Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Acknowledgments
- A note on the texts
- Introduction
- Part 1 THE PASSIONS IN GENERAL
- Part 2 PARTICULAR PASSIONS: THE CONCUPISCIBLE PASSIONS
- Part 3 PARTICULAR PASSIONS: THE IRASCIBLE PASSIONS
- 9 Hope and despair
- 10 Fear
- 11 Daring
- 12 Anger
- Epilogue: The passions, the virtues, and happiness
- Bibliography
- Index
11 - Daring
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Acknowledgments
- A note on the texts
- Introduction
- Part 1 THE PASSIONS IN GENERAL
- Part 2 PARTICULAR PASSIONS: THE CONCUPISCIBLE PASSIONS
- Part 3 PARTICULAR PASSIONS: THE IRASCIBLE PASSIONS
- 9 Hope and despair
- 10 Fear
- 11 Daring
- 12 Anger
- Epilogue: The passions, the virtues, and happiness
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The consideration of daring is compressed, receiving but a single Question. Aquinas spends little time on daring's formal object because he has already covered much of the ground in the discussion of fear. Like fear, daring is a response to something perceived as a threatening evil. But if this is true, how does something become an object of daring rather than fear? Aquinas addresses this problem by isolating the “contrariety” of daring and fear (§11.1). After he distinguishes daring from fear, Aquinas determines that the primary cause of daring is hope. He locates various privations (e.g. drunkenness) as accidental causes (§11.2). How is daring related to courage? They are not the same, but Aquinas thinks that courage may include daring in its exercise. He also acknowledges, however, that daring can be the product of foolhardiness. Everything depends on the passion's relation to reason (§11.3). Thinking about daring's relation to reason provokes a first objection. If daring originates not simply from the perception of a threatening evil, but more nearly from a judgment that it can be overcome, does not the origination of daring in an act of reason disqualify it from being a passion in the proper sense? From another angle, it may be objected that daring is virtually indistinguishable from anger, since both involve the same pattern of rising up against a perceived threatening evil for the sake of victory over that evil. Why does Aquinas distinguish daring and anger as passions different in kind? I consider both objections, for their own sake and as a preparation for the following chapter on anger (§11.4).
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- Information
- Thomas Aquinas on the PassionsA Study of Summa Theologiae, 1a2ae 22–48, pp. 252 - 267Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009