Determinatively, i.e. not just privatively, evil

"the evil that constitutes a difference of habits is not [the] pure privation [common to every fallen being], but something determinate [that is] repugnant to a determinate nature", in this case human nature.

"malum quod est differentia constitutiva habitus, non est privatio pura, sed est aliquid determinatum repugnans determinatae naturae."

     St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II.54.3.ad 2, as trans. FEDP (Shapcote).  Latin from Corpus Thomisticum.

Ways of knowing

"The physicist proves the earth to be round by one means [(medium)], the astronomer by another: for the latter proves this by means [(media)] of mathematics, e.g., by the shapes of eclipses, or something of the sort; while the former proves it by means [(medium)] of physics, e.g., by the movement of heavy bodies towards the center [(medium!)], and so forth. Now the whole force of a demonstration, which is a syllogism producing science, as stated in Poster. i, text. 5, depends on the mean [(medio)]. And consequently various means [(media)] are as so many active principles, in respect of which the habits of science are distinguished."

     St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II.54.2.ad 2, FEDP as modified by (?) the Aquinas Institute translator.

"'It is not good that the man should be alone'"

"All things are twofold, one opposite the other,
    and he has made nothing incomplete. 
One confirms the good things of the other,
    and who can have enough of beholding his glory?"

πάντα δισσά, ἓν κατέναντι τοῦ ἑνός,
καὶ οὐκ ἐποίησεν οὐδὲν ἐλλεῖπον·
ἓν τοῦ ἑνὸς ἐστερέωσεν τὰ ἀγαθά,
καὶ τίς πλησθήσεται ὁρῶν δόξαν αὐτοῦ;

     Sir 42:24-25, RSV.  NETS:    

"Everything is in pairs, one opposite one,
     and he did not make anything deficient.
One firmed up the good things of the other—
     and who will be filled when he sees his glory?"

Three words for "to kindle"

accendere:  to set fire to from above, such that what burns burns downwards.

succendere:  to set fire to from below, such that what burns burns upwards.

incendere:  to set fire to on every side, such that what burns burns inwards.

Lewis & Short; the OLD says this for succendere only.

Ps 18 (17):29, Nova Vulgata (1979):  "you light [(accendis)] my lamp, O Lord: my God illuminates [(illuminat)] my darkness."

Ps 17 (18):29, Vulgata:  "thou lightest [(illuminas)] my lamp, O Lord: O my God enlighten [(illumina)] my darkness."

According to Sabatier, anyway (for the Psalms volume of Vetus Latina has not yet been completed), the Old Latin, too, has inluminas/inlumina.

Apparently eccendere (or extercendere) something would be impracticable, a "non-starter," as it were ☺.

A word to the wise

"repeated acts cause a habit to grow.  If, however, the intensity of the act falls short proportionately of the intensity of the habit, such an act does not dispose to an increase of that habit, but rather to a lessening of it."

"multiplicatis actibus, crescit habitus. Si vero intensio actus proportionaliter deficiat ab intensione habitus, talis actus non disponit ad augmentum habitus, sed magis ad diminutionem ipsius."

     St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II.52.3.Resp.  Latin from Corpus Thomisticum.

What a relief

"the nature of virtue does not require that man should reach [(attingat)] the mean of right reason as though it were an indivisible point, as the Stoics thought, but it is enough that he should approach [(propre . . . esse, that he be near)] the mean, as stated in the Ethics [(II.9 (1109b18))]." 

"Non enim exigitur ad rationem virtutis, quod attingat rectae rationis medium in indivisibili, sicut Stoici putabant, sed sufficit prope medium esse, ut in II Ethic. dicitur."

     St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II.66.1.Resp.  Latin from Corpus Thomisticum.

Too bad Lincoln met his Maker unshriven (as it were)

"Surely, the Judge of all the earth, would, by the solemnities and atrocities of this astounding event, teach us as a people, lessons from which we must not fail to learn, if we would not have something yet more terrific befal us.  Yesterday afternoon, [Lincoln’s] funeral procession passed from City Hall, through Broadway and Fifth avenue, to 34^th st., occupying several hours. . . .  Solemnity and order marked the mournful obsequies.  One cannot but think, amid all of this, where is the soul of the departed chieftain, so suddenly called to leave the poor body tenantless?  Would that our dear President had not received his death wound in the theater."

     Phoebe Palmer, as quoted in Richard Wheatley, ed., Life and Letters of Mrs. Phoebe Palmer (New York: W.C. Palmer, 1881), 60, possibly in the letter of "July 27, 1874" to "My Beloved Sister Hamline."  Note that in the second paragraph of this excerpt, which extends onto p. 61, Palmer quotes "a minister friend who said that in going to the theater the evening when he was shot, Abraham Lincoln had departed from the 'shadow of the Almighty' (Ps. 91:1), which would [otherwise] have protected him" (Charles Edward White, The beauty of holiness:  Phoebe Palmer as theologian, revivalist, feminist, and humanitarian (Grand Rapids, MI:  Francis Asbury Press, Zondervan Publishing House, 1986), 153.
     If these paragraphs do occur in the aforementioned letter of 1874, then 1874 was the date of Palmer's (in this sense unshriven) death as well (!).
     My thanks to Dr. Douglas M. Strong for the quote-sleuthing occasion.