
multae importentur rationes, quarum una simpliciter et perfecte constituit tale
secundum illud nomen, et aliae imperfecte et secundum quid: ideo dicitur, quod
analogum sic dividitur, quod non tota ratio eius in omnibus analogatis salvatur,
nec aequaliter participant analogi rationem, sed secundum prius et posterius.
Cum grano tamen salis accipiendum est, analogum simpliciter salvari in uno et
secundum quid in alio.”
55. DNA §1. The same three theories are listed again at DNA §71. For
discussion of Cajetan’s use of “indisjunction” at §1 and “disjunction” at §71,
see Edward A. Bushinski and Henry J. Koren, The Analogy of Names and the
Concept of Being (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1953), 9n4, and Bruno
Pinchard, Metaphysique et semantique: La signification analogiques des termes dans
les Principes Metaphysiques (Paris: Vrin, 1987), 161.
56. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts.”
57. Ibid., 404–5. The distinction between objective and formal concepts
will be explored in chap. 5, as a part of a more systematic presentation of Ca-
jetan’s semantic principles.
58. Ibid., 405. Ashworth’s article discusses, in particular, historical disputes
about the analogy of “being.” Though this particular case of analogy was un-
doubtedly one of the most, if not the most, important case for the philosophers
she discusses, it remains that the semantic problem is one for analogy generally,
and not just for this particular analogical term. Cajetan does discuss the analogy
of “being” in DNA, chap. 6, where he contrasts his view with the three rejected
views (§71), but still it is clear that he is developing a logical or semantic theory
of analogy generally, and not one specific to the case of “being,” which he insists
is used only as an example (§72).
59. Cf. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 407. Note that Ashworth’s ex-
clusive alternatives presuppose particular semantic assumptions about the na-
ture of objective and formal concepts, shared by all the authors she considers. If
these assumptions are not shared, it would be possible to construe, e.g., “unity
of order” and “unequal participation” as not mutually exclusive. This seems to
be the position of McInerny in the following passage: “In things named analogi-
cally . . . the common notion signified by the name is not shared equally by all
the things which receive the name; only one of the analogates is signified per-
fectly by the name. The others are signified imperfectly and in a certain respect,
that is, insofar as they refer in some way to what is perfectly signified. . . . The
analogous name signifies precisely an inequality of significations, but according
to a certain order.” McInerny, The Logic of Analogy, 76.
206 — Notes to Pages 78–80

60. And with unknown authors: a late thirteenth-century commentator on

the Sophistici Elenchi describes three kinds of analogy, of which one is the most
genuine and involves a ratio that “non est aequaliter participata.” Incertorum
Auctorum, Quaestiones super Sophisticos Elenchos, ed. Sten Ebbesen (Copenha-
gen: Corpus Philosophorum Danicorum Medii Aevi, 1977), 317 (q. 823, l. 85).
61. Capreolus, Defensiones theologiae, vol. 1, ed. Paban and Pégues (1900),
135a, 142a–b (cited in Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 406).
62. Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 102.
63. Soncinas, Super artem veterem (Venice, 1499), f. 19r–v: “unam rationem
in actu, sed inaequaliter participatum” (quoted in Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance
Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 99). Cf. Soncinas, Quaestiones in XII Metaphysi-
corum VI, q. 4, ad 1, 9, and Epitomes quaestionum Ioannis Caprieoli, super libros
sententiarum I, d. 1, q. 2, 35, both also quoted in Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance
Thomist Divisions of Analogy,” 101–2.
64. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 406.
65. Dominic of Flanders, Quaestiones super XII libros Metaphysicorum
(Frankfurt: Minerva, 1967 [reprint of Venice, 1499]), IV, q. 2, a. 1. Ashworth
finds Dominic attributing the view to others; Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,”
406–7. Cf. Franco Riva, “L’analogia dell’ente in Dominico di Fiandra,” Rivista
di Filosofia Neo-scolastica 86 (1994): 289–90.
66. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 402.
67. Ibid., 407.
68. John Versorius, Quaestiones super metaphysicam Aristotelis (Coloniae,
1494), f. 25v: “ens dicatur de omnibus entibus . . . de uno primo et principaliter
et de aliis dicitur secundum quod unumquodque eorum habet habitudinem ad
ipsum primum, ergo non est ibi pura aequivocatio sed est unitas analogiae.”
(Quoted in Tavuzzi, “Some Renaissance Thomist Divisions of Analogy,”
96n11.)
69. Pinchard, Metaphysique et semantique, 161.
70. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 408.
71. Dominic of Flanders, Quaestiones super XII libros Metaphysicorum, IV,
q. 2, a. 6: “Utrum ens significet unum conceptum disiunctum?”
72. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 408.
73. Stephen Brown, “L’unité du concept d’être au début du quatorzième
siècle,” in John Duns Scotus: Metaphysics and Ethics, ed. Ludger Honnefelder,
Rega Wood, and Mechthild Dreyer (Leiden: Brill, 1996), 334–36.
74. Ibid. Cf. Ashworth, “Analogical Concepts,” 408.
75. DNA §§1, 71.
76. Indeed, a further problem with the “disjunct concept” theory of anal-
ogy is that it allows any two things to be analogical, if we stipulate a word that
signifies their alternative. This objection is raised by Bochenski, “On Analogy,”
The Thomist (1948): §16. However, Bochenski does prove that a term so analo-
gous can be the middle term of a valid syllogism, if the ratio of the middle term
of the major premise is the disjunction of the ratio of the middle term of the
minor premise and some other ratio (“On Analogy,” §15).
 Notes to Pages 85–88 — 207

C hapter Fiv e

1. Like many Thomists Cajetan also completed Aquinas’s unfinished

commentary on Aristotle’s De Interpretatione. We could assume from this that
Cajetan endorses the semantic principles articulated by Aquinas in that work,
though Cajetan’s semantic principles can be reconstructed without relying on
Aquinas’s commentary.
2. CPA 3: “. . . res incomplexae non adunantur et distinguuntur cum con-
ditionibus, quas habent in rerum natura, sed ut sic acceptae per intellectum, id
est ut stant sub simplici apprehensione intellectus, id est ut obiectae simplici ap-
prehensioni intellectus, et res sic acceptae nihil aliud sunt quam res dictae verbis
interioribus, vel (quod idem est) quam res conceptae conceptibus simplicibus,
et res huiusmodi nihil aliud sint quam res significatae vocibus incomplexis,
quondo voces sunt signa conceptuum et conceptus rerum.”
3. In this and other respects Cajetan stands firmly in the via antiqua “realist”
tradition, on which see Gyula Klima, “The Medieval Problem of Universals,” in
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2000 ed.), ed. Edward N. Zalta. URL
= http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2000/entries/universals-medieval/.
4. CDEE §84: “. . . est notandum, quod cum nomine naturae intelligatur
id quod per diffinitionem significatur, nomen autem suppositi individuum ha-
bens illam quiditatem.”
5. CPA 18: “. . . scito quod formae nomine in hac materia intelligimus omne
id quo aliquid dicitur tale, sive illud sit secundum rem accidens, sive substantia,
sive materia, sive forma.” CST I.37.2, n. iv: “Omne denominans, ut sic, habet
rationem formalis.” Cf. DNA §§31–32: “. . . in nominibus tria inveniuntur, scil-
ecet vox, conceptus in anima, et res extra, seu conceptus obiectivus. . . . Vocatur
autem in proposito res, non solum natura aliqua, sed quicumque gradus, quae-
cumque realitas, et quodcumque reale in rebus inventum.” Cf. Aquinas, Summa
Theologiae I.37.2.c: “. . . sciendum est quod, cum res communiter denominentur
a suis formis, sicut album ab albedine, et homo ab humanitate, omne illud a quo
aliquid denominatur, quantum ad hoc habet habitudinem formae. Ut dicam,
iste est indutus vestimento, iste ablativus construitur in habitudine causae for-
malis, quamvis non sit forma.” Cf. Aquinas, Quaestiones disputatae de potentia
Dei 7.10, ad 8: “Dicendum est quod illud a quo aliquid denominatur non oportet
quod sit semper forma secundum rei naturam, sed sufficit quod significetur per
modum formae, grammatice loquendo. Denominatur enim homo ab actione et
ab indumento, et ab aliis huiusmodi, quae realiter non sunt formae.”
6. CDEE §8: “. . . nota quod sicut quid rei est quidtas rei, ita quid nominis
est quiditas nominis. Nomen autem cum essentialiter sit nota earum quae sunt
objective in anima passionum ex I Perihermenias, non habet aliam quiditatem
nisi hanc quod est signum alicujus rei intellectae seu cogitatae: signum autem,
ut sic, relativum est ad signatum. Unde cognoscere quid nominis nihil est aliud
quam cognoscere ad quod tale nomen habet relationem ut signum ad signatum.
Talis autem cognitio potest acquiri per accidentalia illius signati, per communia,
per essentialia, per nutus et quibusvis aliis modis, sicut a Graeco quaeretibus
208 — Notes to Pages 88–90

nobis quid nominis anthropos si digito ostendatur homo, jam percipimus quid
nominis; et similiter de aliis. Interrogantibus ver quid rei, opertet assignare id
quod convenit rei significatae in primo modo perseitatis adaequatae. Et haec est
essentialis differnetia inter quid nominis et quid rei, scilicet quod quid nomis
est relatio nomis ad signatum; quid rei vero est rei relatae seu significatae es-
sentia. Et ex hac differentia sequuntur omnes aliae quae dici solent, puta quod
quid nominis sit non entium complexorum, per accidentalia, per communia,
per extranea; quid rei vero est entium incomplexorum per propria et essentialia:
relatio enim vocis potest terminari ad non entia in rerum natura, et complexa, et
declarari per accidentalia, et hujusmodi ; essentia autem rei non nisi per propria
essentialia habetur de entibus incomplexis.”
7. To be sure, considered as elements of Cajetan’s particular philosophical
psychology, which in turn depends on a certain metaphysical framework, one
could take issue with Cajetanian “concepts.” The only point here is that, consid-
ered in their general semantic and epistemological function, “concepts” are just
what make possible signification and understanding.
8. The metaphysician might treat them as forms analogically, that is as
not strictly speaking the same as, but nonetheless analogous to, really existing
forms in rerum natura.
9. Cf. Gyula Klima, “The Semantic Principles Underlying Saint Thomas
Aquinas’s Metaphysics of Being,” Medieval Philosophy and Theology 5 (1996):
106–7, 114–15.
10. Cf. Gyula Klima, “Ontological Alternatives vs. Alternative Semantics
in Medieval Philosophy,” in Logical Semiotics, special issue of S-European Jour-
nal for Semiotic Studies 3 (1991): 587–618.
11. The distinction between formal and objective concept is usually traced
back to the fourteenth century, though many commentators have found Aqui-
nas expressing, albeit without these technical names, the same distinction. It is
not uncommon for it to be invoked in the Thomistic tradition; cf. Jacques Mari-
tain, Distinguish to Unite, or The Degrees of Knowledge, trans. Gerald B. Phelan
(New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959): 387–417.
12. CDEE §14: “. . . nota quod conceptus est duplex: formalis et objectalis.
Conceptus formalis est idolum quoddam quod intellectus possibilis format in
seipso repraesentativum objectaliter rei intellectae: quod a philosophis vocatur
intentio seu conceptus, a theologis vero verbum. Conceptus autem objectalis est
res per conceptum formalem repraesentata in illo terminans actum intelligendi,
verbi gratia: conceptus formalis leonis est imago illa quam intellectus possibilis
format de quiditate leonina, cum vult ipsam intelligere; conceptus vero objecta-
lis ejusdem est natura ipsa leonina repraesentata et intellecta. Nec putandum est
cum dicitur nomen significare conceptum quod significet alterum tantum: sig-
nificat enim leonis nomen conceptum utrumque, licet diversimode, est namque
signum conceptus formalis ut medii, seu quo, et est signum conceptus objectalis,
ut ultimi seu quod.” In fact, Cajetan will in some contexts make even further
distinctions about how the formal and objective concepts can be considered (cf.
CDEE §48).
13. E.g., DNA §31.
 Notes to Pages 90–92 — 209

