Chapter III. Question 3 introduction on God’s nature and his attributes in general

BEFORE we come to consider God's various attributes, we must discuss His nature as conceived by us, and His attributes in general. This especially applies here, because from the very end to which the five proofs converge, which is the self-subsisting Being, there arises the question whether what formally constitutes God's nature, according to our conception of it, is self-subsisting Being, from which perfection all the other attributes are afterward deduced.

WHAT FORMALLY CONSTITUTES GOD’S NATURE ACCORDING TO OUR CONCEPTION OF IT

State of the question. We are not concerned here with God’s nature as it is in itself and as it is seen by the blessed; for what formally constitutes the divine nature as it is in itself, is that most proper and most eminent formal concept of the Deity, which contains actually and explicitly (and not merely implicitly) all God's attributes, which are truly identified in the absolute simplicity of the Deity, and which are seen in it by the blessed without any deductive process.

It is our analogical and very imperfect knowledge of God’s nature that concerns us here, and the question is whether among all the divine perfections there is one that is, as it were, the source of the others, just as in the human nature rationality is the source of the various properties in man. Then the divine nature, when so viewed, according to our imperfect mode of knowing it, is virtually distinct from the divine attributes. This means that it contains them actually and implicitly, but not explicitly; for these attributes are afterward explicitly derived from it.

Billuart and certain other Thomists make another addition to the state of the question, but, unless I am mistaken, on insufficient grounds. Billuart is of the opinion that it is not a question of the divine nature as expressed by the most common and transcendental concept of uncreated being, which applies to all the divine at- tributes, just as the concept of created being applies to all the differences found in creatures.

There seems to be no foundation for this distinction between what is common and special in God, for God is not in any genus, not even according to our mode of conceiving Him. We can indeed distinguish in any creature the transcendentals that are common to all the genera and the species. But this distinction is of no value in God, since God is not in any genus, and transcendentals, such as being, unity . . . , are verified in God in a most special manner, that is, by reason of Himself. Hence it is not repugnant on a priori considerations for what constitutes the divine nature to be the self-subsisting Being, this constituting the terminus of the five proofs in the ascending order and the principle for the derivation of the attributes.

THE VARIOUS OPINIONS AS TO WHAT CONSTITUTES THE DIVINE NATURE

1. The nominalists reply that God is an accumulation of perfections, and there is no need of our inquiring into the logical priority of one perfection over the others. It would be a useless question. In fact, the nominalists said that the distinction between the divine attributes was a purely mental one (rationis ratiocinantis), a verbal distinction, such as we have between Tullius and Cicero, and from this it would follow that the divine names are synonymous.? This opinion of the nominalists leads to agnosticism, for it could just as well be said that God punishes by His mercy and forgives by His justice. This would mean the end of all knowledge about God, and for this reason the nominalists were formerly expelled from the University of Paris.

2. On the other hand, Scotus admitted an actual and formal distinction between the divine attributes, a distinction that is actual from the nature of the thing, and which is prior to the consideration of our mind, and which gives us the answer to the question as to what constitutes the divine nature, by saying that it Is radical infinity, demanding as such the various divine attributes.

In reply to this, the Thomists say that radical infinity, or the exigency of all perfections, does not constitute the divine nature, but is presupposed by it and has its foundation therein. It is indeed the very essence of God that demands all the perfections which are derived from it. Moreover, God’s infinity is deduced from the fact that He is the self-subsisting Being.? Besides, infinity is a mode

of each of the divine attributes. Finally, the Thomists say that the actual and formal distinction of Scotus, by the very fact that it is prior to our consideration of it, is already a real distinction, however slight this may be, and hence it is excluded from God by reason of His absolute simplicity in whom, as the Council of Florence says, “all things are one and the same where there is no opposition of relation,” * and this opposition is to be found only between the divine Persons.

3. Several Thomists of the seventeenth century and later, such as John of St. Thomas, the Salmanticences, and Billuart, hold that subsistent intellection is what constitutes the divine nature. Their principal argument is as follows: The supreme degree of being is that which must constitute the divine nature; but the various grades of being are existence, life, and intellection; therefore subsistent intellection is what constitutes the divine nature.

Hence in their opinion “self-subsisting Being” is in God to be taken as something transcendental and not specific. But, as we have pointed out in the state of the question, there seems to be no foundation for this distinction in God between what is common and what is specific; because God is not in any genus, not even according to our mode of conceiving Him.

4. Many other theologians, several of them being Thomists, hold that self-subsisting Being is what constitutes the divine nature. Among the Thomists holding this opinion we have Capreolus, Bannez, Ledesma, Contenson, Gotti, and more recently del Prado and Father Billot. We find this view expressed in the twenty-third proposition of the Thomistic theses approved by the Sacred Congregation of Studies (1914): “The divine essence, in that it is identical with the actuality of the divine being in act, or in that it is the self-subsisting Being, is proposed to us as constituted, as it were, in its metaphysical aspect, and by this same furnishes us with the reason of His infinite perfection.” + But Suarez says that it is better to posit the fact itself of aseity as the principle from which the divine attributes are derived.

Others reply to this, and justly so, that the reason for this fact is that only in God are essence and existence identical, or that God alone is the self-subsisting Being. But Suarez expresses a different view, because he does not admit a real distinction between created essence and existence.

As we shall at once see, it seems that our preference must be for

4Cf. Guido Mattuissi, S.J., Le XXIV tesi della filosofia di S. Tomasso d’Aquino approvate dalla S. Congregazione degli studi. Roma, 1917, pp. 260-76.

this opinion, on the supposition, however, that God is not a body but pure spirit. But it is especially because God is He who is ® that He transcends all spirits. Before we prove this fourth opinion, mention must be made of two other views proposed by those outside the Catholic schools of theology.

Fifth opinion. There are those, who maintain that essential goodness is what formally constitutes the divine nature. Thus Plato was of the opinion that the supreme reality is the idea of Good transcending essence and intelligence." In like manner Plotinus considered that the supreme reality is the One Good transcending intelligence. We still find some traces of this theory in the writings of several Augustinians although they do not explicitly examine this question, Thus Peter Lombard divided the subject matter of his Book of the Sentences with reference to enjoyable and useful good, namely, to those things that can be enjoyed, especially God, usables or creatures, inasmuch as they are means for the attainment of the supreme Good.

To this opinion the Thomists reply in the words of St. Thomas,’ that, as being is absolutely prior to the good, God, prior to being conceived as the supreme Good, is conceived as the supreme Being existing of Himself; in fact, God is the supreme Good only because He is the plenitude of being. In other words, the idea of being is more absolute, simple, and universal than the idea of good, and good can be conceived only as being that has reached its final stage of perfection, and that is capable of appealing to the appetitive faculty and perfecting it. Hence God is the supreme Good inasmuch as He is the plenitude of being.

But it must be conceded ë that in a certain sense, that is, not in order of being but of causality, good is prior to being, since the end is first among causes, attracting the agent, and the agent educes the form from the matter for the production of the causated being. Hence, for us, God is first of all considered as the supreme Good, our ultimate end; but in Himself, God is first of all the self-subsisting Being, and would be so even if He had not created anything, and were not the end of any creature.

Sixth opinion. It is that of certain modern philosophers, such as Secrétan and J. Lequier, who believed in voluntarism and absolute libertism. These maintained that divine liberty is what formally constitutes the divine nature, for God is His own reason for what

6 The Republic, Bk. VII.

He is. But there is nothing, they say, that is more its own reason for what it is than liberty, which determines itself as it wills. Hence God would be absolute liberty, and most freely would have determined all things, even those that pertain to His intimate life. Wherefore, according to Secrétan,® the definition of God is not “Who is” or “I am who am,” but, “I am that which I most freely will to be.”

The writings of Descartes revealed a tendency to accept this theory. In his opinion, eternal truths, even the truth of the principle of contradiction, depend upon God’s free will. Ockham had said something similar to this in maintaining that God could have commanded us to commit murder and even to lead an irreligious life; to which Leibnitz replied that “God would then no more be, according to His nature, the supreme Good than the supreme evil of the Manichaeans.” 1° St. Thomas likewise said: “To say that justice depends simply upon the wili of God, is to say that the divine will does not act according to wisdom; and this is blasphemy.” 4

This libertarian theory cannot be admitted, because freedom of choice presupposes deliberation on the part of the intellect, otherwise it would be the same as chance. But chance is an accidental cause, and so cannot be the first cause; for the accidental presupposes the essential. If anyone digging a grave, did not intrinsically as such dig, the treasure would not accidentally be found. Hence it is most manifest that the first liberty presupposes the supreme Being and the first Intellect.

Besides these six opinions, it is difficult to conceive or think of any other ways of solving this problem. Priority is given either to Being or to the Good or to the Infinite or to Intellection or to liberty. Whether we consider in God what is subjective or what is objective, no other answers than these can be found.

We have already stated why the last two opinions cannot be admitted, nor the opinion of the uominalists nor that of the Scotists. Therefore we have but two opinions left to consider, namely, whether self-subsisting Being is what formally constitutes the divine nature, or whether it is self-subsisting intellection.

Solution. From the teaching of St. Thomas we see that the formal constituent of the divine nature is self-subsisting Being, which is the view held by several Thomists above mentioned, although not all are of this opinion.

We are at least persuaded of this for three reasons: (1) because of the order observed by St. Thomas in this treatise on God; (2)

9 La philosophie de la liberté, 1, Bk. XV, pp. 361~70. 10 Theodicée, 11, $9 176 f. 11 De veritate, q.23, a.6.

from his teaching on this point; 1? (3) from the solution of the difficulties proposed against this opinion.

1. The order observed in the treatise is evidence of this. In fact, according to this order, by means of the five proofs, we advance in knowledge to the establishing of this supreme truth: “God is the self-subsisting Being,” 13 and the divine attributes are afterward derived from this supreme truth.

Thus from the beginning of the third question to the end of the fourth article the mind continually advances in knowledge, for the first article establishes that God is not a body; the second, that God is not composed of matter and form; the third, that God is not a composite, consisting of His nature and the principle of individuation. From this we conclude that God is a pure spirit. But a pure spirit can be a created being; hence to distinguish God from even the noblest of creatures, it is established in the fourth article that God is the self-subsisting Being, since He is the first efficient cause, pure act, and essential being.

This is the culminating point in the ascendant order or by the way of finding, and the principle in the descendent process or by the way of judgment, of wisdom, which judges of all things by the highest of causes. Thus from the fact that God is the self-subsisting Being is deduced the real distinction between God and the world," and from this the divine attributes are afterward deduced, such as goodness (plenitude of being),'® infinity (being not received in anything is infinite), immutability, eternity, and other attributes. Likewise the divine intellection is deduced from the immateriality of the divine being, and omniscience from the fact that God is the self-subsisting Being. Hence it is only in the fourteenth question that the divine intellection is discussed. In fact, the opening words of the prologue to this question are: “Having considered what belongs to the divine substance, we have now to treat of God’s operation.” Being is prior to truth and intellection, for intellection is predicated only of the subject and as this latter is related to intelligible being as the object.

Such is the order observed in this treatise on God. From this we see that the formal constituent of the divine nature is stated before the fourteenth question, in the fourth article of the third question, where it is shown that only in God are essence and existence identical. As Father del Prado * with good reason shows, this prop-

17 De veritate fundamentali philosophiae christianae.

osition constitutes the fundamental of Christian philosophy, fundamental indeed not by way of finding but by way of judgment, since wisdom judges of all things by the highest cause, or by reason.

