Sentences, Books I–II

Chapter 1 (164).

1. The ways in which God is said to be in things. Since it has been shown in part how all things are said to be in God, it seems appropriate to add here the ways in which God is said to be in things—if the human mind can worthily conceive this even in part, or the tongue suffice to express it.

2. God is in every thing by essence, power, and presence; in the saints by grace, and in Christ the man by union. It must therefore be understood that God, always existing immutably in himself, is present, powerful, and essential in every nature or essence, without being defined by it; in every place, without being circumscribed; and in every time, without change. Moreover, he is in holy spirits and souls in a more excellent way, dwelling in them by grace; And most excellently in Christ the man, in whom, as the Apostle says, the fullness of divinity dwells bodily¹. For God dwelt in him not by the grace of adoption, but by the grace of union.

3. He confirms this with authorities. Lest some presume to charge these claims with falsehood because they exceed the capacity of human understanding, it seems to me that they must be supported by the authorities of the Saints. Blessed Gregory says in his exposition of The Song of Songs²: «Although God is in all things in the common way, by presence, power, and substance, he is nevertheless said to be in a familiar way by grace in those who consider the majesty of God's works more keenly and faithfully.»

4. On this same subject Augustine says to Dardanus in the book On the Predestination of the Saints³: «Since God is incorporeal in nature and unchangeably eternal, remaining steadfast in himself, he is wholly present to all things and wholly present to each; but those in whom he dwells possess him according to their differing capacities, some more, others less. By the grace of his goodness he builds them into a temple most dear to himself.» — Hilary too teaches most plainly in book VIII of On the Trinity⁴ that God is everywhere: «God, he says, a power of immense strength, a living might that is nowhere absent and nowhere lacking, reveals himself throughout his works, so that he may be understood to be himself what belongs to him. Yet, because he is somewhere, he is not to be believed to exist there in a bodily way and not also everywhere, since he does not cease to be in all things.»

5. Ambrose too, in book I of On the Holy Spirit⁵, proves that the Holy Spirit is not a creature because he is everywhere—a property of divinity—and says: «Since every creature is bounded by the definite limits of its nature, how dare anyone call the Holy Spirit a creature, when he has no circumscribed and determined power, and is always in all things and everywhere? This is surely proper to divinity and lordship.» — The same author says in the same work⁶: «It belongs to the Lord to fill all things, as he says: I fill heaven and earth. If the Lord is he who fills heaven and earth, who then can judge the Holy Spirit to be excluded from lordship and divine power, when he has filled the world¹ and, what is more, has filled Jesus², the redeemer of the whole world?» From these and many other authorities it is plainly shown that God is everywhere and in every creature essentially, in presence, and in power.

¹ generat MOPTVX. 7 et] de added NRW. 18 tamen] id added NRV. 19 valeat] valet NRW. 20–21 rubric omitted PRW. 21 igitur est transposed in RVWX. 1 Chapter 27 (PL 42, 560; CSEL 25, 868).]

² ex BCOP, corrected to ex eo BO, ex eo LX. 10 nascuntur] omnia added BCLNOPRWX, deleted O. 13 sunt transposed after Patre² in RV, after omnia in WX. 21 ne quia] neque BCL, corrected in B. 24 possit] possint CMW, corrected in C. 1 Acts 17:28. 2 Chapter 28 (PL 42, 560; CSEL 25, 868). 3 Book VI, chapter 10, no. 12 (PL 42, 932; CCL 50, 243). 4 Romans 11:36.]

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Chapter 2 (165).

1. That he not only is in the saints but also dwells in them; he does not dwell wherever he is. He also dwells in the saints, in whom he is by grace. For he does not dwell wherever he is, although where he dwells, he is. He dwells only in the good, who are his temple and his seat. — Hence the Lord says through Isaiah³: Heaven is my throne, but the earth is the footstool of my feet: because God dwells and reigns in the elect, who are heaven and obediently submit to his will; but the wicked, who are earth, he tramples underfoot with the severity of judgment. Hence it is also said in the book of Wisdom⁴ that the soul of the just is Wisdom's throne, because God is in the just more specially than in other things, although he is wholly in all things.