14. CDEE §66: “Esse in intellectu contingit dupliciter, subjective et objec-

tive. Esse in intellectu subjective est inhaerere ipsi, sicut accidens suo subjecto, ut
albedo superficiei. Esse in intellectu objective est terminare actum intellectus.”
15. E.g., I. M. Bochenski, “On Analogy,” The Thomist (1948).
16. E.g., E. J. Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying in
Thirteenth-Century Logic: A Preface to Aquinas on Analogy,” Medieval Phi-
losophy and Theology 1 (1991): 51, 53.
17. E.g., Edward A. Bushinski and Henry J. Koren, The Analogy of Names
and the Concept of Being (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1953). Indeed,
Bushinski’s translation also renders “ratio” variously as “character,” “notion,”
“nature,” “definition,” and “mode.” This testifies to the difficulty of finding a
single adequate word in English, but it also means that the centrality of this
important notion is obscured by Bushinski’s translation.
18. CPA 9: “Ly «ratio», licet multipliciter sumi possit, hic sumitur non pro
diffinitione, quoniam res generalissimae aequivoca dici non possent, eo quod
diffinitione carent, sed sumitur pro conceptu significato per nomen, qui in ha-
bentibus diffinitionem est diffinitio ipsa, in non habentibus vero diffinitionem
ratio quam significat nomen vocatur, et nihil aliud est quam id quod directe
significatur per nomen.”
19. CST I.13.4, n. 3: “[ratio sumi potest pro] conceptionem et definitionem,
sed diversimode. Conceptio enim mentalis ratio nominis dicitur, quia est id quo
refertur nomen in significatum extra animam: definitio autem, quia est id quo
explicatur nominis significatum.” Cf. Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I.5.2. Cajetan
is clarifying the sense of Aquinas’s claim, “Ratio enim quam significat nomen,
est conceptio intellectus de re significata per nomen.” It is worth noting that
in the context of this article Cajetan recommends taking “ratio” as the mental
concept, not as the definition, and so his interpretation would apparently differ
from that of Ashworth, who would translate “ratio” with “analysis.” Ashworth,
“Signification and Modes of Signifying in Thirteenth-Century Logic,” 51, 53.
20. On the inherence theory of predication see L. M. de Rijk, Logica Mod-
ernorum: A Contribution to the History of Early Terminist Logic, vol. 1, On the
Twelfth Century Theories of Fallacy (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1962), 37–38; Peter T.
Geach, Logic Matters (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), 289–301;
and Klima, “The Semantic Principles Underlying Saint Thomas Aquinas’s
Metaphysics of Being.”
21. Cf., e.g., CDEE §63.
22. Ashworth explains the difference between what is predicated and what
verifies the predication as the difference between the significate (significatum)
and the thing signified (res significata). Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of
Signifying in Thirteenth-Century Logic,” 50–53. Her explanation is coherent
and valuable with respect to the thirteenth-century authors she considers, but I
do not notice Cajetan observing a strict technical difference between “significa-
tum” and “res significata.”
23. In fact, this is the reason why in certain contexts Cajetan is reluctant
to describe predication in terms of inherence, and instead describes what looks
like the theory sometimes contrasted with the inherence theory of predication,
210 — Notes to Page 92

the identity theory (or “two-names theory”) of predication. CPA 47: “Praedicari
de aliquo cum nihil aliud importet quam inesse seu convenire illi de quo praedi-
catur, consequens est quod praedicari de aliquo secundum nomen nihil aliud sit
quam nomen praedicati convenire subiecto, ita quod nomen praedicata sit etiam
nomen subiecti; nec refert an tale nomen sit subiecti secundum substantiam aut
secundum qualitatem, vel quodcumque aliud extraneum, Sufficit enim quod
nomen illud eius aliquo modo nota sit essentialiter vel denominative intrinsece
vel extrinsece; et similiter sequitur quod praedicari secundum rationem nihil
aliud sit quam rationem praedicata convenire subiecto, ita quod ratio praedi-
cati sit etiam ratio subiecti; nec refert an ratio praedicati sit tota ratio subiecti
an sit pars rationis, dummodo sit pars intrinseca, quod dico propter ea quae
cadunt in ratione ut addita, sicut subiectum est pars rationis accidentis et cor-
pus animae.” CDEE §9: “. . . veritas propositionis, quae est entis secundo modo
significati, nihil aluid est quam compositio facta in secund operatione intellectus
objecto conformis, verbi gratia, Sortes est caecus, ly est non significat inhaeren-
tiam caecitatis in Sorte, eo quod caecitas omni inhaerentia caret, cum inhaerere
realium accidentium sit, sed significat compositionem factam ab intellectu ad-
equante seipsum per illam objecto, Sorti, scilicet, carente virtute visiva, unde V
Metaph. in alia littera, dicitur quod ens significans veritatem propositionis signi-
ficat quoniam propositio est vera.” But cf. CPI 20–21: “Imaginandum enim est,
quod intellectus videns Sortem habere albedinem, prima sua attentione format
hanc propositionem mentalem: Sortes est albus in qua propositione tot termi-
nos poscit, quot videt extra animam res; tria siquidem ibi videt, scilicet Sortem,
albedinem et inhaesionem albedinis in Sorte.” The point is that on Cajetan’s
semantics, in a true sentence the predicate-term and the subject-term both sup-
posit for the same thing(s), because the predicate supposits for that in which the
significate of the predicate inheres. Some articulations of the (realist) inherence
theory, in emphasizing its contrast with the (nominalist) identity theory, have
denied that in the realist theory the predicate supposits. On the supposition of
the predicate in realist semantics, see Stephen Theron, “The Supposition of the
Predicate,” Modern Schoolman 77 (1999): 73–78.
24. Klima, “The Semantic Principles Underlying Saint Thomas Aquinas’s
Metaphysics of Being,” carries out this project with respect to Aquinas, with
results substantially the same as those we would expect from a similar analysis
of Cajetan.
25. However, what cannot be avoided is that the different senses of “being”
that are required to account for these different verification conditions are an
instance of “the analogy of being.” Since this outline of Cajetan’s semantic as-
sumptions was supposed to be preparatory for his semantic analysis of analogi-
cal signification, it might seem circular for a semantic analysis of analogy to
presuppose semantic principles that in turn presuppose the analogy of “being.”
However, it is not circular. Cajetan’s theory of analogy is not an attempt to prove
that there is analogy, but rather an attempt to show that, given that there is anal-
ogy, we can make some sense of its semantic conditions. That these semantic
conditions are themselves described in the context of a general semantic theory
that in turn is articulated by means of terms that are analogical is no more cir-
cular than a presentation of the semantic conditions of univocity that assumes
 Notes to Pages 93–94 — 211

the existence of (and makes use of) univocal terms. Furthermore, the occurrence
of analogical terms even in Cajetan’s basic framework of semantic principles
should at least appease those who might otherwise fear that a semantic analysis
of analogy is an attempt to analyze analogy away.
26. CPA 16: “non debet denominativum differre a nomine formae denomi-
natis in significatione. . . . Differentia autem in modo significandi inventa inter
denominativum et denominans non excluditur.”
27. Otherwise, e.g., “lapis” (stone)—in the accusative “lapidem”—which
was hypothesized to have been imposed from “laedens pedem” (foot-hurting),
would have foot-hurting as its denominating form, when in fact it denominates
stones on account of their nature, which could be called “lapiditas.” Cf. the dis-
cussions of imposition in Klima, “The Semantic Principles Underlying Saint
Thomas Aquinas’s Metaphysics of Being,” 110–11, and Ashworth, “Significa-
tion and Modes of Signifying in Thirteenth-Century Logic,” 46–50.
28. In general, it is remarkable that there is so little explicit reflection and
explanation of the notions of intrinsic or extrinsic denomination, both in mod-
ern scholarship and in the medieval authors. While the distinction has obvious
precedents in Aquinas and before, it appears in technical terminology only later,
and the examples and applications quickly become familiar, but even in a sys-
tematic work of logic such as the Ars Logica of John Poinsot’s Cursus Philosophi-
cus the notion of extrinsic denomination is taken for granted and neither fully
defined nor explained.
29. E.g., Aquinas, In octo libros Physicorum exposito 3.5, §322; Aquinas,
Summa Theologiae I.6.4.
30. For a discussion of the notion of extrinsic denomination in Aquinas,
see Thomas J. Loughran, “Efficient Causality and Extrinsic Denomination
in the Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas” (Ph.D. diss., Fordham University,
1969), 78–123.
31. The Summa Totius Logicae was also occasionally attributed to Peter
of Spain. According to the hypothesis of Angel d’Ors, the author is one Gra-
tiadeus of Asculo, a fourteenth-century Dominican logician, as attested by St.
Antonio de Firenze (1389–1459) and Johannes Trithemius. See p. 238 of Angel
D’Ors, “Petrus Hispanus O.P., Auctor Summularum (II): Further Documents
and Problems,” Vivarium 39 (2001): 209–54.
32. Summa Totius Logicae tr. 5, c. 6: “Dupliciter autem potest aliquid de alio
praedicari denominative, sive illud denominare. Uno modo quod talis praedica-
tio seu denominatio fiat ab aliquo quod sit intrinsecum ei de quo fit talis praedi-
catio seu denominatio, quod videlicet ipsum perficiat sive per identitatem sive
per inhaerentiam. . . . Secondo modo fit denominatio ab extrinseco, scilicet ab eo
quod non est in denominato formali, sed est aliquod absolutum extrinsecum, a
quo fit talis denominatio.”
33. John P. Doyle, “Prolegomena to a Study of Extrinsic Denomination in
the Works of Francis Suarez, S.J.,” Vivarium 22 (1984): 122–23. Doyle is careful
to offer this as a provisional description, not a definition of extrinsic denomina-
tion as that was understood by Suarez or other medieval philosophers.
34. Summa Totius Logicae tr. 5, c. 6: “Sciendum est autem, quod de-
nominatio ab extrinseco requirit aliquem per se respectum inter extrinsecum
212 — Notes to Pages 95–97

denominans et denominatum ab eo; quia oportet quod per se et ex conditione

rerum talis modus denominandi consequatur res; et ideo oportet quod illud a
quo fit talis denominatio, sit fundamentum per se alicujus habitudinis.”
35. CST I.6.4, nn. 3, 8: “. . . denominatio est duplex, quaedam intrinseca,
et quaedam extrinseca. Vocatur denominatio intrinseca, quando forma denomi-
nativi est in eo quod denominatur, ut album, quantum, etc.: denominatio vero
extrinseca, quando forma denominativi non est in denominato, ut locatum,
mensuratum, et similia. . . . Dupliciter enim contingit aliquid dici tale ab aliquo
extrinseco. Uno modo, ita quod ratio denominationis sit ipsa relatio ad extrin-
secum, ut urina dicitur sana, sola relatione signi signi ad sanitatem. Alio modo,
ita quod ratio denominationis sit, non relatio similitudinis, aut quaevis alia, sed
forma quea est fundamentum relationis similitudinis ad illud extrinsecum; ut
aer dicitur lucidus luce solari, ea ratione qua participat eam per formam lu-
minis.” It is not clear whether we can regard one of Cajetan’s two alternatives
as reducible to the other, insofar as a relation is only called extrinsic because its
foundation is extrinsic.
36. Cf., e.g., Cajetan’s discussion of the objects of understanding being ex-
trinsically denominated as intelligible or as actually understood; CDEE §67.
37. This often seems to be the case in late medieval discussions of whether
the “six principles” (the last six of the accidental categories) were real beings or
not; it was often suggested that they were not, and that they were denominated
extrinsically. Cf. Summa Totius Logicae, tr. 5, c. 6. For discussion of these de-
bates and references, cf. William E. McMahon, “Some Non-Standard Views of
the Categories,” in La tradition médiévale des Catégories (XIIe–XVe siècles): XIIIe
symposium européen de logique et de sémantique médiévales, ed. Joël Biard and
Irène Rosier-Catach (Louvain: Peters, 2003), 53–67, and William E. McMahon,
“The Categories in Some Post-Medieval Spanish Philosophers,” in Medieval and
Renaissance Logic in Spain, ed. I. Angelelli and P. Pérez-Ilzarbe (Hildesheim:
Georg Olms Verlag, 2000), 355–70.
38. This is at least the case with what were called relatives secundum esse,
as opposed to relatives secundum dici; the former signify a relation, the latter
only imply a relation insofar as they signify something that is the foundation of
a relation.
39. Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I–II.7.2, ad 1: “In his autem quae ad aliq-
uid dicuntur, denominatur aliquid non solum ab eo quod inest, sed etiam ab eo
quod extrinsicus adjacet.”
40. Cf. CPA 4–5.
41. There are some conditions, at least, in which we would be willing to
say that the eye sees itself, and not just that the eye sees only its reflection. Alter-
natively we could have considered the case in which Socrates is thinking about
something, and what he is thinking about is his own intellect.
42. CPA 124: “Ly vero «ad aliquid» sive «relativa» potest accipi duplici-
ter scilicet: materialiter pro re illa quae relativa vel ad aliquid denominatur, et
formaliter pro ipsa relatione seu re ut habet relatione, verbi gratia: dominus po-
test accipi pro illo homine qui denominatur dominus, et potest accipi pro illo in
quantum dominium habet.”
 Notes to Pages 100–103 — 213

