--- title: "Summa Theologica, First Half" author: "Thomas Aquinas" translator: "Fathers of the English Dominican Province" languages: [en] shelf: "Medieval" section: 545 of 1210 url: https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-first-half/545/ cite: "Thomas Aquinas, tr. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, Summa Theologica, First Half, section 545. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-first-half/545/" --- # Summa Theologica, First Half *Thomas Aquinas, tr. Fathers of the English Dominican Province* God and creation, human action, law and grace, then faith, hope, charity and justice. ## 545. I–II · Q. 40, Art. 3: Whether hope is in dumb animals? Source: https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-first-half/545/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-first-half/545/#p-N [¶0] Whether hope is in dumb animals? [¶1] Objection 1: It would seem that there is no hope in dumb animals. Because hope is for some future good, as Damascene says (De Fide Orth. ii, 12). But knowledge of the future is not in the competency of dumb animals, whose knowledge is confined to the senses and does not extend to the future. Therefore there is no hope in dumb animals. [¶2] Objection 2: Further, the object of hope is a future good, possible of attainment. But possible and impossible are differences of the true and the false, which are only in the mind, as the Philosopher states (Metaph. vi, 4). Therefore there is no hope in dumb animals, since they have no mind. [¶3] Objection 3: Further, Augustine says (Gen. ad lit. ix, 14) that "animals are moved by the things that they see." But hope is of things unseen: "for what a man seeth, why doth he hope for?" (Rom. 8:24). Therefore there is no hope in dumb animals. [¶4] On the contrary, Hope is an irascible passion. But the irascible faculty is in dumb animals. Therefore hope is also. [¶5] I answer that, The internal passions of animals can be gathered from their outward movements: from which it is clear that hope is in dumb animals. For if a dog see a hare, or a hawk see a bird, too far off, it makes no movement towards it, as having no hope to catch it: whereas, if it be near, it makes a movement towards it, as being in hopes of catching it. Because as stated above (Q 1, A 2; Q 26, A 1; Q 35, A 1), the sensitive appetite of dumb animals, and likewise the natural appetite of insensible things, result from the apprehension of an intellect, just as the appetite of the intellectual nature, which is called the will. But there is a difference, in that the will is moved by an apprehension of the intellect in the same subject; whereas the movement of the natural appetite results from the apprehension of the separate Intellect, Who is the Author of nature; as does also the sensitive appetite of dumb animals, who act from a certain natural instinct. Consequently, in the actions of irrational animals and of other natural things, we observe a procedure which is similar to that which we observe in the actions of art: and in this way hope and despair are in dumb animals. [¶6] Reply to Objection 1: Although dumb animals do not know the future, yet an animal is moved by its natural instinct to something future, as though it foresaw the future. Because this instinct is planted in them by the Divine Intellect that foresees the future. [¶7] Reply to Objection 2: The object of hope is not the possible as differentiating the true, for thus the possible ensues from the relation of a predicate to a subject. The object of hope is the possible as compared to a power. For such is the division of the possible given in Metaph. v, 12, i.e. into the two kinds we have just mentioned. [¶8] Reply to Objection 3: Although the thing which is future does not come under the object of sight; nevertheless through seeing something present, an animal's appetite is moved to seek or avoid something future. ### I–II · Q. 40, Art. 4: Whether despair is contrary to hope? [¶10] Whether despair is contrary to hope? [¶11] Objection 1: It would seem that despair is not contrary to hope. Because "to one thing there is one contrary" (Metaph. x, 5). But fear is contrary to hope. Therefore despair is not contrary to hope. [¶12] Objection 2: Further, contraries seem to bear on the same thing. But hope and despair do not bear on the same thing: since hope regards the good, whereas despair arises from some evil that is in the way of obtaining good. Therefore hope is not contrary to despair. [¶13] Objection 3: Further, movement is contrary to movement: while repose is in opposition to movement as a privation thereof. But despair seems to imply immobility rather than movement. Therefore it is not contrary to hope, which implies movement of stretching out towards the hoped-for good. [¶14] On the contrary, The very name of despair [desperatio] implies that it is contrary to hope [spes]. [¶15] I answer that, As stated above (Q 23, A 2), there is a twofold contrariety of movements. One is in respect of approach to contrary terms: and this contrariety alone is to be found in the concupiscible passions, for instance between love and hatred. The other is according to approach and withdrawal with regard to the same term; and is to be found in the irascible passions, as stated above (Q 23, A 2). Now the object of hope, which is the arduous good, has the character of a principle of attraction, if it be considered in the light of something attainable; and thus hope tends thereto, for it denotes a kind of approach. But in so far as it is considered as unobtainable, it has the character of a principle of repulsion, because, as stated in Ethic. iii, 3, "when men come to an impossibility they disperse." And this is how despair stands in regard to this object, wherefore it implies a movement of withdrawal: and consequently it is contrary to hope, as withdrawal is to approach. [¶16] Reply to Objection 1: Fear is contrary to hope, because their objects, i.e. good and evil, are contrary: for this contrariety is found in the irascible passions, according as they ensue from the passions of the concupiscible. But despair is contrary to hope, only by contrariety of approach and withdrawal. [¶17] Reply to Objection 2: Despair does not regard evil as such; sometimes however it regards evil accidentally, as making the difficult good impossible to obtain. But it can arise from the mere excess of good. [¶18] Reply to Objection 3: Despair implies not only privation of hope, but also a recoil from the thing desired, by reason of its being esteemed impossible to get. Hence despair, like hope, presupposes desire; because we neither hope for nor despair of that which we do not desire to have. For this reason, too, each of them regards the good, which is the object of desire.