Reply Obj. 1:  This argument would prove, if the formal object of the concupiscible faculty were something contrary to the arduous, just as the formal object of the irascible faculty is that which is arduous.  But because the object of the concupiscible faculty is good absolutely, it naturally precedes the object of the irascible, as the common precedes the proper.

Reply Obj. 2:  The remover of an obstacle is not a direct but an accidental mover:  and here we are speaking of passions as directly related to one another.  Moreover, the irascible passion removes the obstacle that hinders the concupiscible from resting in its object.  Wherefore it only follows that the irascible passions precede those concupiscible passions that connote rest.  The third objection leads to the same conclusion. ________________________

SECOND ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 25, Art. 2]

Whether Love Is the First of the Concupiscible Passions?

Objection 1:  It would seem that love is not the first of the concupiscible passions.  For the concupiscible faculty is so called from concupiscence, which is the same passion as desire.  But “things are named from their chief characteristic” (De Anima ii, 4).  Therefore desire takes precedence of love.

Obj. 2:  Further, love implies a certain union; since it is a “uniting and binding force,” as Dionysius says (Div.  Nom. iv).  But concupiscence or desire is a movement towards union with the thing coveted or desired.  Therefore desire precedes love.

Obj. 3:  Further, the cause precedes its effect.  But pleasure is sometimes the cause of love:  since some love on account of pleasure (Ethic. viii, 3, 4).  Therefore pleasure precedes love; and consequently love is not the first of the concupiscible passions.

On the contrary, Augustine says (De Civ.  Dei xiv, 7, 9) that all the passions are caused by love:  since “love yearning for the beloved object, is desire; and, having and enjoying it, is joy.”  Therefore love is the first of the concupiscible passions.

I answer that, Good and evil are the object of the concupiscible faculty.  Now good naturally precedes evil; since evil is privation of good.  Wherefore all the passions, the object of which is good, are naturally before those, the object of which is evil—­that is to say, each precedes its contrary passion:  because the quest of a good is the reason for shunning the opposite evil.

Now good has the aspect of an end, and the end is indeed first in the order of intention, but last in the order of execution.  Consequently the order of the concupiscible passions can be considered either in the order of intention or in the order of execution.  In the order of execution, the first place belongs to that which takes place first in the thing that tends to the end.  Now it is evident that whatever tends to an end, has, in the first place, an aptitude or proportion to that end, for nothing tends to a