C hapter Six

1. CPA 10: “Ly «diversa» non coartatur ad diversitatem simpliciter, sed

communiter accipitur ut comprehendit sub se diversitatem simpliciter vel secun-
dum quid, totaliter vel partialiter, ita quod aequivoca dicuntur et illa quorum
ratio secundum illud nomen est penitus diversa, et illa quorum ratio secundum
illud nomen commune est aliquo modo diversa.”
2. CPA 10: “Et propter hoc cave ne dixeris hic esse diffinita tantum pure
aequivoca, quae alio vocabulo dicuntur aequivoca a casu, sed dicito aequivoca
in communi, ut comprehendunt analoga quae aequivoca a consilio sunt, et pure
aequivoca diffiniri, et quod pure aequivocis convenit habere rationem substan-
tiae diversam penitus, analalogis vero diversam aliquo modo.”
3. Cf. CST I.13.5 n. 12: “analoga comprehenduntur sub aequivocis, quae
in Praedicamentis definiuntur.” Of course in finding analogy inchoately con-
tained in the Categories discussion of equivocation, Cajetan is just following a
long tradition, which includes Boethius and goes back at least to Porphyry. Bo-
ethius, In Categorias Aristotelis Libri Quatuor, in PL 64, 166B–167A. Porphyry,
In Aristotelis Praedicamenta per interrogationem et responsionem brevis explanatio,
in Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca, IV.1, ed. A. Busse (Berlin: Reimeri, 1887),
65.16–67.34.
4. CPA 11: “Quot autem modis contingat variari analogiam et quomodo,
nunc quum summarie loquimur, silentio pertransibimus, specialem de hoc trac-
tatum, si Deo placuerit, cito confecturi.”
5. One of the few studies to compare Cajetan’s teaching on analogy in
CDEE with that in DNA is Aloys Goergen, Kardinal Cajetans Lehre von der
Analogie; Ihr Verhältnis zu Thomas von Aquin (Speyer a. Rh.: Pilger-Druckerei,
1938), 13–18, 20–22.
6. CDEE §21: “Univocata sunt, quorum nomen est commune, et ratio
secundum illud nomen est eadem simpliciter. Pura aequivocata sunt, quorum
nomen est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen est diversa simpliciter.
Analogata sunt quorum nomen est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen
est aliquo modo eadem, et aliquo modo diversa seu secundum quid eadem, et
secundum quid diversa. . . . Unde analogum est medium inter purum aequivo-
cum et univocum, sicut inter idem simpliciter et diversum simpliciter cadit me-
dium idem secundum quid et diversum secundum quid.”
7. CDEE §18: “. . . aliquid dupliciter contingit de aliquibus praedicari per
prius et posterius. Uno modo secundum esse illius praedicati. Alio modo secun-
dum propriam rationem ejusdem. Illud dicitur praedicari analogice secundum
esse, quod perfectius habet esse in uno quam in alio et sic omne genus praedi-
catur per prius et posterius de suis speciebus, eo quod perfectius esse necessario
habet in una specie, quam in alia.”
8. CDEE §21: “Nota secundo quod duplicia sunt analogata: quaedam
secundum determinatam habitudenem unius ad alterum; quaedam secundum
proportionalitatem. Exemplum: Substantia et accidens sunt analogata primo
modo sub ente; Deus autem et creatura secundo modo: infinita enim est distantia
inter Deum et creaturam. Differunt autem haec plurimum: quoniam analogata
214 — Notes to Pages 104–105

primo modo ita se habent, quod posterius secundum nomen analogum diffinitur
per suum prius: puta accidens, inquantum ens per substantiam. Analogata vero
secundo modo non: creatura enim inquantum ens non diffinitur per Deum.”
9. CDEE §21: “Unde analogata primo modo habent nomen commune,
et rationem secundum illud nomen secundum quid eadem et secundum quid
diversam: per hoc quod analogum illud simpliciter, id est sine additione ali-
qua, de primo dicitur, et de aliis vero non nisi diversimode respiciendo primum,
quod cadit in eorum rationibus sicut in exemplo de sano manifestum est: analo-
gata vero secundo modo habent nomen commune et rationem secundum illud
nomen alliquo modo eadem et aliquo modo diversam: non propter hoc, quod
illud simplicitur dicatur de primo et de aliis relative ad primum, sed habent
rationem eadem secundum quid propter identitatem proportionis, quae in eis
invenitur, et secundum quid diversam, propter diversitatem naturarum sup-
positarum illius proportionibus. Exemplum: Forma et materia substantialis et
forma et materia accidentium sunt analogata quaedam sub nominibus formae
et materiae: habent enim nomen commune, puta formam et materiam, et ratio-
nem secundum nomen formae sive materiae eamdem et diversam hoc modo,
quia forma substantialis ita se habet ad substantiam, sicut forma accidentalis ad
accidens; similiter materia substantiae ita se habet ad substantiam, sicut materia
accidentis ad accidens: utrobique enim salvatur identitas proportionum cum di-
versitate naturarum et unitate nominis. Hunc modum analogiae exprimit Com-
mentator (XII Metaph., com. XXVIII), et clarius cum Aristotele (I Ethic., cap.
VII).”
10. CDEE §21: “Ens analogice utroque modo analogiae dicitur de substan-
tia et accidente.”
11. The point cannot be, therefore, just that one mode of analogy is rele-
vant to what some refer to as the “transcendental” predication of being (being as
said of God and creatures) and another is relevant to “predicamental” predica-
tion (being said of the different categories). More will be said about Cajetan’s
treatment of such “mixed cases” later in this chapter.
12. We cannot rule out the possibility that Cajetan may have in mind here
Aquinas’s distinction between analogy secundum esse and analogy secundum in-
tentionem in I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1, even if he does not cite that text. But even if
Cajetan does have that text in mind, we must note that he alters its terminology
slightly and does not apply it consistently. Cajetan says: “. . . aliquid dupliciter
contingit de aliquibus praedicari per prius et posterius. Uno modo secundum
esse illius praedicati. Alio modo secundum propriam rationem ejusdem”
(CDEE §18). But being predicated “per prius et posterius . . . secundum esse” is
here sufficient to describe (what Cajetan will later call) analogy of inequality, al-
though according to a parallelism with I Sent. 19.5.2 ad 1, two modes of analogy
(Cajetan’s analogy of inequality and analogy of proportionality) should be per
prius et posterius secundum esse, and a sufficient description of inequality is that
it is “secundum esse et non secundum intentionem.” Furthermore, in discussing
what will come to be called analogy of attribution and analogy of proportion-
ality, Cajetan does not say that the former is analogy “secundum rationem et non
secundum esse,” nor does he say that the latter is analogy “secundum rationem
 Notes to Pages 106–108 — 215

et secundum esse.” Cajetan’s terminology in these passages thus does not suggest
that he is trying to justify his threefold distinction by basing it on implicit refer-
ence to the threefold distinction in I Sent. 19.5.2, ad 1.
13. CDEE §21: “. . . cum talis unitas apud Aristotelem (IV Metaph., text.
com. II) sufficiat ad objectum scientiae, ens non oportet poni univocum ad hoc
quod passiones habeat et contradictionem fundet, et reliqua hujusmodi habeant
sibi convenientia.” The reference to Aquinas’s commentary on the Metaphysics
is apparently to book 4, lect. 1 (§547 Cathala).
14. Cajetan presents the arguments of Scotus in CDEE §19.
15. Among those who have inaccurately claimed that Cajetan’s distinction
between modes of analogy is based on or defined in terms of the properties of
extrinsic and intrinsic denomination are E. J. Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivo-
cation in Thirteenth-Century Logic: Aquinas in Context,” Mediaeval Studies 54
(1992): 126, and John D. Beach, “Analogous Naming, Extrinsic Denomination
and the Real Order,” Modern Schoolman 42 (1965): 201.
16. DNA §10–11; Cf. DNA §29.
17. DNA §4: “Analoga secundum inaequalitatem vocantur, quorum nomen
est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen est omnino eadem, inaequaliter
tamen participata”; §8: “Analoga autem secundum attributionem sunt, quorum
nomen commune est, ratio autem secundum illud nomen est eadem secundum
terminum, et diversa secundum habitudines ad illum”; §23: “[A]naloga secun-
dum proportionalitatem dici, quorum nomen est commune, et ratio secundum
illud nomen est proportionaliter eadem.”
18. The one apparent exception to this parallel is that Aristotle was careful
to emphasize that he was not defining things as they are, but as they are signified
by our terms. Thus, as has often been noted, Aristotle wrote that equivocals and
univocals “dicuntur,” rather than “sunt.” Cajetan only follows this inconsistently;
he uses “sunt” for analogy of attribution, but since he uses “vocantur” for analogy
of inequality and “dici” for analogy of proportionality, I think we can assume
that the deviation is not significant. On Cajetan’s appreciation of Aristotle’s use
of “dicitur,” see chap. 2, n. 16, above.
19. Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation in Thirteenth-Century Logic,”
107. Cf. Cajetan’s use of “latere” at DNA §108, quoting Aristotle (Sophisticis
Elenchis, 182b22). Ramirez also cites remarks on genus in Aristotle’s Physics in
connection with analogy of inequality. Jacobus M. Ramirez, “De analogia se-
cundum doctrinam Aristotelico-Thomisticam,” Ciencia Tomista 24 (1921): 195.
20. CDEE §18: “Unde Commentator (XII Metaph., com. II) dicit quod
prioritas et posterioritas specierum non impedit unitatem generis.” DNA §7:
“Perhibet quoque huic analogiae testimonium Averroës in XII Metaph., text. 2
dicens, cum unitate generis stare prioritatem et posterioritatem eorum, quae sub
genere sunt.”
21. The distinction also turns out to be the same as the distinction between
the nature absolutely considered and the nature as it is in things. Cf. CDEE
§55. This also helps us to make sense of why Cajetan can say that in analogy of
inequality, “the analogates are the same in the ratio signified by that common
name, but they are not the same in the being [esse] of that ratio” (DNA §6).
216 — Notes to Pages 109–110

22. DNA §6: “Non solum enim planta est nobilior minera; sed corporei-
tas in planta est nobilior corporeitate in minera.” While this formulation might
seem to depend entirely on a specific version of Aristotelian hylomorphist meta-
physics, even someone who rejects that metaphysics can understand the intuitive
point that Cajetan is trying to express: that stone and plant are equally bodies,
though they are not equal bodies. Cf. Aquinas, preparing us to understand how
not all sins are equal, Quaestiones disputate de malo, II.9, ad 16: “Dicendum quod
omnia animalia sunt aequaliter animalia, sed unam animal est altero maius et
perfectus.” In fact, while Cajetan’s and Aquinas’s language presupposes a hi-
erarchy of species within a genus, all that matters for a genus term to signify
by analogy of inequality is that there be a diversity of species. For a brief but
common-sense discussion of analogy of inequality (“the pseudo-analogy, the
stretched univocity called analogy of inequality by Cajetan”) see Yves Simon,
“On Order in Analogical Sets,” in Philosopher at Work: Essays by Yves R. Simon,
ed. Anthony O. Simon (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999), 135–36,
138.
23. DNA §§5, 7.
24. DNA §3.
25. Cajetan also notes that this is why even though in this sense every genus
term is analogous, they are not normally so called; DNA §5. Aristotle says that
generic unity implies analogical unity in Metaphysics V.6 (1017a2).
26. Herbert Thomas Schwartz, “Analogy in St. Thomas and Cajetan,”
New Scholasticism 28 (1954): 127–44.
27. Frank R. Harrison also fails to understand Cajetan’s comments on anal-
ogy of inequality because he fails to understand Cajetan’s semantic principles;
in his case, a Wittgensteinian inclination prevents him from understanding the
semantic function of the ratio. Frank R. Harrison, “The Cajetan Tradition of
Analogy,” Franciscan Studies 23 (1963): esp. 185–86. Armand Maurer criticizes
Cajetan’s position on analogy of inequality, but in fact it is precisely the posi-
tion that Maurer finds and agrees with in Aquinas: accepting it from the point
of view of the natural philosopher, rejecting it from the point of view of the
logician. Maurer, “St. Thomas and the Analogy of Genus,” New Scholasticism
29 (1955): 127–44. Maurer complains that Cajetan’s position is evidence of his
“essentialism,” as compared with the “existential” approach of Aquinas. Maurer
is apparently reading Cajetan through the somewhat distorting lens of Étienne
Gilson, “Cajétan et l’existence,” Tijdschrift voor Philosophie 15 (1953): 267–86. For
correctives to Gilson’s interpretation of Cajetan see Laurence Dewan, “Étienne
Gilson and the Actus Essendi,” Maritain Studies/Étudies Maritainiennes 15 (1999):
70–96, and John P. Reilly, Cajetan’s Notion of Existence (The Hague: Mouton,
1971). Riva discusses the allegations of Cajetan’s “essentialism” in Analogia e uni-
vocità in Tommaso de Vio “Gaetano” (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1995), 65–82.
28. DNA §8: “. . . sanum commune nomen est medicinae, urinae et animali;
et ratio omnium in quantum sana sunt, ad unum terminum (sanitatem scilicet),
diversas dicit habitudines. Si quis enim assignet quid est animal in quantum
sanum, subiectum dicet sanitatis; urinam vero in quantum sanam, signum sani-
tatis; medicinam autem in quantum sanam, causam sanitatis proferet.” Cf. DNA
§52.
 Notes to Pages 111–112 — 217

