Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- 1 OCKHAM AS A POLITICAL THINKER
- 2 THE PROBLEM OF RADICAL ACTION
- 3 THEORY OF INSTITUTIONS: SECULAR AND SPIRITUAL GOVERNMENT
- 4 POLITICS AND PHILOSOPHY: NATURAL RIGHT AND THE ETHICAL BASIS FOR OCKHAM'S POLITICAL IDEAS
- 5 POLITICS AND THEOLOGY: SECULAR POLITICS AND CHRISTIAN VIRTUE
- CONCLUSION: OCKHAM AS A CONSTRUCTIVE POLITICAL THINKER
- Bibliography
- Index of passages in Ockham quoted, discussed, or cited
- Index of names
- Subject index
4 - POLITICS AND PHILOSOPHY: NATURAL RIGHT AND THE ETHICAL BASIS FOR OCKHAM'S POLITICAL IDEAS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 October 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- 1 OCKHAM AS A POLITICAL THINKER
- 2 THE PROBLEM OF RADICAL ACTION
- 3 THEORY OF INSTITUTIONS: SECULAR AND SPIRITUAL GOVERNMENT
- 4 POLITICS AND PHILOSOPHY: NATURAL RIGHT AND THE ETHICAL BASIS FOR OCKHAM'S POLITICAL IDEAS
- 5 POLITICS AND THEOLOGY: SECULAR POLITICS AND CHRISTIAN VIRTUE
- CONCLUSION: OCKHAM AS A CONSTRUCTIVE POLITICAL THINKER
- Bibliography
- Index of passages in Ockham quoted, discussed, or cited
- Index of names
- Subject index
Summary
Hoc est elicere conformiter rationi rectae, velle dictatum a ratione recta propter hoc, quod est dictatum … ad hoc quod velim virtuose illud dictatum a ratione recta oportet necessario quod velim rectam rationem per eundem actum.
To elicit an act conformably to right reason consists of willing what right reason dictates because right reason dictates it … In order for me to will virtuously what right reason dictates, it is strictly necessary for me to will right reason [itself] in the same act.
Sent III, 12, DDDOckham's philosophical and theological writings are difficult to interpret; they contain little that is directly concerned with politics, and Ockham himself seldom referred to them in the polemical writings central to the present study. For these reasons, and fortified by the example of such scholars as Boehner, Jacob, and Bayley, we have attempted in the preceding chapters to understand Ockham's political thought in its own terms, with little reference to his predominantly earlier work in other fields. This course has led to a surprisingly clear view of the territory so far explored. That we have been proceeding in a reasonable direction is also attested by the moderate, somewhat anti-metaphysical character of Ockham's chief constitutional doctrines. Yet, if it would be an ‘adventure’ or a ‘construction of the writer’, as Boehner has it, to develop Ockham's political ideas from his ‘so-called metaphysics’, it does not follow that there is no significant connection between the academic and political phases of his thought.
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- The Political Thought of William Ockham , pp. 173 - 196Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1974