Saint Thomas Aquinas, thinker and philosopher: “If a captain’s highest objective were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever”

Among the many currents that feed the philosophical river shaping modern Western thought, the doctrine of Saint Thomas Aquinas is undoubtedly one of the most substantial.

This 13th-century medieval philosopher and theologian stands as a central figure of Scholasticism and as one of the clearest representatives of an idea later developed by many other thinkers: that reason has value in its own right, even within faith itself.

In other words, Saint Thomas Aquinas helped lay some of the earliest foundations for the development of rational thought in Europe.

There are so many quotations that capture his thinking that it is difficult to choose one that stands above the rest, especially given the many dimensions of his philosophy. At its core, as mentioned above, his thought can be summarized through the relationship between faith and reason: they do not contradict one another because both come from God.

Reason can arrive at certain truths on its own, while faith reveals higher truths. From this, he concluded that reason prepares the way for faith, and faith, in turn, perfects reason. Above all, this is the foundation of his famous Five Ways for demonstrating the existence of God.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained

Still, despite the complexity of his ideas, not all of Saint Thomas Aquinas’s philosophy can, or should, be understood only within such an abstract framework. His ideas can be applied quite naturally to ordinary, everyday concerns, and many of his most popular quotations show exactly that.

In this respect, one of the best examples may be the following line: “If a captain’s highest goal were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever.”

From a strictly philosophical standpoint, the quote aligns perfectly with his teleology, his virtue ethics, and his understanding of humanity’s ultimate end. Put another way, his doctrine suggests that choosing not to live fully out of fear of loss is already a kind of failure to fulfill one’s purpose. In even more practical terms, the quote reminds us that those who never take risks are unlikely to achieve the outcomes they hope for. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

In this example, we can see the dual nature of his thought, which is capable of both explaining the relationship between faith and reason and offering advice to a close friend about any personal endeavor. It is no coincidence that Saint Thomas is considered one of the fathers of Western philosophy: his ideas find their way into everyday life almost without us noticing.

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