29. More specifically, it is a relation secundum esse, not secundum dici; cf.
chap. 5, n. 38, supra.
30. CST I.13.6, n. 4: “Quaedam enim significant ipsos respectus ad pri-
mum analogatum, ut patet de sano.” This is confirmed in Ross’s attempt to for-
mulate definitions of the different modes of analogy, where it is clear that a
word analogous by attribution, insofar as it signifies a secondary term, signifies a
relation. James F. Ross, “Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language”
in Aquinas: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. Anthony Kenny (Garden City,
N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1969), 115.
31. DNA §10: “Attribuuntur autem huic analogiae multae conditiones, or-
dinate se cosequentes: scilicet quod analogia ista sit secundum denominationem
extrinsecam tantum; ita quod primum analogatorum tantum est tale formaliter,
caetera autem denominantur talia extrinsece.”
32. Even Ashworth is imprecise on this point, referring to “Cajetan’s
notorious claim . . . that the supposed division between analogy of attribution
and analogy of proper proportionality is based on the difference between in-
trinsic and extrinsic denomination.” Ashworth, “Analogy and Equivocation in
Thirteenth-Century Logic,” 126.
33. DNA §11: “Sed diligenter advertendum est, quod haec huiusmodi ana-
logiae conditio, scilicet quod non sit secundum genus causae formalis inhae-
rentis, sed semper secundum aliquid extrinsecum, est formaliter intelligenda et
non materialiter: idest non est intelligendum per hoc, quod omne nomen quod
est analogum per attributionem, sit commune analogatis sic, quod primo tan-
tum conveniat formaliter, caeteris autem extrinseca denominatione, ut de sano
et medicinali accidit; ista enim universalis est falsa, ut patet de ente et bono; nec
potest haberi ex dictis, nisi materialiter intellectis. Sed est ex hoc intelligendum,
quod omne nomen analogum per attributionem ut sic, vel in quantum sic ana-
logum, commune est analogatis sic, quod primo convenit formaliter, reliquis
autem extrinseca denominatione.”
34. DNA §11: “Ens enim quamvis formaliter conveniat omnibus substan-
tiis et accidentibus etc., in quantum tamen entia, omnia dicuntur ab ente subiec-
tive ut sic, sola substantia est ens formaliter; caetera autem entia dicuntur, quia
entis passiones vel generationes etc. sunt; licet entia formaliter alia ratione dici
possint.”
35. E.g., cf. John Beach, “Analogous Naming, Extrinsic Denomination,
and the Real Order,” Modern Schoolman 42 (1965): 204, and Henry Chavannes,
The Analogy Between God and the World in Saint Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth,
trans. William Lumley (New York: Vantage Press, 1992), 53–58. Masiello finds
Cajetan’s qualification an odd concession. Ralph J. Masiello, “The Analogy of
Proportion According to the Metaphysics of St. Thomas,” Modern Schoolman 35
(1958): 95–97. Jean-Luc Marion, Sur la théologie blanche de Descartes, 94n33, calls
Cajetan’s clarification “l’étrange précaution.”
36. Ralph McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy (Washington, D.C.: Catholic
University of America Press, 1996), 20. Cf. McInerny, The Logic of Analogy: An
Interpretation of St. Thomas (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1961), 7–9.
37. Although this has been McInerny’s interpretation for some time, in this
most recent book on analogy it is accompanied by an unfortunate mistranslation
218 — Notes to Pages 113–115

of part of Cajetan’s qualification, which does indeed render that qualification

nonsensical: “Although being belongs formally to all substances and accidents,
etc., insofar as they are called beings they are all denominated from the being which
is a subject, only substance is being formally; the others are called beings because
they are properties or becomings of being, etc., although they can be called be-
ings formally for other reasons” (McInerny, Aquinas and Analogy, 20, emphasis
added). However, McInerny had earlier rendered the passage correctly: “For
although being agrees formally with all substances, accidents, etc., nevertheless
insofar as all are denominated from being taken subjectively as such, substance alone
is being formally, and the others are called beings because they are qualities,
activities, etc. of being. However, under a different aspect they could be called
beings in a formal sense.” Ralph McInerny, “The Logic of Analogy,” New Scho-
lasticism 31 (1957): 157 (emphasis added).
38. Cajetan also uses a reduplicative term when he describes analogy of
attribution at CDEE §21: “. . . accidens, inquantum ens [diffinitur] per substan-
tiam. . . . creatura enim inquantum ens non diffinitur per Deum.” We are not
surprised to find similar reduplicative phrases in other expositions of Cajetan’s
position. Thus Penido writes: “L’attribution en tant qu’attribution ne pose pas
autre chose parce qu’ell est un pur rapport de dépendence” (emphasis added).
M. T.-L. Penido, Le rôle de l’analogie en théologie dogmatique (Paris: Librairie
Philosophique J. Vrin, 1931), 27. According to Anderson, followers of Cajetan
“do not hold that there is nothing intrinsic to the secondary analogates but only
that they do not realize formally the analogical notion as such” (second emphasis
added). Anderson, The Bond of Being: An Essay on Analogy and Existence (St.
Louis: Herder, 1949), 109–10. Cf. Yves Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,”
165–66: “If the unity of a concept is analogical, its inferiors make up an ordered
set, and . . . neither the unity of the set nor the meaning of each member, con-
sidered qua member of the set, is understood except in the system of relations of
priority and posteriority . . .” (emphasis Simon’s).
39. Harrison, “The Cajetan Tradition of Analogy,” 191, maintains that
Cajetan’s theory couldn’t account for the case of healthy skin.
40. A similar argument could be made for “healthy” as predicated of food.
Some foods may have their own intrinsic health, although “healthy” is the tra-
ditional example of a term analogous by attribution which denominates food
extrinsically. Cf. Aquinas, De Veritate 1.4, and Hampus Lyttkens, The Analogy
Between God and the World: An Investigation of Its Background and Its Use by
Thomas of Aquino (Uppsala: Almqvist and Wiksells Boktrycheri AB, 1952), 331.
We have here also the material for a reply to Beach, who claims that Cajetan is
unable to explain how a leech or oyster might be denominated healthy extrinsi-
cally, and yet still be intrinsically healthy. Beach, “Analogous Naming, Extrinsic
Denomination, and the Real Order,” 204.
41. Log. p. 2, q. 13, a. 4 (487b25–32): “possunt tamen in illis analogatis
minus principalibus praerequiri aliqui respectus intrinseci, non quibus denomi-
nentur analogice et sub forma analoga constituantur, sed quibus respiciant illud
principale analogatum, ut deinde denominentur extrinsece ab illo analogice.”
42. Cajetanians have expressed the point in a variety of ways. Garrigou-
Lagrange puts it this way: “Analogy of attribution never implies intrinsic
 Notes to Pages 115–116 — 219

denomination in the various analogates, but does not necessarily exclude it.”
Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, God: His Existence and His Nature, vol. 2, trans.
Bede Rose (St. Louis: Herder, 1934, 1936), 207. Anderson, The Bond of Being,
112, describes mixed cases as “a kind of ‘material coincidence’ of attribution
and proportionality.” John of St. Thomas speaks of cases of proportionality
which contain analogy of attribution “virtually”: “Analogia entis ad decem
praedicamenta non sufficienter explicatur dicendo, quod est transcendentiae,
sed dicendum est quod est analogia proportionalitatis formaliter, licet virtuali-
ter analogiam attributionis seu proportionis includet.” John of St. Thomas, Ars
Logica p. 2, q. 14, a. 3 (512b26–33). Cf. Ibid., q. 13, a. 4 (489b42–490a6): “Quodsi
inquiras, quomodo ista duplex analogia possit eidem convenire, v.g. enti, cum
habeant conditiones omnino oppositas. . . . Respondetur non dari utramque
analogiam formaliter, sed alteram virtualiter.” Joseph Owens arrives at a very
similar treatment of the relationship between Aristotle’s two kinds of equivoca-
tion (pros hen equivocation and analogy): “There is nothing in the Aristotelian
text . . . to preclude the same things from being equivocal in both ways. . . . The
two types, though clearly distinct, are not mutually exclusive. Just as things may
be denominated univocally or equivocally by the same word, according as their
nature demands, so things may be expressed by the same term [either] analo-
gously or through reference, according as their nature allows.” Joseph Owens,
The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian “Metaphysics”: A Study in the Greek Back-
ground of Medieval Thought, 3rd ed. (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval
Studies, 1978), 125.
43. Suarez, Disputationes Metaphysicae, vol. 2, disp. 28, sect. 3, ¶¶14, 17; disp.
32, sect. 2, ¶14 (Paris, 1866; repr. Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1965), 17, 19, 323;
P. Pedro Descoqs, Institutiones Metaphysicae Generalis (Paris: Beauchesne, 1925),
260–69; Descoqs, Praelectiones Theologiae Naturalis, vol. 2 (Paris: Beauchesne,
1932),: 765; Giulio Righi, Studio sulla Analogia in S. Tommaso (Milan: Marzorati
Editore, 1981), 97–106.
44. E. J. Ashworth, “Suárez on the Analogy of Being: Some Historical
Background,” Vivarium 33 (1995): 59–65; Ashworth, “Domingo de Soto (1494–
1560) on Analogy and Equivocation,” in Studies on the History of Logic, ed.
Ignacio Angelelli and María Cerezo (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1996), 122–23;
Riva, Analogia e univocità in Tommaso de Vio “Gaetano,” 139–64.
45. Ashworth, “Suárez on the Analogy of Being,” 59.
46. Anderson, The Bond of Being, 232.
47. Ibid., 232–33. Similarly, a review note by R. Bernard in Bulletin
Thomist 1 (1924): 124–27, suggests that the different treatments of analogy by
the Suarezian Blanche and the Cajetanian Ramirez might be attributed to the
fact that the former considers analogy in actu exercito, while the latter consid-
ers analogy in actu signato. Cajetan does not invoke this distinction himself in
this context, although he introduces the terminology at DNA §78–79; cf. DNA
§72. On this distinction in general, a study by Nuchelmans confirms the sense
invoked by Anderson and Bernard that it is the distinction between consid-
ering a form (or significate of a term) either “as concretely realized in some
individual or as abstractly conceived of in an intellectual act of simple apprehen-
sion.” Gabriel Nuchelmans, “The Distinction Actus Exercitus/Actus Significatus
220 — Notes to Pages 116–118

in Medieval Semantics,” in Meaning and Inference in Medieval Philosophy, ed.