2. This opinion is equivalently what St. Thomas said: “This name, He who is, is most properly applied to God for three reasons. First, because of its signification . . . , since the existence of God is His essence itself. . . . Secondly, on account of its universality . . . to designate by this the infinite sea of substance... . Thirdly, from its consignification, for it signifies present existence, and this above all applies to God, whose existence knows not past or future.” 18

Thus, when Moses asked God His name, “God said to Moses: I am who am. He said: Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me to you.” 1° The Hebrew word “Yahweh” (from which the word Jehovah is derived, which is written with the vowel signs of Adonai) is the equivalent of “He who is.” It is known as the Tetragrammaton, a word of four letters, and is God’s proper name in the strictest sense.

3. This opinion receives its confirmation from the solution of the principal difficulty proposed by other Thomists who hold a different opinion. This difficulty is enunciated as follows: The highest degree of being is what constitutes the divine essence. But this highest degree is intellection; for, in the ascendant order of the grades of being we have: existence, life, intellection. Therefore intellection is what constitutes the divine nature.

St. Thomas replies to this by distinguishing between participated being—which can be without life and intelligence—and self-subsisting being, which is the fullness itself of being, including all other perfections actually and implicitly. In the passage referred to, St. Thomas says: “Although therefore existence does not include life and wisdom, because that which participates in existence need not participate in every mode of existence, nevertheless God's existence includes in itself life and wisdom, because nothing of the perfection of being can be wanting to Him who is subsisting being itself.” °° Similarly, from the work just quoted, we read: “Being taken simply, as including all perfection of being, surpasses life and all that follows it.” 21

21 Ibid., Ja Hae, q.2, a.p ad gum; see also J Sent., d.8, q.1, a.1, 8; De potentia, q-7, a-2 ad gum; cf. Gotti, O.P., De Deo, tr. I, dub. 3, §3; Contenson, O.P., De Deo, diss. Il, c. 2, spec. 2.

THE DIVINE ATTRIBUTES IN GENERAL

The theologians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries usually discussed this question at the beginning of their treatise on God. St. Thomas discusses it in a special manner in the thirteenth question, in connection with the divine names, and rightly so, because the divine being is first considered by him, and then our possibility of knowing it.

Nevertheless the different views about these attributes as presented by nominalism, the formalism of Scotus, and the moderate realism of St. Thomas, oblige us to insert this introduction, which serves as material for reflection upon this treatise, and which was ideally present to the mind of St. Thomas as he was assigning in orderly arrangement the various parts of this treatise.

In this question of the divine attributes, all theologians distinguish between absolutely simple perfections, which imply no imperfection (such as intellection) and relative or mixed perfections, which denote imperfection even in their formal signification (such as reasoning). But certain theologians do not sufficiently distinguish the divine attributes or the absolutely simple perfections from God’s free action and the divine persons; for, although the latter do not imply any imperfection, yet they are not absolutely simple perfections in the strict sense.

HOW THE DIVINE ATTRIBUTE IS DEFINED

To avoid the above-mentioned confusion we must define the expression “divine attribute,” as the Thomists usually do, by saying that it is an absolutely simple perfection which exists necessarily and formally in God, and which is deduced from what we conceive as constituting the divine essence.?#

Explanation of this definition.

1. We are concerned with what is an attribute in the strict sense of the term, for sometimes the term refers in an improper sense to all that is predicated even not necessarily of God (as the divine free act) or else relatively (as the relations of paternity, filiation, passive spiration, by which the divine persons are constituted).

2. It is called an absolute perfection, not to the exclusion of perfections that are named with reference to creatures, such as providence, mercy, justice, omnipotence, but to the exclusion of the divine relation, to which the term “attribute” does not apply since

22 Cf. Damascene’s De fide orthodoxa, Bk. I, chap. 12; Summa theol., la, q.g, a.3 ad 1um; q.13, 2.4 ad gum, gum.

the relations are not common to the three Persons; for the attribute is a property of the nature and is common to the three Persons.

3. It is called an absolutely simple perfection so as to exclude relative or mixed perfections, which essentially imply imperfection, such as rationality. But what in the strict sense is an absolutely simple perfection? It is that perfection which in its formal concept implies no imperfection, and which it is better for one to have than not. Many add these last words to the definition, and rightly so, because the divine free act and the divine relations, although they imply no imperfection, yet are not absolutely simple perfections, at least in the strict sense. For it is not better for God to have the creative act than not, and there would have been no imperfection in God if He had not created, no matter what Leibnitz said about this; nor does it add to God’s perfection that He most freely wills to create the universe. In like manner the Father, to whom the opposite relation of filiation does not apply, would be lacking in some absolutely simple perfection if the relation of filiation were an absolutely simple perfection, as if it were superadded to the infinite perfection of the divine nature, which is common to the three Persons. Hence neither the divine relations nor the divine free act are absolutely simple perfections, at least in the strict sense. But the contrary of this is true as regards liberty and omnipotence, for God would be free and omnipotent, even if He had not created anything.

4. It is said to be necessarily existing in God, which means that it is like a property of the divine nature, so that God’s free acts such as creation, are excluded by these words.

5. It is said to be formally existing in God so that also mixed perfections may be excluded; for these are only virtually in God, since He can produce them in creatures. Thus life is formally attributed to God, but not animal or rational.

6. It is said, “as derived from the essence,” so as to exclude the prior concept of the divine nature. Thus the divine attribute is accurately defined.

HOW THE DIVINE ATTRIBUTES ARE CLASSIFIED

The theologians are not altogether in agreement concerning this classification. Some stress too much the attributes as they relate to us in the classification; others prefer to discuss the attributes as they relate to God as He is in Himself.

Suarez and several other theologians, discussing the attributes more as they relate to us, classify them into positive attributes, such as goodness, wisdom, justice, and negative attributes, such as in- corporeity, infinity, immutability, ineffability. They also point out that very many negative attributes, such as infinity and immutability, are incommunicable, or cannot be participated in.

A difficulty presents itself in this classification, inasmuch as certain attributes expressed in a negative form, such as infinity, are in themselves positive, just as incorporeity in itself denotes spirituality,?* and immutability in itself expresses stability in the highest degree, the positive form of which is eternity. Hence this Suarezian division stresses too much the quoad nos element in the attributes.

St. Thomas, however, in considering the attributes as they relate to God as He is in Himself, seems to have devised a better classification, by distinguishing between those that pertain to the divine substance and those that refer to the divine operation.** In the first class of attributes we have simplicity, perfection, goodness, infinity, immensity, immutability, eternity, unity, invisibility, and ineffability. In the second class, however, we have knowledge, will, and love, and subordinate to these are justice, mercy, and providence, as virtues residing either in the will or in the intellect. Finally, as regards virtually transient operations, we have the creative, conservative, and directive powers.” This division is primary and fundamental, because it stresses more God as He is in Himself, and not so much as we are related to Him. The classification proposed by Suarez is more of the nature of a subdivision, and St. Thomas refers to it as such.26

HOW THE DIVINE ATTRIBUTES ARE DISTINCT FROM ONE ANOTHER AND FROM THE DIVINE ESSENCE

There are three leading opinions, and they are the result of the different ways of solving the twofold problem about universals and the analogy of the divine names.*’ Let us first consider the extreme views that are fundamentally in opposition.

1. The nominalists admitted only a mental distinction between the divine attributes, like the verbal one between Tullius and Cicero, or between Cicero the subject of some proposition and Cicero the predicate of another proposition.

23 On the contrary, for the angels who have a positive and intuitive knowledge of spiritual things, corporeity is the negation of spirituality.

24 Summa theol., Ia, prologue to q.3 and especially to q.14.

26 Ibid., q.13, a.2. In this same article St. Thomas notes another subdivision, since certain divine names are predicated absolutely (as perfection, simplicity), whereas others are predicated relatively as referring to creatures (such as providence, mercy, justice, omnipotence).

27 This has been more fully examined by us in God, His Existence, II, 203-45.

They give two reasons for this opinion: (1) The universal is not even fundamentally present in things; only individuals exist, and in these there is no true, essential, and unchangeable similarity according to the species, the genera, and the transcendentals; (2) hence not even analogically can anything be predicated of God and creatures at least in the proper sense, but only metaphorically or symbolically.28 Hence to say, “God is just,” would no more properly belong to Him, than to say “God is angry.” To say that “God is just” would not mean that He is so substantially but only causally, inasmuch as He is the cause of justice in creatures just as He is the cause of life in animals.?®

Criticism. From this opinion it follows that the divine names are synonymous and that, contrary to reason, Scripture, and tradition, it can be said therefore that God punishes by means of His mercy and pardons by means of His justice; for, as the nominalists say, there is only a verbal distinction between these two attributes as between Tullius and Cicero, and wherever we find the name Tullius written the name Cicero can be written for it. Thus this opinion leads to pure agnosticism, which would result in God being absolutely unknowable, the treatise on God an absolute impossibility, and all the definitions of the Church about the divine attributes would be identical in meaning. As St. Thomas remarks: “If the words ‘God is good’ signified no more than ‘God is the cause of good things,’ it might in like manner be said that God is a body, inasmuch as He is the cause of bodies.” 8° In the next two articles of this question he observes that not all the names applied to God are metaphorical in meaning, for some are applied properly although analogically (as in the case of “God is just”), and not all the divine names are synonymous.’ The nominalist view destroys the analogy of being, and leads to equivocality of being.??

2. Scotus admits, however, that the divine essence is distinct from the attributes and the Persons, and he posits an actual and formal distinction pertaining to the nature of the thing, between the divine

28 Concerning the philosophical errors of the nominalists, see Denzinger, nos. 553-70. The following philosophical errors of Nicholas of Autrecourt are condemned: (t) “That we can have no certainty from the natural appearances of things,” which is practically a denial of the ontological validity of primary ideas; (3) “There is absolutely no difference in meaning between the propositions: God is, God is not.” This is a denial of the transcendent validity of the notion of being in acquiring a knowledge of God, and so being is equivocal or is used in absolutely different senses, if its affirmation and negation are no different in meaning; (32) “God and the creature are not anything.”

attributes, which is previous to our consideration of them, as already stated. Only in this way, according to Scotus, it can be affirmed that God punishes by His justice and not by His mercy. This necessitates that these two attributes be formally and actually distinct in God, previous to our consideration of them, about the same way as, in our soul, the intellect and the will are formally and actually distinct.*

This theory has its foundation in‘the extreme realism advocated by Scotus, who contends that already in created beings there is an actual and formal distinction between the metaphysical degrees of anything whatever, as, for instance, in Peter, between humanity, vitality, substantiality, and entity. From this it follows that being is predicated univocally of God and creatures, as Scotus explicitly maintains. Nor is it to be wondered at that being is univocal, if, previous to the mind’s consideration, it is formally and actually distinct from substantiality, vitality, that is, from the modes of being.

Criticism. (a) This actual and formal distinction, devised by Scotus, if it is truly more than virtual, that is, as we remarked, if it truly exists in the thing before the mind’s consideration, is already a real distinction, however slight it may be, and then it is opposed to God’s absolute simplicity; for, as the Council of Florence says: “In God all things are one and the same where there is no relation of opposition.” 3 In other words, in this way Scotus ends in extreme realism and in a certain anthropomorphism, since he posits in God a distinction that exists only in the mind. ‘This theory is the absolute reverse of nominalism and agnosticism. Thus Scotus does not sufficiently recede from the exaggerated realism of Gilbert de la Porrée, which was condemned in the Council of Reims as contrary to God’s absolute simplicity.*® , b) The metaphysical degrees are not actually distinct in a thing before the mind’s consideration, as, for instance, in Peter, animality, vitality, rationality, and substantiality; for these are reduced to the same concept of humanity, of, which animality is the genus, and rationality is the specific differentia. Thus they correspond to the same reality that is in itself one but virtually multiplex.% c) Moreover, if being is formally and actually distinct from its

34 There is no intermediate distinction between the real and the virtual or that distinction which has its foundation in the thing, because there is no intermediate step between what precedes the mind’s consideration and what does not.