Just as the soul, as Augustine says in his letter to Jerome, On the Origin of the Soul⁵, «is wholly present at once throughout every part of the body, neither less in the smaller parts nor greater in the larger, yet works more intensely in some parts and less intensely in others, while it is essentially in each part of the body»; so too God, although he is essentially and wholly in all things, is said to be more fully in those whom he inhabits—that is, in whom he is such that he makes them his temple. — Such people are already with him in part, but perfectly in blessedness; the wicked, though they are where he is, since he is nowhere absent, are nevertheless not with him. Hence Augustine says in his Tractates on John⁶: «It was not enough to say, Where I am, they too may be, but he added with me, because the wretched too can be where he is, since he is nowhere absent; but only the blessed are with him, because they are blessed only through him. Those who enjoy him and see him as he is are with him; but the wicked are with him as things in the light are not with the light. Nor are the good now with him in such a way as to see him by direct vision, even if they are with him in some way through faith.»

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3. If you wish to understand how he dwells, look to what was said above about the Holy Spirit. You will be able to understand to some extent how God dwells in the good from what was said above¹, when his temporal procession was being discussed; there, although only in part, it is explained—for we know in part and prophesy in part²—how the Spirit dwells in us, since he does not dwell within us apart from the Father and the Son.

Chapter 3 (166).

1. Where God was or dwelt before there was a creature. But since you ask where God dwelt before the saints existed, we say that he dwelt in himself. Hence Augustine says in Against Maximinus³: «God dwells in his temple, he says, namely in the saints, who are God's temple»; and: «those⁴ who are God's temple now walk according to faith, and one day will be God's temple also according to direct vision, as the Angels are God's temple even now.» But someone may say: Before God made heaven and earth, before he made the saints, where did he dwell? God dwelt in himself: God dwells with himself; he dwells with you and with me, if we are his temple. God does not dwell in the saints, who are God's house, in such a way that if that house were removed God would fall; rather, God dwells in the saints in such a way that if they depart, they fall.

2. He briefly teaches many things here that confirm what has been said. It must also be understood that, as Augustine says in his book To Dardanus⁵, «only the most foolish person could say that the Holy Spirit has no place in our body, which our soul has filled entirely.» It is still more foolish to say that the Trinity is confined somewhere by narrow bounds, so that the Father and Son and Holy Spirit cannot be together in some place. But this is much more remarkable: although God is wholly everywhere, he does not dwell in all things. Who, unless wholly ignorant of the inseparability of the Trinity, would dare think that the Father or Son could dwell in someone in whom the Holy Spirit does not dwell, or that the Holy Spirit could dwell in someone in whom the Father and Son do not dwell? We must therefore acknowledge that God is everywhere through the presence of divinity, but not everywhere through the grace of indwelling. For this indwelling is why we do not say Our Father, who art everywhere, although that too is true, but who art in heaven¹—that is, in the saints, in whom he is in a certain more excellent way.

3. God dwells in some who do not yet know him, and does not dwell in some who know him. «This too is remarkable: as Augustine says in the same work², God dwells in some who do not yet know God, and does not dwell in some who know God. Those who know God but do not glorify him as God³ do not belong to God's temple. The little ones, sanctified by the sacrament of Christ and endowed with the Holy Spirit, belong to God's temple, though they are not yet able to know God. Thus those who could know him were unable to possess him, while these could possess him before they knew him. But those are most blessed for whom possessing God is the same as knowing him.» Here Augustine explains to some extent how God dwells in someone—that is, is possessed—namely, when he is in someone in such a way that he is known and loved by that person.