Norman Kretzmann (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1988), 57–90.
48. Ironically, in the context of his criticism of Suarez, Jean-Luc Marion
might be said to fall into this same Suarezian trap of failing to distinguish be-
tween the signification of an analogical term just as conceived by the intellect,
and the signification as concretely realized in the analogates. Thus, after ob-
serving that Cajetan grants that accidents have intrinsic (or formal) being, and
that even created beings have inherent goodness, Marion writes: “Mais, juste-
ment aux yeux de Cajetan, cet être formel et cette bonté inhérente aux ana-
logués dérivés ne peuvent pas, sauf contradiction, appartenir aussi, per prius et
formellement, au seul analogum princeps; il faut donc invoquer un autre être
et une autre bonté qui, intrinsèques à l’analogum princeps et à lui uniquement,
n’atteindront les autres analogués que par une dénomination extrinsèque. . . .
Cajetan n’envisage jamais l’hypothèse que le même être, la même bonté à la fois
constituent intrinsèquement, mais sur un mode déficient, les analogués seconds
et relèvent intrinsèquement de Dieu qui les constitue” (Marion, Sur la théologie
blanche de Descartes, 94). Of these two sentences, the latter is false, and the for-
mer is confused by an equivocation. Cajetan needs only to posit an other being
and an other goodness “formally”—that is, as distinct semantic entities—to ob-
serve the difference between the way a term signifies by analogy of attribution
and the way a term signifies by analogy of proportionality. But of course as a
metaphysician, Cajetan entertains—indeed, regards as true—the hypothesis
that the same being and the same goodness are intrinsic to God and creatures
(provided Marion’s qualification that they are in creatures only in a “deficient
way,” and provided the further qualification that the “sameness” here is not
specific or generic but proportional).
49. E. J. Ashworth, “Equivocation and Analogy in Fourteenth Century
Logic: Ockham, Burley and Buridan,” in Historia Philosophiae Medii Aevi: Stu-
dien zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, vol 1, ed. Burkhard Mojsisch
and Olaf Pluta (Amsterdam: Gruner, 1991), 28.
50. Ashworth, “Signification and Modes of Signifying in Thirteenth-
Century Logic,” 67. Cf. the many other comments by Ashworth on this theme,
quoted and cited in chap. 3 above.
51. DNA §8; cf. §4 and §19.
52. And at DNA §12 Cajetan explains that this is true whether we consider
the “one” universally or particularly.
53. DNA §14.
54. DNA §15.
55. DNA §19.
56. DNA §20.
57. DNA §7: “In huius modi autem analogis, quomodo inveniantur unitas,
abstractio, praedicatio, comparatio, demonstratio et alia huiusmodi, non oportet
determinare; quoniam univoca sunt secundum veritatem, et univocorum can-
ones in eis servandi sunt.”
58. DNA §22: “Quomodo autem de huiusmodi analogis sit scientia, et con-
tradictiones et demonstrationes, et consequentiae et alia huiusmodi de eis fiant,
 Notes to Pages 122–125 — 221

ex dictis, et consuetudine Aristotelis patet. Oportet enim significationes diversas

prius distinguere (propter quod ambigua apud Arabes haec dicuntur), et deinde
a primo ad alia procedere.” It is commonly said that Cajetan preferred analogy
of proportionality to analogy of attribution because the latter involves extrinsic
denomination, while the former involves intrinsic denomination. This is only
partially correct. It would be more fair to say that Cajetan prefers analogy of
proportionality because it is more genuinely a mean between univocation and
equivocation; analogy of attribution, as we see here, is logically speaking a form
of equivocation, and although unified secundum quid—that is, with respect to
the primary analogate, to which the secondary analogates are referred—it is not
unified enough to avoid being treated like equivocation in all respects relevant
to the logician—that is, insofar as abstraction, predication, and reasoning are
concerned. But Cajetan’s reasons for preferring proportionality will be taken up
in greater detail in the next chapter.

C hapter Sev en

1. DNA §23: “Ex abusive igitur analogis ad proprie analogiam ascen-

dendo.” Cf. DNA §21.
2. Cajetan also speaks of other “abusive” locutions at DNA §§51, 94, 121.
3. On Latin and Greek use of “analogia” see the introduction. Ashworth
notes that fourteenth- and fifteenth-century authors often remarked on the dis-
tinction between Greek and Latin senses of “analogia.” E. J. Ashworth, “Suárez
on the Analogy of Being: Some Historical Background,” Vivarium 33 (1995):
55–56.
4. DNA §2: “. . . multarum distinctionum adunatio si fieret, confusionem
paret.”
5. The exaggerated phrase is from John Deely, “The Absence of Anal-
ogy,” Review of Metaphysics 55 (March 2002): 539. Cf. Ralph McInerny, Aquinas
and Analogy (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1996), 21,
24, interpreting Cajetan as accusing Aquinas of a “misuse” of language. A simi-
lar overinterpretation of “abusive” is found in Jean-François Courtine, Inventio
analogiae: Métaphysique et ontotheologie (Paris: Vrin, 2005), 231–32.
6. Still, the sense of improper or abusive language should not be dimin-
ished too much; DNA §121 implies that a term’s use can be extended so that its
use is “quite broad and liberal” without being improper, but that if it is extended
too much, it would become “abusive and false.”
7. For examples of some playful metaphorical language in De Nominum
Analogia, see Cajetan’s use of ‘expoliata’ in §111 and ‘pater’ in §122.
8. DNA §23: “analoga secundum proportionalitatem dici, quorum nomen
est commune, et ratio secundum illud nomen est proportionaliter eadem. Vel
sic: Analoga secundum proportionalitatem dicuntur, quorum nomen commune
est, et ratio secundum nomen est similis secundum proportionem.”
9. Cf., e.g., Aristotle, Metaphysics 5.6 (esp. 1016b31–1017a2); Aquinas, De
principiis naturae c. 6.
222 — Notes to Pages 125–130

10. Of course, Aristotle clearly seemed to distinguish these two kinds of

unity in the famous passage in Nichomachean Ethics I.6 (1096b27–29). Cajetan
invokes this passage at DNA §28. On the difference between analogy and pros
hen equivocation in Aristotle, cf. Joseph Owens, The Doctrine of Being in the
Aristotelian “Metaphysics”: A Study in the Greek Background of Medical Thought,
3rd ed. (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1978), 116–25.
11. DNA §23: “. . . quia sicut intelligere, rem animae offert, ita videre cor-
pori animato.”
12. DNA §§25–26: “Fit autem duobus modis analogia haec: scilicet meta-
phorice et proprie. Metaphorice quidem, quando nomen illud commune abso-
lute unam habet rationem formalem, quae in uno analogatorum salvatur, et per
metaphoram de alio dicitur. . . . Proprie vero fit, quando nomen illud commune
in utroque analogatorum absque metaphoris dicitur: ut principium in corde re-
spectu animalis, et in fundamento respectu domus salvatur. Quod, ut Averroës
in comm. septimo I Ethic. ait, proportionaliter de eis dicitur.”
13. This is why in metaphor, as opposed to analogy of proper proportion-
ality, what is secondarily (metaphorically) signified by the term is not understood
without understanding also what is primarily (nonmetaphorically) signified by
the term. Cf. DNA §75–76. More will be said on this in chap. 8, below.
14. A principled theoretical distinction between metaphor and analogy
does not rule out hard cases in practice. Given the development of language,
an extension of a term that is originally only metaphorical may come to be re-
garded as no longer (merely) metaphorical but rather more (analogically) literal.
(E.g., it is not clear that English speakers regard speaking of the “leg” of a table
as merely metaphorical, although it may once have been.) Indeed, at certain
points in a language’s history it may be difficult to determine whether given
terms are being used metaphorically or properly analogically. (E.g., is it only
metaphorically that we speak of “folders” on the “desktop” of a computer oper-
ating system?) Likewise, a term that is predicated of something analogically in
one language may have a correspondingly close translation in another language
whose predication of the same thing would be regarded as at best metaphorical.
(E.g., while a support for a table is called a “leg” in English, the standard French
translation of “leg” [jambe] would be predicated of a table support only meta-
phorically; in French, it would more properly be called a pied [English “foot”].)
Indeed, analogical or metaphorical predications in one language may be com-
pletely nonsensical in another language, as is often the case with poetic expres-
sions and figures of speech (idioms, colloquialisms, slang, etc.). That is why so
much of learning a language involves coming to appreciate what metaphors and
analogies are considered native to a language, and where certain terms are in the
move from metaphor to proper analogy.
15. The formula is used especially in the debate between Penido and
Descoqs, and from there is taken up by, e.g., Garrigou-Lagrange and Mascall.
P. Pedro Descoqs, Institutiones Metaphysicae Generalis, vol. 1 (Paris: Beauchesne,
1925), 269–83; Descoqs, Praelectiones Theologiae Naturalis, vol. 2 (Paris:
Beauchesne, 1932, 1935), 794–96; M. T.-L. Penido, Le rôle de l’analogie en théolo-
gie dogmatique (Paris: Vrin, 1931), 22–25, 65; Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, God:
 Notes to Pages 130–135 — 223

His Existence and His Nature, vol. 1, trans. Bede Rose (St. Louis: Herder, 1934,
1936), 218–20; E. L. Mascall, Existence and Analogy (London: Longmans, Green,
1949), 104–11, 120.
16. Austin Farrer frames the “two unknowns” objection, saying, “The
scheme of proportionality looks as uninformative as it is unexceptionable . . . we
cannot do the sum which the formula appears to propose to us.” Austin Farrer,
Finite and Infinite: A Philosophical Essay (Westminster: Dacre Press, 1943), 53.
Likewise, Mascall frames the objection: “Our equation has . . . two unknowns
and cannot be solved.” Mascall, Existence and Analogy, 110.
17. Garrigou-Lagrange, God: His Existence and His Nature, vol. 1, 227. Cf.
Ibid., vol. 2, 217–20.
18. James F. Anderson, The Bond of Being: An Essay on Analogy and Exis-
tence (St. Louis: Herder, 1949), 286–90. Anderson adds to this a further response
to the two-unknowns objection: he says that the apparent equation actually con-
tains only three terms, not four, since two of the four are analogically the same.
This leads to an objection of circularity, as it seems the fourth term in an analogy
is known only by analogy; the objection of circularity will be considered below.
19. To the objection that in analogy, “it is impossible [except in mathemati-
cal analogies] to ascertain the nature of one term from the other three,” James F.
Anderson agrees, saying, “But metaphysical analogy is not a means of ‘calculat-
ing’ or in any way ascertaining the nature of something from the known natures
of other things. It is in our minds a way of seeing how things are, not of discover-
ing what they are.” Anderson, “Response to Comments,” Review of Metaphysics
5 (1952): 470.
20. Hilary Putnam, “Thoughts Addressed to an Analytical Thomist,” The
Monist 80 (1997): 496–97.
21. Thus McInerny notes that Cajetan’s definition of analogy of propor-
tionality “could be trivialized by rephrasing it thus: ‘those things are said to be
analogous according to analogy which have a common name, and the notion
signified by the name is the same according to analogy.’” McInerny, Aquinas and
Analogy, 22.
22. Anderson, The Bond of Being, 289.
23. Mascall, Existence and Analogy, 104–5.
24. Ibid., 105–6. For a compressed version of the infinite regress objection,
see Hampus Lyttkens, The Analogy Between God and the World: An Investigation
of Its Background and Interpretation of Its Use by Thomas of Aquino (Uppsala:
Almqvist and Wiksells Boktrycheri AB, 1952), 474.
25. Mascall, Existence and Analogy, 109–26.
26. David Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1973), 13.
27. Ibid., 9.
28. Ibid., 10.
29. Ibid., 14.
30. Ibid.
31. Paul C. Hayner, “Analogical Predication,” Journal of the History of Phi-
losophy 55 (1958): 857, 860, 862.
224 — Notes to Pages 135–140

