Page:Theory of Mind of Roger Bacon.djvu/29

 as such; for that, as an immediate effect of the Agent, remains an ultimate datum. The problem is: Whence does the Species come? And there is only one possible reply; the Species comes from the active potentiality of the Matter of the Patient. This active potentiality of the Patient corresponds to and co-operates with the active potentiality of the Agent; and is thus contributory to the process. The Agent acts as a whole; the Patient is affected part by part. The first part of the Patient is made Species or effect by mere contact with the Agent; but this part has depth, and accordingly the Patient is so far altered “within.” This first part having been altered into a Species or effect of the Agent, acts upon the next part to change it in turn into a Species or effect. And so on successively until the complete Effect is produced.

As a last consideration, in the presentation of our Author’s theory, we must take up the question concerning the limitations of the activity of the Species. And we have here to inquire, first, whether there are some things which cannot produce this immediate effect, or Species; and, second, whether this effect once produced can always be developed into a complete Effect?

In Bacon’s discussion of this first question, it might seem that really all things produce Species. But this is not unqualifiedly true; a limitation is fixed by a certain fact. And this fact is that the “materia prima” is essentially passive, and therefore cannot generate Species. It is always the Species of “materia specifica” that are renewed. There is no other limitation than this; but we must see just what it signifies.

What Bacon means by “materia prima” as opposed to “materia specifica” we have already seen. But he elsewhere takes up this discussion in full detail, and shows how there is a “genus generalissimum” for Matter as well as for Form and for their Composite. This is pure Matter as opposed to pure Form; “materia prima” as opposed to “forma prima.” It is this which constitutes the common basis for the natural and the spiritual worlds. The differences