Reply Obj. 3:  As stated above (Q. 55, AA. 3, 4), a virtuous habit has a fixed relation to good, and is nowise referable to evil.  Now the good of the intellect is truth, and falsehood is its evil.  Wherefore those habits alone are called intellectual virtues, whereby we tell the truth and never tell a falsehood.  But opinion and suspicion can be about both truth and falsehood:  and so, as stated in Ethic. vi, 3, they are not intellectual virtues. ________________________

THIRD ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 57, Art. 3]

Whether the Intellectual Habit, Art, Is a Virtue?

Objection 1:  It would seem that art is not an intellectual virtue.  For Augustine says (De Lib.  Arb. ii, 18, 19) that “no one makes bad use of virtue.”  But one may make bad use of art:  for a craftsman can work badly according to the knowledge of his art.  Therefore art is not a virtue.

Obj. 2:  Further, there is no virtue of a virtue.  But “there is a virtue of art,” according to the Philosopher (Ethic. vi, 5).  Therefore art is not a virtue.

Obj. 3:  Further, the liberal arts excel the mechanical arts.  But just as the mechanical arts are practical, so the liberal arts are speculative.  Therefore, if art were an intellectual virtue, it would have to be reckoned among the speculative virtues.

On the contrary, The Philosopher (Ethic. vi, 3, 4) says that art is a virtue; and yet he does not reckon it among the speculative virtues, which, according to him, reside in the scientific part of the soul.

I answer that, Art is nothing else but “the right reason about certain works to be made.”  And yet the good of these things depends, not on man’s appetitive faculty being affected in this or that way, but on the goodness of the work done.  For a craftsman, as such, is commendable, not for the will with which he does a work, but for the quality of the work.  Art, therefore, properly speaking, is an operative habit.  And yet it has something in common with the speculative habits:  since the quality of the object considered by the latter is a matter of concern to them also, but not how the human appetite may be affected towards that object.  For as long as the geometrician demonstrates the truth, it matters not how his appetitive faculty may be affected, whether he be joyful or angry:  even as neither does this matter in a craftsman, as we have observed.  And so art has the nature of a virtue in the same way as the speculative habits, in so far, to wit, as neither art nor speculative habit makes a good work as regards the use of the habit, which is the property of a virtue that perfects the appetite, but only as regards the aptness to work well.

Reply Obj. 1:  When anyone endowed with an art produces bad workmanship, this is not the work of that art, in fact it is contrary to the art:  even as when a man lies, while knowing the truth, his words are not in accord with his knowledge, but contrary thereto.  Wherefore, just as science has always a relation to good, as stated above (A. 2, ad 3), so it is with art:  and it is for this reason that it is called a virtue.  And yet it falls short of being a perfect virtue, because it does not make its possessor to use it well; for which purpose something further is requisite:  although there cannot be a good use without the art.