87 Cf. Goudin, Metaphysica, disp. I, q.3: “De distinctione quo gradus metaphysici distinguuntur.”

modes, then these modes would be outside being, and therefore nonentities. There is danger of pantheism in this, for if being were univocal, there would be but one being, because the univocal is not differentiated except by differences extrinsic to it, and what is not being is a nonentity. Truly the modes of being are included in the concept of being, and are contained in it actually and implicitly. Therefore being is not univocal (like a genus, the differentiae of which are extrinsic to it), but analogical. Being expresses something that is not absolutely but proportionately the same in self-existing Being, in created substantial being, and in accidental being. Finally, this doctrine of Scotus does not. seem to be in conformity with the teaching of the Fourth Lateran Council, in which we read: “So great similarity cannot be detected between the Creator and the creature that we do not have to take note of a greater dissimilarity between them.” § This is practically a definition of analogy, since the analogical aspect in God and creatures is not absolutely but proportionately the same, as with wisdom which in God is the cause of things and in us is measured by things.® Hence, while the nominalists tend toward equivocation of being, Scotus maintains the univocation of being. The two opinions are fundamentally in opposition.*°

3. The common opinion of the theologians mediates, so to speak, between nominalism and exaggerated realism, and towers above them. This opinion, the source-of which is the moderate realism of St. Thomas, is commonly formulated by the Thomists and a great number of theologians as follows: There is a minor virtual distinction between the divine attributes and God’s essence, between the divine attributes, and likewise between the divine persons and the essence.

St. Thomas uses simpler terminology, saying that God’s essence is distinct from the attributes and the divine Persons “not really but logically.” 4 He is speaking of the logical distinction that is founded on reality, which subsequently is commonly called virtual; and this calls for an explanation.

a) The virtual distinction is a distinction founded on reality, which means, contrary to Scotus’ theory, that it is non-existent previous to the mind’s consideration, and it does not destroy God's absolute simplicity. Against the nominalists and agnostics, however,

40 Nevertheless, when Scotus substitutes his formal distinction for St. Thomas’ real distinction, for instance, between the faculties of the soul, he paves the way for nominalism.

it is said to be “founded on reality,” since the different absolute perfections found in creatures are equivalently expressed in the eminence of the Deity.‘? St. Thomas says expressly: “To the various and multiplied conceptions of our intellect there corresponds one altogether simple principle, according to these conceptions, imperfectly understood.” 4 The eminence of the Deity is most simple, but it is virtually multiple, and all absolutely simple perfections are contained in it formally and eminently. This must now be briefly explained, and more fully in the thirteenth question.

Formally: This means substantially and properly; not merely metaphorically, but analogically and properly.‘

Eminently: How the perfections are contained is mysterious; but the divine attributes are so identified in the most eminent and formal concept of the Deity as not to be destroyed by it. They are contained formally in it, and yet they are not formally distinct. In fact, they are found in their purest state, without any imperfection, only in the Deity.

More briefly, absolute perfections are in God more so than the seven colors are in the white light; for these seven colors are only virtually present in whiteness, whereas the divine perfections are formally distinct from one another. For, whereas whiteness is not blue, one and true are predicated of the Deity.‘ b) The distinction between the divine attributes is called a minor virtual distinction. For the major virtual distinction is that which is of the nature of excluding and excluded, as in Peter the genus of animality is distinct from rationality, which is the differentia extrinsic to it, and there is a real foundation for conceiving it as in potentiality for this latter, as being susceptible of further perfection by something extraneous to it. But there is no real foundation for conceiving anything in God as in potentiality for some further perfection by the addition of something extraneous to Him. Whatever is conceived in God, must be conceived in Him as purest act. Hence there is a minor virtual distinction between the divine attributes, and between these and the divine essence. This means that the distinction is not of the nature of excluding and excluded, but of implicit and explicit. In other words, God’s nature as we conceive it (the self-subsisting Being) contains the attributes more so than virtually, more so than the genus contains the differences extrinsic to it, for they are contained actually and implicitly in it; but dis-

cursive reasoning is necessary for their explicit deduction from the divine nature. But the Deity, as it is itself, contains them actually and explicitly. Thus the blessed no longer need to have recourse to discursive reasoning so as clearly to see God’s attributes in the Deity. Hence all the attributes mutually include one another, or each contains the others actually and implicitly.

Moreover, this minor virtual distinction properly applies only to those attributes that are differentiated specifically and that pertain to different orders, as, for instance, between intellection and volition, justice and mercy; but there is no such distinction between attributes which, as found in creatures, differ only as potency and act do, such as between essence and existence, intellect and intellection. There is only an extrinsically virtual distinction between these, which means that the foundation for this distinction is not in the divine reality but in creatures. Otherwise it would have to be said that our conception of God includes the presence of something potential in Him for which there is a foundation in the divine reality. St. Thomas, as we have remarked, makes use of simpler terminology, and says that the distinction between the attributes and the Persons and the divine essence is “not real but logical.” 4 Moderate realism and the doctrine of analogy are the two fundamental reasons for this traditional opinion.

1. According to moderate realism, the universe exists fundamentally in things, and there is a foundation for this in them. Thus in Peter there is a virtual distinction between rationality, animality, and entity. In like manner, there is a virtual distinction between God's attributes.

2. Being is analogous, and is not a genus, for the differences of being would be outside being, and what is outside being is a nonentity. Nor is being equivocal, for this would mean the abolition of all true resemblance between beings. God would be absolutely unknowable, and it could be said of Him, as Nicholas of Autrecourt contended, “God is” and “God is not.” 4 In fact, if being were equivocal, the principle of contradiction would be false.*

Therefore the divine attributes apply to God analogically, and are present in Him formally and eminently; but between the attributes and between each of them and the divine essence there is only a virtual distinction. Expressed more briefly: the attributes are formally in God, but they are not formally distinct.

Tue SIMPLICITY OF Gop PROLOGUE

CONCERNING God we must consider what He is and how He is, or rather how He is not, for in this life we cannot know His essence, since this would be to see the Deity.* Hence we inquire how God is not, by removing from Him what does not apply to Him, such as composition and motion. Thus we must treat of God’s simplicity, perfection, infinity, immutability, and unity. But we shall afterward see how God is known and named by us.

This question of God’s simplicity starts out by excluding from Him what is known as physical composition, or of really distinct parts. In the first four articles it is established: ¹ that God is not a body; (2) that He is not composed of matter and form; (3) nor of nature and suppositum; (4) nor of essence and existence. Then what is known as metaphysical composition, which consists of genus and differentia, is excluded in the fifth article.

Finally, it is shown that there is no accident in God (a. 6), that God is altogether simple (a. 7), and that He does not enter into the composition of other things, either as form or matter, since He is the extrinsic cause, which means that He is the efficient and final cause of all things (a.8). In these last three articles we have the refutation of pantheism, and they are the result of the conclusions of what was established in the fourth article, namely, that only God is the self-subsisting Being. This fourth article contains the dominating principle of this question, that is, it is the terminus in the ascending order by way of investigation, and the beginning in the descending order by way of judgment, since wisdom judges of all things by the highest of reasons.

FIRST ARTICLE WHETHER GOD IS A BODY

State of the question. A body is defined as a substance that is extended according to three dimensions. But Holy Scripture speaks metaphorically of God’s arm, right hand . . . , as pointed out in the beginning of this article, and we must carefully distinguish between the metaphorical and literal senses in Holy Scripture. Tertullian did not sufficiently observe this distinction. But among philosophers Spinoza, as a pantheist, maintains that extension is an attribute of God, and he admits that it is infinite.

The reply, which is de fide, is as follows: God is a spirit and therefore is not a body. Jesus said to the Samaritan woman: “God is a spirit, and they that adore Him, must adore Him in spirit and truth.”² Similarly St. Paul says: “The invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made.” * Preaching to the Athenians, he said: “We must not suppose the divinity to be like unto gold or silver or stone, the graving of art and device of man.” * The Vatican Council says: “The Holy Catholic Church believes that there is one true and living God ... absolutely simple and immutable spiritual substance.” 5

Three proofs from reason are given, that God is not a body. The first proof discusses the body as a physical entity; in the second proof the quantitative aspect is considered; in the third proof the metaphysical element is stressed.

First proof. No body is in motion unless it is put in motion; but God is the first unmoved Mover (first way); therefore God is not a body. Against the major there is the difficulty of attraction, since the magnet attracts other bodies to itself, although it is not itself set in motion. In reply to this we say that, although the magnet has this property of attraction, its action is not its own, its power to act is not its action; for this it would have to be its own being, because operation follows being, and the mode of operation the mode of being. Therefore the magnet is moved invisibly by the first Mover, at least as a qualitative motion. Moreover, as Cajetan observes, the magnet can also be moved locally, and every moving body is moved at least as in potentiality for this, since it is by nature apt to be moved, and this suffices to distinguish it from the absolutely immobile first mover (this immobility not being that of inertia but of perfection), which is the terminus of the first way in proving God’s existence. Hence the major can be construed as meaning: every body is mobile. But God is the first immobile Mover. Therefore He is not a body.

Second proof. It considers rather the quantitative aspect in bodies, inasmuch as the parts are continuous. Every body is in potentiality, at least because the continuous is divisible to infinity. But God is pure act and there is absolutely no potentiality in Him. Therefore God is not a body.®

The minor is proved as follows: actuality is, absolutely speaking, prior to potentiality, for whatever is in potentiality can be reduced into actuality only by some being in actuality; but God is the first Being, as established in the fourth way of proving God’s existence; therefore God is pure Act.” Every potentiality presupposes actuality, for every being that is in potentiality expresses a relation to actuality and cannot be reduced into actuality except by a being that is in act. Therefore the supreme Being is in no way in potentiality.

Third proof. It considers the metaphysical aspect in bodies. The noblest of all beings cannot be a body; but God is the noblest of all beings, as established in the fourth way of proving God’s existence; therefore God is not a body.

The major is proved by showing that corporeity is something inferior. For a body is either living or non-living, and a living body is nobler than a non-living body; thus the ant is, absolutely speaking, nobler than a heavenly body. Moreover, the principle of life in a living body is nobler than the body as such. To put it more briefly, life is something nobler than corporeity, otherwise every body would be a living body. Vegetative life and sensitive life come from the specific form in the living body; this form, however, is not a body, but vivifies the body. From this third argument, as also from the other two, it is proved, indeed, that God is not a body; but this does not as yet prove that God is not the form of a body, so that He might be the soul of the world. This is proved, however, in the following articles, especially in the eighth article.

In the reply to the objections, St. ‘Thomas explains the metaphors of Holy Scripture, when it speaks of the height or the depth of God and of His knowledge.

SECOND ARTICLE WHETHER GOD IS COMPOSED OF MATTER AND FORM

State of the question. According to St. Thomas, everything composed of matter and form is a body, as he affirms in the counter-

6 The major is explained by St. Thomas in his commentary on Aristotle's Physics, Bk. VI, chaps. 1£., where he discusses especially the question of the continuous.

7 This had already been clearly proved by Aristotle in his Metaphysics, Bk. XII, chap. 7.

argument. But in Avicebron’s opinion there is a composite of matter and form that is not a body, because this philosopher said that even spiritual substances are composed of spiritual matter and form. Perhaps he said this so as to explain their individuation, and thus there could be several angels of the same species. Contrary to this, St. Thomas is of the opinion that the only composition in created spiritual substances is that of essence and existence, and of substance and accident. Each of them is a subsistent and immaterial form, and hence there cannot be two angels of the same species.

The conclusion of the article states the impossibility of matter existing in God. The proofs for this are given by considering: (1) matter in itself; (2) matter in its relation to its participated form; (3) matter in its relation to the action of the first agent.

First proof. Matter is in potentiality. But God is pure act, as stated in the preceding article, because He is the first being, the maximum in being (fourth way). Therefore God is immaterial. This article is expressed according to Aristotle’s terminology.

