(by the translator)
Agibile: Literally, the doable, whatever can take the form of human action; or Simply, human acts.
Analytico-Synthetic: Pertaining to the method which combines the analytic and the synthetic. The analytic method, which predominates in the natural sciences and is inductive, proceeds from the observation of facts to the formulation of the laws governing them; the synthetic method, which is dominant in speculative science and is deductive, goes from the general to the particular, from first principles to specific applications, from the simple to the complex.
Causality: In modern usage, the relationship or category of cause and effect; in Scholasticism, the quality or order of being according to which a thing depends on something else for its being or becoming. Material causality pertains to the undetermined or unspecified material from which the thing is constituted; formal causality, to the intrinsic principle or form that specifies or differentiates this material as a particular thing.
De Deo Uno: Concerning the One God: a treatise in dogmatic theology which deals with the existence and the nature of God.
Ex prima causa: From the First Cause, that is, from God considered as Cause of all other causes.
Ex propriis rerum causis: From the proper causes of things; that is to say, from the second or created causes which constitute things. These causes from which philosophy starts are proximate and second only relative to the First Cause, God; in another sense, philosophy considers things in their first and highest causes in contradistinction to the natural sciences which deal in secondary and proximate causes.
Gratia materiae: By reason of the subject matter.
Gratia sanans: A healing or medicinal grace. One of the effects of divine grace is the health (sanatio) of the soul.
Habitus: A stable or habitual intellectual disposition, or let us say light, which aids or conditions the act of knowledge in attaining its object.
Hypostasierung (Ger.): An agency for giving substance to; personification (pejoratively here).
In gradu (verae) scientiae (practicae): On the level of a (true) (practical) science. (See Science)
In statu virtutis: In the state or condition of virtue; as a virtue.
Inform: To give an inner form or shape to.
Infused: Used in theology to specify virtues and gifts which have been imparted to the soul by God gratuitously, independently of human effort or merit; hence antonymous to acquired.
Logos (Gr.): A term which in the earlier Greek writers signified the principle of reason or intelligibility, and which later came to mean 'word' -- with a cosmic connotation in either case. It is found chiefly in Heraclitus, the Stoics, and Philo, and was appropriated by St. John (Cf. Prologue of 4th Gospel), who referred it to Christ, as the Word uttered eternally by the Father, through Whom everything is made and all men are enlightened.
Motives of credibility: A phrase commonly employed by theologians and apologists to designate the signs or proofs of divine revelation, which are principally miracles, prophecies, and the marks and attributes of the Church.
Naturaliter christiana: Naturally or inherently Christian. This expression was first used by Tertullian who applied it to the soul (anima). It is used today to describe a philosophy which in addition to expounding the highest truths of reason, discovers by its own methods or exemplifies in itself the inner dynamism which leads to God as the final fulfillment of all things.
Object: That to which an act of knowledge is directed and in which it terminates. In criteriology this term is opposed to 'subject,' but can sometimes be synonymous with it. (See Subject.) The material object is that of which no specific aspect has been determined for consideration; the formal object is the material object considered under a specific or special point of view; the proper object is the one to which the act of knowledge naturally tends, and in which it is completed.
Opus rationis: Literally, the work of reason, that is to say, the philosophic effort. With perfectum it is used by St. Thomas to define philosophy as the perfect accomplishment of reason.
Order: In this study, a fundamental class of being; synonymous with 'sphere,' 'level,' or 'plane.'
Philosophia ancilla theologia: Philosophy the handmaid of theology.
Ratio fide illustrata: Reason enlightened by faith.
Reason (ratio): In psychology, the discursive faculty of the mind; in metaphysics, the essence or form of a thing; in logic (with formal), the light in which an object is viewed and by which it is specified. In this last sense -- which is the most frequent sense used in this study -- it is used interchangeably with 'aspect,' 'viewpoint,' 'perspective,' etc.
Reduplicative ut sic: In logic, a proposition is taken reduplicatively when by means of "redoubling" phrases (as such, insofar as, as, etc.) it focuses on the formal reason of the subject, in order to consider it in itself.
Science: In its widest meaning, synonymous with knowledge; in the narrow sense, a particular discipline with its own proper object and formal reason; more precisely, an organically constituted body of evident, certain, and necessary truths. A science is true if it is adequate to its object and can resolve its conclusions in evident principles.
Separated Philosophy: A philosophy which claims absolute sovereignty for itself by shunning all higher wisdom and lights; any form of pure rationalism. This philosophy may be seen as stemming from Descartes who based all science on pure reason, and made science and faith mutually exclusive disciplines.
Serva: Bond-servant, slave.
Subalternation: This term signifies more than simple 'subordination' or 'infraposition,' in which cases the lower science retains its proper autonomy when employed instrumentally by the superior science: it refers rather to the state of the science which cannot exist as a true science unless it receives illumination from the higher science. Thus, the subalternating (or subalternant) science makes its own first principles in order to become adequate to its alternated (or subalternate) science must take the conclusions of the subalternating science as its own first principle in order to become adequate to its object.
Subject: When this term does not designate the individual knower (psychological sense) or that of which something is predicated (in logic) it denotes (as is most frequently the case in this study) that upon which a faculty or science acts, and is synonymous with 'object.'
Synderesis: In St. Thomas, a stable inborn disposition of the intellect, or habitus, which inclines us to know the first principles of practical reason.
Wisdom: Knowledge through the highest sources and causes. In its highest reaches science coincides with wisdom, but becomes an imperfect form of it as it approaches the particular or the empirical.
Veluti stella rectrix: As a guiding star, that is to say, as an exterior and superior orientation.