St Bonaventure, who sees so clearly that theology has an object of its own—'the things we have to believe, when considered as such, pass into the class of things that can be grasped by the mind, and this because we now look at them from a second point of view’ (I Sent. I proem, q. 1.)—does not for all that think it anything but an instrument or stage in the movement towards Love. He states its aim like this: ‘Revelation turns us towards the affections', (loc. cit. q. 3, a. 1.) Albert the Great holds the same opinion: ‘Knowledge of truth is not sought through the intellect alone but through the affections and substance; hence it is not intellective but effective, for the intellect is directed towards the affections as towards it end'. (I Sent. d. 1, a. 4, ad 2m.)

This text lays bare the heart of the matter: the intellect is subordinate to the affectus. Cognitive activity, especially at the supernatural level, does not represent something autonomous, something with value in itself. To use Aristotelian terms, we have in theology not a speculative science but a practical one.