Second proof. Here Plato’s terminology concerning participation is more in evidence. Everything composed of matter and form is a participated good, or a participated form in matter; but God, inasmuch as He is the greatest good, is the essential good (fourth way); therefore God is not composed of matter and form.

Third proof. It starts from the principle that God is primarily and essentially an agent. Since the agent acts by its form, the manner in which it has its form is the manner in which it is an agent. But God, since He is the first agent (second way), is primarily and essentially a form, but not composed of matter and form.

The major is evident from the fact that the agent acts by its form, that is, the form is the reason of its acting; for to act is to determine, to actuate, and it is only by reason of its own determination that any being can determine. Thus fire heats and water cools. Hence it is said that the agent acts inasmuch as it is in act, and it is in act by means of its form, primarily by its substantial form from which the natural qualities originate.

Minor. God, being the first agent, is primarily and essentially an agent, which means that He is not moved by some higher power, but is of Himself essentially and immediately operative, just as the triangle of itself and immediately (or essentially and primarily) has three angles equal to two right angles. But this is a necessary property of the triangle, whereas God, as we shall see farther on,? is free in His external operations.

There arises a difficulty from this third argument. It seems that we can conclude only that God has essentially and primarily a form that is the reason of His action, but not that He is essentially and primarily a form. There is considerable difference between the verb “to be” and the verb “to have.” Thus fire essentially and primarily generates heat, because it has essentially and primarily heat, but it is not heat.

In reply to this we say with Cajetan: It can truly be concluded that God is primarily and essentially a form, because He is primarily and essentially an agent, and not dependent upon any other being. For if God were an agent who, by reason of His form, constituted a part of a composite, He would not be primarily and essentially an agent; for action in this sense could be attributed to all that participate in such a form. Thus fire is not, strictly speaking, essentially and primarily generative of heat, because it is not heat, but participates in heat. If fire were unreceived heat, then, just as in the case of unreceived or subsistent heat, it would be unique of its kind. Hence St. Thomas’ argument holds good. From the fact that God is primarily and essentially an agent, it follows that He is primarily and essentially a form not received in matter. This is also evident, as was said, from the fact that God is pure act and essential good. Thus God is pure spirit.

In the replies to the objections St. Thomas explains the metaphorical use of terms in Holy Scripture, when discussing the questions of a soul and of anger in God. It is said in the reply to ihe third objection: “The form which cannot be received in matter, is individualized precisely because it cannot be received in a subject.”

Hence God is an unreceived and unreceptive form. We shall see in the fourth article that God is also the unreceived and unreceptive being, and in the sixth article that He is the unreceived being because He cannot be the recipient of accidents. Thus what is meant by participation and unparticipated being is made increasingly clear, and we already find this vaguely presented to us in the writings of Plato.

THIRD ARTICLE WHETHER GOD IS THE SAME AS HIS ESSENCE OR NATURE

State of the question. It is asked whether there is composition of suppositum and nature in God. In the order of created things the suppositum is the complete subsisting being, of which the nature is the essential part. Thus the suppositum is really distinct from the nature, as the whole is from its principal part. ‘Thus man is not his humanity (as stated in the second objection), but has humanity. The question is therefore, whether God is His Deity or has Deity.

Thus it becomes increasingly evident that there is a difference between the verb “to be” and the verb “to have.” By this name “God” in the concrete sense, St. Thomas understands that which is, namely, suppositum or the Godhead as it connotes the individual, whether this word is previously taken to mean that He consists of three Persons or is one of the three Persons. This point is at present undetermined.

Reply. God is the same as His essence or nature. In other words, God is His Godhead and not only has the Godhead.

1. There is evidence of this on the authority of Holy Scripture, and it is a revealed truth, since Jesus said: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” 1° He did not say: “I have truth and life,” or merely: “I am true or truthful and living,” but “I am the truth and the life.” So that underlying the logical difference between subject and predicate, the verb “is” expresses real identity between them. Just as life, however, refers to the living being, so the Godhead refers to God. Hence God is His Godhead whereas, on the contrary, man is not His humanity, because the whole is not its part, but has its part, a point that will be more clearly explained in the body of the article.

In like manner, “God is charity,” and not only has charity. Contrary to this, the just, whether angels or men, have charity and are not charity. It must be observed that the Council of Reims defined against Gilbert de la Porrée, who denied that abstract terms can be predicated of God in the concrete: “We believe and confess that the simple nature of the Divinity is God, nor can it be denied in any Catholic sense that the Divinity is God and God is the Divinity.” 12

2. Proof from reason. In corporeal things nature differs from suppositum, just as the essential part differs from the whole, for besides the essential part there are the individualizing principles, for example, these bones and this flesh. But God is not corporeal, or composed of matter and form, but is a pure subsistent form (preceding article). And thus in God nature does not differ from suppositum. In other words, the suppositum is the subsistent form itself of the Godhead.

This proof rests upon the principle that, if affirmation is the cause of affirmation, negation is the cause of negation. But the affirmation that nature is a part of the suppositum, is the foundation for the aforesaid distinction. Therefore to deny that nature is a part of the suppositum, is to deny the aforesaid distinction. This argument is of validity provided it is properly understood.

A difficulty, however, presents itself, since it seems to follow from this that, since the archangel Michael is a pure subsistent form apart from matter, he is his Michaelness. But this is false, for Michaelness is only an essential part of Michael, who in addition to this has existence and accidents.

In reply to this we say that, from the very fact that God is a pure form without matter, St. Thomas excludes from Him in this article individuating principles that are distinct from the common nature. In the angel, too, there are no individuating principles distinct from the nature.

But in the present article St. Thomas is not yet explicitly considering the fact that in God there is nO composition of either essence and existence, or of substance and accident. This he will do in the fourth and sixth articles, in which it will be more clearly seen that God is His Godhead, because the Godhead in God is not solely an essential part, whereas, on the other hand, Michaelness is but an essential part in Michael, who is also a contingent being with the accidents of intellect and will. Hence Cajetan says in reference to this article: “Although this process of argumentation taken by itself can be criticized, yet when taken in conjunction with the doctrine of the subsequent articles it was found to be irreproachable, because the subsequent articles of this question exclude all composition.” 14 Hence, to bring out more clearly the force of this argument, it may be expressed by the following syllogism: Where nature is not a part of the suppositum they do not differ; but in God nature is not a part of the suppositum; therefore in God nature and suppositum do not differ. The major is explicitly enunciated by St. Thomas in several places.*®

Proof of minor. Since God is pure form, there are no individuating principles in addition to His nature. In fact, His existence is

15 Thus St. Thomas says in his Quodl. II, a.4, “Whether suppositum and nature are identical in the angel”: § 4, “To whatever being anything can accrue that does not belong to the concept of its nature, in that being suppositum and nature differ. . . . It is only in God that His essence excludes the presence of anything accidental, because His existence is His essence. Therefore suppositum and nature are absolutely the same in God. In the case of an angel, however, these are not absolutely the same, because there accrues to an angel something that does not belong to the species as such, for an angel’s essence or nature does not include existence, and there are certain other accidental notes in an angel (contingent thoughts and volitions), and these do not belong to the nature but to the suppositum.”

identical with His nature, nor is there such distinction as that between accidents and nature. Thus God and the Godhead are absolutely identical whereas, on the contrary, Peter is not his humanity, nor also, strictly speaking, is Michael his Michaelness.

But if God is His Godhead, then why the use of the concrete noun God and the abstract noun Godhead? The reply to the first objection solves this difficulty by saying: “We can speak of simple things only as though they were like the composite things from which we derive our knowledge.” But the composite is the subsistent concrete thing, and its nature is spoken of in the abstract, as its essential part.

FOURTH ARTICLE WHETHER ESSENCE AND EXISTENCE ARE THE SAME IN GOD

State of the question. This article, as we already pointed out, is the terminus in the ascending order by way of finding, of the five proofs for God’s existence, and it is also the principle in the descending order by way of judgment, by which wisdom judges of all things by the highest of reasons and causes. We shall at once see that what St. Thomas says in this article is already a refutation of pantheism, since he gives us the reason why God is really and essentially distinct from every finite being.

But it must be well understood what is meant by existence, so as to distinguish the divine existence from existence as applied to various other things. The first objection of this article refers to this difficulty. The second objection, however, is as follows: We can know whether God exists, but we can cannot know what He is (at least know Him quiddatively). Therefore His essence is not existence.**

Reply. God and God alone is His existence, or in God alone are essence and existence identical.

There is at least a veiled reference to this in the Scripture, for we read: “God said to Moses: I am who am. . . . Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me to you.” 11 This constitutes God’s proper name. Creatures, however, have existence, and cannot be so named. Therefore from this it is intimated that God not only has existence but is existence, that He is His own existence.

Also truth and being are convertible terms. But Christ said: “I am the truth,” and not merely: “I have truth.” Therefore this sup-

16 Concerning this article, cf. Norbert del Prado, O.P., De veritate fundamentali philosophiae christianae, p. 89; also pp. 20, 60. 17 Ex. 3: 14.

poses that He is essential being. But being derives its name from existence, because being is that which exists or can exist, whose act is existence. Similarly, St. Hilary, who is quoted in the counterargument, says: “In God existence is not an accidental quality, but subsisting truth.” 18 This does not mean that existence is properly an accident of created substance, but that it is predicated contingently of the creature, though not so of God.

St. Thomas replies in the body of the article by advancing three proofs from reason for his conclusion. In the first he proves that God is the first efficient cause (first and second ways); in the second, that He is pure act (third and fourth ways); in the third, that He is the first being. Thus we can truly say that in this article we have the one end expressed to which the five proofs for God’s existence by the ascending process of reasoning converge.

First proof. Essence and existence are the same in the first uncaused cause. But God is the first uncaused cause (second way). Therefore essence and existence are the same in God. The minor presents no difficulty, and it is the terminus of the second proof for God’s existence.

The major is proved as follows: Whatever a thing has besides its essence must be caused either by the essential principles or by some exterior agent; but in the first uncaused cause, existence is not caused either by any other cause or by the essential principles of the thing, because “no thing is its own cause,” since operation follows being; therefore existence is not something besides essence in the first uncaused cause, but is identical with it.

It cannot be said that God is cause of Himself, because to cause is to operate, and operation follows being. But it can be said that God's essence is the reason of His existence, inasmuch as He exists of Himself, is of Himself the reason for His existence. Thus this proposition, God exists, as stated above,'® is self-evident in itself, but not to us.

Corollary. Father N. del Prado rightly infers against Suarez that in all other efficient causes existence differs from essence. He says: “It belongs therefore to the nature of the first efficient cause that its essence and existence is one and the same, since the first efficient cause must of necessity have its existence uncaused; and it is of the essence of uncaused existence in a being that this is identical with its nature, which exists without being caused. Therefore . . . it must be inferred that in all other efficient causes existence differs from essence. Otherwise there would be no secondary efficient causes, and before we could establish God’s existence by means of

efficient cause we should also have to find out what properly belongs to an uncaused cause, namely, identity of essence and existence.” 2°

Thus this first argument serves a double purpose: (1) It points out the terminus of the first, second, and third proofs for God’s existence, namely, of first unmoved Mover, of first uncaused Cause, and of the first necessary Being who is His own existence, or of the self-subsisting Being. (2) It assigns the ultimate reason for the distinction between caused or created being and the uncreated Being, as also between contingent being and the necessary Being. Contingent being is a potentiality to be or not to be, because it is not its own existence, but, if it exists, has existence. There is a vast difference between the verbs “to be” and “to have.” Hence it is said that “the powers tremble” with reverential fear in seeing the selfsubsisting Being, because the angels are not their own existence, but only have existence, and they could be annihilated by God’s absolute power.

