CAPUT XVII. Quod cum imaginationem, rationem, voluntatem dicimus, diversis modis id accipimus
Imagination's Mother and Son
The opening analogy explains that the mother (imagination as power) and her son (imagination as act) are one in name, just as a genus begets a species.
Don't be troubled that I call both the mother and the offspring imagination. But I want the relation between mother and son to be what holds between instrument and act; or again, the relation between mother and her offspring to be what holds between genus and species. A genus, when combined with a difference, generates a species from itself, just as a man's union makes a woman fertile.
Instrument and Action Share One Name
The common naming of instrument and action is illustrated by 'sight' and applied to reason, will, and intellect; the instrument is always prior to its action, so the mother is the instrument and the son its act.
We often use one name for both an instrument and its action; for example, we call both what we see and the means by which we see "sight."1 So when we name reason, will, or intellect, we sometimes mean the instrument and sometimes its action. We know, of course, that the instrument always comes before its action and can exist without it. Therefore, the action derives its being from the instrument, not the instrument from the action. It's not unfitting, then, to understand the mother as the instrument and her son as its action.
Imagination as Power and as Act
Imagination is both the soul's power to form images at will and the act that results when the mind uses it; the clarification done, the author returns to the main argument.
So imagination, when it means the instrument, is that power of the soul by which the soul can form an image of whatever it wants, whenever it chooses. When the mind uses this instrument to imagine something, some action is without a doubt produced, and that action is likewise called imagination. I wanted to note these points briefly, but there's no need to linger on them any longer. But now let's return to the order of the argument.2
Read the original Latin
Neminem conturbet quod et matrem et prolem imaginationem appellem. Sed hoc volo esse inter matrem et filium, quod est inter instrumentum et actum, vel hoc est inter matrem et prolem ejus, quod est inter genus et speciem. Nam genus adjuncta sibi differentia ex se speciem generat, quemadmodum copula viri feminam ad prolem fecundat. Et saepe instrumentum et ejus actionem uno nomine appellamus: nam illud quod videmus, et illud quo videmus, visum vocamus. Sic cum ratio, vel voluntas, vel intellectus nominatur, aliquando instrumentum, aliquando ejus actio intelligitur. Et scimus quidem quia instrumentum quam ejus actio semper prius est, et sine ipsa esse potest. Habet ergo ab instrumento actio esse, non instrumentum ab actione. Unde nec inconveniens est, per instrumentum matrem, per actionem autem filium ejus intelligere.
Imaginatio ergo, quando instrumentum significat, est vis illa animae qua cum voluerit quodlibet imaginari valet. Hoc instrumento cum ad aliquid imaginandum mens utitur, actio procul dubio quaedam efficitur, quae similiter imaginatio nominatur. Haec volui breviter commemorare, sed in his immorari diutius non est necesse. Sed nunc ad prosecutionis ordinem revertamur.
Notes
Benjamin Minor (The Twelve Patriarchs / Preparation of the Mind for Contemplation) companion
A daily portion of stillness
Chosen Portion delivers one short contemplative reading and a guided moment of silence each day — the ascent, one step at a time.
Chosen Portion is the paced doorway into this collection: it portions the dense mystical treatises into one daily reading plus guided silence, exactly as the 14-day plan teaches.
- Daily bite-sized excerpts from the contemplative classics, never a wall of text
- A built-in timed stillness practice that grows from 2 minutes to 10
- Gentle progression through the tradition — the app remembers where you are on the ascent