QUESTION 28

OF THE EFFECTS OF LOVE
(In Six Articles)

We now have to consider the effects of love:  under which head there are six points of inquiry: 

(1) Whether union is an effect of love?

(2) Whether mutual indwelling is an effect of love?

(3) Whether ecstasy is an effect of love?

(4) Whether zeal is an effect of love?

(5) Whether love is a passion that is hurtful to the lover?

(6) Whether love is cause of all that the lover does?
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FIRST ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 28, Art. 1]

Whether Union Is an Effect of Love?

Objection 1:  It would seem that union is not an effect of love.  For absence is incompatible with union.  But love is compatible with absence; for the Apostle says (Gal. 4:18):  “Be zealous for that which is good in a good thing always” (speaking of himself, according to a gloss), “and not only when I am present with you.”  Therefore union is not an effect of love.

Obj. 2:  Further, every union is either according to essence, thus form is united to matter, accident to subject, and a part to the whole, or to another part in order to make up the whole:  or according to likeness, in genus, species, or accident.  But love does not cause union of essence; else love could not be between things essentially distinct.  On the other hand, love does not cause union of likeness, but rather is caused by it, as stated above (Q. 27, A. 3).  Therefore union is not an effect of love.

Obj. 3:  Further, the sense in act is the sensible in act, and the intellect in act is the thing actually understood.  But the lover in act is not the beloved in act.  Therefore union is the effect of knowledge rather than of love.

On the contrary, Dionysius says (Div.  Nom. iv) that every love is a “unitive love.”

I answer that, The union of lover and beloved is twofold.  The first is real union; for instance, when the beloved is present with the lover.  The second is union of affection:  and this union must be considered in relation to the preceding apprehension; since movement of the appetite follows apprehension.  Now love being twofold, viz. love of concupiscence and love of friendship; each of these arises from a kind of apprehension of the oneness of the thing loved with the lover.  For when we love a thing, by desiring it, we apprehend it as belonging to our well-being.  In like manner when a man loves another with the love of friendship, he wills good to him, just as he wills good to himself:  wherefore he apprehends him as his other self, in so far, to wit, as he wills good to him as to himself.  Hence a friend is called a man’s “other self” (Ethic. ix, 4), and Augustine says (Confess. iv, 6), “Well did one say to his friend:  Thou half of my soul.”