Second proof. It has its foundation in the principle that God is pure act, and is as follows: Existence is compared to essence, which is a distinct reality from it, as actuality to potentiality; but God is pure act, in whom there is no potentiality; therefore God's essence is not potentiality for existence, but is identical with existence. The major is the very definition of esse or existence: It is that which makes every form or nature actual. Thus humanity is not spoken of as actual except so far as it is spoken of as existing.

The minor was proved in the first article of this question. The reason given was that, absolutely speaking, actuality is prior to potentiality, since a being is said to be in potentiality with reference to its actuality, and is not reduced into actuality except by some being in actuality. But God is the first Being (fourth way). Therefore nothing of potentiality is in Him, but He is pure act. This is also evident from the fact that God is the first Mover, the first Cause, the first necessary Being. God must be His action, and hence His own existence, because operation follows existence, and the mode of operation the mode of existence. This argument points out the one end to which these three proofs for God’s existence converge.

Corollary. Therefore in everything that is caused by God, essence is potentiality with reference to existence, and‘ hence is really distinct from it, just as matter is from form. Before the consideration of our mind, matter is not form, but is potency that is made actual by its form, and hence is really distinct from it. In like manner, the essence of a caused thing is not its existence, previous to the 20 Del Prado, op. cit., p. 320.

mind’s consideration of this. In other words, it is not identical with its existence, but is distinct from it previous to the mind's consideration. Therefore this distinction, however slight it may appear, is real. The angel, knowing its own essence directly, sees this to be distinct from its existence. From this it is already apparent that there can be only one essence that is existence itself, for multiplication presupposes participation. Thus participated existence is manifold, as the existence of a stone, of a plant, of an animal, of a man.

Third proof. It is derived from the principle that God is the first Being (fourth way). That which is essential being is its own existence; but God is essential being, since He is the first being; therefore God is His own existence.

The minor presents no difficulty, for it is the terminus of the fourth way in proving God’s existence. The major is declared as follows: “That which has existence, but is not existence, is a being by participation,” just as that which has fire, but is not itself fire, as a coal fire, is on fire by participation. Therefore, “that a thing be essential being, it must be its own existence.”

We have in this argument a transcendent confirmation of the principle of efficient causality, This principle, which is invoked in proving God’s existence, is thus formulated: Some other being is the efficient cause of every contingent being. It is commonly held among the Scholastics that an uncaused contingent being is a contradiction in terms, that is, it is something not only unintelligible (which Kant admits), but is also an absurdity and an absolute impossibility, as for instance, that Lucifer originates from nothing, without any efficient cause.

However, an “‘uncaused contingent being” is not so clearly repugnant to reason as a “caused non-contingent being”; to say that it is uncaused is not a direct denial of the definition of contingent being, but of its property. “The uncaused contingent being” would be neither self-existent nor dependent on another for existence, and the proposition, “the uncaused contingent being exists,” would be the affirmation of the positive agreement between two terms that in no way agree. Hence what exists, but is not self-existent, depends on another for its existence.

But now it is said that the contingent being has existence and is not its existence. Therefore it is participated being, and hence it depends on the essential Being. The idea of participated being, however, is not completely intelligible apart from the correlative idea of essential Being. Therefore it is better to use this term after and not before the proofs for God’s existence. Plato, indeed, practically started out with this notion of being but, on account of his extreme realism, he thought he had a certain intuition of the supreme Good, or of God.

St. Thomas, in accordance with moderate realism, makes use of this notion of participated being preferably after the proofs of God’s existence. Then the principle of causality receives its confirmation as from a transcendent source, since participated being is shown to be dependent on essential being, or being composed of potency and act on pure act.

Corollary. Father del Prado #4 concludes from this argument that the division of real being into essential being and participated being has its root in the distinction between the self-subsisting Being and that which is composed of essence and existence.

In this distinction we have the foundation for the refutation of pantheism. For if God is the self-subsisting Being, then nothing can be added to His being,®? because He is ultimate actuality. Hence there can be no accident in God,** because the self-subsisting Being is not capable of further determination, but is the maximum in determination, although not limited, for limitation is on the part of matter that receives the form, or of essence that receives existence. From this we have the refutation of absolute evolutionism, according to which God is becoming in the world, and of Spinoza according to whom God is the recipient of finite modes that are, as it were, His accidents. Neoplatonic emanatism is likewise virtually refuted. This theory states that the soul is not made, not created out of nothing, but is “of God’s substance,” generated, as it were, from God. St. Thomas says in contradiction to this: “The soul is not its own existence, but is a being by participation. Therefore it is not a pure act like God.” 24 Hence it is not the same as God’s nature, and therefore is not generated from Him, is not of His substance, because generation is the origin of a living being from a living principle in the likeness of nature.2* Thus man generates man, and as stated in revelation, God the Father generates the Son in the likeness of His nature, communicating to Him even the whole of His indivisible nature, which cannot be multiplied.

Thus we readily see from this that pantheism, by confusing God with the creature, must end either in the absorption of the world in God, as in the acosmism of Parmenides, or else in the absorption of

God in the world, as in the absolute evolutionism of Heraclitus and of several modern philosophers.

There are other corollaries to which Father del Prado alludes,?° such as that the real distinction between created essence and existence is the foundation of the division of real created being according to the various grades of perfection, for the formal concept of existence does not denote either imperfection or limitations, and it is not susceptible to divers limitations in the stone, the plant, the animal, and man, unless it is received in some subject, namely, in some essence which is capable of existing, or in which there is a real capacity for existence, just as in matter there is a real capacity for its form, which is received in it and thus limited by it. Hence the various grades of being or of perfection are the result of the diversity of participation in being. Thus the fourth way of proving God’s existence is illustrated from a transcendent source, namely, from the grades of being.

Finally, in accordance with this doctrine of a real distinction between created essence and existence, which Suarez rashly rejected, St. Thomas admits one existence for the composite of matter and form, although the essence is composite, that is, the parts of the essence (matter and form) have not partial existences. Thus the unity of the natural composite is much better safeguarded. There is one existence even in the human composite; and the soul, which is essentially subsistent and immortal, will again communicate its existence to the reassumed body on the resurrection day. Moreover, as St. Thomas teaches, there is one existence for the two natures in Christ, which is the divine existence.?? All these things presuppose that created essence is really distinct from its existence. And this is the corollary of the conclusion of this article, namely, that only in God are essence and existence identical.

Hence this truth is rightly termed by Father del Prado ** the fundamental truth of Christian philosophy, fundamental indeed, not by way of investigation (which starts from facts attested by experience and the first principles of reason), but by way of judgment, by which wisdom judges of all things from the highest reason and cause.

Father del Prado expressly says: “This is the primary fundamental truth of Christian philosophy, not by way of investigation by which the mind ascends from creatures to God . . . but by way of judgment, since we decide about those things and resolve the

truth of our knowledge into its ultimate causes, and we seek for the ultimate reason why there must be only one unrelated absolute immutable being that is endowed with every perfection, and why all other beings except this one have received and must receive both what they have and desire to have, because of their absolute dependence on the first Being from whom, through whom, and in whom are all things.” 7°

Thus it is apparent why the proper name of God is “Who is” or “I am who am,” and why God said to St. Catherine of Siena: “I am who am; thou art who art not,” because, as St. Augustine says, creatures in comparison to God are as if they did not exist. For after creation, although there are more beings, there is not more of being or more of perfection.

Hence with good reason Father del Prado says: “All those things that are set forth by St. Thomas in his first consideration of the one God are contained fundamentally, virtually, and as to their beginnings, in the third article of the second question, and the subsequent questions are but explanations of those five ways by which God’s existence can be proved. And the golden key of entrance in the explanation of these proofs is presented by St. Thomas in the fourth article of the third question, where he gives many reasons why it is impossible for God’s existence to differ from His essence. In this we have the secret for finding out not what constitutes but rather what does not constitute the nature of the one who is the mover, the causer, the necessary in being, the maximum in being and in intelligence. In this we have the scientific foundation of the whole treatise on the one God. This constitutes the cornerstone. of all subsequent statements, namely, the identity of essence and existence in God,” *° and in God alone.

CONFIRMATION OF THE THESIS FROM THE SOLUTION OF THE OBJECTIONS

Reply to the first objection. The divine being is being to which nothing can be added, because being is the ultimate actuality of essence, and therefore divine being is neither received nor receivable, but is irreceptive, and is not in potentiality to further actuality; wherefore, as stated in the sixth article, there can be no superaddition of any accident in God. In fact, it is only in an improper sense that addition can be attributed to God in His external operations by way of causality and creation. For after creation, although there are more beings, there is not more of being, of perfection, because

God already possesses unlimited being and perfection. Contrary to this, universal being is that to which something can be added, as in the determination of the genus and the species, or in the modifications of being, and these are contained actually and implicitly in being.

Reply to the second objection. From the fact that we know a posteriori that God is, we do not, however, know that God’s existence is His essence; but from the effects we know that this proposition is true, when we say: “God is.” In creatures, “to be” concerns in itself only the question of the existence, not of the quiddity, of a being. In God, “to be” concerns also, and even in the strict sense, the question of His quiddity, for God alone is the self-subsisting Being, and what this self-subsisting Being is in Himself, this we shall see only in heaven, because, as stated farther on, in this life we know God only by means of His effects, from the concepts derived from creatures, and “every effect which is not an adequate result of the power of the efficient cause, receives the similitude of the agent not in its full degree, but in a measure that falls short.” 31 This existence in creatures is a contingent, but in God an essential, predicate, which is not really distinct from God's essence that is unknown to us. Hence in this life we know God’s essence not as it is in itself, but as it is the foundation for the truth of the proposition known from effects, namely, “God is.”

Doubt. Has St. Thomas clearly deduced the corollary of this article, namely, that in every creature its essence differs from its existence? He explains this at length in another of his works (Contra Gentes), where he says: “Now being, as being, cannot be diverse, but it can be differentiated by something besides being: thus the being of a stone is other than the being of a man. Hence that which is subsistent being can be one only. Now it was shown above (Bk. I, chaps. 22, 42) that God is His own subsistent being: therefore nothing besides Him can be its own being. Therefore in every substance, besides Him, the substance itself must be distinct from its being.” °? Likewise in every creature, what is (or the suppositum) and existence are different.

Father del Prado ** proposes this fundamental argument in the deduction of the above corollary as follows: Act is multiplied and limited by the really distinct potency in which it is received; but in creatures existence is multiplied and limited by the essences of different creatures; therefore in creatures essence is potency, or

82 Contra Gentes, Bk. I, chap. 52; see also Summa theol., Ia, q.7, 4.1; 4-54, a.2; De ente et essentia, chap. 5.

real capacity, which is really distinct from existence, just as matter is real capacity for the form, and really distinct from the forin. In other words, previous to the mind’s consideration, essence and existence are not identical in creatures, just as matter is not form.

The major is explained by stating that the division of being into potency and act is absolutely necessary for the understanding of change and multiplicity, as Aristotle shows * in solving the arguments of Parmenides against change and multiplicity in beings, by appealing to the real distinction between potency and act. Being does not come from what is already being, just as a statue does not come from a statue, for it is already such. Nothing comes from nothing. But being’ comes from potential being, just as the statue can be sculptured from the wood, and just as the plant is developed from the seed.

In like manner, the act of existence cannot be multiplied or limited by itself, because in its formal concept it implies no limitation. Therefore it can be limited and multiplied only by the real capacity in which it is received, that is, by the essence which is capable of existing, for instance, by the essence of either stone, plant, animal, or man. Thus the form is limited and multiplied by the matter, which is the principle of individuation; thus intellection is limited and multiplied according to the various intellectual capacities of human beings, and so forth.

