THE MEANING OF NATURE 263 



matter, a characteristic of nature, its deterviinatio ad unum, 

 diminishes in a proportional degree. Because of their material- 

 ity, both non-living things and plants are limited to one form, 

 their entitative, natural form. Since one form cannot give 

 rise to contrary active inclinations, in this way they are deter- 

 mined ad unmn. Already in plants, however, there is a certain 

 beginning of indetermination insofar as they can grow up and 

 down — their growth being not mere local movement but the 

 development of an organism, a body of heterogeneous parts; 

 there is a certain spontaneity in that they can adapt themselves 

 to varying circumstances. Hence St. Thomas's distinction in 

 his commentary on the De Anirna between nature and the 

 vegetative soul. As form rises above matter, the thing emerges 

 from the purely entitative and becomes capable of the inten- 

 tional. As such it is not limited to its own form. The inclina- 

 tions of the thing are not merely those springing from its entita- 

 tive (natural) form but also those that rise from certain ac- 

 quired forms, its forms of knowledge. An animal can have 

 now one intentional form, now another, and therefore, can 

 have now one tendency, now another. Man, however, can 

 possess intellectually at the same time a form and its opposite. 

 Hence, precisely as rational, he is above nature insofar as he is 

 not at all determined ad unum but must determine himself — 

 and therein, by the way, lies his freedom.^^ 



To return now to the development in meaning of nature: it 

 might be observed that the variation is based on the different 

 senses of two elements in the definition of nature. Nature, it 

 will be recalled, is defined as a principle of movement in that 

 in which it is. It is an intnnsic principle and it is a principle of 

 movement. We have seen that the active principle by which 

 living beings move themselves is not in every way intrinsic; ^* 



'* It is interesting to note that although the plant is more determined in its 

 operations than the beast and the beast more than man, as to their being the order 

 is the reverse: man is more determined than the beast and the beast more than 

 the plant. The more perfect the form the more determined a thing is in its 

 being and the less determined in its operations. 



^* With respect to this " innerness " of nature we might go even further and 



