Cause Principle Unity

Cause, principle and unity
execute different statues without having a preconception of their different
forms.
TEOFILO. You understand all that excellently. What I want, indeed, is
that two sorts of form be considered: one is the cause which, even if not the
efficient, allows the efficient to produce its effects; the other is the principle,
called forth from matter by the efficient cause.
DICSONO. The aim, the final cause which is sought by the efficient, is
the perfection of the universe, which consists of all forms having actual
material existence; the intellect delights and takes such pleasure in pursuing
this goal, that it never tires of calling forth from matter all sorts of
forms, as Empedocles himself seems to maintain.
TEOFILO. Quite right, and I add that, just as this efficient is universal in
the universe, but specific and particular in the universe’s parts and members,
so are also its form and its purpose.
DICSONO. But enough concerning causes. Let us come to principles.
TEOFILO. In order to get at the constitutive principles of things, I will
first discuss form, since, in a way, it is identical to the efficient cause we have
just defined: we said, in fact, that the intellect, which is a potency of the
world soul, is the proximate efficient cause of all natural things.
DICSONO. But how can the same subject be principle and cause of
natural things? How can it have the character of an intrinsic part, and not
that of an extrinsic part?
TEOFILO. That is no contradiction, if we consider that the soul is in the
body as the pilot is in the ship: since the pilot is part of the ship, he moves
with it; yet, considering that he governs and moves it, he must not be
included as a part, but as a distinct efficient cause. Likewise, the soul of the
universe, in so far as it animates and informs it, is found to be an intrinsic
and formal part of the universe, but in so far as it directs and governs the
universe, it is not a part, and does not have the character of principle, but
of a cause. Aristotle himself grants us this, since, though he denies that the
soul has the same relation to the body as the pilot to the ship, he does not
go so far, when he considers it with regard to its power to know and to
understand, as to call it the act and form of the body, but he looks on it as
an efficient cause separate in its being from matter. The intellect is something
that comes from outside from the point of view of its substantiality,
independent of the composite.
DICSONO. I approve of what you say, because if it is correct that the
intellectual potency of our soul is separated from the body and has the
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