Thus by means of the distinction between potency and act we have not only the reconciliation of the principle of identity or of contradiction, a principle to which Parmenides always appealed, but also change and multiplicity, which Heraclitus defended. In other words, it is only in this way that the first principle of reason is reconciled with the most certain facts of experience. But because there is a certain lack of identity in change and multiplicity, in virtue of the principles of identity and causality our mind of necessity soars to the first Cause who is absolutely identical with Himself, who is to being as A is to A, and in whom there can be neither change nor composition, but who is absolutely simple. This point will be made still clearer in the subsequent articles.

FIFTH ARTICLE WHETHER GOD IS CONTAINED IN A GENUS

State of the question. By genus, in the strict sense, is meant the logical genus. Thus, according to Aristotle, there are ten genera or categories, namely, substance, quantity, quality . . . and under the

supreme genus come the less universal genera ranging down to the proximate genus, and this latter is expressed together with the specific difference in a definition, for instance, by the words rational animal, by which man is defined.

The principal difficulty is that God seems to come at least under the genus of substance, because substance is a being that subsists of itself, and we speak of the divine substance. But, on the other hand, it is generally admitted that God transcends the genera and species. But it may be asked whether God is at least reducible to the genus of substance, as habitual grace is to the genus of quality, or as the point is to the genus of quantity, as the terminus of the line.

Conclusion. God is not in any genus either directly or as reducible to it.

It is proved in many ways that God does not come directly under any genus, and this first of all in the counterargument from general notions. For genus is prior in the mind to what it contains. But nothing is prior to God either really (because He is the first Being), or mentally, because He is the self-subsisting Being, and all formal concepts, such as those of substance, quality, presuppose being whose act is to exist. Yet for us there is something prior to God, namely, being in general.

In the body of the article three proofs are given why God is not directly in any genus. The first is founded on the notion of genus, the second on the notion of being, and the third on the identity of essence and existence in God.

1. On the notion of genus. Genus takes the place of potency, whereas specific difference takes the place of act. But God is pure act. Therefore God is not in a genus.

The minor has been proved. The major needs explanation. Genus is not indeed matter; but it is to the specific difference as matter is to form. For just as the matter is determined by the form, so the genus is determined by the specific difference. Thus, for instance, the genus animality is determined by rationability; for animality is derived from the material body endowed with sensitive life, and rationability is derived from the rational soul. Hence no being is in a genus unless there is really something potential in it, something susceptible of further determination. The genus is in potentiality for the differences by which it is determined.

2. On the notion of being. Being cannot be a genus, but transcends the genera. But if God were in a genus, then being would be His genus. Therefore God is not a genus.

The major is proved by Aristotle.*® For the genus is diversified

by the differences that are extrinsic to it, for instance, animality by rationality. But being cannot be diversified by differences that are extrinsic to it, for what is not being is nothing. Whereas rationality is not animality, substantiality still is being, and the same is true of vitality and other notes. Whereas the genus contains only virtually the differences extrinsic to it and is not contained in them, being contains actually and implicitly the modes of being and is contained in them. Therefore being is transcendent, or transcends the genera or the categories of being, and hence is analogous. It signifies in the different categories something that is proportionately alike, namely, that whose act is to exist. But the existence of substance is existence not in another, whereas the existence of accidence is inexistence or existence in another. Hence being is not a genus.

The minor. If God were in a genus, being would be His genus, because God is essential being, since He is His existence. Manifestly, if God were in a genus, His genus would have to be most universal and unlimited being.

3. On the identity of essence and existence in God. Essence and existence differ in all things that are in a genus. But essence does not differ from existence in God. Therefore God is not in a genus.

Cajetan given us the following explanation of the major: “When St. Thomas says that ‘all in a genus differ in existence,’ ‘esse’ is taken both for specific existence (specific difference) and for actual existence; and from the verification of one is inferred the verification of the other”; for those things that differ in species differ also in existence, because specific (and individual) existences are the proper recipients of the act of existence. Hence from the fact that God is His existence, He is above all the genera. ‘This proves that God is not at least directly in a genus.

Corollary. God cannot be defined by genus and differentia.

In the last part of the body of the article it is proved that God is not in any genus as reducible to it. For “a principle reducible to any genus does not extend beyond that genus; as a point is the principle only of continuous quantity; and unity, of discontinuous quantity. But God is the principle of all being” and of all the genera of being. Likewise habitual grace, which is reduced to the genus of a quality, is not in the other genera. The solution of the objections confirms this.

Reply to the first objection. God is not in the genus of substance, because the word “substance” does not signify the self-subsisting Being, but an essence that has the property of existing in itself and not in another. Now existence is predicated contingently of every substance, for the substance of a stone, plant, animal, man, or angel exists contingently. Spinoza refuses to give this consideration, defining substance as being that exists of itself, in this sense, that existence is not a contingent but an essential predicate of substance. It follows from this that there can be only one substance.

Reply to second objection. If God is said to be the measure of things, He is not the homogeneous measure, as unity is the principle of number, but He is the heterogeneous measure since everything has being only according as it resembles God, who is the maximum in being (fourth way).

Thus it is evident that God is not in a genus, and this is commonly admitted, even by Scotus, although he holds that being is univocal. We shall comment on this farther on.**

SIXTH ARTICLE WHETHER IN GOD THERE ARE ANY ACCIDENTS

State of the question. Composition of substance and accident is excluded from the exposition of God’s simplicity. We are here concerned with accident as a predicament, the existence of which is to exist in another, whether this accident is necessary as a property as, for instance, the intellective faculty in our soul, whether this accident is contingent, as this man who happens to know geometry. The difficulty here is because wisdom and virtue, which are accidents in us, are attributed to God.

Conclusion. There cannot be any accident in God.

For this conclusion three proofs are given, based on the fact that God is (1) pure act, (2) the self-subsisting Being, (3) the first Being.

1. A subject is compared to its accidents as potentiality to actuality by which it is perfected; but God is pure act; 3 therefore there cannot be any accident in God.

The major is evident; for the subject is determined and perfected by a positive accident, for instance, the soul by faculties and habits. But God is pure act and therefore is not in potentiality for any further actuality. He is not determinable but is supremely determined.

2. Being that is absolute and unreceived cannot have anything superadded to it; but God is the absolute and unreceived being; therefore God cannot have any accident superadded to Him.

Cajetan explains the major by pointing out that what is not received cannot have anything else superadded to it without re-

ceiving. But absolute being cannot receive or be determined, because it is the ultimate actuality of a thing. Therefore unreceived being cannot have anything superadded to it, and so is at the same time incapable of receiving anything.

Contrary to this, therefore, it must be said that if, as we see in creatures, being has an accident superadded to it, for instance, operation, then this is not unreceived being, but is received in the essence, which is potency in relation to being; and this essence or substance is capable of further determination by the faculties and operations. Hence created essence can be determined in two ways, namely, by the act of existence and by the faculties and operations. On the other hand, God is the self-subsisting Being and is therefore incapable of further determination.

3. What is essential is prior to what is accidental, and accident is what comes after; but God is the absolute primal being, and in Him there cannot be anything that comes after, whether this be caused or derived; therefore nothing accidental can be in God.

In the reply to the first objection it is stated that virtue and wisdom, which are accidents in us, are not so in God, because they are predicated only analogically of Him.** Indeed, as we shall see, God is not in potentiality, either as to the act of understanding, or as to that of loving, but is self-subsisting intelligence and essential love. We already have some evidence of this inasmuch as God is pure act.*°

Corollary. This article gives us a complete refutation of pantheism, for pantheism, willingly or unwillingly, must posit accidents in God. Thus Spinoza posited in God not only necessary attributes (which are, according to his theory, thought and infinite extension), but he also posited finite modes of thought and extension, these being successively produced in the world from eternity. But Spinoza never succeeded in deducing these finite modes from the divine substance, and he did not refute the doctrine of St. Thomas in the present article, in which it is shown that there can be no accident in God, since God is incapable of further determination. Likewise it follows from this that God cannot be “creative evolution,” which is always capable of further determination and perfection. Creative evolution cannot be to being, as A is to A. Only the true God is the self-subsisting Being, and for this very reason He absolutely transcends the composite and changeable world.

Difficulty. We shall have the completion of this doctrine in a subsequent article,*? in which it will be shown that God’s free act of

creation, although it would be possible for Him not to act, is not an accident. Free will in God is not as in us a faculty that must be perfected by act, but it is self-subsisting will, by which the divine good is necessarily loved, and creatable good not necessarily so. In other words, God’s liberty is the dominating indifference, not of a faculty in need of perfection, but of pure act itself. Thus it is said of Him:

“God, powerful sustainer of all things,

Thou who dost remain permanently unmoved, Determining the course of time,

By the successions of the light of day.”

SEVENTH ARTICLE WHETHER GOD IS ALTOGETHER SIMPLE

State of the question. This article is a recapitulation and synthesis, as it were, of the preceding articles.

The difficulty is that creatures are but images of God, and among created things the composite are better than the simple, as chemical compounds are better than simple elements, plants than stones, and animals than plants. The higher organisms are more complex. The same is to be said of sciences that have acquired their final development.

The reply is, however, that God is absolutely simple. It is of faith, and is thus enunciated by the Vatican Council: “God, as being one, sole, absolutely simple and immutable spiritual substance, is to be declared as really and essentially distinct from the world (which is composite and changeable).” *

In the body of the article many proofs from reason are given for this conclusion. They have their foundation in the doctrine of the preceding articles, which is here recapitulated, and in the truths that God is the first Being, the first Cause, pure Act, and the self-subsisting Being.

1. From the very start, composition of many kinds is excluded, such as that of quantitative parts, of matter and form, of suppositum and nature, of essence and existence, of genus and differentia, of substance and accident. This means the exclusion of all composition, both physical and metaphysical.

2. Every composite is posterior to its component parts, and is dependent on them; but God is the first Being; 4# therefore He is absolutely simple.

To understand the major we must note that every composite is posterior to its component parts, at least by a posteriority of nature if not of time, for the composite results from the parts, and is dependent on them. Thus man results from matter and form, from body and soul. But God is the first Being according to priority not only of duration, but of nature and dignity, so that there is nothing in God that is caused or dependent, or that is resulting. Therefore He is absolutely simple.

3. Every composite has a cause; but God is the first uncaused cause; therefore in God there is no composition.

The major is explained by St. Thomas as follows: “Things in themselves different do not unite unless something causes them to unite”; or the uncaused union of different things is impossible. This principle is implicitly contained, as we have said, in the fourth way of proving God’s existence, which starts in the ascending order from a consideration of diverse and imperfect composites to establish the existence of the maximum and uncaused in being. Expressed more briefly: things in themselves different, do not in themselves unite.

In another of his works, St. Thomas thus explains this principle: “A diversity of causes produces a diversity of effects.” 4 In like manner he writes: “Whatever a thing may fittingly have, if it does not originate from its nature, accrues to it from an extrinsic cause; for what has no cause is first and immediate.” 4 This means that what has no cause is to existence as A is to A; it not only has existence, but is identical with its existence, in virtue of the principle of identity: being is being, not-being is not-being. This principle is absolutely verified, without any lack of identity, only in the one who can say: “I am who am.” 4 More briefly: the uncaused being has not existence, but is its existence.

4. In every composite there must be potentiality and actuality; but God is pure act; therefore God is in no way composite.

The major is evident, whether the reference is to essential and natural unity, or to accidental unity. If it is a question of essential unity, as in the human composite, then one part, matter, is in potentiality as regards the other. If it is a question of accidental unity, as in the proposition, the man is a musician, then the subject is to its accident as potentiality is to actuality.

5. In every composite there is something which is not it itself, or which is not predicated of it first. Thus the parts are distinguished from the whole. But since God is pure form, in fact the

self-subsisting Being, there is not anything that is not predicated of Him first, for this latter would be less perfect than the selfsubsisting Being, and therefore cannot be in God.