32. Yves Simon, “On Order in Analogical Sets,” in Philosopher at Work:

Essays by Yves R. Simon, ed. Anthony O. Simon (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and
Littlefield, 1999), 139.
33. One may object here that what Cajetan offers is rather an explana-
tion of what it is for two things to be analogically related. Cajetan’s definition
speaks of analogues, after all, not analogous terms. In response, observe that
Cajetan offers an explanation of what it is for things to be said to be analo-
gous by analogy of proportionality: “analoga secundum proportionalitatem dici,
quorum nomen est commune [&c.].” Given Cajetan’s understanding of the na-
ture of logic, this statement proves to be equivalent to the claim made here, that
Cajetan offers an explanation of what it is for a term to be analogous by analogy
of proportionality. Cf. CPA 4–5: “Idem enim est tractare de rebus ut concep-
tis simplici apprehensione, et de vocibus ut significant illas sic conceptas. . . .
Quamvis autem sic intellecta intentio ista sustinenda sit, memores tame esse
oportet eius quod optime ab Avicenna in principio suae Logicae dicitur, scilicet
quod considerare de vocibus non est logici negocii ex intentione, sed necessitas
ad hoc compulit, quoniam res sic conceptas nonnisi verbis exprimimus, doce-
mus, adunamus et ordinamus. . . . Et propterea si quaeratur, de vocibus an de
rebus principaliter hic tractetur, respondendum est quod de rebus non absolute
sed incomplexe conceptis et consequenti necessitate significatis.”
34. James F. Ross, “Analogy as a Rule of Meaning for Religious Language,”
in Aquinas: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. Anthony Kenny (Garden City,
N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1969), 131.
35. To Ross’s hope for a “practicable criterion of similarity relations” it is
tempting to respond with the words of Aristotle: “But the greatest thing by far is
to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learnt from others;
and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive percep-
tion of the similarity in dissimilars” (Poetics, 22 [1459a5–8]). It was no doubt a
failure to secure the kind of “practicable criterion” Ross was looking for that led
to the different turn his work took with Portraying Analogy, although in giving
up the search for such a “practicable criterion” Ross did not have to repudiate
Cajetan and classical semantics.
36. More typical of Aristotelian commentators is to treat the ability to
found a contradiction as a feature of univocal terms, e.g., Simplicius, Commen-
tary on Aristotle’s “Categories, 34.7–11” (On Aristotle’s “Categories 1–4,” trans.
Michael Chase [Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003], 48). But for Simplicius
and others this is still compatible with treating analogous terms as a mean be-
tween univocation and equivocation, exhibiting some features of both. Scotus
may have been the very first to define univocity explicitly in terms of the ability
to found a contradiction, an approach that became common among Scotists.
37. DNA §§3, 23, 27.
38. The priority of attribution in Aquinas is defended by Klubertanz,
Montagnes, Lyttkens, and others. But the findings of Klubertanz also make
clear how difficult it is to discern in Aquinas’s works a coherent teaching on
analogy in general, or on analogy of proportionality and analogy of attribu-
tion in particular. In this light it is somewhat surprising that those who most
 Notes to Pages 141–146 — 225

faithfully remind us that Aquinas had no ex professo teaching should be the most
adamant that Cajetan’s teaching contradicts Aquinas’s own teaching on analogy
of attribution and analogy of proportionality.
39. George B. Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy: A Textual Analy-
sis and Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1960), 92.

C hapter E ight

1. DNA §30: “Sed quoniam, ut dictum est, obscura et necessaria valde res
haec est, accurate distincteque dilucidanda est per plura capitula.”
2. A similar structural observation was made by Robillard, although he
did not classify chap. 11 as pertaining to reasoning. Hyacinthe-Marie Robillard,
De l’analogie et du concept d’être de Thomas de Vio, Cajetan: Traduction, commen-
taires et index (Montreal: Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1963), 253.
3. CPA 8: “Aequivoca ergo diversis respectibus et nomina et res signifi-
care dicuntur. Dicitur enim nomen aliquod aequivocum, quia significat plura
secundum diversas rationes, ut ly ‘canis’ significat caelestem, marinum atque
terrestrem canem. Ipsae vero res significae dicuntur aequivocae, non quia sig-
nificant, sed quia significantur unico vocabulo diversis rationibus, ut sydus illud
et piscis et animal latrabile aequivoca appelantur. Unde ipsum nomen appelari
consuevit aequivocum aequivocans, res vero aequivoca aequivocata.”
4. CPA 11: “Est siquidem duplex univocum, scilicet univocans univocum
etc.”
5. DNA §31: “Et quia in nominibus tria inveniuntur, scilicet vox, concep-
tus in anima, et res extra, seu conceptus obiectivus: ideo singula perlustrando,
dicendum est, quomodo analogum ab analogatis distinguatur.”
6. DNA §33: “Unde inter univocationem et analogiam haec est differen-
tia: quod res fundantes univocationem sunt sic ad invicem similes, quod fun-
damentum similitudinis in una est eiusdem rationis omnino cum fundamento
similitudinis in alia: ita quod nihil claudit in se unius ratio, quod non claudat
alterius ratio. Ac per hoc fundamentum univocae similitudinis, in utroque ex-
tremorum aeque abstrahit ab ipsis extremis. Res autem fundantes analogiam,
sic sunt similes, quod fundamentum similitudinis in una, diversae est rationis
simpliciter a fundamento illius in alia: ita quod unius ratio non claudit id quod
claudit ratio alterius. Ac per hoc fundamentum analogae similitudinis, in neu-
tro extremorum oportet esse abstractum ab ipsis extremis; sed remanent funda-
menta distincta, similia tamen secundum proportionem; propter quod eadem
proportionaliter vel analogice dicuntur.”
7. DNA §34: “Et ut possint omnibus praedicta patere, declarantur exem-
plariter in univocatione huius nominis animal, et analogia huius nominis ens.
Homo, bos, leo et caetera animalia, quia habent in se singulas naturas sensitivas,
seu proprias animalitates, quas constat diversas secundum rem esse, et mutuo
similes: sic quod in quocumque extremo, puta homine aut leone, consider-
etur secundum se animalitas, quae est similitudinis fundamentum, invenitur
aequaliter abstrahens ab eo in quo est, et nihil includens in uno quod non in
226 — Notes to Pages 146–148

alio. Ideo et in rerum natura fundant secundum suas animalitates similitudinem

univocam, quae identitas generica vocatur; et in esse cognito adunantur non ad
duas vel tres animalitates, sed unam tantum, quae animalis nomine in concreto
per se primo significatur, et univoce vocatur communi nomine animal.”
8. DNA §34: “Substantia autem quantitas, qualitas etc., quia non habent
in suis quidditatibus aliquid praedicto modo abstrahibile, puta entitatem, (quo-
niam supra substantialitatem nihil amplius restat), ideo nullam substantialem
univocationem inter se compatiuntur.”
9. DNA §35: “Et quia cum hoc, quod non solum eorum quidditates sunt
diversae, sed etiam primo diversae; retinent similitudinem in hoc, quod unum-
quodque eorum secundum suam proportionem habet esse; ideo et in rerum
natura non secundum aliquam eiusdem rationis in extremis sed secundum pro-
prias quidditates, ut commensuratas his propriis esse fundant analogam idest
proportionalem similitudinem. Et in intellectu adunantur ad tot res, quot sunt
fundamenta, proportionis similitudine unitas, significatas (propter illam simili-
tudinem) entis nomine, et analogice communi nomine vocantur ens. Differenter
ergo res adunantur sub nomine Analogo et Univoco.”
10. Representatio and significatio are not always the same, but here Cajetan’s
“repraesentare” is just a word for the natural signification of the objective concept
(the object of the intellect) by the formal concept (the intellectual intention that
mediates understanding). It does not imply the kind of problematic “represen-
tationalism” that has been rightly distinguished from genuine Thomistic phi-
losophies of mind and language. See John O’Callaghan, Thomistic Realism and
the Linguistic Turn: Toward a More Perfect Form of Existence (Notre Dame, Ind.:
University of Notre Dame Press, 2003).
11. DNA §38: “conceptus unus repraesentans perfecte alterum analogatum
ut sic, imperfecte repraesentat reliquum.”
12. DNA §36: “analogo et suis analogatis respondet unus conceptus men-
talis imperfectus” (emphasis added). Cf. DNA §38: “Analogi vero et analogato-
rum ut sic, plures necessario sunt conceptus perfecte ea repraesentantes, et unus
est conceptus imperfecte repraesentans.”
13. In fact, this seems to be Cajetan’s position at DCE §7: “Et sicut in
mente duplex conceptus imperfectus reperitur, ita res significata, extra potest
obici dupliciter: imperfecte scilicet vel in uno explicite in quo caetera obiciuntur
indeterminate; vel in nullo explicite, sed omnia implicite, in solo formalissimo
significato explicite.”
14. DNA §37: “Unde et analogum unum habere mentalem conceptum, et
plures habere conceptus mentales: verum est diversimode; quamvis simpliciter
loquendo, magis debeat dici, analogi esse plures conceptus; nisi loquendi oc-
casio aliud exigat. Dico autem hoc: quoniam cum secundum dicentes, analoga
omnino carere uno conceptu mentali, sermo est; unum eorum conceptum abso-
lute dicere non est reprehendendum. Propter quod oportet solerti discretione
lectorem uti quando invenitur scriptum, quod analogata conveniunt in una ra-
tione, et quando invenitur dictum alibi, quod analogata non conveniunt in una
ratione.”
 Notes to Pages 148–150 — 227

15. On the sense in which there is and is not a common concept in analogy,
cf. John of St. Thomas addressing the question “utrum in analogis detur unus
conceptus ab inferioribus praecisus” in Ars Logica p. 2, q. 13, a. 5, especially
(492b49–493a7): “Analogia proportionalitatis propriae possunt habere concep-
tum unum respectu omnium analogatorum inadaequatum et imperfectum,
nec praescindentem ab inferioribus per aliquid, quod in potentia illa includat et
actu excludat, sed per aliquid quod actu non explicet, actu autem includat seu
implicet.”
16. DNA §§33, 34.
17. DNA §43: “[abstrahere] semper sonat intelligi unum, non intellecto
altero.”
18. DNA §44: “nihil aliud est agere de abstractione analogi ab analogatis
quam inquirere et determinare, quomodo res significata analogo nomine intel-
ligi possit, non cointellectis analogatis; et quomodo conceptus illius habeatur,
absque conceptibus istorum.”
19. DNA §46.
20. DNA §58.
21. DNA §47: “Unde concedi potest, rem analogam abstrahere, et non ab-
strahere ab analogatis diversimode. Abstrahit quidem, pro quanto abstrahit ab
eis, quemadmodum res ut sic, idest ut res similis alteri proportionaliter abstrahit
a se absolute sumpta. Non abstrahit vero, pro quanto res ut sic accepta seipsam
necessario includit, et absque seipsa intelligi non potest. Quod de univocis dici
non potest: quia res univoca, absque aliis quibus est univoce communis, intel-
ligitur sic, quod res in suo intellectu nullo modo actualiter includit ea quibus
est communis, ut patet de animali.” Cf. DNA §56: “Sicque fit, ut in analogo
secundum identitatem in se clausam, ad diversitatem rationum in se quoque
clausam comparato, abstractio quaedam, quae non tam abstractio quam quidam
abstractionis modus est inveniatur.”
22. DNA §53.
23. David Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1973), 14.
24. DNA §49: “De ratione siquidem unius proportionaliter est habere
quatuor terminos (ut in V Ethicorum dicitur). Quoniam proportionalitas qua
similitudo proportionum fit, inter quatuor ad minus, (quae duarum proportio-
num extrema sunt), necessario est; et consequenter unum proportione non uni-
ficatur simpliciter, sed distinctionem retinens, unum pro tanto est et dicitur, pro
quanto proportionibus dissimilibus divisum non est. Unde sicut non est alia ratio
quare unum proportionaliter non est unum absolute, nisi quia ista est eius ratio
formalis; ita non est quaerenda alia ratio, cur a similibus proportionaliter non
potest abstrahi res una; hoc enim ideo est, quia similitudo proportionalis talem in
sua ratione diversitatem includit. Et accidit ulterius procedentibus, ut quaerant
id, quod sub quaestione non cadit: ut quare homo est animal rationale, etc.”
25. I. M. Bochenski, “On Analogy,” The Thomist (1948): 425–77, §17. (I
cite this work by section number as it has been reprinted, with corrections, in
Logico-Philosophical Studies, ed. Albert Menne (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1962), and in
228 — Notes to Pages 150–153

Inquiries into Medieval Philosophy: A Collection in Honor of Francis P. Clarke, ed.