4. How God is wholly everywhere by essence cannot be understood by human understanding. From what has been said it is clear that God is wholly everywhere by essence and dwells in the saints by grace. Although it was shown above⁴, however briefly, in what sense he is said to dwell in some, the order of discussion would require us also to specify how he is wholly everywhere by essence, were it not that the sublimity and immensity of this matter entirely surpass the understanding of the human mind. For, as Chrysostom says in his Homilies on the Epistle to the Hebrews⁵: «Just as we understand many things about God that we cannot express at all, so we say many things that we are unable to understand. For example, we know and say that God is everywhere; but how this is so, or what this means, we are wholly ignorant.»

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5. The opinion of certain persons who presume to show how God is everywhere by essence, power, and presence. Yet certain people, presuming to measure the immeasurable by their own understanding, have taught that this is to be understood as follows: God is said to be everywhere by essence, not because God's essence is properly in every place and every creature, but because every nature and everything that exists by nature, wherever it may be, has its being through him, as does every place in which it exists. They also say that God is said to be everywhere by essence or power because all places are present to him, together with what is in them, and he never ceases to act in them. For the places themselves, and whatever is in them, cannot remain unless he preserves them. Thus, they say, God is in them by substance, because by the power of his own substance he causes places to exist, as well as everything in them. But although what they assert is true, we must believe that those words contain more when they explain them—words by which God is said to be everywhere by essence—than a living human being can comprehend.

Cap. 4 (167).

1. That although God is present to all things, he is not defiled by the filth of things. The same people also commonly ask how God is substantially present to all things without being touched by the defilements of bodily filth. This question is so frivolous that it does not deserve an answer, since even a created spirit cannot be defiled by bodily filth, even that of a leper or of anyone however polluted. He shows this by comparison, and from the lesser case. The sun pours forth its rays without pollution of itself upon places and bodies, not only clean but also unclean and foul with filth, contact with which infects human beings and certain other things; yet the sun's rays remain unpolluted and undefiled as they touch them. It is therefore no wonder if the wholly simple and immutable divine essence fills all places and is essentially present to all creatures, yet is neither contaminated nor touched by the filth of anything. Hence Augustine says in On the Nature of the Good¹: “Although all things he created are in God, those who sin do not defile him,” he says; and of his wisdom, which “reaches mightily from end to end”², it is said: “It reaches all things because of its purity, and nothing defiled enters into it.”³

2. Augustine, On Christian Combat. “Some fear what cannot happen, namely, that the truth and substance of God might be defiled by human flesh. And yet they preach that this visible sun spreads its rays through every kind of refuse and filth, while keeping them pure and untainted. If, then, visible clean things can touch visible unclean things without being defiled, how much more can the invisible and immutable Truth?”⁴

3. He shows by an absurd consequence that God is everywhere. Finally, let them answer which they think ought rather to be said of God: either that he is nowhere by essence, or everywhere, or somewhere but not everywhere. But who would dare say that the divine essence is nowhere, or that it is somewhere but not everywhere? For if it is somewhere but not everywhere, then it is local. Therefore it is wholly everywhere: it contains the whole and penetrates the whole, and because of its simplicity it cannot be divided, because of its purity it cannot be stained, and because of its immensity it cannot in any way be comprehended. Hence Augustine⁵: “God is everywhere; we draw near to him not by places but by actions.”

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Chapter 5 (168).

That although God is everywhere and at every time, he is not local or circumscribed, and is moved neither by place nor by time. Although the divine nature is truly and essentially in every place and at every time, it is not moved through places or times, nor is it local or temporal.¹ It is not local because it is in no way circumscribed by place: it is not in one place in such a way as not to be in another, nor does it have dimensions as a body does, to which a beginning, middle, and end, front and back, right and left, above and below are assigned according to place, “and which, by its interposition, creates distance among the things around it.”²

Chapter 6 (169).

1. The senses in which something is called local or circumscribed. For in Scripture something is called local or circumscribed in these two ways, and conversely: either because, having dimensions of length, height, and breadth, it creates distance in a place, as a body does;³ or because it is bounded and determined by a place, since, being somewhere, it is not found everywhere. This applies not only to a body but also to every created spirit.