In other words, whereas no part of man is man, whatever is in God is God. Likewise, whereas the parts of the air, although they are air, are not the whole air, whatever is in God is the whole of God and not a part of Him. ‘This has its foundation in the principle that is inserted in the body of the article about the end of the fifth proof, and which is very briefly expressed as follows: “In the form itself (that is not received), there is nothing besides itself. Hence since God is absolute form, or rather absolute being, He can be in no way composite.” ‘Thus the fourth way of proving God's existence is illustrated from on high, by the very fact that we have reached the terminus of this proof. Thus when we are on the summit of a mountain we have a better knowledge of the way that leads to it.

Reply to the first objection. It declares that there is a real distinction between created essence and existence: “It is of the essence of a thing caused, to be in some sort composite, because at least its existence differs from its essence, as will be shown hereafter.” 4

Reply to the second objection. “With us composite things are better than simple things, because the perfection of created goodness cannot be found in one thing, but in many things.” However, there is a certain likeness in creatures to God’s higher simplicity, inasmuch as the soul is of a higher and simpler order than the body, the angel than the soul, and although a perfect science is more complex than one in its rudimentary stage, yet its tendency is toward a simplicity of a higher order, for it sees all things in a few principles. Thus we must distinguish between the lowest simplicity of pure potency, of matter, for instance, and the highest simplicity of the most pure Act. Thus this makes more complete the refutation of pantheism, namely, that God, being absolutely simple, is really and essentially distinct from the composite world.

A certain difficulty still presents itself, for according to revelation there are three distinct Persons in God. Does this mean then that God is composed of three Persons? St. Thomas considers this difficulty in one of his works, and says: “A plurality of Persons posits no composition in God. For we may consider the Persons from two points of view. First in their relation to their essence with which they are identified; and thus it is evident that there is no composition remaining. Secondly we may consider them in their mutual relations, and thus they are related to one another as distinct, and not as united. For this reason neither from this point of view can there be composition: for all composition is union.” 4 Elsewhere he remarks: “All the divine relations are not greater than only one; because the whole perfection of the divine nature exists in each Person”; *® otherwise any one of the Persons would not be God.

Therefore God is absolutely simple, and it will be stated farther on that the three Persons have, in fact are, one existence, one intellect, one essential will.

WHETHER GOD ENTERS INTO THE COMPOSITION OF OTHER THINGS

State of the question. The purpose of this article is to complete the refutation of pantheism, or to prove that God absolutely transcends the world and all finite beings.

In the title, as Cajetan observes, “enter into the composition of other things” is said of form and matter that constitute a composite, and of substance and accident. Hence the meaning is whether God can be joined to another in the entitative order, as the informing act or as potency, as if He were either the matter or soul of the world, or the common substance of the whole universe. This must be carefully considered, so as to distinguish the composition in question here from the hypostatic union, which according to revelation is possible and de facto exists. In the hypostatic union, the Word is united, indeed, in the entitative order with the humanity of Christ, but not as the informing form, but as the Person terminating the humanity and communicating to it His existence. And thus the Word does not enter into composition with Christ, because the Word is not related to Christ as a part, for the part is always less perfect than the whole.

To explain the doctrine of St. Thomas against pantheism, let us see: (1) what forms of pantheism were known to St. Thomas, which he wished to refute; (2) how he refuted them; (3) how, in accordance with the principles formulated by St. Thomas, modern pantheism can be refuted; (4) how the doctrine of St. Thomas on the divine causality preserves that portion of truth, which pantheism distorts.

1. THE FORMS OF PANTHEISM KNOWN TO ST. THOMAS

This question is not of minor importance, for many and also modern philosophers tend toward pantheism. Moreover, several

47 De pot., q.7, a.1 ad 10um. 48 Summa theol., Ia, q:42, a.4 ad gum, modernists said that St. Thomas in his treatise on the one God did not professedly consider, and therefore did not refute, pantheism. So says Hébert.*®

On the other hand, others said that Thomism exaggerates the divine universal causality, and that it tends toward occasionalism and pantheism, as if God alone existed and acted in every agent. Thus do those sometimes speak who reject physical premotion. Hence it must be carefully considered whether St. Thomas wished to refute various forms of pantheism. The present article already makes this point clear, for the body of the article distinguishes three forms of pantheism. The first form is of those who said that God is the soul of the world or at least of the highest heaven. It is the pantheism of the Stoics, who to some extent revived the evolutionism of Heraclitus, who taught that the principle of all things is the artificer, fire, which is endowed, as it were, with intelligence. St. ‘Thomas mentions in this article the error spoken of by St. Augustine.®°

This type of pantheism was to some extent retained by Spinoza, who said that God is the only substance, whose two principal attributes are thought and infinite extension, in which finite modes are distinguished, which from all eternity are successively produced in time.

The second type of pantheism to which St. Thomas alludes is of those who said: “God is the formal principle of all things,” even of the lower order. So said Amalric of Chartres or of Bena, who died in 1209, and whose disciple was David of Dinant.

The third type is materialistic pantheism or rather the atheism of David of Dinant, who, as St. Thomas says, “most absurdly taught that God is prime matter.” He says “most absurdly,” because this teaching is quite opposed to wisdom, which judges of all things by the highest cause. David of Dinant judges of all things, even of the highest, by the lowest cause, and his is simply foolishness, which is contrary to wisdom. Thus St. Thomas, after the question on the gift of wisdom, professedly treats of folly.®! For what is there more absurd than to say that the minds of St. John the Baptist and of St. Augustine, and their holiness, come from matter or are the result of material and blind necessity? This means that the greater comes from the less, the more perfect and the nobler from the least and the ignoble. It means a return to the doctrine of the first Ionian philosophers, to Thales, Anaximenes . . . who said that the

49 Cf, “La dernière idole” (Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale, July, 1902).

50 Cf, De Civitate Dei, Bk. VII, chap. 6, in which the doctrine of Varro is discussed.

principle of all things is a material element, either water, air, or fire.

It must be observed that the Fourth Lateran Council condemned the pantheism of Amalric in the following words: “We reject and condemn the most perverse teaching of the impious Amalric, whose mind was so blinded by the father of lies, that his doctrine is to be considered not so much heretical as insane.” 5 In like manner, the Council of Sens condemned the following error of Abélard: “The Holy Spirit is the world-soul.” 53

What has just been said suffices to show, contrary to what certain modernists declared, that the error of pantheism was not unknown to St. Thomas. In fact, St. Thomas has elsewhere ** explained more fully these types of pantheism, beginning with that of Parmenides.. Moreover, St. Thomas refuted, as Aristotle did,5* two ancient types of pantheism. These are: (1) the static monism of Parmenides, who reduces all things to one being, in fact, to the sole and motionless being, and this by denying change and multitude; * (2) the absolute evolutionism of Heraclitus, who denied the real validity of the principle of contradiction or of identity, because according to his view everything becomes, nothing is, and being and non-being are identified in the very becoming, which is its own reason for such. The first type is a sort of acosmism, the second is rather atheism.

St. Thomas, following Aristotle, solves the arguments of Parmenides by distinguishing between potency and act; and from this distinction the four kinds of causes are derived. Thus becoming and multitude are explained, but as dependent on the sole supreme Cause, who is motionless and most simple. Against Heraclitus, however, St. Thomas defends the real validity of the principle of contradiction.** Thus St. Thomas not only knew the various

še Parmenides said: It is only from being or from non-being that something could come. But being does not come from being, because it is already being; just as a statue does not come from a statue, because it is already a statue.

To this Aristotle replies: Being does not come from actual being, this I con- cede; but being does come from potential being, just as the plant comes from the seed, and the animal from the semen.

In like manner, Parmenides denied multiplicity in being, because being cannot be diversified by itself, but only by another, and what is not being is nothing. To this Aristotle replies that being is not univocal but analogous, and is predicated in various ways of different beings. Also act is multiplied by the potency in which it is received, just as the form of a lion or man is by matter,

58 See Met., Bk. IV (almost in toto), but especially chaps. 3-5.

types of ancient and medieval pantheism, but he examined and refuted the sources of these errors. $

Finally, throughout his life St. Thomas refuted Averroism, which is another type of pantheism, for the Averroists say that there is a single intellect for all men.**

Afer having explained the article we shall consider the principal types of modern pantheism condemned by the Vatican Council. It suffices at present to say, as noted in the schemata of the Vatican Council,®° that for the modern pantheists either God becomes the world, or the world becomes God.

According to Spinoza and Schelling, God, actually existing from all eternity and prior to the world, becomes the world; thus in some way we have a revival of the teachings of Parmenides and the Neoplatonists, which is descendent evolution or emanation.

On the contrary, in absolute evolutionism, according to the ascendant process of evolution, the world becomes God. According to the modern pantheists, however, absolute evolutionism appeared under two forms. It was conceived either from the materialist (Haeckel), or the idealist point of view (Hegel). It is a quasi revival of the Heraclitean evolutionism.

There is always a return to the two ancient types of pantheism, those of Parmenides and Heraclitus. The former is a quasi absorption of the world in God, the latter is rather the absorption of God in the world. Thus it is clearly enough established from the history of pantheism that it cannot be defined unless it includes the tendency to deny either God or the world. From this we already see clearly the contradiction in identifying God with the world.

2. WHERE AND HOW ST. THOMAS REFUTED THE ABOVE- MENTIONED TYPES OF PANTHEISM a) St. Thomas explains, indeed, in his commentaries on Aristotle’s works ®t how this philosopher refuted Heraclitus and Parmenides by the division of being into potency and act, and also by the principle of causality: nothing is reduced from potency to act except by a being that is in act, and in the final analysis by the pure Act, who by reason of His immutability and absolute simplicity is

59 See the opusculum of St. Thomas, De unitate Dei, against the Averroists; also Summa theol., la, q.76, a.1: “Whether there is one intellect for all men”; also Contra Gentes, Bk. IJ, chap. 23: “That God does not act by a necessity of His nature or by a necessity of knowledge”; also chaps. 26-29.

60 Cf. Vacant, Etudes sue le Concile du Vatican, I, 200, 211 f., 230-44, 571, 581.

61 Cf. Com. in Phys., Bk. I, chap. 8, lect. 14; in Met, Bk. I, chap. g; Bk. IV, chap. 3 (end); Bks. XI, XII, De actu puro.

really and essentially distinct from the changeable and composite world. But Aristotle said nothing about the divine liberty in the production of things, and so he left unanswered the question whether God, who is distinct from the world, is the cause of it by a necessity of nature or of knowledge. These questions are solved by St. Thomas himself in his own works.

b) In the body of the article St. Thomas shows that God cannot enter into the composition of other things either as the formal principle or as the matter of the world. Three proofs are given for this in the present article, from the truth that God is (1) the first efficient Cause, (2) the first and essential Agent, (g) the first and unparticipated Being.

1. The agent and the form are not numerically identical, and the agent and matter are not so specifically; for the matter is potential, whereas the agent is actual; but God is the first efficient Cause; therefore He cannot be either the form or the matter of any composite.

This is a simple application of the distinction between potency and act, from which the four kinds of causes are derived. Of these, the efficient and final are the extrinsic causes, whereas the form and matter are the intrinsic causes. Thus it is evident that the efficient cause is not numerically identical with either the form or the matter, for nothing produces itself.

A difficulty arises concerning the proof. Perhaps God is the form of another composite, that is, of the one generating but not generated. To this Cajetan replies: “To be a composite implies being an effect (because every composite is made, as evident from the preceding article)”; but every effect depends on the first efficient cause; therefore the first efficient cause is neither the form nor the matter of any composite, because it would be the form or matter of its effect, which is impossible, since the agent is not numerically identical either with the form or matter of its effect, as was said.

2. No part of the composite is primarily and essentially the agent; but God is primarily and essentially the agent; therefore God is not a part of any composite.

