Chapter 18 — That God is infinite according to essence

This leads to the consideration of God’s infinity. God is not infinite by way of privation, according to which infinity is a passion of quantity: in this sense something is called ‘infinite’ which naturally would have a limit by reason of its genus, but does not. Rather, God is infinite negatively, as a thing is called ‘infinite’ that is in no way limited. For no act is found to be limited except by a potency that is receptive of the act; thus we observe that forms are limited in accordance with the potency of matter. Hence, if the first mover is an act without any admixture of potency, since it is not the form of any body or a force inhering in a body, it must be infinite.

The very order perceived in things is also a proof of this. For the higher the position occupied in the scale of being, the greater are things found to be in their own way. Among the elements, nobler things are found to be greater in quantity, as also in simplicity. Their generation demonstrates this, since fire is generated from air in a multiplied proportion, and air from water, and water from earth; and the heavenly body clearly exceeds the entire quantity of the elements. Necessarily, therefore, that which is the first among all beings, and which can have nothing prior to it, must be of infinite quantity in its own mode.

Nor is there anything to wonder at if what is simple and lacks bodily quantity is said to be infinite and to exceed in its immensity all quantity of body. For our own intellect, which is non-bodily and simple, exceeds the quantity of all bodies by the strength of its knowledge, and embraces all things. Much more, then, that which is the very first of all exceeds the universe in its immensity, and embraces everything.