Chapter XXIII. Question 104

THE CoNSERVATION OF CREATURES

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HE first effect of the divine governance is the conservation of creatures; the second effect is the movement of creatures either directly by God or through the mediation of superior creatures.

First ARTICLE

WHETHER CREATURES NEED TO BE CONSERVED IN BEING BY GOD

State of the question. It seems that creatures need not be conserved by God in being because: 1. many creatures are incorruptible; 2. a builder can erect a structure that will last for many ages, and a fortiori God can do the same with beings; 3. in no creature do we find a positive tendency to non-being; 4. divine conservation would be an action without a positive effect, because whatever is does not become.

Reply. The reply is that creatures need divine conservation and this truth is of faith. Of the Son of God we read in the Scriptures, “upholding all things by the word of His power”; * in the language of the Bible “uphold” signifies the same as “conserve,” and the same interpretation is accepted by the Septuagints, Philo, and in Christian tradition. We read further, “For in Him we live and move and are,” ? “For of Him and by Him and in Him are all things,” * “And He is before all, and by Him all things consist.” * St. Thomas says, “Both according to faith and according to reason we must say that creatures are conserved in being by God.”¹

Proof from reason. 1. God indirectly conserves corruptible things by removing from them corruptive principles. 2. Directly and per se God conserves all creatures even those creatures that are incorruptible.

Every effect that depends on a certain cause not only according to its becoming but also directly according to its being needs to be conserved directly by that cause. But every creature depends directly for its being on God, who alone is being itself in essence. Therefore every creature needs to be conserved directly by God.

Proof of the major. Every effect depends on its cause in the way it is caused. Just as the becoming of a thing cannot perdure when the action of the agent which is the cause of the becoming ceases (for example, the passive erection of the house ceases when the builder does not work), so the being of a thing does not perdure when the action of the agent which is the cause of its being ceases.

Proof of the minor. God alone is being by essence because His essence is His being, whereas the creature is being by participation, and its essence is not its being.

Hence, if the conserving action of God were to cease, every creature would be annihilated, just as, says St. Augustine, “the atmosphere would be continually darkened” if the illuminative action of the sun were to cease.”

To understand this reasoning we must note the opposition between the cause of the becoming and the direct cause of the being of a thing. When a father begets a son he is the direct cause of the passive generation of his son but not of the son’s being. Thus the son often remains alive after the death of the father. Indeed, if the father were the direct cause of the very nature and the very being of his son, he would be his own cause since nature and being are found in the father and the son in the same way, inasmuch as they belong to the same species.

On the other hand, since God is being by essence He is the direct cause of the very being of every creature, and the creature is being by participation, depending on essential being as long as it perdures, just as the diffused light in the air depends on the illumination of the sun and ceases with the cessation of this illumination.

We may understand this more readily if we recall that there are causes in the world upon which the permanence of their effects de-

pends after the effects are produced.® For example, atmospheric pressure and solar heat are required for the conservation of a living animal as well as for its production; the object of sensation not only objectively causes sensation but also conserves it, and when the object is removed the sensation ceases. In the intellectual order, too, the knowledge of principles is necessary not only for acquiring the knowledge of the conclusions but also to conserve that knowledge, and similarly if the desire for the end ceases, the desire for the means to that end also ceases.

From this we may be able better to understand St. Thomas’ words: “It is manifest that if two things are of the same species, one cannot be the cause of the form of the other inasmuch as the form is such a form because it would then be the cause of its own form; it can, however, be the cause of this form inasmuch as it is in matter, that is, inasmuch as this matter acquires this (individuated) form. This is a cause according to becoming, as when a man begets a man, or when fire kindles fire.

Evidently, a cow, however perfect it may be, cannot be the cause of bovinity or of the bovine race, for then it would be its own cause. The cause of the bovine race is the divine idea of cow, or the idea of this species.

Hence if a cause is of the same species as its effect, it is a direct cause only of the becoming. If, on the other hand, the cause is of a higher nature than its effect, it not only produces the effect but also conserves it. Thus God, who is being by essence, conserves every creature, which is being by participation.

Reply to first objection. The potency to non-being is not positively in incorruptible beings, but God can remove from such creatures His conserving influence.

Reply to second objection. God cannot communicate to a creature that it continue in being after the divine action ceases, just as He cannot communicate to a creature that He should not be its cause.

Reply to third objection. In corruptible creatures there is a tendency

St. Thomas offers examples from the ancient physics, according to which light belonged essentially to the sun; we now know that the sun is only one among innumerable similar stars. But there are other examples: heat is not only necessary to produce the expansion of metals but to maintain that expansion. Similarly, the good proposed by the cognitive faculty is not only necessary to excite the desire for it but also to maintain that desire.

to non-being inasmuch as the matter of these beings desires another form; and these beings need to be conserved even indirectly by the removal of that which may corrupt them.

Reply to fourth objection. “God’s conservation is not a new action, it is a Continuation of the action which confers being. This action, however, is without movement or time,” that is, it is a continuation of the creative action above time by which God creates without any instrument and without any intermediary matter and those things that cannot be produced except by creation, namely, the angels and spiritual souls. Therefore God directly conserves matter, the soul, and the angels, in being, and He is therefore intimately present in these creatures.’

