(1) Read Aquinas's argument (directly below) and highlight (or underline) all the
indicator words for premises and conclusions that you can find in the text.
Aquinas' Second Way:
The second way is based on the nature of causation. In the observable world causes are
found to be ordered in a series; we never observe, nor ever could, something causing itself,
for this would mean it preceded itself, and this is not possible. Such a series of causes must
however stop somewhere; for in it an earlier member causes an intermediate and the
intermediate a last (whether the intermediate be one or many). Now if you eliminate a cause
you also eliminate its effects, so that you cannot have a last cause, nor an intermediate one,
unless you have a first. Given therefore no stop in the series of causes, and hence no first
cause, there would be no intermediate causes either, and no last effect, and this would be an
open mistake. One is therefore forced to suppose some first cause, to which everyone gives
the name "God."
(From Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, translated by the Fathers of the English
Dominican Province)
