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xxxviii PREFACE 

to the nature of the thing in a marginal aspect, but these acci- 
dents are not necessary acts of the natural thing, that is to say, 
not that by virtue of which the thing is formally what it is, 
and hence they do not ensue from the specific operation as such. 
Materia signata (or a determinacy ensuing from a grade of 
being in matter, which a given substance has prior to the 
supervention of a further perfection) is the basis of numerical 
distinctions. It follows from this that though the specific unity 
of the individual makes it numerically one as such a kind of 
species, still individuals differ from each other as things of the 
same species by accidental factors derived from matter and not 
from the proper form. These signaled material factors are in- 
crements outside of the formal operation by virtue of which a 
nature primarily exists and is intelligible. It may be said that 
although the thing is and is intelligible essentially by virtue of 
its proper operation, still matter as determined by active and 
passive qualities, such as rarefaction and condensation (simple 
dispositions of matter in excess of pure potentiality in the order 
of substance), has a certain determined character prior to the 
supervention of another perfection. Hence it is that the dis- 
tinctions of materia signata ensue from material dispositions 
and not from essential form or proper act. An inferior mode of 
being stands as matter to a superior mode of being, and can be 
assimilated to the superior whereby it individuates the superior 
mode. It is for this reason among others that there is not one 
common or generic soul of all men, but each man has an in- 
dividual soul peculiar to himself. 

But the individual is not another predicable as some thought, 
for this would be an equivocation between the natural order 
and the rational order. The first intention is the singular sign 
of the sensible thing as assimilated in sense, and therefore of 
the individuated thing; consequently, it is the potential sign 
by virtue of which the nature (that which exists) is known,