Thank you for subscribing to Annotated Thomist...check back each day for a new section of St. Thomas' corpus, annotated and summarized. (FREE TRIAL FOR NEW SUBSCRIBERS!!!)
AT is also available to donors of $10 or more on Patreon or SubscribeStar along with all of the other benefits (daily bonus videos, bonus articles, PDFs, etc.)
If you need more personalized help reading the Summa, I am available for 1-on-1 sessions, here.
cf., Sent.I.D4.Q2.A1; Sent.I.D22.Q1.A2.Rep1; SCG1.C36; QDePot.Q7.A5.Rep2
There are three acts of the intellect, 1. Simple Apprehension (which produces concepts), 2. Judgments (which produces propositions), and 3. Reasoning (which produces arguments).
For example, let's say I begin with the apprehension of human nature. Then, I see Socrates and combine the term "man" (which represents the concept I have apprehended) with the new thing I have perceived, i.e., Socrates, to say "Socrates is a man." From this, I combine another judgement "all men are moral" to conclude "Socrates is mortal."
In this question, St. Thomas is asking whether we can go from apprehending concepts to making judgments (which will lead to a profession that we can draw forth conclusions about God).