Francis P. Siegfried

“ In their endeavour to solve the problem, philosophers have followed two extreme tendencies. Some have denied the objectivity of the substantial or noumenal element, and attributed it wholly or in part to the mind; others have made the phenomenal or accidental element subjective, and accorded objectivity to substance alone. These two extreme tendencies are represented among the ancient Greek materialists and atomists on the one hand and the Eleatic pantheists on the other. Aristotle and his medieval followers steer a middle course. ”

“ I.—The obvious division of things into the stable and the unstable, the more or less independently subsistent and the dependent, or essentially inherent, appears beset with obscurity and difficulty as soon as it is brought under reflective consideration. ”

“ The same doctrine, however, suggests the further question, whether such accidents may not be separable from substance. Reason alone offers no positive arguments for such separability. The most it can do is to show that separability involves no inherent contradiction, and hence no absolute impossibility; the Omnipotence that endows substance with the power of supporting accidents can, it is claimed, supply some other means of support. ”

“ Theorists who, like the Cartesians, deny the objective, distinct entity of all accidents have been obliged to reconcile this negation with their belief in the Real Presence by maintaining that the species, or accidents, of bread and wine do not really remain in the Eucharist, but that after Consecration God produces on our senses the impressions corresponding to the natural phenomena. This theory obviously demands a seemingly unnecessary multiplication of miracles and has at present few if any serious advocates. ”

“ This element is likewise dissolved in the philosophy of Hume and the Associationists. Kant considered accidents to be simply subjective categories of sense and intellect, forms according to which the mind apprehends and judges of things—which things are, and must remain, unknowable. Spencer retains Kant's unknowable noumenon but admits phenomena to be its objective aspects or modifications. ”