2. A created spirit is neither local nor circumscribed in one sense, but is so in the other; a body is wholly local and circumscribed, whereas God is wholly nonlocal and uncircumscribed. A body, however, is wholly local and circumscribed; God is wholly nonlocal and uncircumscribed. Thus every body is local in every way; a created spirit is local in one way and not local in another. It is called local because it is bounded by the definition of a place: while wholly present somewhere, it is not found elsewhere. But it is not local in the sense of having dimensions and creating distance in a place.

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3. Therefore the divine essence alone is wholly nonlocal and uncircumscribed, and is in no way moved by places—whether by finite determination or by receiving dimensions—nor by times, that is, through affection and thought. For change in a creature, far removed from the Creator, occurs in these two ways, namely by place or by time. Hence Augustine, in On the Literal Meaning of Genesis¹: “Almighty God, always the same in immutable eternity, will, and truth, moves the spiritual creature through time; he also moves the bodily creature through time and place, so that by this movement he governs the natures he created. God is more inward and more outward, older and newer, than all things.” When he does something of this sort, we ought not to think that his substance, which is God, is made mutable by times and places, or is moved through times and places, since he is both more inward than every thing, because all things are in him, and more outward than every thing, because he is above all things; both older than all things, because he is before all things, and newer than all things, because he himself is after the beginnings of all things. Here it is clearly shown that God is changed or moved neither by places nor by times; the spiritual creature, however, is moved through time, while the bodily creature is moved through both time and place.

Chapter 7 (170).

1. What it means to be changed according to time. To be changed through time is to vary according to the inner or outer qualities present in the thing that is changed—for example, when it undergoes a succession of joy, sorrow, knowledge, or forgetfulness, or a variation in its form or in some exterior quality. This change according to time is a variation of qualities occurring in a bodily or spiritual creature, and for that reason it is called time.

2. The opinion of certain persons who say that created spirits are not moved by place and are not local. There is great disagreement among inquirers about change of place. Some say that no spirit can in any way be changed by place, wishing to remove place universally from every spirit. For They maintain that place consists only in dimensions and circumscription, and call only that local or in a place which receives dimensions and creates distance in a place. They say that the foregoing words of Augustine support their view, and that Augustine meant to ascribe change through time alone to the spiritual creature, but change through both place and time to the bodily creature.

^{14 15 16} omitted in BCLMNRW.]

3. He answers them. But, as we said above,¹ a thing is called local or circumscribed in two ways: either because it receives dimensions and creates distance, or because it is bounded by the limit of a place. Both apply to a bodily creature, but only one applies to a spiritual creature. For, as we said above,² a bodily creature is local or circumscribed in such a way that it is bounded by the definition of a place and, by receiving dimensions, creates distance in a place; for if many spirits were here, they would not crowd the place so as to leave room for fewer bodies. Therefore Augustine attributes change of place to a body, not to a spirit: although a spirit passes from place to place, it does not do so in such a way that, circumscribed by dimensions, it creates distance among the things around it by its interposition, as a body does.

Chapter 8 (171).

Conclusion from what has been said: created spirits are local and circumscribed in a certain way, whereas the Spirit of God is wholly uncircumscribed. Created spirits, then, are in a place and pass from place to place, and are local and circumscribed in a certain way, though not in every way in which bodily creatures are. The uncreated Spirit, who is God, is indeed in a place and in every place, but is wholly nonlocal and uncircumscribed. Hence Bede says in On Luke³: “When angels come to us, they so fulfill their ministry outwardly that they nevertheless stand inwardly before God in contemplation; for although an angel is a spirit, the Spirit who is God is uncircumscribed, and the angel runs wherever he is sent.” Behold, here it is said that the angelic spirit is circumscribed, whereas the Spirit who is God is uncircumscribed. Elsewhere too, showing the difference between the uncreated Spirit and a created spirit, Ambrose says that the Seraph passes from place to place, speaking thus in On the Trinity¹: “Isaiah said: ‘For one of the Seraphim was sent to me.’² The Holy Spirit too is said to be sent,³ but the Seraph to one, the Spirit to all. The Seraph is sent on a ministry; the Spirit works a mystery. The Seraph passes from place to place, for he does not fill all things, but is himself filled by the Spirit.” This clearly shows that angels are local in a certain way.

