Dionysius Cartusianus, Commentaria in I Sententiarum, d. XVII q. 6; Opera omnia, t. 20 (Tournai, 1902) — reporting Durandus of Saint-Pourçain
Reported. These are not Durandus of Saint-Pourçain's own words. The Latin below is Denys the Carthusian's report of him — quoted at length in Denys's survey, rejecting Giles of Rome's account before giving his own. It is evidence for what Denys the Carthusian wrote about Durandus of Saint-Pourçain, and never for what Durandus of Saint-Pourçain wrote.
Finally Durandus writes on these matters, and rejecting the opinion of Giles brought forward above, he says: wherever there is an augmentation according to more and less — which augmentation is, however, more an alteration than an augmentation — there degrees of greater and lesser perfection are to be found. For that whose nature consists in what is simply indivisible is not spoken of according to more and less, since more and less, properly taken, is according to the same specific nature, as is said in Physics VII: that things comparable according to more and less are of the same account.
Now there are two opinions as to what the degrees of a form are measured by, according to which the form receives more and less. For some say that they are not measured according to essence, but according to being. But this opinion fails in many ways. First, in this, that it supposes being itself to be really distinguished from essence — the opposite of which many hold as entirely true.
Finally, when they say that the degrees are measured according to being and not according to essence, either it is understood that in the act of being itself, as it is a certain thing, there are diverse degrees, just as others posit diverse degrees in the essence of a form; or it is understood that being is a thing in itself wholly indivisible, but that its participation in the subject has a certain latitude of degrees. The first cannot be said, for many reasons. First, because being at least follows upon the form, or upon the whole composite by reason of the form, just as any proper attribute or property follows upon the species — as risibility follows upon man. But in a species and its proper attribute there cannot be degrees in the one without there being degrees in the other; therefore neither in the form and in its being.
Draft English (Claude), awaiting Wilson · cc-by · published at bonaventure.wrootpress.com. This page quotes it; that is its home.
Dionysius Cartusianus, Commentaria in I Sententiarum, d. XVII q. 6; Opera omnia, t. 20 (Tournai, 1902) — reporting Durandus of Saint-Pourçain · pd
⭐ Durandus was on this project's second-pass list and both routes to him had failed: Capreolus never names him in this distinction, and no scan of the Venice 1571 print exists on archive.org under any spelling tried. Denys is the only road to him this edition has found, and the words below are Denys's report, not his own (RULINGS.md ruling 8). ⭐ What he contributes is the sharpest formulation on the page of what the argument is actually about: the growth of charity is more an alteration than an augmentation, and the real question is whether the degrees of a form are measured by its essence or by its being. He refuses the second because it presupposes that being is really distinct from essence, which he will not grant. ⭐ A Dominican on the dissenting bench, as Auriol is a Franciscan there — between them they are the argument for arranging these benches by school and not by order.