at Cologne, Paris, Rome and Bologna;
his chief work the "Summa Theologiae"; his complete writings
collected in 1787.

A DEFINITION OF HAPPINESS[3]

The word end has two meanings. In one meaning it stands for the thing
itself which we desire to gain: thus the miser's end is money. In
another meaning it stands for the near attainment, or possession, or
use, or enjoyment of the thing desired, as if one should say that the
possession of money is the miser's end, or the enjoyment of something
pleasant the end of the sensualist. In the first meaning of the word,
therefore, the end of man is the Uncreated Good, namely God, who alone
of His infinite goodness can perfectly satisfy the will of man. But
according to the second meaning, the last end of man is something
created, existing in himself, which is nothing else than the
attainment or enjoyment of the last end. Now the last end is called
happiness. If therefore the happiness of a man is considered in its
cause or object, in that way it is something uncreated; but if it is
considered in essence, in that way happiness is a created thing.

[Footnote 3: From the "Ethics." The complete works of Aquinas were
published in 1787; but a new and notable edition was compiled in 1883
under the intimate patronage of Pope Leo XIII, to whom is given credit
for a modern revival of interest in his writings.]

Happiness is said to be the sovereign good of man, because it is the
attainment or enjoyment of the sovereign good. So far as the happiness
of man is something created, existing in the man himself, we must say
that the happiness of man is an act. For happiness is the last
perfection of man. But everything is perfect so far as it is in act;
for potentiality without actuality is imperfect. Happiness, therefore,
must consist in the last and crowning act of man. But it is manifest
that activity is the last and crowning act of an active being; whence
also it is called by the philosopher "the second act." And hence it is
that each thing is said to be for the sake of its activity. It needs
must be therefore that the happiness of man is a certain activity.

Life has two meanings. One way it means the very being of the living,
and in that way happiness is not life; for of God alone can it be said
that His own being is His happiness. In another way life is taken to
mean the activity on the part of the living thing by which activity
the principle of life is reduced to act. T