Chapter 9 (172).

1. Repeating what was said above, he confirms by authorities that God is everywhere without local movement. Let us therefore acknowledge that, because of its immensity, the divine nature is absent nowhere; and that it alone is wholly nonlocal and uncircumscribed, enclosed by no place, yet reaching from end to end⁴—not by spatial magnitude or local motion, but by the immensity and immobility of its essence. Hence Augustine says in Letter to Dardanus⁵: “Let us not imagine that God is diffused through all things as a great expanse, as earth or this light is diffused. Rather, just as among two wise men, one of whom is larger in body than the other but not wiser, there is one wisdom, neither greater in the larger nor smaller in the lesser, nor smaller in one than in the two: so God, ruling and containing the world without effort, is wholly in heaven, wholly on earth, and wholly in both, contained in no place, but wholly everywhere in himself.” — The same author says concerning a Psalm:

¹⁷ “attributes” C LMOPTV. 12 “and”] “that” added in C²RTW.]

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²⁰ “is” added in LNR. 4 “Seraphim”] “seraphim” BMR, “seraph” V. 5–6 “Seraphim”] “seraphim” MT. 6 “Seraph”] “seraphim” LRWX, “seraphim” M, corrected from “seraphim” in T. 7 “Spirit”] “Holy” added in LNVW. || “Seraph”] “seraphim” MW, “seraphim” LRTWX, which is corrected in TX. 8 “mystery”] “ministry” CTVWX, corrected to “ministry” in OR. || “Seraph”] “seraphim” LNRTW, which is corrected in NT. 14 “nonlocal”] “illocal” CLW.]

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“It belongs to the Word of God not to be in part, but to be everywhere in itself. For this is the wisdom of God that reaches mightily from end to end,² yet not by local motion but by its own immobility: just as a mass of stone filling a place is said to extend from one end of that place to the other, although it does not abandon one part in order to occupy another. That Word and that Wisdom therefore have no local motion: they are solid and everywhere.”

From what has been said it is clear that God is everywhere by essence in such a way that he is not diffused by spatial magnitude, nor does he abandon one place to occupy another, since he has no local motion.

2. Therefore Augustine, wishing to exclude all local motion and local circumscription from God's purity, says rather that all things are in him than that he is somewhere; yet he is not himself a place, since he is not in a place. In Eighty-Three Questions³ he says: “God is not somewhere. What is somewhere is contained by a place; what is contained by a place is a body. God, however, is not a body; therefore he is not somewhere. And yet, because he exists and is not in a place, all things are rather in him than he somewhere; nor are they in him in such a way that he himself is a place. For a place is in space, which is occupied by the length, breadth, and height of a body; God is nothing of that sort. All things, then, are in him, who is neither a place nor in a place. Yet the temple of God is called God's place, though improperly, not because he is contained by it; and nothing is better understood by this than a pure soul.”

Behold, here he says that God is not in a place. But we must understand that he is not in a place locally, that is, because he has neither circumscription nor local motion.

3. An objection seeming to prove that God changes place. A common objection is raised as follows: Creatures that did not exist before come into being every day, and God is in them, although he was not in them before; therefore he is where he was not before, and so seems changeable. Reply. Although he begins each day to be in creatures in which he was not before because they did not exist, this happens without any change in him. In the same way he began to be in the world that he made, yet without any change in himself; he did not then leave a place, but began to exist there.

4. Epilogue explaining why they entered into the foregoing discussion. It now seems to have been sufficiently demonstrated how all things are said to be in God and God in all things. We undertook this discussion as if incidentally,¹ because the matter under discussion seemed to require it. For we were discussing the knowledge or wisdom of God, and, as we were teaching that God knows all things, the question arose whether all things were said to be in God by reason of the knowledge he has of them, or whether Scripture says this for another reason. The occasion of this question therefore led us into the foregoing discussion.