James F. Ross (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1971), 99–122.
26. Cf. Bochenski, A History of Formal Logic, trans. Ivo Thomas (Notre
Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1961), 397, commenting on a
discussion of “systematic ambiguity” from Principia Mathematica: “All the state-
ments in question evidently share the same formal structure. We have in fact a
case of isomorphy. It is remarkable that the name used for this kind of isomor-
phy, ‘systematic ambiguity,’ is an exact translation of the common Scholastic
expression aequivocatio a consilio, synonymous with ‘analogy’; for isomorphy is
precisely analogy.”
27. DNA §§33–34.
28. This is not just an ad hoc distinction, but one anticipated before the
writing of DNA, as is evident from Cajetan’s discussion of univocation in CPA.
Commenting on Aristotle’s definition of univocals, according to which there is
“eadem ratio substantiae,” Cajetan says of the word “eadem” that it “non dicit
identitatem simpliciter vel secundum quid, sed identitatem simpliciter, ita quod
licet ad aequivocationem sufficiat qualiscunque diversitas rationis secundum
illud nomen, ad univocationem tamen non sufficit qualiscunque identitas ra-
tionis secundum illud nomen, sed exigitur quod ratio univocatorum, quae at-
tenditur penes illud nomen in quo univocantur, sit totaliter eadem et nihil plus
aut minus includat unum quam reliquum in ratione illius nominis” (CPA 11).
29. DNA §§67–68: “Fundatur enim superioritas super identitate rationis
rei significatae, idest super hoc quod res significata invenitur non in hoc tantum,
sed illamet non numero sed ratione invenitur in alio. Univocatio autem supra
modo identitatis omnimodae scilicet identitate rationis rei significatae, idest
super hoc quod ratio rei significatae in illo et in isto est eadem omnino. Quamvis
enim in analogis hic identitatis modus non inveniatur, quem in univocis inveniri
pluries dictum est, identitas tamen ipsa rationum invenitur. Est namque iden-
titas proportionalis, identitas quaedam. Et ideo non minus analogum (puta ens)
est praedicatum superius, quam univocum (puta animal), sed alio modo: ana-
logum enim est superius proportionaliter, quia fundatur supra identitate pro-
portionali rationis rei significatae; univocum autem praecise et simpliciter, quia
supra omnimoda identitate rationis rei significatae eius superioritas fundatur.”
30. Cajetan describes the same sophisma consequentis at CST I.13.5 nn.
9–10, this time explictly in response to Scotus’s famous argument that a concept
is univocal between God and creatures if it is not specific to one but applies
commonly to both. Cajetan replies: “illud argumentum nihil aliud concludit
nisi alietatem conceptus sapientiae, verbi gratia, in communi, a sapientia Dei
et sapientia creaturae. Sed ex hoc inferre, ergo univocus conceptus, est sophisma
Consequentis: quoniam conceptus analogus est etiam alius ab inferioribus. Non
tamen eo alietatis modo, quo est alius conceptus univocus ab univocatis: quia hic
est alius ut praecisus ab eis, ille vero ut continens eos, ut diffuse scripsimus in
tractatu De Nominum Analogia.”
31. DNA §69: “. . . obiectiones ad oppositum adductae in hoc peccant,
quod inter identitatem et modum identitatis non distinguunt. Fatendum enim
 Notes to Pages 153–156 — 229

est, quod ad hoc, quod aliquis terminus denominetur superior aut commu-
nior, oportet ut rem unam et eamdem in utroque ponat; sed sophisma conse-
quentis committitur inferendo ex hoc: ergo oportet quod dicat rem unam et
eamdem omnino. Et est semper sermo de identitate secundum rationem, seu
definitionem. Identitas enim et unitas continent sub se non solum unitatem et
identitatem omnimodam, sed proportionalem, quae in analogi nominis ratione
salvatur.”
32. DNA §1.
33. DNA §71: “Ex praedictis autem manifeste patet, quod analogum non
conceptum disiunctum, nec unum praecisum inaequaliter participatum, nec
unum ordine; sed conceptum unum proportione dicit et praedicat.”
34. DNA §83: “Constat autem quod analogum nomen, puta ens aut bonum,
non relationem identitatis aut similitudinis significat, sed fundamentum.”
35. CST I.13.6, n. 4: “Quaedam enim significant ipsos respectus ad primum
analogatum, ut patet de sano. Quaedam vero significant fundamenta tantum il-
lorum respectuum; ut communiter invenitur in omnibus vere analogis, proprie
et formaliter salvatis in ominbus analogatis.”
36. DNA §79: “sicut animal dictum de homine et de equo importans univo-
cationem in actu exercito, non praedicat de homine totum hoc, scilicet naturam
sensitivam eamdem omnino secundum rationem naturae sensitivae equi et
bovis, sed naturam sensitivam simpliciter; quam tamen ad hoc, quod univoca
sit praedicatio, oportet omnino esse eamdem secundum rationem naturae sensi-
tivae equi et bovis,—ita ens importans proportionalitatem in actu exercito, non
praedicat de quantitate totum hoc, scilicet habens se ad esse sic proportionaliter
sicut substantia, aut qualitas ad suum esse; sed habens se ad esse sic absque alia
additione; quod tamen oportet, ad hoc quod analoga sit praedicatio, idem pro-
portionaliter esse cum altero, sic se habere ad esse quod de substantia aut quali-
tate ens praedicat.”
37. DNA §76: “analogum metaphorice sumptum, nihil aliud praedicat,
quam hoc se habere ad similitudinem illius, quod absque altero extremo intel-
ligi nequit.”
38. DNA §75: “sed proprie sumptum, in ratione sui metaphorice sumpti
claudi necesse est; quoniam impossibile est intelligere quid sit aliquid secundum
metaphoricum nomen, nisi cognito illo, ad cuius metaphoram dicitur. Neque
enim fieri potest, ut intelligam quid sit pratum in eo quod ridens, nisi sciam
quid significet risus nomen proprie sumptum, ad cuius similitudinem dicitur
pratum ridere.”
39. To be sure, as Yves Simon pointed out, one can understand a meta-
phorical predication, and even know that it is a metaphorical predication, without
knowing the primary (nonmetaphorical) analogate, and so without understand-
ing why the subject of the metaphorical predication is a subject of that predi-
cate—but then, in a crucial sense, one does not understand the metaphor. “Many
people who know that ‘crocodile tears’ stand for demonstrations of feigned sad-
ness do not know why such demonstrations are called crocodile tears. . . . I can-
not say why feigned demonstrations of sadness are called crocodile tears unless
230 — Notes to Pages 157–162

I know that in ancient legends crocodiles were reputed to imitate human sob-
bing in order to attract passersby and devour them.” Yves Simon, “On Order in
Analogical Sets,” in Philosopher at Work: Essays by Yves R. Simon, ed. Anthony O.
Simon (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999), 167.
40. DNA §78.
41. DNA §82. Cf. CST I.13.6 n.7: “Huiusmodi nomina, quoad rem signifi-
catam, prius de Deo: quoad impositionem nominis, prius de creaturis dicuntur.”
42. The question of an order of priority in proportionality was raised by
Blanche. For citations and discussion see the long footnote in Simon, “On Order
in Analogical Sets,” 165–67n27.
43. DNA §67.
44. DNA §86: “Succumbitur autem difficultati huic, quia proprium com-
parationis fundamentum non consideratur. Fundatur enim super identitate seu
unitate rei, in qua fit comparatio, et non super modo identitatis aut unitatis;
sicut de intentione superioritatis praedictum est. Unde cum analogum ex dictis
constet rem unam, licet proportionaliter, dicere; nihil prohibet in ipso comparari
analogata, licet non eo modo, quo univoca fit comparatio.”
45. Cajetan returns to the issue of comparison in analogy in CST I.13.5
nn. 9–10. To the Scotistic objection that “omnis comparatio est in aliqualiter
univoco,” Cajetan responds: “compariatio fit etiam in analogo, quod medium
est inter univocum et aequivocum. . . . Cum enim dicitur, Deus est perfectius ens
creatura, comparatio fit in ratione entis una secundum analogiam, et sic com-
muni utrique, ut alibi docuimus.”
46. DNA §46.
47. DNA §56.
48. DNA §57: “Sicque non sola significationum in voce confusio, analogo
convenit, sed confusio quaedam conceptuum, seu rationum fit in identitate
eorum proportionali, sic tamen ut non tam conceptus, quam eorum diversitas
confundatur.”
49. DNA §§98–100.
50. DNA §§102–3.
51. DNA §99.

C hapter N ine

1. DNA §105: “Verbi gratia: si ponamus sapientiam esse analogice com-

munem Deo et homini, ex hoc quod sapientia, in homine inventa, secundum
formalem rationem praecise sumpta, dicit perfectionem simpliciter: non potest
concludi: ergo Deus est formaliter sapiens, sic arguendo: Omnis perfectio sim-
pliciter est in Deo; sapientia est perfectio simpliciter; ergo etc. Minor enim dis-
tinguenda est: et si ly sapientia pro ratione sapientiae, quae est in homine stat,
argumentum est ex quatuor terminis: quia in conclusione, sapientia stat pro
ratione sapientiae quam ponit in Deo, cum concluditur: ergo sapientia est in
Deo. Si autem pro ratione sapientiae in Deo, stat in minore; non concluditur, ex
 Notes to Pages 162–164 — 231

perfectione sapientiae creatae, Deum esse sapientem; cuius oppositum et phi-

losophi et theologi omnes clamant.”
2. DNA §106: “Decipiuntur autem isti, Scotum (cuius est ratio haec I
Sent. dist. 3, q. 1) sequentes: quia in analogo diversitatem rationum inspicientes,
id quod in eo unitatis et identitatis latet, non considerant.”
3. DNA §106: “eo quod quidquid convenit uni, convenit et alteri pro-
portionaliter; et quidquid negatur de una, et de altera negatur proportionali-
ter: quia quidquid convenit simili, in eo quod simile, convenit etiam illi, cui est
simile, proportionalitate semper servata.”
4. Cf. DNA §36: “Quidquid assimilatur simili ut sic, assimilatur etiam illi,
cui illud tale est simile.” Cf. DCE §3: “quidquid est imago alicuius similis alteri,
est etiam imago illius alterius quatenus primo assimilatur.” It goes without say-
ing that similarity, in addition to being transitive, is also symmetrical.
5. Even here a clarification is needed: if one did not call the picture cute
qua picture of that puppy, but rather called it cute because of its artistic style, then
it does not follow that one regards the depicted puppy as cute. But then this case
also confirms Cajetan’s principle.
6. DNA §107: “unitas analogiae non esset in coordinatione unitatum nu-
meranda, nisi unum proportionaliter, unum esset affirmabile et negabile, et con-
sequenter distribuibile et scibile, ut subiectum, et medium, et passio.”
7. DNA §112: “Identitas siquidem tam rerum quam rationum, ut pluries
replicatum est, ad identitatem proportionalem se extendit.”
8. DNA §111: “Unde, cum fit huiusmodi processus: Omnis perfectio
simpliciter est in Deo; sapientia est perfectio simpliciter; ergo etc.; in minore
ly sapientia non stat pro hac vel illa ratione sapientiae, sed pro sapientia una
proportionaliter, idest, pro utraque ratione sapientiae non coniunctim vel disi-
unctim; sed in quantum sunt indivisae proportionaliter, et una est altera propor-
tionaliter, et ambae unam proportionaliter constituunt rationem.”
9. Bochenski offers a formal proof of the validity of syllogisms using ana-
logical middle terms, in “On Analogy,” The Thomist (1948): §19. He defines
analogy in terms of “isomorphy” (which is proportional similarity) (§17), and
attributes this interpretation of analogy (“the isomorphic theory”) not only to
Cajetan (§16) but also to Aquinas (§12 and §17).
10. DNA §113: “Ex hoc autem apparet, Scotum in I Sent. dist. 3, q. 1, vel
male exposuisse conceptum univocum vel sibi ipsi contradicere: dum, volens
univocationem entis fingere, ait: «Conceptum univocum voco, qui ita est unus,
quod eius unitas sufficit ad contradictionem, affirmando et negando ipsum de
eodem». Et sic univocum vult esse ens. Si enim identitas sufficiens ad contra-
dictionem, univocatio dicitur; constat quod, ponendo ens esse analogum, et
secundum proportionalitatem tantum unum, satisfiet univocationi: quod scoti-
cae doctrinae adversatur, tenenti ens habere conceptum unum simpliciter, et
omnino indivisum, (ut de univocis diximus). Si autem non omnis talis identitas
sufficit ad univocationem, non recte igitur univocatio conceptus declarata est
esse eam, quae ad contradictionem sufficit, quasi proportionalis identitas ad hoc
non sufficiat.”
232 — Notes to Pages 164–168