The major is illustrated by the following example: “For the hand does not act, but the man by his hand.” St. Thomas does not mean by this, as Cajetan observes, that the composite is primarily and essentially an agent. On the contrary, he said °? that God is primarily and essentially an agent, therefore He is primarily and essentially a form, that is, a form separated from matter; in fact, He is the Being that is not received in another.

3. The major is evident, for matter is potency, and thus is pos- terior to act and less perfect. But the form which is part of a compound is a participated form; and as that which participates is posterior to that which is essential, so likewise is that which is participated. Therefore no part of a compound can be absolutely primal among beings.

These three proofs can be compendiously expressed as follows: God is not the matter of the world, because matter which is potency or capacity susceptible to further determination, can be determined only by another, namely, by an agent, and in the final analysis by the first agent, who is His activity and His being. (First, second, and third proofs of God’s existence.) ` Moreover, God is not the form of the world, because thus He would be something participated and less perfect than the composite of which He would be a part. In fact, everything composite requires a cause. Therefore God must be superior to everything composite, as being the absolutely simple and unchangeable cause, not capable of further determination.

N.B. In the hypostatic union, the Word is not a part, either as matter or as informing act, but as terminating act, just as in some way, in the order of being as in that of intelligence, the divine essence clearly seen terminates the intellect of the blessed. This is a mystery, and the existence or even the possibility of this can be neither proved nor disproved by reason. Apparent- contradiction is excluded, since the terminating perfection is not participated as an informing form. Thus the statue of Moses seen by me, terminates my vision, but it is not something participated in me, as is the case with the representative similitude which is received in the visual faculty. Thus the confusion of the divine and human natures is avoided in the hypostatic union. They remain unconfused, and the one is not to the other as matter is to form.

Even if God were to unite Himself hypostatically to all created natures, this would not result in pantheism, for there could not be a fusion of the assumed natures with the divine nature. We know from revelation that God is hypostatically united only with Christ’s humanity, and if He were united with the humanity of other human beings, these would be impeccable as Christ is, which is manifestly not so.

We shall find the completion of the refutation of pantheism in two subsequent articles, in which St. ‘Thomas shows that God did not produce the world either by a necessity of His nature, or by a necessity of science, but with absolute freedom: (1) because God's goodness, which He necessarily loves with utmost joy, is infinite

and can exist without other things, “inasmuch as no perfection can accrue to Him from them”; (2) because God acts not only freely but immediately by His intellect and will in things external to Himself, not by nature as man does in freely generating. For every natural agent by the very fact that it acts for an end must be directed by the supreme and intelligent agent (fifth way). Therefore already from the fifth way of proving God's existence it is to some extent clear that God acts by His intellect and will.*

Finally, emanatism is refuted when St. Thomas denies that the soul is of God’s substance,** for God would be material if things were not produced from nothing, but from God's substance as their pre-existing subject. Thus God’s substance would not be His existence, for He would be capable of further determination. In like manner, he shows that there cannot be one intellect for all men,‘ nor even one active intellect for all; 6€ for the human soul, which is intellectual, is the form of the body and is multiplied with the body. The same man understands that he understands, and that he wills freely.

Summing up, we must therefore say that these refutations of pantheism proceed from the five proofs for God’s existence, and they can be reduced to this one statement of the Vatican Council: “God is really and essentially distinct from the (mutable and composite) world,” ® for He is required as the absolutely immutable Cause (first, second, and third proofs), and is absolutely simple and perfect (fourth and fifth proofs).

3. HOW MODERN PANTHEISM CAN BE REFUTED BY INVOKING THE PRINCIPLES FORMULATED BY ST. THOMAS

The Vatican Council refers to the various types of modern pantheism. “If anyone shall say that the substance and essence of God and of all things is one and the same; let him be anathema.” 7° Here we have pantheism in general. Then the Council condemns emanatism in the following terms: “If anyone shall say that finite things, both corporeal and spiritual, or at least spiritual, have emanated from the divine substance; let him be anathema.” 1

65 Consult also on this point Conira Gentes, Bk. II, chaps. 23, 26-29, in which St. Thomas says against the Averroists that God does not act by a necessity of His nature or of His intellect.

Here we have descendent emanatism in which God exists with all His perfections prior to the world, and He then becomes the world, since the world emanates from Him. Thus God would be capable of further determination, and thus He would not be the pure Act, at least He would have accidents. After this the pantheism of Schelling is condemned, in which God still becomes the world: “If anyone shall say that the divine essence by the manifestation and evolution of itself becomes all things; let him be anathema.” 7?

Finally pantheism of universal being is condemned, and it is especially this type that was proposed by Hegel. It is evolution of the ascendant order; hence in this type it is rather the world that becomes God: “If any one shall say that God is universal or indefinite being, which by determining itself constitutes the universality of things, distinct according to genera, species, and individuals; let him be anathema.” 7°

The various types of pantheism are refuted by one and the same principle already formulated by St. Thomas.” It is thus expressed by the Vatican Council: “God, as being one, sole, absolutely simple, and immutable spiritual substance, is to be declared as really and essentially distinct from the world . . . and ineffably exalted above all things.” *

The reference is to a real distinction. God and creatures are not one being but many beings, although after creation there is not more being, namely, more perfection. The reference is not only to a real but to an essential distinction, since the divine nature infinitely transcends other natures.

The Vatican Council ** confirms the condemnation of pantheism by its definition of the absolutely free creation of all things, both corporeal and spiritual, from nothing and not from God's substance. Pantheism is absolute determinism, which is a denial of both divine and human liberty, and hence of the distinction between moral good and moral evil, of merit and demerit. It excludes the moral life from man, just as it excludes true personality from him.

But previous to this, the Syllabus of Pius IX had clearly set forth the contradiction in pantheism, condemning the following formula propounded by it: God is one and the same thing with the world, and, therefore, spirit with matter, necessity with liberty, good with

73 Ibid., § 3. On this point see Vacant, Etudes sur le Concile du Vatican, I, 212 £., 581.

evil, justice with injustice.” 77 It would follow from this, of course, that all things in the world, even the gravest errors and crimes, would be, with the destruction of contingency and liberty, neces. sary moments of universal evolution, in which nothing could be absolutely and simply true; but there would be something that is relatively true and good in the present state of knowledge and of ethics, which would be followed by an opposite state or antithesis, which again would be succeeded by a superior synthesis, and so on in succession. There would be nothing stable, not even the principle of contradiction or of identity, because the fundamental reality would be this universal becoming, which would be its own reason for such. Contrary to this, it must be said that the greater does not come from the less, and what is already in existence is greater than what is becoming. Hence there is an eternally selfexisting Being, who is the self-subsisting Being, who said of Himself: “I am who am.” 78

It must be noted that certain theses of the ontologists savor somewhat of pantheism, and for this reason they were condemned. Such are the following propositions: “That being, which is in all things and without which nothing is understood by us, is the divine being. Universals considered in the concrete are not really distinct from God.” °° In this way universal being is confused with the divine being, and universal truth with the divine truth. . . . The same is to be said of certain propositions propounded by Antonio Rosmini.°°

All these declarations are a confirmation for us that the fundamental truth of Christian philosophy is, that God alone is the selfsubsisting Being, that essence and existence are identical only in God. The first truth by way of investigation is the principle of identity: being is being, not-being is not-being. The supreme truth by way of investigation and the first by way of judgment is: God alone is His existence, so that He is really and essentially distinct from any other being whatever.

4. DOES ST. THOMAS IN HIS DISCUSSION OF THE DIVINE CAUSALITY PRESERVE INTACT THE TRUTH THAT IS DISTORTED BY PANTHEISM?

In every error there is a distortion of some part of the truth. Yet it is there not as “the soul of truth,” but rather as the servant of

error, because it serves to seduce or deceive the intellect. Thus in pantheism it is, as it were, the grain of truth that is distorted. This is most apparent in the natural order. (1) There is nothing that is not, as to the whole of its being, caused by God.** (2) There is nothing that is not preserved by God, for the being of things is the proper effect of God. Just as the becoming ceases when the cause of any becoming ceases to act, so when the cause of the being of things ceases to act, the being of things would cease to exist, just as the light in the air disappears when the sun ceases to give us its light, or just as there is no longer evidence in the conclusions when there is a cessation of evidence in the principles, or just as the means to the end lose their attraction for us when the end ceases to attract us.8? (3) There is not any being in existence to which God is not intimately present, contacting it by His power and keeping it in existence.** Thus God is intimately present in all things, and is even more intimately present to our soul than it is to itself, for He moves it to acts that are more intimate and profound to which it could not move itself. (4) God operates in every agent, not to dispense the creature from acting, as the occasionalists think, but to apply it to action.5t (5) God moves every intellect,* and immediately moves the created will, but He does no violence to it, for He moves it interiorly in accordance with its inclination for universal good, and He moves it to a particular good which can be the object of its deliberate choice; or He permits sin, and then He is the cause only of the physical entity of the act of sin, but not of the sin itself as it is a defect, for which only a deficient cause is needed.

Thus there is nothing real and good external to God that is not related to Him as causally dependent on Him. Even the free determination of our will, inasmuch as it is something real and good, cannot be external to God so as not to be in a relation of dependence on Him. Thus the fruit of the tree comes all from the tree as from its secondary cause, and all from God as its first cause; so also my choice, inasmuch as it is real and good, is all from God as first cause and all from myself as secondary cause. Thus God is present in all things by a virtual contact, keeping them in being, and He operates in every agent applying it to its act.

It is this truth which pantheism distorts. This truth is strikingly affirmed by St. Thomas, although he absolutely rejects pantheism,

since God is neither the material cause nor the formal cause of the world, nor its necessary and efficient cause, but its absolutely transcendent and free efficient cause.

Then after our elevation to the order of grace, the intimacy of our union with God is increased, since habitual grace is a formal and physical, although analogical, participation in the Deity, or in God's intimate life, so that we are like to Him not only in being, life, and intelligence, but in the very Deity. Thus a soul in the state of grace is the temple in which the most Holy Trinity dwells, dwelling indeed in the blessed as clearly seen by them, but dwelling in us as obscurely known.

Finally, the union of the divine and human natures in Christ is the greatest that can be. The union is substantial and personal, so that there is only one person and one existence. However, there is not the least trace of pantheism in this, for there is an infinite distinction between the two natures and without any confusion of the natures. All these truths are strikingly affirmed by St. Thomas.

Moreover, in none of the teachings of Catholic theologians is the truth more clearly expressed than in Thomism, namely, that God is distinct from the world, and yet He is most intimately present to it by His efficacious influx. The doctrine of analogy as set forth by St. Thomas * brings out far more clearly, indeed, the distinction between God and the world than does univocation of being, which is admitted by Scotus, and which is retained to some extent by Suarez.** On the other hand, St. Thomas stresses the intimacy of divine motion in us more than Scotus does, and he stresses especially its efficacy more than Suarez and Molina do.8®

Thus we terminate the question of God’s simplicity. The principles enunciated here about being can easily be applied to cognition and volition, by treating of the most eminent simplicity of God's wisdom and love.® But this will be discussed in subsequent questions.*!

89 Some have said that Thomism is pantheism in disguise. This could be said with greater truth about univocation of being, and the denial of a real distinction between created essence and existence. “A slight error in the beginning is great in the end.”

90 We have explained this in another work; sce Providence, pp. 79-go.

Footnotes

1. Wayfarers, as regards the Deity, since they have not the adequate concept of this, but know it only in name, are like men who would have seen the seven colors and never have seen whiteness; this latter they would know only in name, and they would understand that by this name is implied the origin of colors. Thus for wayfarers the Deity is the root of all divine perfections that are naturally participable and knowable. The Deity is participable only by grace, and the participation is physical, formal, and analogous. ↩

2. John 4: 24. 3 Rom. 1: 20. 4 Acts 17: 29. 5 Denz., no. 1782. ↩