tions of the
recipient. But the intellect is of a more stable nature, and is more
immovable than corporeal nature. If, therefore, corporeal matter
holds the forms which it receives, not only while it actually does
something through them, but also after ceasing to act through them,
much more cogent reason is there for the intellect to receive the
species unchangeably and lastingly, whether it receive them from
things sensible, or derive them from some superior intellect. Thus,
therefore, if we take memory only for the power of retaining species,
we must say that it is in the intellectual part. But if in the notion
of memory we include its object as something past, then the memory is
not in the intellectual, but only in the sensitive part, which
apprehends individual things. For past, as past, since it signifies
being under a condition of fixed time, is something individual.

Reply Obj. 1: Memory, if considered as retentive of species, is not
common to us and other animals. For species are not retained in the
sensitive part of the soul only, but rather in the body and soul
united: since the memorative power is the act of some organ. But the
intellect in itself is retentive of species, without the association
of any corporeal organ. Wherefore the Philosopher says (De Anima iii,
4) that "the soul is the seat of the species, not the whole soul, but
the intellect."

Reply Obj. 2: The condition of past may be referred to two
things--namely, to the object which is known, and to the act of
knowledge. These two are found together in the sensitive part, which
apprehends something from the fact of its being immuted by a present
sensible: wherefore at the same time an animal remembers to have
sensed before in the past, and to have sensed some past sensible
thing. But as concerns the intellectual part, the past is accidental,
and is not in itself a part of the object of the intellect. For the
intellect understands man, as man: and to man, as man, it is
accidental that he exist in the present, past, or future. But on the
part of the act, the condition of past, even as such, may be
understood to be in the intellect, as well as in the senses. Because
our soul's act of understanding is an individual act, existing in
this or that time, inasmuch as a man is said to understand now, or
yesterday, or tomorrow. And this is not incompatible with the
intellectual nature: for such an act of understanding, though
something individual, is yet an