11. DNA §109.

12. DNA §108. “. . . ideo oportet, huiusmodi analogis nominibus utendo
ex parte unitatis, semper modum proportionalitatis subintelligi; aliter in uni-
vocationem lapsus fieret. Nisi enim prae oculis haberetur proportionalitas, cum
dicitur immateriale omne esse intellectuale, tamquam univoce dictum accipere-
tur, et latens aequivocatio non visa obreperet.” Apparently the problem Cajetan
has in mind in his example (“everything immaterial is intellectual”) is that in
concluding to God’s intellectuality from his immateriality, we might wrongly
attribute to his intellectuality what is proper only to creaturely intellectuality
(e.g., that it is discursive).
13. DNA §115.
14. DNA §117. Cf. DCE §5.
15. DNA §118: “Cavendum tertio est, ne vocalis unitas rationis analogi no-
minis mentem involvat. Ex eo namque verbi gratia, quod principium dicitur
esse id ex quo res fit, aut est, aut cognoscitur; et haec ratio in omnibus quae prin-
cipia dicuntur, salvatur: principii nomen univocum creditur. Erratur autem,
quia ratio ipsa non est una simpliciter, sed proportione et voce. Vocabula enim,
ex quibus integratur, analoga sunt, ut patet; neque enim fieri, neque esse, neque
cognosci, neque ly ex unius omnino est rationis, sed proportionalis salvatur. Et
propterea ratio illa in omnibus utpote proportionalis salvatur: sicut et principii
nomen proportionaliter commune dicitur.”
16. DNA §119.
17. DNA §§120–22.
18. DNA §§123–24.
19. DNA §125: “Unde si quis falli non vult, solerter sermonis causam
coniectet.”
20. CDEE §14: “. . . idem est loqui de conceptu entis et de significatione
ejus.”
21. DCE §3; cf. DNA §§36, 106.
22. DCE §4.
23. DCE §5.
24. DCE §6.
25. DCE §7.
26. DCE §8.
27. DCE §9: “Ita quod (ut unico verbo rem absolvam): ens esse primo
notum in quod fit omnis resolutio, in quod omnia addunt, per modum analogi
interpretandum est: cum quo stare potest, quod ens secundum perfectum adae-
quatumque conceptum, non abstrahit a naturis praedicamentalibus, sicut nec
aliquod analogum a fundantibus analogiam.”
28. And it is compressed, despite Cajetan’s polite claim to the contrary
(“Plura nunc non mihi occurunt ad propositum dicenda, immo prolixior fui
acutissimo ingenio tuo, quo ex unico verbo concepisses cuncta” [DCE §10]).
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Index

abstraction, 54–55, 59, 143, 148–53, in the De Ente et Essentia

158–59, 168–69, 175–76, 195n39 commentary, 25, 102–4
analogia: Greek vs. Latin meanings, defined, 36, 107–8
5–11, 179n9 logically equivalent to univocation,
analogical unity, 54–55, 59, 66, 77, 37, 81, 109, 118–21, 142
109, 131, 139, 216n25. See also only “abusively” a form of analogy,
proportional unity 123
analogy of attribution, 11–12, 17, 20, analogy of proportionality
23, 45, 71–72, 77, 98, 124, 153–54, and abstraction, 144–51, 167–68
156 in Aquinas, 18–20, 23, 103, 105,
in Cajetan’s De Ente et Essentia 139–40, 182n22, 199n10, 204n50,
commentary, 25, 104–5, 214n12 214n12, 224n38
defined, 36, 106–7, 110 circularity objection, 126, 131–34,
in De Veritate, 139–40 223n21
functions logically as equivocation, in the De Ente et Essentia
118–21 commentary, 25, 102–6
mixed cases, 112–17, 141, 218n38, defined, 36, 106–7, 124–25
218n40, 218n42 and intrinsic denomination, 20,
only “abusively” a form of analogy, 23–24, 26, 98, 111, 140, 220n58
123 most genuine mode of analogy, 12,
secondary analogates denominated 139–42, 220n58
extrinsically, 20, 23, 26, 111–17, priority and posteriority, 156–58,
141 230n42
signifies a relation, 111, 113, 118 proper vs. metaphor, 11–12,
Yves Simon on, 196nn45–46 125–29, 156, 222nn13–14
See also analogy of proportionality signifies the foundation of a
analogy of inequality, 11, 17, 81, 99, relation, 154–55
101–4, 107–10, 153, 214n12, as true mean between univocation
215n21, 216n22, 216n27 and equivocation, 139–42,
before Cajetan, 108, 215n19 173–74, 220n58

— 245
246 — Index

analogy of proportionality (cont.) Broadie, Alexander, 60

two unknowns objection, 129–31, Brown, Stephen, 79
223n16, 223nn18–19 Burrell, David, 21, 43, 53–55, 59,
and valid reasoning, 45, 105–6, 125, 133–35, 149–50, 181n8, 196n47,
161–64 203n46
See also metaphor; proportio; Bushinski, Edward A., 19, 38, 209n17
proportionalitas
Anderson, James F., 19, 116, 130, concept, 36, 117
180n20, 184n48, 196n45, 218n38, Cajetan on, 56–60, 86–91
218n42, 223nn18–19 criticism of Cajetan’s attention to,
Aristotle 20, 27, 47–56
and analogy of inequality, 108, formal vs. objective, 34, 38, 77–78,
215n19, 216n25 89–91, 108, 119, 144–45, 151–52,
associated meaning vs. nongeneric 167–68, 176, 194n37, 208nn11–
likeness, 4–6, 178n4 12, 226n10
Categories, 35, 86, 90, 92, 99–100, part of semantic triangle, 34, 38–41,
187n4, 215n18 86–91
in De Nominum Analogia, 24–26, perfect vs. imperfect, 144–48, 151,
104–5, 164–66, 199n10, 215n19 158, 162–63, 168–69, 175
on metaphor in cognition and question of abstraction in analogy,
language, 177n1, 224n35 55, 59, 148–51, 169
on use of analogy in syllogism, 42, question of how unified in analogy,
44, 67, 106, 164 28–29, 35, 43–45, 48, 100, 169
why being is not a genus, 159 Scotus on, 43–44
Ashworth, E. J., 20, 28–29, 31–32, See also ratio
41, 43, 47–51, 69, 74–79, 108,
115–17, 205n59, 209n19, 209n22, De Conceptu Entis, 166–68
217n32 De Ente et Essentia, Cajetan’s
associated meaning commentary on, 25, 39, 44, 57,
in Aquinas, 9–10 62, 99–106, 108, 168
in Aristotelian commentary, 6–7 denomination
in Aristotle, 4–6, 178n4 defined, 92–93
in Boethius and scholasticism, 8–9 extrinsic vs. intrinsic, 12, 23, 26,
defined, 2–3 93–98, 211n28, 220n58
in De Nominum Analogia, 12–13, Descoqs, P. Pedro, 19–20, 222n15
37, 173 Dominic of Flanders, 28, 30, 44,
relation to nongeneric likeness, 78–79, 185n61, 185n72
3–4, 179n10 Doyle, John, 94
Averroës, 24–26, 102–5, 108, 186n1
equivocation, 3–4, 6–9, 36, 40–45. See
Bochenski, I. M., 42, 150, 176, 187n9, also fallacy of equivocation; pros
190n35, 191n37, 206n76, 228n26, hen equivocation
231n9
Boethius, 7–9, 11, 41, 85 fallacy of equivocation, 42–45, 60,
Bonaventure, 9 65–81, 101, 118, 121, 125, 138–39,
 Index — 247

143–44, 154, 162–65, 190n31, Kretzmann, Norman, 61

190n35, 199n11 Kuhn, Thomas, 22, 26
focal meaning, 4, 70. See also pros hen
equivocation Lyttkens, Hampus, 20–21, 203n46,
Francesco Securo da Nardò, 30 204n50
Francesco Silvestri da Ferrara, 70
Marion, Jean-Luc, 20, 184n48, 220n48
Geach, Peter, 54, 195n39 Mascall, E. L., 132–33
Gerard of Bologna, 79 Maurer, Armand, 51–52, 216n27
Gilson, Étienne, 20, 51–55, 57–59, McInerny, Ralph, 21, 37, 70, 73–75,
216n27 112, 204n49, 205n59, 217n37
Goergen, Aloys, 18, 21 Meagher, Robert, 24, 37
metaphor, xx, 3–5, 8, 11–12, 123,
Hayner, Paul, 134–35 126–29, 156, 170, 177n1, 221n7,
Henry of Ghent, 29, 79 222nn13–14, 224n35, 229n39
hermeneutics, 12, 61–64, 165–66 Mondin, Battista, 21, 192n14
Hervaeus Natalis, 28, 79 Montagnes, Bernard, 19–21, 29,
185n67
isomorphy, 150–51, 176, 228n26,
231n9. See also analogia; nongeneric likeness
nongeneric likeness; in Aquinas, 9–10
proportionalitas; proportional in Aristotle, 4–5, 178n4
unity defined, 1–2
as proportionality, 12, 125, 128, 138,
Johannes Capreolus, 28, 78, 184n51 174
Johannes Versor (John Versorius), relation to associated meaning, 3–4,
78–79, 185n72 179n10
John Duns Scotus, 20, 31, 45, 63, 72, See also proportionalitas;
102 proportional unity
arguments against analogy, 42–43,
60, 143, 173, 215n14 Paulus Soncinas, 28, 30, 44, 78–79,
attention to concepts, 52–54, 58 184n51, 185n72
Cajetan’s response to, 44, 56, 101, Penido, M. T.-L., 18, 21
138–39, 152, 162–64, 170, per prius et posterius, 8–9, 25, 68–70,
228n30 73, 77, 80, 101–2, 123, 157–58,
definition of univocity, 43, 224n36 200n15, 200n21, 202n35
John of Jandun, 28, 79 Peter Aureol, 28, 79
John of St. Thomas (John Poinsot), Pinchard, Bruno, 79, 188n15
xiv–xv, xvi, 114–15, 196n46, Porphyry, 7, 62, 85, 179n11, 187n4,
211n28, 218n42, 227n15 213n3
judgment, 20, 51–55, 60–61, 124, proportio, 7
151–60, 195n41 proportionalitas, 7–8
in Boethius, 7–8
Klubertanz, George P., 19–21, 68, 70, See also analogia; nongeneric
141, 199n10 likeness
248 — Index

proportional mean, 8–9 res significata vs. modi significandi,

proportional unity, 59–60, 105, 125, 68, 74–76, 203n46, 204n49,
129, 136–39, 141–42, 148, 154, 209n22
158–59, 163–64, 169–71, 174, Silvestro Mazzolini, 70
176, 222n10. See also analogia; Simon, Yves, 18, 54–55, 59–60,
analogical unity; nongeneric 135–36, 149, 181n8, 196nn45–46,
likeness 197n50, 200n21, 201n30, 229n39
pros hen equivocation, 4, 6–9, 13, Simplicius, 7, 79, 179n11, 187n4,
70–71, 136, 174, 187n4, 218n42, 224n36
222n10 Suarez, Francisco, xiv, 20, 115–16,
Putnam, Hilary, 131 141, 219n47, 220n48
Sutton, Thomas, 44, 185n67
Ramirez, Jacobus, 19–20, 219n47 syllogistic reasoning, 42–44, 56–57,
ratio, 7, 36, 39, 68, 70–81, 90–91, 60, 67, 75–76, 162–64, 190n35,
209n17, 209n19 197n1, 206n76, 231n9
in Cajetan’s definitions of analogy,
36, 107 Tavuzzi, Michael, 28–32, 185n72
how signified in metaphor, 126–27 Thomas Aquinas, 9–10
of one analogate in the definition of characterizations of the unity of
others, 70–72, 77–78 analogical signification, 66–76
proper only in one analogate, Commentary on the Sentences,
72–74, 77–78 18–20, 23, 25, 30, 78, 105, 184n51,
proportional sameness of in 186n73, 214n12
syllogistic reasoning, 162–64 De Veritate, 18–19, 23, 25–26, 30,
See also concept 105, 140, 198n7, 201n31, 204n53
resolution, 157–59, 168 logical vs. metaphysical approach
Rijk, L. M. de, 60–61, 197n51 to analogy, 9–10, 20, 37–38
Riva, Franco, 28–32, 115, 186n75, question of relation to Cajetan’s
186n80, 190n25, 190n30 analogy theory, xvi, 17–22, 24,
Ross, James, 43, 50–52, 54, 71, 137, 27–32, 139–40, 176
191n37, 203n46, 217n30, 224n35 role of judgment in analogy, 51–55,
57–59
Schwartz, Herbert, 110 Summa Theologiae, 66, 70, 72,
semantic triangle, xx, 34, 38, 40–42, 201n31
86–91, 145–47 Thomas Claxton, 185n67
Sherry, Patrick, 52, 191n36 Thomas Sutton, 44, 185n67
signification, 37, 45, 48–51, 57, 63,
85–91, 117, 119, 124, 138, 167, Vencenzo Merlini da Venezia, 30
170, 193n23, 194n38, 197n51,
208n7, 220n48, 226n10 Wippel, John F., 21
J o s h u a P. H o c h s c h i l d
is associate professor of philosophy and Dean of the College
of Liberal Arts at Mount St. Mary’s University.