Several corollaries may be deduced from the principle that St. Thomas lays down in this article: “When an effect that is not born is to receive the imprint of the agent in the same manner as the imprint isin the agent . . . , then the cause of this effect is the cause not only of the becoming but also of the being.” Thus the influence of Christ is as necessary for the conservation of the Church as it was for its institution; the same is true of the influence of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the same way the influence of the founders of religious orders perdures even in heaven so that their orders may continue in being. St. Thomas’ influence also perdures that the true spirit of his doctrine may be conserved."

We see, then, that there are, under God’s conservation, subordinate conserving causes but always in the sense that the most universal effect, namely, being, must be attributed to the most universal cause. The proper effect, according to the fourth mode of predication per

® Thus St. Thomas excels his commentators. Not only does he beget us intellectually but he also preserves us in his teaching, while the professor who transmitted to us the teaching of St. Thomas was only the cause of our formation with regard to the becoming, not directly with regard to the being. Cf. Summa theol., la, q.117, a.1: “Whether one man can teach another. The teacher is the cause of knowledge in the learner, since he reduces the learner from potency to act. . . . Every teacher, teaching on the basis of what the pupil knows, leads him to the knowledge of the things he did not know.” But great geniuses, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas, not only propose the subject matter in a methodical way, but they also strengthen the intellect of the student since they had such a deep understanding of higher principles and of the things that are virtually contained in these principles. Thus they are in a way like the illuminating angels. Cf. Summa theol., Ia, q.106, a.1.

se, necessarily and directly depends on the proper cause, just as in the second mode of predication the properties depend on the essence from which they are derived.® As illumination depends on light, so the being of things depends on God, who is subsisting being itself.

WHETHER GOD CONSERVES EVERY CREATURE DIRECTLY

Reply. God directly conserves the very being of things inasmuch as it is being, but other agents, subordinate to God, conserve being as such being, for example, the sun conserves the light in the atmosphere. Similarly the influence of other subordinate causes is necessary for the conservation of vegetative and sensitive life on the surface of the earth; and the succession of day and night and of the four seasons, without which there would be no generations or conservation of life, depends on the regular movement of the stars.

In the spiritual order God directly conserves spiritual souls in being, and under God the angels and the saints in their way illumine souls and assist them to know and love divine things and to conserve the principles of the spiritual life.?°

WHETHER GOD COULD REDUCE ANYTHING TO NOTHING

Reply. As God most freely created and conserves all things, according to the words of Scripture, “Whatsoever the Lord pleased He hath done,” ** so He could cease to supply being to creatures, which would reduce them to nothing. Annihilation would not be an action; it would be the cessation of conservation.

Reply to second objection. Without prejudice to His goodness, God could have refrained from creating. Erroneously Leibnitz asserted the contrary: God would not be infinitely good and wise if He had not created, and if He had not created the best of all possible worlds. To which Bossuet replied: “God is in no way greater for having created the universe.” 1?

10 Cf. Summa theol., Ia, q. 106-14, on the illumination of the angels, etc. 11 Ps, 134:6.

12 “Dieu n'est pas plus grand pour avoir créé Vuniverse.”

WHETHER ANYTHING IS EVER REDUCED TO NOTHING

Reply. The reply is in the negative, based on the words of Holy Scripture, “I have learned that all the works which God made, continue forever.” 1°

By His ordinary power God annihilates neither material beings, whose corruption is not annihilation since their matter remains, nor immaterial beings, in which there is no potency for non-being since they are incorruptible.

Neither by His extraordinary power, that is, miraculously, does God ever annihilate anything, because such annihilation does not pertain to the manifestation of His glory and grace. Hence there is never a motive for annihilation on the part of the end.

Some theologians, like Scotus, thought that by the Eucharistic consecration the substance of bread is annihilated when the body of Christ becomes present; but to preserve the proper use of the terms, the Councils of Florence and of Trent taught that the substance of bread is not annihilated but is changed into the body of Christ.

Reply to second objection. St. Thomas noted: “Those things that do not have a contrary, although they may have a limited power, perdure in eternity.” Some thinkers have used this text to defend the principle of inertia, or the inertia of movement, namely, if some mobile thing, actually in motion, were to be deprived of every influence, it would persevere always in motion if it did not meet an obstacle. This cannot be proved a posteriori because we cannot isolate any mobile thing from every influence, especially every invisible influence, nor can we verify the statement that the movement would always perdure unless there were an obstacle. This principle of inertia is a postulate suggested by experience, but it is not evident, and it cannot be demonstrated a priori or a posteriori, as the better physicists admit today."

Reply to third objection. The forms of corporeal things, which cease to exist by the corruption of the composite, are not annihilated; they remain in the potency of the matter.

13 Eccles. 3:14. 14 H, Poincaré, La science et l'hypothèse, 112-19; cÉ. Garrigou-Lagrange, Dieu, son existence et sa nature (7th edition), pp. 774-79.

It is evident, then, that the conservation of things is the continuation of free creation from nothing. If the world had been created from eternity, God would have only a priority of causality and not of duration with regard to the world, but the unique, immobile instant of eternity would always be infinitely above time and it would embrace all time including that which might be infinite in its prior part.

Footnotes

1. Heb. 1:3. 2 Acts 17:28. 8 Rom. 11:36. 4 Col. 1:17. 442 ↩