Of God and His CreaturesA fifth argument is alleged from Aristotle, De anima, III, iv, 6, which comes to this: -- A sensory organ is damaged by meeting with its object in a high degree: vivid light is seen, and crashing sounds are heard, but to the damage of eye and ear; whereas a highly intellectual object, -- Aristotelian psychology, for example, -- if understood at all, is understood to the improvement of the understanding; the understanding, as such, not working through any bodily organ.
St Thomas however is far from confining dumb animals to mere sensation. He allows them sense memory, phantasy, a sort of judgement called vis aestimativa (notes pp. 122, 125), and a certain power of self-determination (Chap. XLVIII, n. 2). He denies in the intellect, free will, the powers of forming general concepts and determining their own judgements, and the immortality of their souls.