Sentences, Books I–II

Single chapter (19).

1. Whether God created the angels perfect and blessed, or wretched and imperfect. After this we must consider whether God created the angels perfect and blessed, or wretched and imperfect. — To this it may be said that they were created neither in blessedness nor in wretchedness. They could not have been wretched before sin, for wretchedness comes from sin 1; if there had been no sin, there would have been no wretchedness. Nor were those who fell ever blessed, since they were ignorant of their fate, that is, of their future sin and punishment. For if they had foreknown their fall, either they wished to avoid it but could not, and so were wretched; or they could have avoided it but did not wish to, and so were foolish and malicious 2.

2. That the evil angels did not foreknow their fall, while the good may have foreknown their future good *. Therefore we say that they did not foreknow their fate, and that knowledge of what would befall them was not given to them. The good, however, those who persevered, may have foreknown their future blessedness. — Hence Augustine, On Genesis 1: «How was he blessed among the angels, he says, if he did not foreknow the sin and punishment that were to come? The question is why he did not. Perhaps God did not wish to reveal to the devil what he would do or suffer, but wished to reveal to the others that they would remain in the truth». — By these words Augustine seems to indicate that the angels who fell did not foreknow their fall, and therefore were not blessed; and that the angels who persevered foreknew the blessedness that would be theirs and were confident of it in hope, so that in a certain way they were already blessed. Indeed, if this had been so, they could in some way be called blessed, unlike the others, who did not know their fate.

3. That he said this as an opinion, not as an assertion—namely, that the angels who persevered foreknew their future good. Augustine says this more as an opinion and question than as an assertion. Hence, opposing this opinion, he goes on to say 2: «But why were those distinguished from the others, so that God would not reveal what concerned them to these, but would reveal it to the others, when he is not an avenger before anyone is a sinner? For he does not condemn the innocent». Here he seems to suggest that God revealed neither the future evil to those who would sin nor the future good to those who would persevere. — Therefore neither those who fell nor those who persevered to the end were ever blessed; for they could not be blessed if they were not certain of their blessedness, or if they were uncertain of their damnation. Hence Augustine says in the same work 3: «To say of angels that they can be blessed in their own kind while uncertain of damnation or salvation, with no hope that they might be changed for the better, is excessive presumption. “For how can those be blessed whose blessedness is uncertain?”»

¹ quaeri LMTV. 11–12 memoriam] «Did they have memory?» 16 creaverit] creavit CMV. 4 forte suae transposed in LMNR. 12 praescierunt] praesciverunt L, praescierint NOPW, corrected in P. 13 illos dici transposed in BCLNTVW. 18 subdit] dicit MX. 21 non] nec MNVW.]

²

³

⁴

4. He gathers the foregoing points, confirming that all the angels were not blessed before confirmation or the Fall, unless blessedness means the state of innocence in which they were before the Fall. From what has been said it follows that the angels who fell were never blessed, unless one takes blessedness to mean the state of innocence in which they were before sin. Those who persevered, however, either foreknew, by God's revelation, their future blessedness and were in some way blessed by the certainty of hope; or they were uncertain of their blessedness, and so were no more blessed than the rest who fell. In my judgment, what was said later is more probable.

5. Response to the question whether the angels were created perfect or imperfect; it is said that they were perfect in one respect and imperfect in another. In answer to the question whether they were created perfect or imperfect, it may be said that they were perfect in one way and imperfect in another. For something is not called perfect in only one way, but in several.

6. “Perfect” is said in three ways: according to time, according to nature, and universally. Something is said to be perfect in three ways: it is perfect according to time, perfect according to nature, or universally perfect. That is perfect according to time which has whatever a given time requires and is fitting to have at that time; in this way the angels were perfect before their confirmation or the Fall. That is perfect according to nature which has whatever is due or advantageous to its nature for glorification; in this way the angels were perfect after their confirmation, and the saints will be perfect after the resurrection. That is universally and supremely perfect which never lacks anything and from which all good things proceed; this is God alone. The first perfection, then, belongs to created nature, the second to glorified nature, and the third to uncreated nature.

7. He briefly touches on the foregoing, adding what the angels were like in their turning and turning away. It has been shown what the angels were like at creation: good, not evil; just, that is, innocent; and perfect in one way, but imperfect in another. They were not blessed until their confirmation, unless blessedness is understood, as has already been said¹, as the state of innocence and goodness in which they were created.